Another mistake I think people make when they discuss police brutality, or war crimes, is to attribute them to some characteristic of the population that joins the military or becomes a police officer. One of my commenters says:
I think a lot of folks who join the military (not to mention police officers and prison guards) have authoritarian or sadistic tendencies which in turn increase the probability of war crimes being committed, especially given the stress of being under fire, in a strange land, among hostile locals.What would you expect from people who sign up for a job where you maim and kill people you don't even know, just because someone else told you to do it?
(sorry if I offend anyone; I know a few of you just signed up for the tuition support or needed the money and got more than you bargained for)
Maybe this is so, but I'm skeptical. I've known a lot of quasi-pacifists with aggressive, domineering personalities and a startling lack of empathy. Give them slightly different political beliefs and an M-16, and I sure wouldn't turn my back on them.
It seems highly probable that there's some selection bias. But a desire to kick some ass is only one reason to become a police officer or a soldier. There's also a desire for justice, an interest in protecting your community, a sense of duty to something larger than yourself, a desire to do something really important with your life, like, say, put it between your beloved home and war's desolation. What do I expect from people like that? Quite a lot, actually.
But as the Milgram experiments show, most people given unlimited power over other human beings tend to abuse that power unless there are adequate institutional safeguards against us. We are natural bullies. And in mobs, we quite often make each other worse. Military culture fights this natural tendency with a pretty rigorous code of conduct--but in the end you've got a bunch of boys out on a corner with big guns. There's only so much that a code of conduct can do.
I think I generally agree with your post, but this statement represents a logical fallacy:
"I've known a lot of quasi-pacifists with aggressive, domineering personalities and a startling lack of empathy. Give them slightly different political beliefs and an M-16, and I sure wouldn't turn my back on them."
Simply put, the predilections of "quasi-pacifists" is irrelevant to your commenter's point. Now if you can point to quasi-pacifists who do join the police and military, that's saying something.
"...but in the end you've got a bunch of boys out on a corner with big guns. "
Now, now, let's give credit where it's due; Lindsy England was no boy.
Even people with the best motives can be prone to be abusive. The people who join for all the right reasons are likely to be the most frustrated. Those who know they are good people feel most justified in breaking the rules if they think it is for the best, and everybody makes mistakes.
The point is, the personality type he's denigrating as peculiarly military seems to be pretty evenly distributed throughout the population.
I would say that one way to verify this assertion is to compare the crimes committed by the force composed of a cross section of the population, as in the draft army, as opposed to the self selected volunteer army. My belief is that such a study would not show a valid statistical difference. The other variable would outweigh the so called "authoritarian or sadistic tendencies".
On a personal level, I would guess that the commenter does not actually know many people in the military. Maybe thier experience is from what is seen on TV or in the movies. My personal observation from 27 years in the Army does not support the assertion.
As someone who served three years in the Army immediately after high school, I think the original commenter is completely clueless. He left out the qualification most democrats ascribe to military members, which is extreme low intelligence.
Most people I know now have no idea what I was doing 25 years ago. It is frequent for them to start all manner of slander against people in the military, having never known any. When I object, the response I get is usually one of shock, followed by "but you're not the military type". The honest ones will come right out an list intelligence and kindness as things they believe members of the military lack.
As far as authoritarian or sadistic tendencies, my experience is that they are no more or less common than among the general population. There are times in the military when you MUST be authoritarian, or someone is going to get hurt. Despite the Hollywood depictions, I never met any sadists, including my Drill instructors. They had a tough job but were genuinely good men who I respect and admire 25 years later.
The point is, the personality type he's denigrating as peculiarly military seems to be pretty evenly distributed throughout the population.
...and at this point we're into the realm of assertion without any real evidence on either side of the argument, as TGriffith suggests. Probably best to just point this out and move on.
Oh, and for the record, I opposed this war as strategically stupid and a complete misuse of the military. It's instructive that those that made the decision to wage it, like Bush and Hilliary Clinton, have not pressured their own offspring to join up.
