I bet this has the FOGO wires a-buzz:
Military officers who denounce policies they helped implement are “cowardly,” the top U.S. officer charged on Friday in an apparent reference to retired generals’ attacks on Iraq war policy.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of staff, told U.S. Naval Academy graduates that military officers face two options when political leaders do not follow their advice — obey orders or quit.
Mullen said officers should not follow orders only to later leave the military and publicly criticize the plans they implemented.
“We give our best advice beforehand,” he said. “If it’s followed, great. If it’s not, we only have two choices — obey the orders we have been given, carrying them out with the professionalism and loyalty they deserve, or vote with our feet.
“That’s it. We don’t get to debate those orders after the fact. We don’t get to say, ‘Well, it’s not how I would have done it,’ or, ‘If they had only listened to me,”‘ he said in Annapolis, Maryland. “Too late at that point and too cowardly.”
Just calling it like he sees it.
And while we’re on about the Chairman, he’s got some good advice for the Memorial Day Weekend as well. The Surge, he says, wasn’t successful because of the politicians or the generals – it was successful because of the soldiers who walked the mean streets to make them just a little less mean every day:
All over this country — in all sorts of ways — people are rolling up their sleeves and doing great things for the men and women who serve.
I’m very grateful for that support. The troops are grateful for it.
But we need to continue connecting to that sea of goodwill, especially as our returning warriors and their families tackle new challenges associated with the stress of long deployments, the pain of combat injuries, or even the uncertainty of new careers in the civilian sector.
We need to wrap our arms around them and never let go, especially those bearing the seen and unseen scars of war. We need to make sure they get the care they need, the time they deserve and the respect they’ve earned … for life.
We owe them nothing less and probably a whole lot more.
So, on this Memorial Day weekend, maybe we should all go on a little walk … to the nearest cemetery, to a hospital, to a local military base, or even to a homeless shelter.
Someone there has served. Someone there has sacrificed.
Someone there has walked some pretty mean streets. And we ought to all say thanks.
I don’t have a problem with it. If a war plan is good, it should survive scrutiny of retired pros. It depends who is commenting also. Example, there are some retired flag rankers that I have no respect for. (won’t name names)
I think that’s the point. There’s been a lot of back-seat driving over the last few years.
The question is, where is the line between legitimate criticism and lessons learned, and carping for political gain and CYA?
Military officers who denounce policies they helped implement are “cowardly…”
It seems to me he’s not criticizing armchair quarterbacks. I think he’s criticizing those who were willing to implement policies while in uniform that they now claim to have been diametrically opposed to at the time, but never speak up until it doesn’t affect their careers.
I agree with him. I’m at times perhaps unreasonably idealistic, but I have to say that were I a senior officer being asked to implement a policy that I believed would cause failure or was in error, I’d resign my commission before I’d be a part of something I believed would cause unnecessary suffering to anyone or damage to this country.
Mike, the line is precisely at the wardroom door (O Club door, Goat Locker hatch, main gate, etc). Legitimate criticism and lessons learned circulate within the command or military community; going public, IMHO, is all about “carping for political gain and CYA”. In the Chief’s Mess, we may beat each other up and bitch about the JOs all day long, but out on the deckplates we present a united front, command policy is our policy, and our det/battalion/ship has the best damn officers in the Navy.
BZ to all the men and women who make the streets a little less mean and voluntarily go into harms way.
Not sure where this comes from ..not that it isn’t fundamentally correct….Basically sounds like, “to thy own self be true”, right? Ain’t that a Navy Core Value (snicker) already? If it ain’t, it should be.
Maybe I’m just suspicious of motives among those super senior to me who obviously have political instincts. Despite that, I think I’ll just accept what he said “as is” and be glad he said it.
re- Memorial Day- not sure where the homeless shelter comes from…However, the theme is perfect.
b2
If followed, this advice bodes well for advancement opportunities at the top.
If, as seems increasingly likely, the swooning masses elect the Obamessiah as our next President, I predict a massive and blatent disregard for competent military advice from our senior uniformed leaders. Undoubtedly there will eventually be a few idiots or sycophants found to fill the billets, but the upward mobility opporunities may well be unprecedented.
Hope it turns out otherwise, but the donkey crowd’s disdain for, and ignorance of military affairs is truly monumental these days.
I’ve done the homeless shelters. Many times and have a little advice to those who do the tour.
Most have not served. Yet they will tell you that they did. It is easy to find out the truth with just a few questions.
