McChrystal fired

On Thu, 24 Jun 2010 10:40:41 -0500, Don Foreman wrote the following:

an excellent

willing to give up

his men was his

Yes, you're right. But the way it happened, it sure seems likely to me that he pulled this on purpose, to get away from the current regime, and I don't mean the one in Afghanistan.

-- Peace of mind is that mental condition in which you have accepted the worst. -- Lin Yutang

On Thu, 24 Jun 2010 10:35:25 -0500, Ignoramus11945 wrote the following:

Penn & Teller program.

-- Peace of mind is that mental condition in which you have accepted the worst. -- Lin Yutang

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 Dan

Yes he was out of line, but he could have continued to follow orders and be in charge of an army being slowly bled to death. I think that if he could have respectfully resigned, he would have, but I don=92t think that that=92s allowed in the military. He got out of a situation that politicians put him using his own political means.

Not the issue. His commander lost confidence in him and that is all it takes. Thomas Ricks wrote a decent piece about this today.

Sure it is. You just announce your retirement.

Tough way to end a fine career don't you think? At least he was allowed to resign instead of being relieved. That would have been my choice.

In the military, what matters to you is irrelevant. If an officer behaved as you did, he would be regarded as incompetent and dealt with accordingly.

an excellent

willing to give up

his men was his

Like some many of this type of situation there are two problems.

A "come to Jesus" meeting would most likely have solved the first problem, which is an excessive supply of opinions and gas from a group that should have known better, i.e. the General and his staff.

The larger problem is the precident/example this sets for the Officer Corp qua civilian control of the military. General McCrystal would/could not tolerate one of his subordinate and/or their staff making similar observations about him or his staff, as this would be fatal to good order and military discipline [and most likely a lot of "grunts" in the field].

Your dictionary is not the standard here. The standard is how insubordination and conduct unbecoming of a commissioned officer are defined in the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) and various regulations.

I don't mean to be critical of your opinions, Dan, just point out that the military has clear and definite expectations of conduct.

Truman was considerably less arrogant than Obama.

an excellent

willing to give up

his men was his

We can only speculate on his motivations, but I'm inclined to doubt that his intent was merely to "get away". He could have done that by quietly resigning or retiring.

The Point is quite different from the Canoe Club.

On Fri, 25 Jun 2010 00:39:38 -0500, Don Foreman wrote the following:

an excellent

willing to give up

his men was his

Yabbut, his staff (or others) might have advised him to shoot himself in the foot publicly so Ali Bama might not have any other choice. Or he might have tried and The Chosen One declined his resignation. We probably won't know for sure until the book comes out.

I think we can all agree that it was embarrassing to the current resident of the White House if only for being the truthful opinions of his minions.

-- Pain makes man think. Thought makes man wise. Wisdom makes life endurable. -- John Patrick

I think that is the crux of the matter. A strong, confident CIC would be able to ignore such things as long as results in the field were positive. Truman was not intimidated by generals, whereas BHO appears to be.

She should know! ;-)

I can read this two ways. Which one was your choice?

Wes

Just fire him although, on second thought, the guy served his country for an entire career. Still.

Indeed he did. 3 presidents did, before they put Mac out to pasture.

Gunner

One could not be a successful Leftwinger without realizing that, in contrast to the popular conception supported by newspapers and mothers of Leftwingers, a goodly number of Leftwingers are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid. Gunner Asch

And that..is going to come back and haunt the Demonrats big time.

Gunner

One could not be a successful Leftwinger without realizing that, in contrast to the popular conception supported by newspapers and mothers of Leftwingers, a goodly number of Leftwingers are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid. Gunner Asch

In retrospect, my response seems a bit brusque and dismissive. I didn't intend that, Dan.

Some things aren't quite the same in the military as they are in a business or corporate setting.

A good military commander seeks input from his experienced and capable staff and makes good use of it, but a subordinate who makes public derogatory remarks cannot be tolerated. Individual competence cannot exuse any behavior that undermines team integrity and performance in endeavours where second place is a body bag. Strong disagreement from staff, including asshole-snapping heated argument, is completely acceptable. The reason a commander has staff is to competently advise him. Staff must understand that they are subordinates and must vigorously implement the final decision of the C.O. I was both staff (combat engr bn S-3 operations officer) and C.O. (platoon leader and company commander) so I have first hand experience in both roles.

Staff and subordinate units and men aren't always privy to all intel that might affect a tactical or strategic decision. Matter of fact, the commander often isn't either, and intel is never perfect or complete and sometimes flat-ass eau-chitte wrong. Each level of command must make the best decisions they can under the circumstances, with no doubt at all that they will be implemented aggressively, skillfully, with no reservations or second-guessing by subordinates. Tactical decisions must sometimes be made extemporaneously under rather chaotic conditions that preclude having meetings with powerpoint presentations inviting dissenting viewpoints for democratic resolution.

Leadership requires that the leader earn and deserve the trust of his subordinates. It is initially assumed that an officer deserves trust, but over time as a unit is forged into a functional combat team the defacto trust must be replaced by earned trust. Part of earning that trust is demonstrating clearly that he will not tolerate any behavior from any subordinate that might compromise the integrity or performance of the team, unit or command, and that he can and wil make that stick.

Don - you are wasting your time - the Obama haters will carp and whine no matter what he does, even when it is the only choice, or a good choice. Trying to explain why this particular action was required will be like teaching a pig to sing - it won't work, and it will annoy the pig. This country is descending into a pit of pure hatred where right thinking people will be universally reviled because they don't wear the right suspenders, or claim the right party allegiance.