Kudos, JimS. I too think it outrageous that the Bush daughters did not join the military upon graduation. (OK, they'd have to be held out of harms way, but the could have done critical jobs stateside). Daddy gives speech after speech about how important the war on terrorism is, and his kids are hanging around nightclubs. The old Vietnam era taunt still applies: "You dig it, you go."
But a desire to kick some ass is only one reason to become a police officer or a soldier.
Well heck, when things get physical cops usually end up on the losing end. It's quite common to hear of some suspect violently resisting arrest, and as a result five cops need medical treatment for injuries. Maybe some police forces have higher physical standards, but the average NYPD cop looks like he'd lose a fistfight with the typical 15-year-old ghetto gangbanger.
Well said Megan. I am pretty much a pacifist liberal but I think you are spot on here.
So obvious credit goes to John McCain then, for having "skin in the game". As well as to many of the current top Army leadership. (noted as a parent with two children in the Army)
Say, JimS and creech - do you have college graduate kids in their early 20's? Or even high school graduate kids 18 or 19? Anyone who talks about "sending" your adult children into the military has no clue. And who can tell whether someone is "pressuring" their kids to do anything? I can tell you I try to pressure my teenage kids to do a lot of things that don't get done.
These are grownups. They make their own decisions. Putting responsibility on parents for the life decisions of their adult children is absurd.
I've worked in and around the military all of my adult life and the only personality differences I've noticed are that, in general, military folks are smarter, better educated, and more self-motivated than the civilian population. Megan hit the nail on the head with the Milgram experiments. Personality has nothing to do with it. It's just an ugly fact of human nature that people tend to abuse authority.
AK Mike,
Fair enough, and yea, I have children. I should have criticized HRC for not having served herself, but being very willing to send other people's kids, especially in a situation where there was no clear and present danger (only a murky potential danger.) My parents weren't thrilled with me heading out at 17 for the Army (they signed under the threat that if I had to wait until I was 18 I'd join the Marines, which they viewed as more dangerous).
I doubt that in either Clinton or Bush's case they would encourage their kids to join. Unlike WW II, this is a danger only grave enough for other's kids.
Again, to consistency: One can't claim that a group such as the military does not harbor any particular sort, and yet at the same time talk about 'liberal' academia, or 'liberal' media.
Hmm, how to respond. This is a tough one. Let me try this one on for size: YOU GUYS HAVE NO CLUE!
Authoritarian? Sadistic?
The vast majority of folks serving in the military are on the bottom of the rank structure. They can't be authoritarian, because they don't have any authority nor anyone to be authoritarian over.
Sadistic? Why on earth would a sadist want to join the military? And believe me, any time someone is found with sadistic tendencies, they are kicked out as quickly as possible.
The last thing we want in the military are folks who will let their personal preferences and tendencies to override common sense and the accomplishment of the mission.
People with authoritarian and/or sadistic tendencies are much more likely to become prison guards, where at least you do have some chance to be authoritarian or sadistic.
There is a vast difference between the jobs of police, prison guards, and the military. If you think they are but different aspects of the same thing, you don't know what you are talking about.
SoV, that's ridiculous. The military is overwhelmingly conservative, particularly the officer corps (although I believe less so than it used to be). There's a difference between personality type and political beliefs.
One can't claim that a group such as the military does not harbor any particular sort, and yet at the same time talk about 'liberal' academia, or 'liberal' media.
There's only so much that a code of conduct can do.
Yeah. Especially when the top of the chain of command is deliberately trying to void it.
Megan hit the nail on the head with the Milgram experiments.
Actually, she was wide of the mark. The Milgram experiments did not show that "most people given unlimited power over other human beings tend to abuse that power unless there are adequate institutional safeguards against us."
Rather, they showed that there is a strong bias towards trusting/following institutional authority, even when it goes against one's own better judgment (these are frequently thought of as 'obedience' experiments). The subjects in the experiment frequently expressed their own discomfort; they were not engaging in a self-directed sadistic power exercise.