Another thing I found out, offering jobs is fruitless, they always come up with an excuse for not being able to take the job. One guy even told me that if he worked it gave him a headache. I offered to give him plenty of drugs to fix it and guess what…he was ready to go to work.
Yes, there are those at homeless shelters who don’t want to be there and only want a little help getting back to being able to care for themselves. But…sadly, those people are few and far between.
Papa Ray
West Texas
USA
Ernie,
Right on shipmate. Words to live by.
AT1 Dwight
b2 – You have to take the comment in context.A hospital, cemetary, military base, homeless shelter are all places you wouldn’t normally go to, so, stretch yourself and thank a vet other than at work, in the neighborhood, or your own family…that’s how I took it.
Thank you to our host, CAPT Lex and all you vets out there for standing watch on the wall.Well done.
While I agree with the idea that we should thank our vets at the non-normal and routine places, I think that should be done on November 11th. Today is all about those that served and paid dearly for that service. It is about their families, and how they carry on. It is about remembrance. While I sincerely thank all of our Veterans, today is for thanking the families of those who passed in the defense of our great nation. I’m taking my kids to the local military cemetary where we’ll place a C-Notes worth of flowers on the graves of our fallen service men and women. As I’ve done since they were knee high to a grasshopper. It’s what they know to do each year on this day.
Ernie, I’m not sure I agree with you 100%. Perhaps it’s the definition of “public”. Possibly with the difference between peace and war thrown in.
From my perspective, there is legitimate discussion of lessons learned, particularly in professional fora such as the USNI Proceedings. And there is illegitimate carping of the sort that we have seen – retired senior officers scurrying in front of TV cameras to blast policies they were willing to support earlier.
Also, there used to be different standards between wartime and peacetime. Criticism that would be acceptable in peace may cross the line in wartime.
And I’m not sure where the borders truly lie. Because we must balance learning from an honest discussion of our mistakes with the need not to undercut morale.
Well that is one opinon. Except the Chairman ignores the fact that their is this little thing called the First Amendment-something that these retired officers have earned the right to exercise.
Furthermore, it gives those politicians a pass on responsibility for heeding advice that was given-and I believe was given-when the adminstration made its headlong plunge into the current fracas in Iraq.
The military is in a damned if you do, damned if you don’t position. They need someone to stick up for them since they cannot actively lobby for themselves. That is the job of the retired community, I believe, and also it is important that the truth gets out.
The Rumsfeld’s and others should not get a free pass when they screw up.
Mullen’s advice is noted-and should be ignored.
They had a first amendment right back when they were in the service, too. But they either lacked the moral courage to oppose the policy behind closed doors, and failing that, to resign their commissions and take their criticism public. Back when it could have made a difference reckoned in thousands of lives. If not cowardice, then they valued their careers more than the lives of their troops. Not quite sure what the word is for that.
But you’re right, they’ve an absolute right to publicly demonstrate their previous lack of courage now, safely behind their retirement pay – probably help with the book sales.
Amen, Lex!
Skippy,
Nobody “earns” the right to free speech. As American citizens we are born into it..Whether we are retired 4 stars or high school dropouts!
While those senior officers I think I know who Mullen’s talking about have “earned” quite a retirement check, and the respect of the American people for their hard avocation; since birth they have had the right to be Ass-Hats.
And they are. Yes, that’s it. If I was Mullen I would have used Ass-Hat vice cowardly. More appropriate- less in your face.
And I thought you would have liked what he said..You all preachy and all about accountability and such? Nope. I think you let your persistent B.D.S. brought on by Rummy Revile Syndrome (RSS) shake your logic tree!
b2
Mike,
I see your point, but I don’t think we’re disagreeing. Consider this: fora such as Proceedings or a speech at an Academy graduation may be public per se, but are still within the wire, that is, addressed to audiences of military or military-oriented professions. Speaking on CNN or 20/20, in my opinion, is aimed at the voting, and book-buying, public. And I think we’ve both gotten away from ADM Mullen’s point; that they are now, no matter the forum, speaking out against policies that he thinks (and I agree) they either supported, or were afraid to denounce, before they retired. But then, I’m a crusty old Chief who doesn’t mind telling a JO, or a general, when I think they’re wrong. I don’t understand those of any rank who are afraid to do the same. I see it every day, but I don’t understand it.
Hot Damn. Now them’s words I am glad to hear. Leadership, as taught in the Division Officers guide even. ADM Mullen is undisputably, 100% correct on both counts.
