The firing of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. “CQ” Brown Jr., by President Donald Trump on Feb. 21, was not the first time a senior military official had been fired by an unhappy commander in chief. Brown might well have been back in uniform had he heeded what one such official learned the hard way.

President Abraham Lincoln famously fired several of his generals who commanded the Union Army for failing to pursue victory against the Confederacy. A famous anecdote claims at one point Lincoln became so frustrated by the inaction of Gen. George B. McClellan, whom he later fired, he sent him the message, if he was not going to use the army, “I would like to borrow it for a time.”

More famously, President Harry Truman fired Gen. Douglas MacArthur in 1951 as commander of the United Nations’ forces in the Korean War. He did so as he believed the general had overstepped his authority in publicly criticizing Truman’s strategy for ending a battlefield stalemate. MacArthur wanted to attack China while Truman preferred diplomacy.

Was Truman’s firing of MacArthur warranted? It was. The intention of the Founding Fathers was that our military be subservient to civilian control under the president and his secretary of defense. The president is elected by voters to make certain decisions that he then may well have to order the military to execute. It would have been more appropriate for MacArthur to simply resign to make his objection quietly known.

Ironically, Lincoln’s generals were fired for failing to be aggressive enough while Brown was fired for being too aggressive. Brown was selected by Trump in 2020 to become the first black US Air Force chief of staff in early 2020. After President Joe Biden claimed the Oval Office and initiated his diversity, equity and inclusion program, Brown ran with it, setting a goal for the Air Force in a 2022 memorandum to “achieve” a reduced number of white males in its Reserve Officers’ Training Corps officer’s applicant program. It was undoubtedly this “gung ho” DEI mindset that caused Biden to select Brown as CJCS in 2023.

But anyone with minimal military service should recognize that DEI and the favoritism it promotes, whether intentional or not, poisons morale. And that was exactly what it did to the military as each of the services began suffering enlistment and reenlistment setbacks.

Director of the Center To Advance Security In America James Fitzpatrick noted the negative DEI impact, stating: “The American people are rightly concerned that, at a time when our country is facing dangerous and increasing threats throughout the world, the Air Force is focused on recruitment efforts based on arbitrary racial diversity goals — not merit or increasing the force’s lethality.”

Brown made it clear, morale be damned, full speed ahead on DEI. Was Brown’s DEI motivation based on the best interests of the military or the political interests of Biden?

Brown should have known DEI was a destructive force to the military, informed Biden of such and, if Biden failed to heed his advice, Brown should have resigned knowing — as per the MacArthur example — he could not publicly condemn Biden’s decision.

Ironically, had Brown done this — retiring either as Air Force CoS or CJCS during the Biden presidency to let it be known DEI was poison to the military — it might well have been him whom Trump selected to be his current CJCS. However, with such a focused DEI commitment, Brown chose to ride a political horse rather than a military one, causing an indisputable negative impact.

As Trump takes hits from the left for firing Brown, it should be remembered that President Barack Obama acted similarly in 2009, firing Army Gen. David McKiernan as commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan — the first wartime commander since MacArthur to be fired. Obama sought to pursue a new policy and wanted McKiernan out, replacing him with Gen. Stanley McChrystal. Defense Secretary Robert Gates claimed he wanted “fresh eyes” on the conflict of that day.

In closing out 52 years of military service that included receiving the Medal of Honor during World War II, MacArthur gave a farewell address to Congress on April 19, 1951. He ended by quoting a line from a popular ballad: “old soldiers never die; they just fade away.” He vowed to do the same concluding with, “And like the old soldier of that ballad, I now close my military career and just fade away, an old soldier who tried to do his duty as God gave him the light to see that duty.”

It was an eloquent ending to an impressive military career. Will Brown at least follow this example set by MacArthur?

James Zumwalt is a retired Marine infantry officer (lieutenant colonel) who served in the Vietnam War, Panama and Operation Desert Storm. He is the author of three books and hundreds of opinion pieces in online and print publications.