Secretary of War Pete Hegseth Speech on the Arsenal of Freedom in Eau Claire, Wisconsin (As Delivered)

View Online Secretary of War Speech Secretary of War Pete Hegseth Speech on the Arsenal of Freedom in Eau Claire, Wisconsin (As Delivered) Oct. 20, 2026 SECRETARY OF WAR PETE HEGSETH: Well, Derek, as always, thank you. A no more steadfast supporter on Capitol Hill than that man right there who never forgets where he came from. Whether it's the US Navy, whether it's the Seals or whether it's Wisconsin, he's a guy that just never backs down and I respect the heck out of what he does and how he does it. Same, same with my fellow cabinet member, Kelly Loeffler, who has taken the Small Business Administration and put it on rocket fuel in a way that President Trump expects and demands. And then the partnership — the reason we're here today is because of her, a recognition that the vast majority of what we do in our defense industrial base comes from small businesses that feed into the systems that we rely on. And so, we said, hey, let's find a couple that we can showcase, both individually because of their excellence, which I'll talk a little bit about. But also as an example of the kind of revival of a defense industrial base that we so desperately need as a nation. And then, of course, Tricia and Sean, thank you for opening your doors to us, to your great company, and to all of you for being here today at Riverside Machine and Engineering, as well as Metalcraft. It's an honor to be — I mean, Derek said it he's right.  The reason for this tour, the Arsenal of Freedom Tour, which has been going on for a better part of the year, is to look you in the eye, American workers in great companies like this one, and say thank you and tell you that you are a part of — I haven't said it this way before, but you're part of the kill chain. You're part of the reality of how our warfighters get what they need on the front lines. You are shoulder to shoulder with them. It's helmets and hard hats together.  And ultimately, the Arsenal of Freedom is about you. Sure, we're all doing it for the warfighters, that's who I serve. That's who President Trump expects me to lead and to serve. But you have their back, and you do so by building, by building in ways that no other country can. And I had a chance to see some of the work that you do, got a chance to sign the outside of one of them and I signed, Forging the Arsenal of Freedom, because these big, beautiful ovens are forging things that no other company can forge. And they go into systems that no other country has. And those systems go on our fighters and our radars and our ships, and they protect our best Americans. But it's a quintessentially American story is our advantage is our manufacturers and our innovators. It's the American experiment and the American story. And I'm tied to it a little bit as someone who was born and raised in Minnesota, because Riverside and Metalcraft, it's a great American story that started in 1978 in a Minnesota basement. Jack Mowry started the Metalcraft Company; he built it and brought it to Riverside — built it up and brought it to Riverside 18 years later. And then a company called Raytheon took notice. They needed work on a specialty plate for a sea-based radar system. Almost no other company in the country could do the job, but Riverside stepped up. And since then, Riverside has won more than $160 million in subcontracting work for precision machine parts, heat exchangers and electronic assembly. [Audio gap] Just like America's assignment or a difficult fight. Now, you've worked on medical, aerospace, and other high-tech clients as well, you still do to this day, and we applaud that. In fact, commercial business is an important baseline for anyone that works in defense as well. Companies that can do both are the most sought after. So, 50 years ago, Jack Mowry had a vision. And with the help of a generation of employees, Tricia and Sean made it a reality, creating hundreds of good, high-paying, skilled jobs in Wisconsin and Minnesota. And Riverside is now a top supplier, one of the top suppliers for defense contractors, one of the best, which is how we landed here. It's not simply by accident. It's not that you have a great Congressman in Derrick Van Orden, DVO, who we love and appreciate, and Kelly's recommendation. It's that last year, out of Lockheed Martin's 13,000 suppliers, this company, that company gave Riverside their Best-in-Class award. Only 10 suppliers earn that award every year. That puts you in the 99.9 percentile. The employees here and the quality that you manufacture are the best of the best and we are here to recognize you for that. Riverside and Metalcraft simply equal American skill using American muscle to supply American warriors. That's a heck of a sentence. American skill for American muscle for American warriors. And as we expand the scale and speed at the Department of War, we're counting on — we need small businesses like this one. You are the foundation of the Arsenal of Freedom. Unfortunately, right now there are only five prime contract defense contractors. We want more. In fact, our job is to ensure that there are 10, 15, 20 by the time this administration is over. But in order for that to happen, we need to grow all the small businesses across our country. And to hear — it's quite an encouragement to hear the amount of growth that has come here, as well, as a reflection of that. Because about 95 percent of America's machine shops have fewer than 50 employees. 83 percent have fewer than 20. Three-quarters of American manufacturers have fewer than 20 employees, yet they each play a role that is absolutely necessary. Small businesses, big consequences.  