(The Stanford Prison Experiment might lead to these conclusions, but despite its fame, it was a very poorly run experiment that makes conclusions difficult to draw).
But as the Milgram experiments show, most people given unlimited power over other human beings tend to abuse that power unless there are adequate institutional safeguards against us.
This is similar to but not identical with what Philip Zimbardo argues in The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. He conducted the famous Stanford Prison Experiment and writes in the book about how the Abu Ghraib scandal took place.
Zimbardo's main thesis, IIRC, is that the conditions in which power dynamics operate -- like prisons -- can affect the way people behave. And the culture and operating conditions within those conditions can end up being powerful disinhibitors of social norms. The book is very much worth reading for people interested in these kinds of issues.
It's true that I was painting with an overly wide brush in my earlier post; perhaps trolling a little bit. I'm sure there are all sorts in the military from those driven by financial necessity, to those driven by some sense of patriotism or duty (which, how well guided, is a matter left to individual judgment), to yes, those with an authoritarian streak. But in lieu of some solid data either way, I will cling to my assertion that, though not everyone in the military may be a sadist (perhaps that was overly strong language to use in the first place), I think the military (and in general work in the euphemistically named "security services") does have an intrinsic appeal to people who are authoritarian in nature and this is reflected accordingly in the ranks, though of course I must give credit to the folks who try to do right by the people of Iraq, report atrocities, and so forth.
It is true that the Milgram experiment and the Stanford prison experiment demonstrated that a shockingly wide array of average folks would commit atrocities when given positions of authority, or under the belief that their actions were sanctioned by a higher authority, but as Megan herself suggests, I have to think there is some self-selection going on for people to find themselves in positions of martial authority in the first place (whether it be over American prisoners or hapless Iraqi civilians).
It's also true that I don't know very many folks in the military, save for my late grandfather who was in the Navy back in World War II. He never talked about it much, but I know that it left its interminable mark on him (I always would come across guns and knives hidden around my grandparents house in the strangest places as a kid). My grandfather nonwithstanding, I don't think military folks and I really see eye to eye, so I keep my distance.
But to return to the Milgram experiment and the lessons of World War II in general, I think an interesting lesson was, as it came to be known, the "banality of evil". I think we can all agree that what happened at places like Abu Ghraib and Mahmoudiyah was despicable. But what about the guys that fly the rendition planes? The guards at Guantanamo Bay? The logistics that moved that bomb that accidentally got dropped on a wedding party? The lawyers back in Washington who try to create legal cover for using "enhanced interrogation techniques"? Even those who don't personally hold a weapon are nonetheless cogs in the military machine, and for the military, the job is ultimately dominance through deadly force.
Other commentators have suggested that war is an inevitable part of human nature and that to deny this fact is to set oneself up for conquest. Though I don't like it and will complain accordingly about the barbarity of human nature in posts such as these, I do have to acknowledge reality. I do not concur, however, with the idea that you can cast away all moral standards and say that, "war is hell". I do not agree that, because it is the "enemy", anything goes.
For all the atrocities committed by all sides in World War II, contrast the American treatment of German POWs; generally better than that which they received within the ranks of their own army; with that of the hapless Arabs interred in Guantanamo Bay and other such American facilities worldwide. Even the Wehrmacht generally followed the Geneva Conventions with regard to their Anglo POWs (not so much for the Slavs and others, however).
The war in Iraq was not a defensive war. It is an offensive war (based upon false pretenses, no less); which is a war crime in and of itself. Atrocities have been committed that are gravely at odds with the principles for which America claims to stand, and I find this bothersome.
There is a difference between realpolitik and hypocrisy. Realpolitik was perhaps to leave Saddam be and look the other way regarding his brutal governance. But hypocrisy is to commit acts of the very same nature by our own hands and of our own will.
the hapless Arabs interred in Guantanamo Bay
I think we can all agree that burying people alive is a bad thing.
