Defense secretary and the termination earlier this week. V a tweet from President Trump. . Hy did that happen guest there has been a lot of friction between secretary esper and the president over the last few months. There was some concerns from the white house that esper was not loyal enough, not telling the president what he wanted to hear and was not helping him. Hear and was not helping him. One of the friction points was the issue of the lafayette one of the friction points was the issue of the Lafayette Square the Infamous Press appearance where the president walked out of the white house after protesters were cleared out and posed in front of the church across the street. Of conversation about the military taking on a more active role in responding to those racial protests and finding some way for the military not just a guard but active duty military to be involved and there was pushback on that. It was not appropriate. Just burrow into some of problems the president had with espers performance and attitude. My colleague got a chance to sit down with secretary esper before he left, in his final days and he looked like he was heading out the door. For what everyone thinks about esper and him being too much of he felt liketrump, he pushed back on a lot of things. There was a lot of tension there. One of the secretarys concerns was someone else would come in and not ever say no to the is it. Sayto the president. No to the president. Host he was the third secretary of defense in the administration . Guest the fourth acting secretary. Chris miller will not be confirmed because theres not a lot of time, unless there is a change with the Election Results which does not look likely. Officetrump came into and the whole history of the department of defense they had only been to acting secretarys. The position where president s like to have a lot of continuity. Before the next secretary steps in, they will make sure he is confirmed and the outgoing one will stay on. Under President Trump, he has done this four times. Its a very different approach. Much more uncertainty and chaos over at the pentagon. Host the headline of the washington times, pentagon policy officials follow esper out the door. The top policy chief abruptly resigned on tuesday after the firing of mark esper as President Trump shakes of the militarys highest ranks in the days following the still unsettled president ial election. The acting under secretary of defense for policy submitted his Resignation Letter on tuesday, less than 24 hours after President Trump unceremoniously dispatched mr. Esper following a series of clashes over policy. Leo shane, what is the mood inside the building, the pentagon . Guest after that move the undersecretary for intelligent stepped aside and was replaced by another trump loyalist. There is a lot of uncertainty right now. There is a lot of feeling that there is years of experience, a breadth of knowledge being lost, but also just uncertainty over what these moves mean in the short term. The president going to install these folks so he can withdraw troops from afghanistan quicker, do troops out of germany quicker. These are things he has talked about in recent months and gotten pushback from congress. Knows whatng who his priorities are going to be for the next few month regarding the military . We know regardless of what happens President Trump is commanderinchief for the next 70 days. There is plenty of time for him some largescale changes at the pentagon. Right now it is budget time among the top folks of the department of defense. They are putting together budget request for fiscal 2022. That work is being done now with the interim secretary and interim policy had an interim intelligence had. A lot of turmoil at a time where those folks are usually guiding the process and kissing other focusing other folks on with the priorities will be. Host we will set a line for veterans to call in. Our guest is leo shane. Veterans use 202 7488000. Active military, 202 7488001. For all others, 202 7488002. Interviewed the veterans wilkie. Y, secretary what did you learn from the secretary in that interview . Guest its interesting. The ongoing pandemic has been the focus of the department of Veterans Affairs. He has been in the past pretty rosy about the departments response. He still feels pretty confident in how the various medical Centers Across the country have reacted and treated in the emergency protocols put in place. He was honest we are the middle of another way and things are going another wave and things are going to get worse before they get better. We can see the facilities rollback on their reopenings. We may see restrictions as numbers go up. I have been tracking the numbers and they have been going up. Around 6000 active coronavirus cases spread out throughout the country they were tracking. Last night it was over 9300. We are seeing dramatic increases. Those numbers are not really reflective of necessarily v. A. Care or how they are responding. As we see these massive increases throughout the country we will see them at the v. A. Hows another marker to show problematic the pandemic and coronavirus continues to be. Host the pandemic even affecting robert wilkies plans to attend the ceremony today at Arlington National, correct . Guest im not sure if he will be there. He has close contact with ben carson, the hud secretary. Diagnosedmonday was positive for coronavirus. Secretary wilkie yesterday out of an abundance of caution cancel date speech canceled a speech to talk about acknowledgments and ideas for the next year. One oppressed officials that he will skip todays events at arlington with the president and other officials, they said he will follow the science and is trying to work as best he can. We will see in a few hours if he decides to go or if he is clear. He said negative tests as recently as two days ago. I dont know if he had one this morning. As we