Gen. Christopher Donahue, the four-star commanding general of U.S. Army forces in Europe and Africa, will relinquish command on July 2 after submitting his retirement papers at the request of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. The departure removes one of the Army's most combat-tested leaders, a West Point graduate, former Delta Force commander, and the last American soldier to leave Afghanistan, from the most consequential Army post on the continent.
Donahue's exit is not an isolated personnel move. He is, by Fox News's count, the latest of more than two dozen military leaders to leave or retire early under Hegseth's leadership. The pattern reflects a deliberate strategy: Hegseth has sought to shrink the number of generals and prioritize adding new enlisted soldiers, a restructuring that has drawn both praise from reform advocates and sharp criticism from Capitol Hill.
The Army's statement was brief and bloodless. "The Army thanks Gen. Donahue for his leadership of U.S. Army Europe and Africa," it read. Maj. Gen. Christopher Norrie, Donahue's deputy, will assume his duties after the handoff.
Donahue's résumé reads like a highlight reel of the post-9/11 military. He led Delta Force units in Iraq and Afghanistan. He commanded the 82nd Airborne Division from July 2020 to March 2022. And in August 2021, he was the officer brought in to oversee security at Hamid Karzai International Airport during the chaotic final days of America's nearly twenty-year war in Afghanistan.
That withdrawal remains a raw wound. An ISIS-K suicide bombing at Abbey Gate killed thirteen U.S. service members and roughly 170 Afghan civilians. Roughly 124,000 Afghan citizens were airlifted out during the evacuation. On August 30, 2021, Donahue boarded a C-17 cargo plane as the last U.S. soldier to depart Afghan soil, an image that became the defining photograph of the pullout.
After Afghanistan, Donahue pivoted to Europe. He arrived at Rzeszow-Jasionka airport in southeastern Poland on February 6, 2022, days before Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. He coordinated military aid to Kyiv and, according to officials who spoke to Fox News, became the Army's preeminent expert on drone warfare, a skill set forged by watching the Ukrainian battlefield in real time.
The Associated Press reported that Donahue was considered a potential future chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Within the Army, he was seen as one of the most seasoned soldiers in uniform, with more combat experience than most of his peers. Biden appointed him to the Europe-Africa command in December 2024.
The defense secretary's appetite for shaking up the brass is no secret. Hegseth has pursued a reported 20 percent reduction in four-star generals and admirals, and sources who spoke to Fox News said discussions inside the Army are underway to downgrade U.S. Army Europe and Africa from a four-star to a three-star command. If that happens, the post Donahue just vacated would never again require a general of his rank.
The New York Post reported that Donahue's departure was driven in part by frustration with the Pentagon's internal dynamics. An anonymous Pentagon insider told the paper: "He was tired of dealing with the static of working under Hegseth and LaNeve." A second source described a broader pattern: "The strained dynamics get good officers to leave on their own... just like in the corporate world."
Gen. Christopher LaNeve replaced Gen. Randy George as Army chief of staff after Hegseth fired George during the Iran conflict in April. The New York Post described LaNeve as "very difficult" and "disliked" by senior Army officers, a characterization that, if accurate, helps explain why experienced commanders might choose the exit over continued service.
The Washington Examiner noted that Donahue joins a growing list of high-ranking departures that includes Navy Secretary John Phelan, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Charles Q. Brown, and George himself. Democratic senators Elissa Slotkin and Mark Kelly have drawn attention to the pace of exits, though their objections carry the familiar scent of political opportunism from a party that spent years demanding the military embrace its own ideological priorities.
Donahue's departure lands in the middle of a broader strategic shift. Just last week, Hegseth told NATO officials in Brussels that he would lead a six-month review of American forces in Europe. His language left no room for diplomatic ambiguity.
"This will be a real review. It will be designed to ensure that NATO is moving fast and irreversibly toward Europe leading, stepping up to take primary responsibility for the defense of Europe."
He added a line that likely rattled more than a few defense ministries: "It's a review that some countries will fail and others will pass with flying colors." The message was clear, allied nations that have coasted on American security guarantees while underfunding their own militaries should expect a reckoning.
That posture has generated friction on both sides of the aisle. Republican Sen. Thom Tillis has publicly rebuked Hegseth over the European troop drawdown and the forced exits of senior generals, warning that the pace of change risks undermining readiness at a moment when the Russian threat remains acute.
The concern is legitimate. Removing a four-star general with direct experience coordinating Ukraine aid, and potentially downgrading the command itself, sends a signal. Whether that signal is read as strength or instability depends on who is watching. Moscow will draw its own conclusions.
Hegseth ordered a new investigation of the 2021 Afghanistan withdrawal last May, adding another layer to Donahue's departure. The Pentagon, U.S. Central Command, the State Department, and Congress have all conducted prior probes, though the findings of those earlier efforts are not detailed in current reporting. President Trump attacked the Biden administration over the withdrawal for years, and the new investigation signals that the matter remains unresolved in the eyes of the current defense leadership.
Whether Donahue's role in the withdrawal factored into Hegseth's decision to request his retirement is unclear. The Pentagon did not immediately comment on the departure, and Donahue himself has not spoken publicly.
There is also a practical wrinkle. Because Donahue has not held his fourth star for the requisite three years, he will need a presidential waiver to retire with four-star benefits. Without it, his retirement pay and honors would reflect a lower rank, an outcome that would strike many in the military community as a poor reward for decades of service in the most dangerous places on earth.
The broader question of Hegseth's personnel decisions continues to draw scrutiny from multiple directions. Some of those decisions, clearing out officers who prioritized ideology over warfighting, are long overdue. Others risk losing exactly the kind of experienced, battle-hardened leaders the military cannot easily replace.
The conservative case for trimming the Pentagon's top-heavy command structure is strong. The defense bureaucracy has grown bloated, and too many generals have spent their careers in conference rooms rather than on battlefields. Hegseth's instinct to add riflemen and reduce brass is the right instinct.
But instinct without discrimination is just a blunt instrument. Donahue was not a desk general. He led Delta Force operators. He commanded the 82nd Airborne in a crisis. He coordinated a live-fire military aid pipeline to a nation fighting a land war against a nuclear-armed adversary. If the goal is a leaner, more lethal military, pushing out the officers who have actually done the fighting raises an obvious question: who exactly is left to lead?
Even Republican allies have begun asking whether the pace and targeting of these personnel moves reflect strategy or simply friction. More than two dozen senior leaders gone in a single tenure is a number that demands an explanation beyond "restructuring."
The Atlantic first reported Donahue's exit. The Army confirmed it with a single sentence of thanks. And a general who once boarded the last plane out of Kabul now finds himself boarding the last plane out of a command he held for barely eighteen months.
Reforming the Pentagon is necessary work. But you don't build a sharper military by running off the men who actually know how to fight.
