Well finally a subject I knew something about. The “so-called” military revolt against SecDef Rumsfeld. When I was a young officer in the Marine Corps, I learned that I could argue forcibly for my position up to the point of decision. After that I had two choices, get on board or resign my commission. Apparently there is a third road.
A crew of former generals has taken to enjoying the fruits of their retirement while taking pot shots at the SecDef. Trust me on this one. When these pillars of silly putty wait for the security of retirement to take their shots at the SecDef it says more about the military being better off without them rather than the current SecDef.
Gen. Wesley Clark proved that the military is becoming as politicized as every other corner of American society. This cannot be a good thing. I didn’t agree with much of anything that Presidents Carter and Clinton did domestically, internationally or militarily but I wrote not a single word against either administration while on active duty or since other than the moral failings of Clinton. As far as I recall, I engaged in no derogatory conversations. Although I voted in every general election, I never registered as a republican or had so much as a bumper sticker on my car while on active duty.
These guys are certainly entitled to their opinion. But I worry that the apolitical nature of our military is being eroded by their actions. Also, keep in mind that the current SecDef has come to the Pentagon to turn the place on its head. When people see their pet projects axed or minimized they tend to take it personally. Everyone of these guys has an ego the size of the Pentagon itself. When something doesn’t go their way, they take it personally. There is probably a bit of that going on as well.
At any rate, their complaints would have had a much greater affect if these men had demonstrated the courage of their convictions by resigning their commissions in protest at the time of decision rather than waiting for the security of retirement to find their voices. The last point I’d make is the hypocrisy of these men. While they heap great praise on the military that they once served honorably, they must believe that it is being led by craven self-serving know-nothings. How can they hold the generals serving this SecDef in high regard at the same time trash the civilian head of the department?
The answer gentlemen is that those serving the SecDef have the courage of their convictions. The courage you apparently lack. We don’t know their political position because those serving have followed the long tradition of military service of voicing your opinion to the point of decision then getting on board or resigning.
6 comments:
You write, "... their complaints would have had a much greater affect if these men had demonstrated the courage of their convictions by resigning their commissions in protest at the time of decision rather than waiting for the security of retirement to find their voices."
You really ought to check your facts before you start defaming men who've given many years to the service of this country.
Marine Corps Lt General Newbold did in fact resign at the time the Iraq was was being planned. Army Major Gen Batiste was offered a third star and the #2 job in Iraq but chose to resign instead rather than work for Rumsfeld. Wes Clark had, of course, retired several years before, but he did not become political until he saw the abuse and neglect to which the soldiers and marines were being subjected. Zinni too was retired before the war began, and has been critical of the decision to go to war, as well as they way the war was prosecuted, from day one.
I don't know all the details of the many others, but I suspect they too are professional casualties of our country's corrupt civilian leadership.
Hey retired LTC, check your own facts.
Newbold, the military's top operations officer before the Iraq war, said in a Time magazine opinion piece on Sunday that he regretted having not more openly challenged U.S. leaders who took the United States into "an unnecessary war" in Iraq. Newbold encouraged officers still in the military to voice any doubts they have about the war. Well it is a bit late for Newbold to do the right thing but at least he’s willing to undermine the war effort by encouraging other to do it.
On GMA Maj Gen Batiste complained that his “plate was too full” with Bosnia, Africa and Iraq to object to about the SecDef. Then added this gem, "Back in the Pentagon four or five years ago, I was a one star general and believe me, no one was going to listen," Batiste said "Within the military culture, you have a chain of command. You report to people. You can express differences, but at the point of decision, you have two options — you either sleuth and execute or you get out. I chose to stay within the system and make it happen." Well LTC, that’s pretty much what I said.
I suppose I ought not “defame” these guys unless I’m going to call them, what was it, oh yeah “corrupt civilians”.
A bit more fact checking
Gen Zinni did in fact voice an objection before the war and while already retired. He has written a book the premise of which is that we ought to prefer the stability of brutal dictators to instability of trying to bring freedom to the people of the Middle East. How many people would have to be bulldozed into mass graves before Gen Zinni might countenance a bit of instability? The world wonders.
