Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin returned to work at the Pentagon on Monday, his first day back in the office this year, due to a health scare.
“At this important time, I’m glad to be back at the Pentagon. I feel good and recovering well, but still recovering and I appreciate all the good wishes that I have received thus far,” he said.
Austin, 70, was hospitalized on Jan. 1 with complications from a procedure to treat prostate cancer from a week and a half earlier. He temporarily delegated some duties to Deputy Secretary Kathleen Hicks, but he resumed those on Jan. 5 and was released from the hospital on Jan. 15. Since being discharged from the hospital, he had been working remotely while undergoing physical therapy.
“Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III returned to work at the Pentagon today,” the Pentagon said in a statement. “The Secretary has been conducting his duties from home since his release from Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Jan. 15, 2024.”
The secretary returned to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Friday for a scheduled post-prostatectomy appointment, and his doctors, Dr. John Maddox and Dr. Gregory Chesnut, said in a statement that “he continues to recover well and is expected to make a full recovery.”
His hospitalization gained significant attention due to the initial secrecy surrounding it. Despite being transported in an ambulance to the hospital on Jan. 1, and his time in the intensive care unit, the White House was not informed until Jan. 4, and Congress and the public were not told until Jan. 5, the day he assumed his authorities back from Hicks.
President Joe Biden was not informed of Austin’s cancer diagnosis until Jan. 9, even though the two leaders talked on Jan. 6 and the secretary got the diagnosis in early December and had the treatment surgery on Dec. 22.
The White House and the Pentagon are reviewing and have made initial changes to the processes and procedures for Cabinet officials, while the Pentagon inspector general is also investigating the debacle.
Austin’s return to the Pentagon comes at a turbulent time for the department.
Three U.S. service members were killed and about three dozen more were injured over the weekend in Jordan. They were killed in an Iraqi militia drone strike that targeted a little-known U.S. base in Jordan called Tower 22.
Militias in Iraq and Syria, which have support from Tehran, have carried out more than 150 rocket and missile attacks against U.S. bases in the region, which have injured dozens of troops and have now killed three service members.
U.S. forces are also involved with the Houthis, the Iranian-supported Yemeni rebel group that has launched more than 30 attacks on commercial vessels in the Red Sea. Their strikes have forced international shipping companies to consider rerouting their vessels on longer voyages to avoid the possibility of an attack, and many have already done that. U.S. forces have carried out a series of strikes to degrade their ability to carry out these attacks, but the strikes have not fully destroyed their capabilities.
America’s response to both situations has been to try and avoid a regional conflict.
While that has been underway, Ukraine continues to fend off Russian aggression, but it is now doing so without new U.S. military support due to Congress’s inability to pass Biden’s supplemental national security-related funding request.
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Last week, Austin participated from his home in the latest meeting of the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, where dozens of defense leaders get together to discuss Ukraine’s most pressing needs.