I hate sour grapes. I’ve had some folks complain about whether they thought they were fairly treated at one time or another. But you go where the Navy sends you, you do what the Navy asks of you, and you never expect nor demand your way. That always has, and always will belong to the Captain. For he is the one with the Command pay and Command pin.
And when you are the CO, you do your best and never look back. All detractors are merely smaller people for that.
Thanks ADM Mullen.
Subsunk
Rights…I think we have a right to our name. Beyond that I look forward to a cogent argument regarding any additional “rights”
And what Lex said in his last paragraph. Those folks are hyenas (except when we agree with them; then they are prescient after the fact). Sheesh.
Whatever ethical questions might arise from retired senior officers individually speaking out now against “plans they implemented” while on active duty, at least it is still legal for them to do so.
What was apparently not quite so legal (or ethical) was the Pentagon’s “ambitious campaign to cultivate dozens of military analysts as ‘surrogates’” to generate propaganda favorable to the administration’s wartime performance in the national media.
Last Friday, the DoD Inspector General’s office launched its own investigation – in addition to an ongoing GAO investigation – into the legality of the recently exposed Pentagon’s PR program of covertly using retired military officers as “message force multipliers” in the media.
Link and Link
Filter, I disagree with your assessment. This isn’t even war 2.0, we’ve moved into conflicts won and lost based solely on the flow and control and absorption of information to the second and third legs of Clausewitz’s triangle.
So long as we have the enemy, and its sympathizers, running agitprop on our territory, the military should be free to defend it.
Give credit to your fellow citizen, he/she’s been around and knows when manure is being shoveled. Subscriptions to the NYT show as much.
Yeah, I’ve been watching that as well. Pace Glenn Greenwald(s), I’m not fully persuaded that the program was illegal although the GAO and IG will determine that in time.
Which leaves this: Our strategic center of gravity is public opinion. Opinion that is, in large part, formed by media coverage. Media coverage that serving officers contribute to under the acknowledged limitation of a duty to perform, and whose presentations are therefore viewed suspiciously. Coverage that has recently been augmented by retired officers “brought back into the fold” to understand and interpret facts, but who have no duty to parrot the company line. Coverage that without their contribution would almost entirely be informed by blow dried empty suits who could scarcely tell a fighter from armored column on the one hand, and Michael Moore fellow travelers on the other.
That serves the public good?
I concur. One of the major weaknesses of the Bush Administration in this campaign has been inadequate mobilization of public opinion. Anything DOD can do to get its message out is a Good Thing. And a legitimate warfighting technique.
It’s not like they were lying – that is a province of the Left.
“Opinion that is, in large part, formed by media coverage.”
Not to be confused with informed opinion, but in our current climes with all opinion weighted equally, (& all authority denied) truth is elusive. I believe the illuminati refer to it as “your aspect versus my aspect”.
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I didn’t know propaganda was illegal. That must be a very very VERY new law.
I mean, before the iron curtain fell we all thought every woman in Yugoslavia was toothless with a beard. Now we know that’s where God hid the world’s supermodels. But that ruse kept all our men safe from turning Soviet. ‘Tis the price of freedom.
I agree 100 percent with Adm. Mike Mullen. It’s the job of generals and admirals to provide candid military advice, to do so within command channels and to uphold the chain of command. At the end of the day, if they think our soldiers and nation are better served by their leadership they should stay and do their jobs. On the other hand, if they think that everyone would be best served by resignation because they cannot in good conscience follow the orders of their commanding officers, they should resign and THEN made those public statements. To do otherwise and cry foul later isn’t only morally cowardly, it’s a betrayal to those they sent in harm’s way.
Someone still has to prove to me that the advice was not given by at least some of these FOGO’s. We will never know what occured behind closed doors will we? Seems to me, that the patented approach here is to discredit the messenger because he chose to speak out at a time when it was perfectly appropriate to do so.
What about the FOGO’s who wrote pro Bush / pro war books and received equal if not better royalties. Seems to me they are guilty of the same thing only because their message supports the party line “they get it”. No one critcizes them for speaking out about what happened on active duty-when it could be argued quite well that they embraced and backed the wrong horse when it came to Iraq. Yet they truly believed they were doing the right thing.
Plus, it is simplistic to simply assume that there was a black and white defining moment when it was resign or comply-it never works like that. More likely it was an objective that for the most part was agreed upon in principle and then ruined in execution. Or not even that-just simple changes and rejections of small bits of advice that in a chain of events snowballed into where we are today. It might also be true that they thought they could still do the best the could and serve to mitgate the end outcome of what was essentially a flawed political decision and what has now been factually proved to have been meddled with by political people outside of the military.
