Donald Trump is planning to establish a "warrior board" to review senior military officers and remove "woke generals".
The president-elect's transition team is considering a draft executive order that would create a board of retired senior officials to scrutinise top military brass.
The board would evaluate officers based on their "leadership capability, strategic readiness, and commitment to military excellence", according to documents seen by the Wall Street Journal.
Pentagon officials are thought to fear a potential purge after Trump takes office in January.
The Republican party's National Convention platform had already promised to "get woke Left-wing Democrats fired as soon as possible".
Trump has specifically demanded that generals involved in the Afghanistan withdrawal should resign by lunchtime on his first day in office.
Donald Trump's plans have Pentagon officials fearing a potential purge
REUTERS
The review process would effectively be outsourced to trusted former officers, according to the draft order.
Trump repeatedly complained on the campaign trail that diversity and inclusion politics had become more important than war-fighting ability in the military.
Trump has faced criticism from several generals who served in his first administration, including Gen Mark Milley, who called him "fascist to the core".
Trump responded by labelling Gen Milley a "loser".
Their relationship deteriorated in 2021 following a congressional hearing where Gen Milley discussed critical race theory.
"On the issue of critical race theory, etc, a lot of us have to get much smarter on whatever the theory is," Gen Milley said at the time.
Trump later accused the general of having "defended critical race theory being shoved down the throats of our soldiers".
In a separate announcement, Trump has revealed plans to create a new Department of Government Efficiency, to be led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy.
"Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies," Trump stated.
Ramaswamy, who dropped out of the GOP presidential race in January after finishing fourth in Iowa, has been working closely with Musk in recent days.
Musk outlined plans for transparency in the new department through social media posts.
"All actions of the Department of Government Efficiency will be posted online for maximum transparency," he wrote.
The tech billionaire announced plans for a "leaderboard" to rank the "most insanely dumb" ways taxpayer money is being spent.
"This will be both extremely tragic and extremely entertaining," Musk said.