Actually "interred in Guantanamo Bay" would probably mean they were drowned.
Sigh. Number one, I never said 'personality types'; you did(I went with, 'of a particular sort' because it's just as vague as what's being tossed around here, but at least it has the virtue of not pretending to be anything but vague.) Number two, your views on what constitutes a 'liberal' (as are the views of a lot of conservatives) can most charitably described as protean. And most certainly 'liberal' does not mean 'votes Democrat'. Nor does voting a Democratic ticket imply that one is a 'liberal'. Number three, look at what you wrote below, not even a day ago:
So it's easy for you to characterize academics as 'bitter', but impossible to visit a label of comparative denotations on the military (of whatever branch or rank)?
That's simply not being consistent.
No, there isn't any such rule. But then again, I didn't say anything about the general case, did I? I compared the military, the media, and academia. If you want to argue that it's true for one of these groups, but not for either of the other two, it behooves you to actually present the argument.
Are you going to present that argument?
And most certainly 'liberal' does not mean 'votes Democrat'. Nor does voting a Democratic ticket imply that one is a 'liberal'.
I suspect there may be a statistically significant correlation in both cases, though. I'm sure there's someone here who could give scratch up a p-value or two on the subject.
I should mention, though, that as academics do not seem overly prone to cling to God or guns, they may not be as bitter as some believe.
Are you going to present that argument?
No. I've never met a bitter status-obsessed academic, so I lack the anecdotes necessary for the creation of data.
Also, this whole post is a diversion from the actual issue at hand: Megan's feelings on war crimes. It is much more likely that selection bias would be a significant factor among the national leadership or at the upper levels of the police and military. The executives and commanders set the tone and establish the "rules of engagement" for the line personnel, and the characteristics that make for one possible path to successful career advancement (ambition, drive, singlemindedness, ruthlessness, etc.) can easily be the same as those that make up a potential war criminal. Add in ideological and moral predispositions (e.g. religious fundamentalism, latent racism, exceptionalism and chauvinism) and self-selection within the service (through political appointments and forced retirements) to remove more level-headed people who act as a brake on excesses and you have a recipe for disaster.
Um, all of these anecdotes are very touching, really, but the poster was at least referencing what is a very well established school of scholarship dealing with the existence (and possible causes) of authoritarian personalities in police officers and military personnel. When we're talking about something that is the basis of an entire discipline, don't you think we should at least mention the hundreds of studies that have been done on the topic testing its validity, shortcomings, and causation? I mean, I know we're not aiming too high here on the old Internet, but really now...
Well, I can speak from personal experience (active duty USAF) that I am not a sadist.
Frankly, I find it kind of insulting that one would think that that sort of mindset would be attracted to the military.
Conservative does not necessarily mean sadist, after all. In fact, I think a majority of the military aren't quite libertarian conservatives. Look at who the military has supported most in donations... AFAIK, it was Ron Paul and then Barack Obama.
As far as my own personal reason for joining? I would like to think I'm patriotic, and I enjoy doing protection our country. Yes, I do of course get benefits such as health care and great education, plus I get to see the world, so it's not a one-sided street by any means. But I think, even if there weren't those benefits there, that I would've enlisted anyways. If only, to make sure that I'm in that situation, and not one of these sadists that are so prevalent. ;)
TGriffith's point is a very good one. A comparison of atrocities committed by volunteer/professional armies versus atrocities committed by conscripts would be most useful. I strongly suspect that you would actually see more atrocities committed by conscripts drawn from the general population than you would see in a professional army. Anecdotally, at the turn of the last century, state militias deployed to the Philippines committed the bulk of the atrocities versus the U.S. Army (volunteers) also deployed. I think one of the reasons for this is the mob mentality. Military violence isn't just group violence, but organized violence. The "organized" part is critical and military discipline and training are far less about getting somebody to kill on command who would otherwise not be so inclined as it is to get them to stop on command. (And do lots of other unnatural things, such as not run away when being attacked, not chase a retreating enemy until told to do so, actually aim your gun before shooting, etc. etc.) After all, mobs kill people all the time and the history (as well as psychology) is replete with examples of "ordinary" people doing very nasty things under stress conditions. Mao's China, Pol Pot's Cambodia, the Rape of Nanking are just a few examples.