have seen with the white house, these things can spread quickly. The interaction raises concern. Host it is likely to be a rainy morning at Arlington National put the ceremony will go on. Thats coming up at 11 00 eastern. The president , first lady, mike pence, and the second lady expected to attend. We will have it on cspan, cspan. Org, and the cspan radio app. Leo shane, President Trump ran veterans,ord with the talking about veterans choice and other issues. Veteran is Veterans Affairs a successful part of the administration . Guest there are a lot of items the president can point to and say he had done reforms he promised. Of then to think some things the president highlighted are not necessarily the biggest improvements. He talked about the v. A. Choice act. I conflated that with the 2014 act passed under obama. Mission acte v. A. That expanded these programs. The distinction that gets to he promised to expand the amount of community programs, Community Clinics veterans can go to. Congress gave him the authority for that. Legislationinto law that is supposed to report more accountability at the v. A. One of the things he has not talked about in recent months but is a pretty revolutionary move over there, and i talked to secretary wilkie about this, the overhaul of the departments Electronic Medical records. For years they have been in a separate system from dod. So when Service Members come back on active duty, they have to switch over all the medical records. If you have an operation in service, the v. A. Doctors cannot necessarily see that. We are in the middle of a massive 10 billion plus project. That will be a Lasting Legacy if it comes together successfully. It is something the president does not often mention. The president on numerous occasions has said he has completely reformed v. A. And there are no problems. That is certainly not true. We have seen quite a few issues still at v. A. A lot of frustration over access, over wait times have improved. There are concerns over the politicization of the Department Like we have seen with the military. Our decisions being made to force more dollars outside the v. A. Rather than hiring folks who work at v. A. . Compared to some other issues, i think the v. A. Was something he could run on. The president s message was sometimes jumbled between what he thought he did and what he actually did. Host how many veterans are there in the u. S. . Guest right around 20 million now and around 9. 5 million are registered with v. A. For healthcare services. Hasof the big issues v. A. Dealt with is the issues of veteran suicide. One of the struggles is they have seen a fair amount of success reaching out to veterans in mental distress or emotional need who are connected to the v. A. System. It is fewer than half of the entire veterans population. The key has been how to get those last 11 million, 10 million folks into v. A. When they need to be. Them sohey connect with if they do need help they know where to go and how to use those services. One of those from louisville kentucky. This is winnifred. You are on the air. Go ahead. Aller i am a vietnam veteran i am calling concerning the actions of President Trump. He said he was one of the greatest president s since abraham lincoln. Can you hear me . Host yes, go ahead with your comments. Respect, i think he is in that he has created so much negativity and attempted to pull down our statue of liberty. He has called our military suckers and losers and i think he wed be satisfied if he could create through his negativity he would be satisfied if he could create through his negativity total warfare. Host in their reaction, leo shane any reaction, leo shane . Guest i did not catch the beginning of his comments. There are some things the president can run on and be proud of but it has been a controversial four years, and a lot of the claims he has made on veterans have not been true. He has expanded care but on the campaign trail he said he came up with the idea of veterans choice. At that is not true. There are decades of experience of veterans going to private sector care for their health care. They have been trying to pass years,r 40 years, 50 those numbers seem to be nonsense. They seem to be numbers he is pulling out of the air. There have been folks within the administration and within Veterans Affairs who have tried to justify the timelines he puts on these things but it is difficult to figure out if there is any real figure behind there. Host next is galena park, texas. Go ahead. Caller thank you for having me on. Mr. Shane, i wanted to say a comment and decor a question. Fired mark esper primarily because of disagreements. Question is can you describe President Trumps strategy in approaching north korea because he did not give into kim jonguns request that he was able to reduce tension without starting a war. Caller it is on the esper issue, a variety of things for me. The Washington Post reported that esper had an appearance a few months ago that where he was asked what it was like working under President Trump and the president did not feel that trump that esper praised him enough. Renaming bases named after confederate generals , that is something esper worked with people on the hill on. We appear to be in the final days of this administration and to jettison yet another defense secretary injects a lot of instability into an area where both democrats and republicans do not want to see National Security be an unstable place, do not want the pentagon to be in turmoil. Korea,subject of north very complex Foreign Policy promised to has handle this differently. Of thes to be the eye beholder. We have seen north korea take wee aggressive actions, but have also seen the relationship between the north korean president and the United States trumpent, president working together, talking at least, having some sort of rapport with each other. If you want to be generous about