The better question to be asked is what is the Chairman ( and the other critics) afraid of? That they cannot successfully defend their ideas? That they will not stand on their own merit? There once was a time that the Navy actually encouraged open and free discussions-where a young JO ( who is now a CAG) could write an article opposed to the pary line and get it published in Proceedings. I daresay that would not be allowed today-not without a backlash by someone’s CO.
I went back and looked at Mullens remarks and he in the same speech he also proposed that the young new junior officers challenge authority and not just blindly accept the wisdom from on high. Thats good advice too and needs to be reported in the discussion of the speech.
Oh and B2, call me all the names you want-it does not change the fact that I firmly believe that this President has made a several very serious errors in the direction he has placed the country. If that makes me deranged-fine. Although I would submit where you sit determines what you see. From where I sit, it is Bush supporters who are the off kilter ones-not me.
Skippy-san-”Seems to me, that the patented approach here is to discredit the messenger because he chose to speak out at a time when it was perfectly appropriate to do so.”
No, it is the messenger who has discredited himself because at the moment of truth, when they had more power than just the power of their voice, they chose to do nothing. That cannot be said for those who write otherwise (the ‘pro-war’ types you reference).
And if they “thought they were doing the right thing at the time”, clearly their commanding officers likely thought the same. It’s one thing to mention mistakes made and what might be learned from them, and another to rewrite history as though the people in charge had a crystal ball and/or were hopelessly inept but the authors went along with it anyway.
Always easy to second-guess things later. Decisions almost always have to be made with incomplete information. If they had complete access to all information, they wouldn’t be decisions. And a child in elementary school could run the country, and a basic airman or private could run the military.
Just to add a bit more,
A fair example would be General Shinseki. He told the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2003 that several hundred thousand troops would be needed to bring stability to Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein. He did not change that number to suit the leadership and then write about how stupid they were but he just ‘went along with it’ later.
Liz, I believe GEN Shinseki retired early. Not sure how that constitutes “went along with it.” In fact, he seems to me to be an excellent example of what ADM Mullen was talking about, since Shinseki hasn’t said a public word that I’m aware of since he retired.
Not that he needed to. The events of the past five years have proven him dead right.
What are they all so afraid of?…
Nice words admiral-but I did not exactly see you turning in your resignation when Vern Clark was driving the US Navy over a cliff in terms of its procurement policy…
Zane, that’s what I said. He DIDN’T go along with it.
I just called a ‘fair example’, yes? Please read my last sentence again.
Shinseki left on time-Summer 2003.
Rumsfeld had emasculated him though by announcing his successor 15 months ahead of time. Shinseki had been Chief of Staff since 1999 so he appears to have served a full 4 year term.
Just reading through my messages above and I came across a lot more ornery than I intended.
Damn, sorry. I should have my morning coffee before posting….
Liz, I always have at least five cups of espresso before posting. Don’t worry about being ornery, what with Skippy and Snakey and Nose around, we’re all thick-skinned.
This is really rather straightforward Skip. If you’re in command while things are going from bad to worse and you soldiers are getting killed in ever larger numbers and you don’t believe that you’re getting the support you need from either the joint chiefs or the politicians, it doesn’t matter what was or wasn’t said behind closed doors – your people are dying and at some point you’ve got to stand for something besides muddling through for that fourth star. A commander is responsible for executing policy – any commander who doesn’t believe the policy is either correct or executable under his current constraints would be better off getting out of the way in favor of one who can commit to it.
So: You take a stand, throw your stars on the table and issue an “or else” ultimatum, and if they call you, you quit. And then hit the talk show circuit. And change the debate.
The Chairman is clearly not afraid of debate, and this is not even about the Iraq war, except tangentially – it’s about leadership, and doing the right thing. He’s right to point to those who had the power to change things – either in uniform or by resigning – and who failed to do so as moral cowards.
Thanks Lex,
I just got through saying the same thing at Skippy’s house.
Just, you know, a whole lot stupider.
Nose
Nose, you pointed out that Mullen stayed around because he knew how to fix it. Thus he was not guilty of not sticking up for principle-even though by the time he got into a position to fix it the damage had been made a hell of lot worse.
I still think the situation in 2004 and 2005 was a lot more complicated than anyone here lets on and without considering the role that people like Bremer, Wolfwitz and others played the story is incomplete.
Sanchez and the others have not really spoken in months, so why raise this point now?