Consequently, it hardly seems surprising that a professional military, with people drilled over and over to do very specific things that run against the grain of a million years of human evolution and psychology might also be less inclined to commit atrocities.
All that said, some armies (and police forces) are better trained and more disciplined.
(sorry if I offend anyone; I know a few of you just signed up for the tuition support or needed the money and got more than you bargained for)
Um, no. Those of us who signed up in the middle of a war know what we got ourselves into.
Also, from my limited experience (just under 2 years in the AF), sadists and such are a tiny minority. I think I've met one, or possibly 2.
I'm with JimS and SeanH, the best part about the military is the quality of people you work with.
None of this is particularly relevant to what has happened in the US over the past 7 years. What has happened here is that, beginning with Dick Cheney's musings that we are "going to have to go to some dark places", the political leadership of the country has deliberately removed the "pretty rigorous code of conduct" which the military had in place to discourage torture and other anarchic abuses of power. They did so on the long-discredited theory that legal restraints make us less safe by restraining our soldiers from doing what needs to be done.
The fact that torture has occurred in every military conflict regardless of efforts to restrain it is neither here nor there. What happened in the US was that the political leadership deliberately encouraged torture. And some in the military went along.
I also think Megan is ignoring the fact that US soldiers seem to have committed dramatically less violence against the civilian populations in Kuwait, during the Gulf War, than they have in Iraq. This feels almost like a tautology, but it goes to the heart of the difference between defensive and aggressive wars. When you're freeing territory which someone else has occupied, you won't have as much hostility from the local population, and you'll be able to leave quicker.
You can argue that wars like the Israeli invasions of Lebanon or the US's occupation of Afghanistan were necessary because those territories harbored non-state actors carrying out violence against other states. But it's hardly surprising that these sorts of wars do indeed lead to more war crimes, as we've traditionally defined them, than clearly defensive wars.
It's also true that I don't know very many folks in the military, save for my late grandfather who was in the Navy back in World War II. He never talked about it much, but I know that it left its interminable mark on him (I always would come across guns and knives hidden around my grandparents house in the strangest places as a kid). My grandfather nonwithstanding, I don't think military folks and I really see eye to eye, so I keep my distance.
Yes, I think that would be best.
I really don't regard you as fit to keep the company of warriors, anyway. You might get some integrity rubbed off on you. You wouldn't know what to do with it.
Geez...can it be that your late grandfather is the ONLY vet you knew?
You're drawing this ignorant assumption from a sample of ONE?
You pathetic bigot.
Steenwyk, why do you use the word "warrior"? It is anachronistic and not a good fit with the tasks or responsibilities of most US military personnel. It also sounds somewhat childish.
Thank you to this sector of the political spectrum for finally being honest about your dislike of the military! I always thought your aloof sympathy in the comments "Bring Our Troops Home!" was a little disingenious in the "support" realm, and military affairs were only discussed when politically adavantageous (e.g. "The Bush administration can't even provide healthcare for people with PTSD!"...as if some of you people even care).
Very Respectfully,
LT Nixon, some "boy" on the corner with a "big gun".
brooksfoe, Liberalrob states "Add in ideological and moral predispositions (e.g. religious fundamentalism, latent racism, exceptionalism and chauvinism) and self-selection within the service (through political appointments and forced retirements) to remove more level-headed people who act as a brake on excesses and you have a recipe for disaster." when talking about our Commanders and you have a problem with JVS using the word "warriors"? The fact that the use of the word seems "childish" to you says more about you than it does about JVS.
brooksfoe clearly hasn't spent time on my base, where the "anachronism" is alive and well, thanks. "Warrior" is a useful and honorable term indicating our particular calling.
