Hegseth says he will allow troops to take personal weapons onto military bases
WASHINGTON (AP) — Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Thursday that he would allow troops to carry it. personal weapons to military installationsciting the Second Amendment and recent shootings at bases across the country.
In a video sent to
He said any rejection of a soldier’s request must be explained in detail and in writing.
“Effectively, our bases across the country were gun-free zones,” Hegseth said. “Unless you are trained or unless you are a military police officer, you cannot carry, you cannot bring your own firearm on duty for your own personal safety.”
Questions about why service members cannot access weapons have often arisen after: attacks on the country’s military bases. Such shootings range from isolated incidents among soldiers to mass fatalities, such as the 2009 shooting of an Army psychiatrist at Ford Hood in Texas that left 13 dead.
Hegseth touched on some events in his video; Shooting at Fort Stewart injured five soldiers Last year in Georgia. The shooter, an Army sergeant working on the base, used his personal handgun before being caught and arrested by other soldiers, authorities said.
“Minutes are a lifetime in these situations,” Hegseth said. “And our service members have the courage and training to seize these precious, brief moments.”
Department of Defense policy prohibited military personnel from carrying personal weapons on base without permission from a senior commander, with strict protocols on how firearms should be stored.
Typically, military personnel are required to officially check their guns out of secure storage to travel to on-base hunting grounds or shooting ranges, and then recheck all firearms immediately after their approved use. Military police are generally the only armed personnel stationed outside firing ranges, hunting grounds, or in training, where soldiers can use their service weapons without ammunition.
Tanya Schardt, senior counsel for the gun violence prevention organization Brady, said in a statement that Defense Department leaders and the military’s top brass were initially opposed to relaxing the current policy, which was put in place under President George H. W. Bush.
Schardt noted that most active-duty soldiers who die by suicide do so with personally owned weapons, not military weapons, and argued that “there will undoubtedly be an increase in gun suicides and other gun violence.”
While fewer American service members will die by suicide in 2024, suicide rates among active-duty troops overall are gradually increasing between 2011 and 2024, according to one study. Pentagon report released Tuesday.
“Our military installations are among the most guarded and protected properties in the world, and they have never been ‘weapon-free zones,'” Schardt said. “If there is a problem with violent crime at these facilities, then the Secretary of Defense has an obligation to warn the American people and explain how he is working to prevent this crime.”