Last note
When I say resign, I mean resign - not retire. If these guys want to make a living selling books attacking the American government, that government ought not be paying them. There is an old saying that goes, "If you take the King's shilling, you do the King's bidding." Well all these guys are taking the money, all the while attacking their benifactor.
With the exception of Marine Gen.
Pat Buchanan writes:
Anthony Zinni, the former head of Central Command who opposed the Bush-Rumsfeld rush to war, the other generals did not publicly protest until secure in retirement.
LTC
Been drawing retirement for seven years.
Zinni calling for Rumsfeld to resign while hawking a book isn't necessarliy the nobelest of deeds.
Ike never called for Truman to resign. Ike said "I will go to Korea." He didn't say Truman or his SecDef was an incompetent boob.
Nobody has ever said the 6 can't voice an opinion. The world wonders why they couldn't screw up the courage while in office.
The fact that they wait for the security of retirement and then zero in on the civilian head of the military rather than policy is thought by many to threaten the underpinning of that civil control.
Also their hypocracy with regard to the current active duty officer corps is stunning. Best led trained and equipped army in history in one breath - led by sycophanic yes men - like themselves before retirement I suppose - in the next.
Thomas Lipscomb from today's Chi Sun:
There is a great furor over whether the opinions of a number of retired high-ranking officers should tip the balance in the ongoing debate over the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
But the question really isn't whether Rumsfeld should resign. He has already resigned several times and had President Bush tear up his letters of resignation. He clearly is taking responsibility for his actions on a continuing basis.
But now that a galaxy of flag officers are raining down on Rumsfeld demanding his resignation, no one seems to have bothered to ask which, if any, of these generals had ever submitted his own resignation in protest against the conduct of the Iraq war, or the bumpy transition we are locked in now. The demands for Rumsfeld's resignation began with Gen. Anthony Zinni.
Differences in policy between the Pentagon brass and its civilian leadership are nothing new. At the end of the Clinton administration there was a dinner at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York in honor of the Joint Chiefs off Staff that illustrates this well. Over the years the Council has morphed from a small but influential voice in international policy issues to a glorified Rotary Club for Park Avenue investment bankers and lawyers. The once acerbic off-the-record questioning that rattled many of its guests of honor has degenerated into a love fest hosted largely for star-struck millionaires.
After listening to subtle and not so subtle digs at national defense policy by the guests of honor and appreciative sniggers from the audience, I jotted a question down on the back of a card and passed it to former Secretary of the Navy John Lehman, who was at my table. ''If you have so many significant disagreements with national defense policy, what have you done about it?'' Lehman wrote back that if I asked that question, he'd buy me lunch, and passed it back to me with a smile. So I asked it.
''What do you expect us to do?'' a senior Marine general replied. ''Resign,'' I said. ''Cyrus Vance did. And he was [President Jimmy] Carter's secretary of state.'' ''You are questioning my cojones, and I am a Marine!'' the general shot back as the millionaire fan club gasped at my disrespect.
He was right. I was. I still am, his and any general officers who apparently decided discretion was the better part of a nice retirement parade with a medal or two and a couple of offers of board positions. At least Wesley Clark got himself fired and summarily retired as NATO commander in comparative disgrace for submarining the Balkans policies of his Oxford classmate President Bill Clinton and his defense secretary, William Cohen. Gen. Billy Mitchell is regarded by many as having saved American military aviation by accepting a court-martial and resigning from the service he loved because of his differences in policy with the federal government.
Retired military and civil servants are receiving ongoing retirement pay from American taxpayers. If they want to give the public the benefit of their experience in consideration of current policies, we are fortunate to get it. But policy differences are one matter and calls for a specific resignation are quite something else. As a book publishing executive for many years, I have always welcomed the opportunity to make a buck by publishing ''now it can be told revelations'' from those formerly in power. And timing those ''revelations'' to promote a forthcoming book is one of the oldest tricks in the trade.
But if Generals Gregory Newbold, John Batiste, Zinni and others have believed Rumsfeld's policies have been so dire that they are calling for his resignation, their opinions would have carried far more weight if they had stated them at some personal cost to themselves while on active service by resigning in protest. That action might have also carried some evidence of the courage Americans expect of the highest ranking officers of its uniformed services.
Thomas Lipscomb is senior fellow of the Annenberg Center for the Digital Future. He founded Times Books. tom@digitalfuture.org
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