Being that there's a war on and all that.
======
Megan, I find your commentary here a bit odd, as if you're an anthropologist trying to characterize some alien society you've glimpsed on occasion. Come on and visit us military folks some time at work. We look kind of like we might even be in the same society on occasion, bathe sometimes and have been known to speak the same language as you.
For instance, the milblogosphere has chewed over Dave Grossman's "wolf/sheepdog/sheep" characterization at length over the last several years. This characterization is an overcompression and easily misused but can get quickly and effectively at the heart of the argument I think you're trying to make. It might be worth a look.
brooksfoe,
Dude. You need to get out more. Seriously. You've got your head shoved so far up your fourth point of contact it's gonna take the jaws of life to extract it.
To be a "warrior" is the first job and responsibility of every uniformed service member. To that effect, the first rung of training in the NCO educational system of the U.S. Army is called the "Warrior Leader Course."
Further, maybe you should meet my friend Luis. Luis was my supply sergeant. He took a frag to the head.
You should also meet my friend Ernesto. Ernesto was another one of my soldiers. He was a medic. Ernesto lost three fingers on his right hand thanks to a moojie RPG in the summer of 2003.
He wrapped it up and continued treating the wounded, until he could be evacuated. Another one of my medics, SGT Ruiz, took a mortar frag to the face in July of 2003.
Those are just a few. SSG Craig, a truck driver attached to my battalion from the Iowa Guard, was killed when the helicopter he was flying in was shot down.
He drove trucks. And he was a warrior, too, and I'll have some serious words with anyone who suggests otherwise. Same goes with all of them.
Nearly everyone in country leaves the wire. Everyone who suits up and leaves the wire, or mans a sentry post on the perimeter is a warrior.
My admin clerks regularly pulled security on convoys between Ramadi and Baghdad. They had SAWS and drivers licenses. And they were and are fine warriors and I'd go out with them again.
They are warriors, all. And you know what? So are the men and women that turn wrenches, literally, until they collapse from exhaustion, or work themselves until leaders have to put them to bed for their own safety.
Sorry, brooksfoe. I don't need your lecture on who's a warrior. And neither does anyone I know in uniform.
We CLEP'd out of your class.
Now crawl back to your hovel, and thank your lucky stars that better men and women than you are protecting your sheltered existence.
One of my favorite movies about military culture is "A Few Good Men" (I'm also partial to "The Caine Mutiny"). Its plot clearly illustrates what I consider to be the main issue we're discussing here: line personnel with the most honorable of motives are ordered to commit a violation of the official code of conduct, because their commander thinks it necessary to enforce discipline. The thing goes south and they wind up accidentally killing the soldier the commander was trying to "train," and then rather than owning his ordering the action up front the commander tries to cover it up (or at least his involvement). When the commander is called to testify at the court-martial of the line Marines, he makes a long-winded speech about honor and duty and warriors manning the walls while effete sheeplike citizens sleep soundly in their beds secure in the safety he provides through his leadership; what moral right can the sheep then claim to criticize the manner in which he provides that safety? But the fact remained that he ordered the commission of an act that went against the code of conduct governing the military, and ordered that a crime be committed; and regardless of how lofty and high-minded his intent might have been, he did order that violation. So he was punished for it. We are a nation of laws, not of men, even in the military.
I have absolutely no criticisms at all for most of the people who carry out the orders and do the fighting and dying in Iraq, Afghanistan, and everywhere else they are called on to do it. They are all heroes. Like those Marines in A Few Good Men, they do need to exercise some basic moral judgment in carrying out orders; you don't give up your knowledge of right and wrong when you take the oath, and that's what some of the displeasure here is about. But I realize that there often isn't time to think about whether what you're doing is the right thing to do, and there is a lot of conditioning to push our troops to default toward following orders without questioning them; so a heavier responsibility HAS to fall on the commanders who are giving those orders. Those are the people who most deserve scorn, those people like Col. whatshisname Miller who came up with the interrogation regime used at Guantanamo and then exported it to Abu Ghraib. Where's his court-martial? Beyond that, where is the investigation into the people who ordered Col. Miller to come up with those techniques? Where is their indictment and trial?