You see, the big companies in Silicon Valley and the prime contractors can make blueprints all day long. And I know they send you blueprints. But those blueprints are worthless without the high precision machining done by great Americans like you. And our job at the Department of War is to kick the door wide open for commercial disrupters, nontraditional vendors, and venture backed builders and actively create, as I said, that next generation of large and medium sized businesses in our Arsenal of Freedom.  Modern deterrence relies on true commercial speed. And so, what do we demand? We demand competitive acquisitions; we prioritize agile, non-traditional prime contracts over slow-moving legacy monopolies. We just want competition, the critical capabilities straight to the warfighters.  And that's why I love and applaud what Kelly is doing with the small war plants effort. It has an echo of World War II to it. The way we were able to build in that generation, the way the entire country pitched in, the way the worker was alongside the warfighter, it percolated the ethos of the country. And so, when Kelly said, we have this effort and we'd like to work with the War Department to revive it, it was an absolute no brainer. Let's build the network, let's build the foundation, let's build the backbone. I hear time and time again from large contractors and others, well, it's this part of the supply chain that we can't fulfill, or it's this widget we can't make, and that's our bottleneck. There are no bottlenecks here; we need more like this company that creates so quickly, that innovates and adapts, that have special particular skills and then invest in them to ensure — because any supply chain is only as weak as its weakest link. And if you can't make a critical subcomponent, then ultimately that F-35 doesn't fly or ultimately that radar isn't working. You understand that. It was so neat to walk the floor and look at the components. I have no idea what they are. I mean, you do, I don't. But then I look up at the radar, or I look up at the F-35, or I look up at that capability and say I know what that is. And I think that's the micro example of what the Arsenal of Freedom Tour is all about. The Arsenal of Freedom Tour is intended to connect you to what you do. Yes, you work for a commercial company; yes, you do commercial applications, but you do defense applications every day. And we can't build at the Department of War what we need in Washington, DC, unless you're doing it right here in Wisconsin. At the same time, ultimately, you're able to look at that product that you're machining and say that goes into that. That's a part of that thing that I see operating on our southwest border, or against narco terrorists, or in Epic Fury to ensure Iran never gets a nuclear weapon. I'm contributing to that aspect in ensuring we have that Arsenal of Freedom. This company, this group right here, represents thousands and tens of thousands of small businesses that are the core of our defense industrial base. And so, our Arsenal of Freedom Tour was incomplete because we were going to larger companies or innovators or Silicon Valley or SpaceX. And those are all great. You should see the rockets Elon Musk builds, they're incredible. But none of that happens without the suppliers all around the country. American made, American manufacturing, American jobs, American muscle, ultimately American power. Without the skills that you possess, those things don't happen. But as Derrick mentioned, elites along — you know, decades ago sent our factories overseas and flooded our country with millions of illegals and, thanks to President Trump, that's over. We're bringing the supply chain back home because American manufacturing doesn't just build our missiles and our tanks, it builds the middle class as well — good quality, stable, high-paying jobs that provide for families all across the country.  There's no reason to outsource these capabilities anywhere else. Nobody builds it better than us, nobody can integrate it better than us, nobody can innovate and iterate better than us, let's bring it home. And that's what President Trump has demanded of me, of our Congress, of Kelly and everyone else, bring the defense industrial back, bring manufacturing back, bring the supply chain back.  We cannot be relying on any other country or any other cause, only the American cause. And I'm encouraged to talk to your leadership and hear that Metalcraft and Riverside have, you know, nearly two dozen openings right now that they believe they'll fill quickly with Americans looking for these great jobs. Business is expanding, our defense industrial base is expanding, and it certainly is President Trump's expectation of us. Speed to delivery is now the organizing principle. You look at the battlefield right now; we can't afford to operate at a Cold War speed where we spent decades designing exquisite platforms against one adversary whose battle plans were fairly predictable. That's not the battlefield of today. From AI to hyper sonics to drones and autonomy and robotics — we just announced an autonomous warfare command. We're looking around the corner and into the future about how your kids and grandkids will fight, how my kids and grandkids will fight, and ensuring they have those capabilities and right now.  That's why it's important that Congress fund what we're doing. President Trump spent $1 trillion on defense last year; we're looking to spend $1.5 trillion this year with a different kind of department. You know the Department of War has never passed an audit? That's like we've never actually balanced our checkbook. Before the end of this administration in 2028, for the first time in two decades, the Department of War will pass an audit, making sure that every taxpayer dollar that you contribute, we know where it's going and how we're spending it.  And we brought businessmen in to help run the department, to turn it from a bureaucracy into a business model, recognizing that if we move at the speed of business, if we only work at the speed of the primes, we will never deliver the capabilities to warfighters that they need right now from subsea and the autonomous submarines that we need to space capabilities that only America can provide and the dominance that we'll have with space lift. I think we have great supporters like Darrick Van Orden in Congress to do it.  