Comments on: That Should Get their Attention

By: virgil xenophon

virgil xenophon — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 22:21:16 +0000

Agreed, Mike, but my point is that most of those who REALLY need to lose their stars have probably moved on well into retirement without suffering any consequences. The only good it will do now is as a warning signal “pour encourger les autres.”

By: Mike Kozlowski

Mike Kozlowski — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 10:02:15 +0000

…Having seen a great many senior blue-suiters do stupid things, allow me to suggest that the only – the ONLY thing that will get anyone’s attention is if some of those guys lose their stars, and lose them permanently – no secret backchannel attempts later to restore them, either, as in the case of BGen Teryl Schwalier (USAF CC in Saudi Arabia at the time of the Khobar Towers attack).

Mike

By: Grumpy

Grumpy — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 07:44:07 +0000

@Justthisguy, to put it mildly, there has been a major change with the US Military. It did not start with 9/11 or Bill Clinton. It started with Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush ’41. With the perceived “end of the Cold War”, this Country made some serious changes to our tactical and strategic thinking about the defense of the Nation. The decisions were made on the Presidential level based on perceived budgetary savings. Those decisions did not save us money and cost us lives.

@Chap, #7,I would give an “echo” to his last paragraph. It is a SERIOUS WARNING!

I’ve gone as far as I can or am comfortable on going with, on this subject. Most of this is out there in open source. If you want it, put your bias aside, as not useful for the task. This becomes a personal journey, not a group event. As you walk through the journey, keep a journal. You’ll be glad you did.

Remember, “Freedom is not free, never was, nor shall it ever be free.”

Grumpy

By: Chap

Chap — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 05:00:33 +0000

So. I used to work at a place that might be relevant to this post. You may remember how grumpy I was about certain things in the ’05-07 timeframe.

I’m not comfortable mentioning much further in this forum, but I will say that (a) during that tour I agonized over going to my congressman or similar painful measures, a tough decision that resulted in my instead working as best I could as a junior field grade to stop some of the worst stupid ideas, and (b) some of the Air Force mistakes are a result of a loud and intense shift of focus at the combatant command level away from the traditional mission of my command to other, sexier things. For example, some of those 2000 people were given away to other commands as part of that shift.

I think there is “opportunity to improve” (heh) in other places not limited to Air Force and other shoes might drop.

By: Justthisguy

Justthisguy — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 04:32:27 +0000

The Donovan is quite exercised about this, having worked with nukes himself. I think he wrote that one could have to sign a statement of charges just for passing a tool the wrong way when working on or around a nuke.

By: virgil xenophon

virgil xenophon — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 03:38:50 +0000

Odds are these are just the guys playing musical chairs when the music stopped…the people REALLY responsible for the long slide into casual incompetence are lonnnggggg gone–retired, playing golf and reading the WSJ with their morning coffee at MacDonalds in Sarasota-and with their at-grade pension.