Four years ago, “Mayor Pete” — Pete Buttigieg — was all the rage.

He is the boyish-looking 42-year-old former Navy officer and former mayor of South Bend. Ind., who ran for president and ended up as Joe Biden’s secretary of transportation.

He hasn’t been heard from since.

This year it is “Major Pete” — Major Pete Hegseth, the boyish-looking 42-year-old former U.S. Army combat veteran and Fox television cohost, who is in line to become Donald Trump’s secretary of defense.

He is about to be heard from a lot.

The comparison ends there, though.  While Buttigieg’s appointment was designed to fill the box in the Biden well-woke balanced administration — he was young, woke and gay — Hegseth, young, anti-woke and straight comes forward as warrior with a mission.

And that mission, with President-elect Donald Trump’s blessing, is to shake up the military as it has not been shaken before to save it from its dismantling by left-wing progressives and craven generals who went along to get along.

One of those generals is Mark Milley, the former woke chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who Hegseth (and Trump) would fire on day one had Milley not resigned and cashed in by becoming a high-paid consultant at JPMorgan Chase Bank, a firm that does huge business with the Chinese.

Hegseth, in his book “The War on Warriors,” goes after Milley and other careerist woke generals for weakening the military by going along with and imposing left-wing theories like DEI, Critical Race Theory and transgenders to serve in the Army.

“Supporting DEI means soldiers DIE,” Hegseth wrote.

Hegseth aims to clean the house of woke generals. Currently, the Department of Defense has 44 four-star generals with a total force of 1.2 million serving in the ranks, according to Hegseth.

“In World War II, there were only seven four-star generals and over 21 million were serving. It’s upside down and ripe for firings — without replacements,” he wrote.

Milley is one of those generals who tilted sideways when he walked on account of all the fancy and heavy medals, pins and ribbons he wore on his left chest. He lit up like a pinball machine.

Milley shot to fame — if not infamy — when he secretly and without President Trump’s knowledge, phoned Communist Chinese Gen. Li Zuocheng in Beijing, during the Jan. 6 riot.

His goal was to warn the Communist Chinese in advance if the U.S. under Trump, the commander in chief, was about to attack Communist China.

According to the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward and Robert Costa in their book “Peril,” Milley told Li, “I want to assure you that the American government is stable, and everything is going to be ok. We are not going to attack or conduct any kinetic operation against you.

“If we are going to attack, I’m going to call you ahead of time,” Milley said.

Trump called Milley a “moron” and accused him of “treason.”

Trump left office before he could fire him or hold him accountable.

While Milley is out of the military and working for a firm that thrives on business with China, there is speculation that he is among those who Biden is considering for a pre-emptive pardon before Trump takes office.

A newly sworn-in President Trump could have Milley recalled to duty to face a court martial over his rogue calls to the Chinese which were made behind Trump’s back.

It is far-fetched at this point, but Trump no doubt remembers Milley’s deviousness. So, with Trump, one never knows.

It is probably best for Trump and Hegseth to leave Milley to history. Events have shown that Milley was as inept a politician as he was a general. It was Milley, after all, who oversaw Joe Biden’s botched and deadly withdrawal from Afghanistan.

It was also Milley who predicted that it would take the Russians only 72 hours to take the capital Kyiv in Ukraine and win the war.

And then Trump, a man Milley called “a fascist to the core,” was elected president again.

If that is not punishment enough, Trump should confiscate Milley’s cell phone so that he can’t call China again.

Peter Lucas is a veteran political reporter. Email him at: peter.lucas@bostonherald.com

Retired Gen. Mark Milley, center, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, left, and retired Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, right, former commander of the U.S. Central Command, prepare to speak to the House Foreign Affairs Committee about the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, at the Capitol in Washington in March. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)