That's what I'm talking about, Jason, LT Nixon, and whoever else wants to think I "hate the military." I don't hate the military. I hate what's being done with it (and to it).
You ever stop to think that maybe Hollywood movies are a pretty stupid place from which to draw your analogies and your impressions of military people?
The point is, the personality type he's denigrating as peculiarly military seems to be pretty evenly distributed throughout the population.
Especially the anti-war hippies. Megan really fears the hippies. We talk a good game about peace and love, but we really want to rip her head off.
Any empirical study of the military and veterans (and yes, I've done it) will show that they are 1) better educated than the general populace, 2) employed in higher numbers than the general populace, 3) less likely to commit suicide than the general populace and 4) less like to suffer from psychological problems than the general populace.
This is true of the present, all volunteer, military, but it was also true of the conscripted military that fought in Vietnam.
All of these facts fly in the face of the generally accepted liberal view, especially as portrayed in the liberal media (but I repeat myself.) They are facts nonetheless. All the liberal claims about "the poor, the underprivileged and the minorities" who are "forced" into the military (because they're apparently too stupid or uneducated to find any other work) are baseless and insulting.
Many of the commenters here have gone out of their way to "excuse" the "grunts" while blaming their commanders for supposed actions that have taken place. One commenter went so far as to claim that the inmates at Guantanamo Bay have been treated much worse than German prisoners were treated during WWII. This without any facts to back up his claim.
In fact, the inmates at Guantanamo are treated *better* than German prisoners were treated. Every study has shown this to be true.
As to the claims of torture - there has not been one documented case of torture brought to light, despite the fulminating claims of those on the left. (And no, waterboarding is not torture. We waterboard our own troops during training. Furthermore, Congress approved the use of waterboarding, all their lying protestations for the cameras notwithstanding.)
You realize it's not wise to criticize the "guys on the ground" so you claim they're lead by unethical commanders without the slightest thought to what that claim says about those who follow without complaint.
You claim they're placed in an untenable position - asked to fight a war that is unjust or criminal - without thinking about what that says about the "guys on the ground" who re-enlist in amazingly high numbers and volunteer to go to the war zone.
The bottom line is, you don't like the military and you hate conservatives.
It would be nice if you could be honest enough to admit that, but liberals are seldom honest about anything, so that hope is vain in the extreme.
Until you can demonstrate that the impressions are inaccurate, I have no reason to.
Those movies were very sympathetic and respectful towards the military, I thought.
This statement is complete baloney. Exactly the opposite is true. I know for a fact that the Red Cross has reported on abuses.
That's all we need to know about your philosophy.
Obviously a lie, as I spent considerable time discussing this very point.
The bottom line is, I do like the military. And I do hate "conservatives" like you who state blatant untruths and try to wrap themselves in the flag as though they were the only true patriots. You have damaged this country severely but now your time in power is ending. Hope you enjoyed it.
Hollywood portrays the military just as realistically as it does portraying lawyers. Or doctors. You know, how they're all attractive and have sex in closets and have such exciting lives?
Anyway, I'm about to retire after 20 years in the Navy, and to talk to me for five minutes, you'd never guess I was military with my libertarian leanings of which I'm all-too-quick to voice. And I don't look real "military," either, other than the short hair, I guess, but I'm not a high-and-tight fanatic about that.
My point is -- if I have one -- is that we're pretty much like the general population. There are some soft-hearted guys, some Earth-Mother types, lots of sports fans (like me), plenty of eggheads, country boys and hip-hop dudes, and, unfortunately, a small fraction of hard-core sadists about which Megan's commentor is correct. But only a small fraction. And those dinosaurs aren't very welcome.
