CHICAGO (WLS) — A former leader of the Pentagon is raising concerns about the future of America’s power in the world.<\/p>\n
Chuck Hagel served as Secretary of Defense from 2013 to 2015. He sat down with the ABC7 I-Team for an in-depth conversation amid rising global military tensions.<\/p>\n
ABC7 Chicago is now streaming 24\/7. Click here to watch<\/a><\/p>\n Hagel, a former Vietnam veteran, two-time purple heart recipient, U.S. senator and Republican serving in the Democratic Obama administration who oversaw the drawdown of troops in Afghanistan speaking candidly with the I-Team about current events he says are troubling. Including the future of American power in the world.<\/p>\n Top of mind was the recent action in Venezuela. Was it an act of war for the US to apprehend President Maduro with military assets?<\/p>\n “Well, it was clearly a violation of international law, and we’ve been violating international law last few months, as we have been killing these people at sea in international waters, without giving any evidence of who they are, what they were doing, what the cargo was. It’s against our domestic law,” Hagel said.<\/p>\n Just this week, Vice President JD Vance cast the tie-breaking vote batting down legislation<\/a> that would have required President Donald Trump to secure congressional authorization before any additional military action in Venezuela<\/a>.<\/p>\n “We built a world of international rules and laws and institutions, collective security, NATO, and that’s all in question now, certainly with what the president has done in Caribbean, the Pacific and in Venezuela,” Hagel said.<\/p>\n In his first year back in office, President Trump has called those targeted by kinetic strikes “narco-terrorists” and has designated Mexican cartels as terrorist organizations, but that designation has some asking if that makes them a legitimate military target.<\/p>\n “Well, in this administration, I guess it does. But in real life, in international law, no, it doesn’t to say somebody is a narco-terrorist,” Hagel said. “Just because you say it or the president says it, that doesn’t mean they are.”<\/p>\n Hagel says the U.S. military is the most advanced fighting force on earth. But, as the President weighs intervention in Iran along with the armada massed off of Venezuela’s coast, there is growing concern about the end game.<\/p>\n “You can’t start these kinds of operations all over the globe and think your military is going to be able to handle all this, because once you start something, you never know where it’s going to go,” Hagel said.<\/p>\n Former secretary Hagel is also deeply troubled at the prospect of threats by President Trump to attack Greenland.<\/p>\n “Well, it’s unprecedented. First of all, if… if we would act on this, you will break NATO,” Hagel said. “NATO countries could not trust the United States anymore. Russia will do whatever it wants in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia and Poland, China. Will move on, Taiwan and South China Sea as they already are. Where do we go from there? And then the world becomes really dangerous.”<\/p>\n Hagel argues NATO has been the cornerstone of American world power allowing us to base our military forces all over Europe and hold aggressive adversaries at bay.<\/p>\n “I could see a situation if we keep going the way we are going a United States with no allies,” he said.<\/p>\n Hagel went on to say he’s seen a level of politicization of the military during President Trump’s second term that is dangerous.<\/p>\n Hagel was in Chicago this week for his work with the University of Chicago’s non-partisan research center, Chicago Project on Security and Threats (CPOST).<\/p>\n Copyright \u00a9 2026 WLS-TV. 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