Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is defending President Donald Trump’s firing of the nation’s senior military officer and a wave of top dismissals at the Pentagon, insisting that they weren’t unusual despite accusations that the new administration is injecting politics into the military.

President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of U.S. military leadership.

U.S. President Donald Trump on Friday announced he would replace the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General C.Q. Brown, and soon swap out five other high level positions in an unprecedented shake-up of the leadership of the U.

The Pentagon announced Friday it plans to ultimately fire five to eight percent of the military’s approximately 950,000 civilian employees, with an initial tranche of 5,400 probationary workers who don’t have “mission-critical” roles expected to be terminated next week.

The dismissals will begin next week, officials said, and could expand to include tens of thousands of other workers throughout the Defense Department.