Jim Michaels

USA TODAY

James Mattis, a retired four-star general, achieved almost mythic status within the Marine Corps as an aggressive combat commander and innovative strategist whose speeches and writings defined the warrior ethos for the latest generation of military men and women.

Donald Trump’s decision to name Mattis to head the Defense Department is a strong signal that the president-elect wants a wartime leader at the Pentagon and not someone to just manage budgets. At a rally in Cincinnati Thursday night, Trump remarked that Mattis had been chosen for the post and compared the retired Marine to Gen. George Patton, the legendary World War II commander.

During the campaign, Trump said he would overhaul the U.S. strategy to defeat the Islamic State. Trump has said the current plan isn’t working and suggested some military leaders had been cowed by the Obama administration.

“You could easily imagine that Trump believes the advice of generals has been muted and diluted,” said Gregory Newbold, a retired Marine lieutenant general and friend of Mattis. “He’s looking for somebody who is the antidote to that. You certainly get that in Jim Mattis.”

Trump picks Mattis for Defense secretary

If confirmed by the Senate, Mattis would be a departure from previous Defense secretaries who have come from the ranks of civilian government service or politics. He would replace Ash Carter, a physicist who rose through the ranks of the Defense Department.

Mattis’ appointment as Defense secretary would require a congressional waiver because federal law requires a seven-year gap between retirement from the military and assuming the Cabinet post, a statute designed to safeguard the principle of civilian control over the military. The last retired general to head the Defense Department was George Marshall in 1950.

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Mattis, 66, retired in 2013 after 44 years in the Marine Corps. He led an infantry battalion in the Persian Gulf War in 1990-91 and commanded a task force that struck deep into Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks.

In 2003, he led a division that raced across the desert toward Baghdad in the initial assault into Iraq. His call sign was “chaos.”

On and off the battlefield, Mattis developed a reputation as a blunt speaker whose language sometimes hearkened to an earlier time, capturing the warrior mentality.

He avoids military jargon such as "exit strategy" and instead speaks unabashedly about "victory," "ferocity" and "slaughtering" the enemy. He sprinkles his talk with historic references, often reaching back to the ancient Romans and Greeks.

When he was preparing his troops to head into Iraq, he cited an epitaph from Roman general Lucius Cornelius Sulla to explain counterinsurgency to his troops: "No better friend, no worse enemy."

"There was always a sense that we had to put things into words that would touch our troops' hearts — not just their heads,” Mattis said in a 2013 interview with USA TODAY.

Speaking to newly minted infantry officers at the Marine base in Quantico, Va., several years ago, he described the affection that leaders feel for their troops and the need to maintain authority despite those emotions. He worked in references to Little Big Horn and Valley Forge.

He left no room for doubt about their role if they find themselves at war with America's enemies. "You are to annihilate them," he said. "You are to make them recoil back and say, 'We don’t ever want to take on the U.S. Marines.'"

Those who have worked with him say he is more than a battle commander. As head of U.S. Central Command, which oversees military operations in the Middle East, he traveled the region, cultivating ties with foreign military leaders and helping shape strategy in the area.

"I know he has this reputation as a 'war fighter,' and it certainly is earned, but he really is a clear, precise strategic thinker, more so than any man I have ever worked for," said Jim Howcroft, a retired Marine officer who served as Mattis' intelligence officer during the Iraq invasion in 2003.

Since retiring, Mattis has lamented the lack of strategy in Washington. Testifying before Congress last year, he said the United States should “come out from our reactive crouch and take a firm, strategic stance in defense of our values.”



In 2013, Mattis left his position as head of Central Command, which oversees combat operations in the Middle East, amid reports the White House squeezed him out.

Asked about the reports at the time, Mattis said he provided the unvarnished truth to his civilian leadership. "The idea that you should moderate it before you give it to them is not showing respect to your civilian leadership," Mattis said at the time.

As Pentagon chief Mattis would also guide the military’s personnel policies, possibly wading into the controversial order by the Obama administration to open all military jobs to women, including the infantry and special operations.

The Marine Corps had asked for an exemption for its infantry units, following a study that showed mixed-gender infantry squads did not perform as well as all-male units. Carter denied the exemption request, and the Marine Corps is taking steps to open the infantry to women.

Trump during the campaign derided “politically correct” military personnel policies, though he has not said whether he would change it.

Mattis has also not publicly stated his position on opening the jobs to women, but he has said the decision should be based on what impact it would have on combat effectiveness. He has talked about what makes jobs like the infantry distinct.

“There is a great difference between military service in dangerous circumstances and serving in a combat unit whose role is to search out, close with and kill the enemy at close quarters,” Mattis testified last year before Congress.