So, our focus is simple. We're getting distractions out of the way, restoring the warrior ethos and rebuilding a military so strong that it won't be challenged. But ultimately, I'm here today to share the promise and the challenge of the Arsenal of Freedom Tour to every industry leader in the country. The days of the Pentagon rewarding the comfortable old guard for failure are over, of just rewarding the same contracts to the same people who have the most lobbyists and the most political connections are over. We don't care whose name is on the side of that capability, we simply want the best.  We're a far different department today than we were two years ago. The acquisitions reforms that we've made, the emphasis on modern technology stacks, all centered around the speed of the modern battlefield. We will reward companies who invest in their people, who invest in their plants, who invest in expanding, which is exactly what I saw on the floor today, expansion. They said we're waiting on two more machines that are coming in in a couple of months to expand what we do. That's a beautiful thing; that's what factory floors should look like all across the country. That's not what it looked like two years ago. And talking to your leadership and talking to small business administrators, small business leaders all across the country, there was no demand signal. There was that — that spirit wasn't there. Jobs were being outsourced and offshored. President Trump has demanded that we bring them back. And it turns out when you bring them back, our people do it better. Americans do it better, most efficiently and in ways that that ensure that American warfighters have what they need. So, to everyone at Riverside and Metalcraft, thank you for delivering when it counts. Each individual here represents thousands of Americans across the country who are critical to our defense industrial base. The skill, the foundation, the backbone of American — of America, American made, American manufacturing, American power. And you should be proud, as the Congressman said, rightfully proud of what you do. You are forging the future that will defend this nation.  Now, when you get a chance to see what our warriors achieve around the world, when you see what they can do in the darkest and most difficult and dangerous places, it is truly humbling. And I had a chance to just come back from — just 24 hours ago from Central Command, where I got to see some of our warfighters. They're preparing and ready to ensure that Iran never has a nuclear weapon.  They've been vigilant for many months, they're prepared and they're dialed in. You look into their eyes, they're ready to go, they understand what their assignment is. They have confidence in each other, and they should, because they're the most well-trained troops on planet earth. But they also have confidence in the systems that they've been provided, the very same systems that you've put parts into every single day right here. They rely on them; they maintain them in the field. I got a chance to see them, I get to talk to the refuelers and the maintainers, the mechanics and the pilots. They know their stuff's going to work when it matters, because you've made the investment time and time again. And those things working when it matters began with somebody on the shop floor clocking in, kicking off the assembly line, putting in the long hours needed to get the job done, moving that schedule left, moving the timeline up so that that warfighter gets it in Q3 of '26 instead of Q2 of '27, getting it when they need it on the battlefield. Our warriors do big things, but without you, nothing works. They do big jobs with the help of people like you day in and day out. So, just my ask of you as you're working hard and working even harder and putting in long hours, is don't forget that that direct line goes from your hands to our warfighters. Keep going. That was the spirit of the Arsenal of Freedom when we kicked it off. Let's go out and talk to the companies. We've been out to Silicon Valley, we've been down to Texas, we've been all across the south up here and the Midwest, on the East Coast, up to Maine talking to shipbuilders and folks that make planes and missiles and every aspect of our defense industrial base, all great Americans tied to a shared purpose.  And the War Department wants you to know that you are part of our foundation. We quite literally cannot do it without you. Expand, grow, go faster, be proud of what you do and why you do it and who you serve. President Trump tells me all the time, make sure the troops know that we have their back. I tell them that everywhere we go; I told them that in Central Command in the Middle East just yesterday. We're going to ask you to do tough things, we're going to have your back. Thank you for having their back as well. Thank you for putting in the hours, putting in the effort, providing your skill. I'm talking to guys who are talking about machining at, you know, 2-1,000th of a critical component that goes into something that ultimately needs to work when it matters. You are helping to restore our nation's strength, heal our defense industrial base, and ensure that for generations, America remains the strongest military in human history. We're going to keep putting America first, we're going to maintain peace through strength, we're going to keep applying good old fashioned Wisconsin common sense, and we are never going to apologize for being proud of our warfighters in this great republic that is now 250 years young. May we fight for it and defend it for 250 more. God bless you all. Thank you.

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