Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Tuesday the Pentagon will overhaul how it assesses officers for promotion to one-star rank, introducing a new battlefield-style evaluation designed to reduce bureaucracy and strengthen merit-based selection.
Speaking in a video posted on social media, Hegseth said the Department of Defense will roll out the Joint Warfighter Evaluation this year for eligible colonels and Navy captains. He said the assessment is intended to test whether candidates can “fight, adapt, and win”, focusing on their performance in scenarios rather than past paperwork.
Hegseth argued that commanders drive outcomes even though non-commissioned officers and petty officers are central to the force. “Victory depends on the commanders who lead them,” he said in the video, adding that senior leaders should be chosen on “proven competence, not paper credential”.
He said the new testing approach is meant to mirror the Louisiana Maneuvers conducted just before the United States entered the Second World War. That large-scale series of exercises involved around 400,000 troops and was used to assess training, logistics and the quality of command. Hegseth cited leaders who emerged from that period, including former President Dwight Eisenhower, Army General Omar Bradley and Admiral Chester Nimitz, describing their roles in major World War Two commands.
New Joint Warfighter Evaluation
Hegseth said the Joint Warfighter Evaluation “brings that standard to the modern multi-domain fight”. He described it as an “objective equalizer”, saying the scenarios will be judged on operational decisions made under pressure.
He also said he tasked Stuart Scheller, deputy chief of staff to the undersecretary of Defense for personnel and readiness, with leading the effort a year ago.
The current promotion system, Hegseth noted, relies on boards that consider accumulated evaluations recorded by an officer’s superiors across a career. The new approach is intended to add a battlefield-focused screening step for those seeking promotion to general or admiral.
Branch-Specific Assessment Formats
Documents reviewed by The Hill indicated each service will run its own version of the evaluation. The Army will use a written assessment followed by a digital wargame. The Air Force and Space Force will require a two-hour online analysis test, followed by a one-hour interactive simulation.
For the Navy, the process will include travel to the Naval War College for a three-hour written assessment and a two-to-three-hour wargame. The Marine Corps will conduct an eight-hour remote evaluation on an AI-enabled platform that combines written assessments with situational judgement tests.
The Joint Staff will assess 50 to 60 Joint Forces Staff College students through a “hybrid” model. The documents said this would involve an independent written analysis and then an “in-person, AI enabled execution phase” at the school in Norfolk, Virginia.
Updates On Pilot Development
The service will provide weekly updates on the pilot programme’s development and implementation of the JWT Operational Planning Team (OPT). The effort is to be coordinated with Scheller and Anthony Tata, the Pentagon’s undersecretary of Defense for personnel and readiness, according to an Aug. 12 internal memo reviewed by The Hill.
Hegseth, a former Fox News host who served in the Army National Guard, has previously criticised the promotion system. He has blocked numerous promotions to one-star general or admiral, and the article said many of those affected were Black and female service members.
He has also pushed what he calls the “warrior ethos”, urging the armed services to adopt higher physical standards. Hegseth has criticised military branches for promoting personnel based on what he claimed, without proof, were race and gender quotas. Last year, he told senior military leaders at Quantico, Virginia, that “Real toxic leadership is endangering subordinates with low standards” and that such leadership includes promoting people based on immutable characteristics or quotas rather than merit.
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23 September 2026
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