The commander of the Navy SEALs who found himself at odds with President Donald Trump over disciplining a notorious member of his force has informed the Navy that he will step down a year early, according to three people familiar with the decision. Rear Adm. Collin Green, commander of the Naval Special Warfare Command, will leave his post in September, two of the people familiar with his decision said. Green was widely viewed as a reformer who was willing to hold his command accountable. His departure follows two years during which he sought to repair the vaunted military unit’s image after a slew of criminal charges against SEALs, including war crimes, murder, drug use, and sexual assault. Green had publicly told his force that the SEALs had a “problem” and that some members of the unit were “ethically misaligned.” Green’s departure is unusual in part because it comes as his current tour length of two years is being extended to three, meaning he has effectively declined a final year in the job and won’t seek a third star.

He will likely be replaced by another two-star SEAL admiral, H. Wyman Howard III, a former commander of SEAL Team 6, according to two people familiar with the Navy’s pick. Howard is currently in command of Special Operations Command Central. Howard has his own questionable past. When he was a squadron commander at SEAL Team 6, Howard solicited donations to procure expensive, hand-made hatchets for his operators, and encouraged them to “bloody the hatchet” on operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, The Intercept previously reported. Later, SEAL Team 6 commanders received internal reports that Howard’s men were using the hatchets to hack dead and dying militants. SEAL Team 6 did not conduct any investigations based on the allegations. A spokesperson for Naval Special Warfare directed questions about personnel changes to the Pentagon. Green led the command of roughly 3,000 SEALs, which includes the Naval Special Warfare Development Group, best known as SEAL Team 6, during a period of unprecedented public controversy. Green faced calls from the Navy and Congress to address the ethical and legal troubles plaguing the SEALs. He has said that the stress from his reform efforts, as well as personal issues, have taken a toll, according to two people who have spoken with him in recent months. His most recent effort to bring what the Navy refers to as “good order and discipline” to his unit failed after he sought to expel Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, who had been charged with murdering an unarmed ISIS detainee during a 2017 deployment in Iraq. Gallagher was acquitted of that charge and several others, but convicted of a relatively minor charge for posing for a photo with the fighter’s dead body. Trump took an interest in Gallagher’s case after seeing his story on Fox News. After the Navy confined Gallagher pending his court martial, Trump had him released and tweeted his support for Gallagher. When Gallagher’s rank was reduced as part of his conviction, Trump reinstated it.