that, you can say that his progress, that is moving forward in some way. On the insurrection act and the firing of mark esper, was there a sign of heightened readiness for the National Guard for the anticipated disruptions after the election . Quite a few were National Guard units who were put on notice. Some were partially activated to get ready. T is hard to say some will look at that and say that is a major concern because oh my god we are going to have the military on the streets after an election. Throughassive protests the summer. We have seen uncertainty with the ongoing pandemic. Guarde sense to have the ready in case there was a something. We did not end up seeing much of anything in terms of violence. We saw quite a few people take to the streets in major cities bidensresident elect results were announced. I do not i am not sure it amounts to anything other than responsible planning. Huntington, pennsylvania, next is tina. Caller i would like to thank every veteran. My dad was one. I think you from the bottom of my heart. I would like to i thank you from the bottom of my heart. I would like to say one thing. When people take the oath they vowed to protect the United States from all enemies foreign and domestic. We have more domestic enemies than we ever have had. All of the violence over the summer . That is domestic terrorism. You are pulling down statues of people you do not agree with. That is terrorism. They are veterans. General lee is a vet whether they like it or not. It is sickening what is happening in this country and i ill not call him, though voted for him, i will not call until he istelect a verified president , but i have a feeling once that happens we are going to see more of the same. You are going to see more of the disrespect and it is sad. It is time for these parents to step in, do their job, teach their children. This is not about white and black and police brutality. They are taking us back. In minnesota the National Guard was used. How widely was the guard used . Caller i am trying to remember the numbers. Were related to pandemic response. Somewhere related to unrest. It was a mix of different to unrest. Elated it was a mix of different missions. Is, you know the guard has a different role than active duty military. About active duty military deploying on american soil, that is a major line, that is something president s in the past have not wanted to cross. It would have to be a clear National Emergency for that to happen. It happened after 9 11. The guard is seen as a nether emergency tool another emergency tool for state governors. Ring them in the wake of a hurricane, bring them in the bring them in the wake of a hurricane, bring them in the wake of unrest. Was definitely out there, assisting. Folks on ase different level. These are not folks who are trained in conflict deescalation, who are trained lawocal local enforcement priorities or techniques. If you signed up to help in the case of an emergency, thought you would be doing hurricane support, and you are told someone is taking down a statue of a confederate general, we were left in a position of going what am i supposed to do . Is this something i am even supposed to deal with . Place and it is a place where real leadership is important to give these folks clear ideas of what is expected of them. One of thetedly issues of disagreement between President Trump and the former secretary of defense mark esper is secretary esper had been in favor of congressional language that would allow the renaming of u. S. Military bases named after confederate generals and soldiers. Where does that stand in the proposed defense bill, the 2021 defense bill . Guest i believe my colleague has a story going up right about now about this. There are quite a few lawmakers pushing today to emphasize the in there. Hould stay the president and the Defense Department should not try to water it down. There are two different versions of that massive defense policy bill, one from the house and one from the senate. Both include language to conduct a study and change the names of these at least 10 bases honoring confederate generals, a review of other buildings named for confederates. There seems to be some consensus at least. There are a few republicans pushing against a this still but there are enough people from both parties to pass this in separate drafts of the bills. We are seeing a push to include it in the final version and isnt watered down too much. Secretary esper before he left was closing was working closely to find some middle ground for this the dod could be comfortable with. President trump has said this will not be in the bill and if it is he will not sign it, even if that means vetoing language that authorizes bonuses. From a veteranr in rochester, new hampshire. Thank you for taking my call. I want to comment on the old draft dodger trump. I think he got five deferments to keep him out of the military and i think he should keep his hands off the military and let the military, who seems to know what they are doing a lot better than he does, and that is basically my comment so thank you very much. From we had a comment michael in portland on twitter vet, obama,not a not a vet, trump, not a vet, biden, not a vet. Trumps explicit militarize asian was trumps explicit ation of space a bad move . Up. T this has come there needs to be an appreciation of the military but the military is under civilian control in america. While there is experience, a breath of knowledge that comes from serving, it is not a disqualifier. As we see a smaller and smaller percentage of the country with military service, this is inevitable. That biden isoted a military father. His son served overseas in iraq while he was vice president. He shares some experience of military families who have seen a loved one deployed overseas. This hasace force, been the hot potato. I wonder often if the space force would be as cont