December 8th – According to a report on the 7th, Biden will nominate Lloyd Austin, the former commander of the Central Command, as the Secretary of Defense of the United States. Biden will announce Austin as the Secretary of Defense as early as the 8th local time.
According to the report, three people familiar with the matter revealed that retired general Austin has been elected as the head of the Pentagon. Austin was the first black general to command an army division in battle, and the first black general to supervise the whole theater of operations. In 2013, Obama appointed him to head the Central Command and was responsible for all U.S. military operations in the Middle East. In 2014, the Islamic State occupied large areas of Iraq and Syria, where he supervised the operation against the Islamic State.
Austin served as the top commander of the U.S. military in Iraq before being appointed commander of the Central Command. He participated in the surge operation that began in 2007 and was responsible for the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops in 2011.
Austin retired in 2016 and joined the board of directors of Raytheon Technologies, one of the largest contractors in the Pentagon.