Unfortunately, and to continue to take this conversation off on a tangent, I have to agree that the term "warrior" as currently used by our military is anachronistic, silly, and basically just PR. Sure, it makes it easier to recruit people and makes people feel nice about being in the military. But it is anachronistic, and has been for centuries. The term "warrior" deliberately harkens back to a time when fighting was individualized and, as commonly used, involves a "warrior ethos" in a society that emphasizes a individualistic caste-based honor code distinct from other elements of society. The ancient Greeks had warriors, as did feudal Europe and Japan. By contrast, what we have today are soldiers (yes, even the Marines). As did the Romans, the Prussians, and pretty much every modern army. The difference is in specialization, discipline and the focus on the unit rather than the individual.
This isn't just an academic distinction -- it has real ramifications for how we think of our military and how the military views its role in society. For example, in the Iliad, the greatest of the warriors, Achilles, essentially goes on strike when he feels his commander, Agammenon, disses him. No soldier would do that. A soldier follows lawful orders. Also (and, of course, this is where the current PR campaign comes in), warriors, being individuals and drawn from a separate caste, fight for themselves, for honor, etc. etc. Soldiers subsume their individuality and fight for a greater good, for the societies from which they are drawn.
In other words, IMHO, having to use the term "warrior" to recruit people these days is just another example of a "me"-based society. A real shame, because the title "soldier" seems much more honorable.
"liberalrob" smugly proclaims, in response to my statement
"This statement is complete baloney. Exactly the opposite is true. I know for a fact that the Red Cross has reported on abuses."
Yes, they have. If you read the (NY Times!) article, what they have done is redefine torture to the same types of techniques that were used in Waco by federal agents. Strange how that was never called torture at the time. I suppose it's because Billy Boy was in charge and the people being "tortured" were those detestable cultists.
"liberalrob" continues, in response to this
"That's all we need to know about your philosophy."
Don't forget to mention that it's also the philosophy of your Congresspersons, including Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and others, all of whom not only approved waterboarding but were concerned that the interrogators weren't being aggressive enough. Not that they'll admit that *now*, in front of cameras, mind you. (Unfortunately for them, it's on the record.)
You can attempt to change the meaning of words to "win" an argument, but intelligent people will chuckle and shake their heads at your lack of integrity. It's a typical liberal tactic to change the rules constantly to "win" arguments.
"liberalrob" then protests too much
So, boiling it all down, "liberalrob" has the highest respect for military grunts, even if they don't disobey orders (although he wishes they would), but the leadership - well, that's another story. They're all complicit, scoundrels who fool those poor fellows on the ground into committing awful war crimes that their indoctrination and/or the stress of the moment prevents them from realizing are crimes.
Sort of the John Kerry line of attack. Like Ghengis Khan, only they're heroes I tell you.
Yeah, you love the military all right. {{{snicker}}}
liberalrob: You may like the military. You say you do (I suspect in the same way you like children or puppies, even though you look down your nose at them and don't respect them).
So maybe you do like the military. But don't think you understand the military.
Watching movies about the military doesn't count.
Here's one good clue that perhaps the person talking about the military has no military experience, and their views are based on Hollywood movies: They think that in the military the leadership (officers and NCO) and subordinates are at odds with each other. They think that the officers gives commands, and the enlisted troops grudgingly follow orders, knowing that they are wrong, but feeling powerless to change things. Based on this perception, they naturally push the blame for soldiers actions up the chain of command to leaders who coerced them into doing what they did not want to do.
My experience: I have yet to experience a situation where the leaders and followers where not working together, toward a common mission that they all agreed on as a worthy goal. I'm sure disconnects between leaders and soldiers do happen, but I've seen no indication that this was the case in Iraq, or even in Abu Griab, or Guantanamo Bay. Am I wrong?
We military folks (I'm a Vietnam-era vet) have a long tradition of griping and bitching about command. We're a lot like Americans and their politicians. We love our supervisor (in most cases) but we bitch about people above them who make what we consider stupid decisions.
But (most of us) follow orders without question, *especially* when lives are on the line (which isn't just in combat, btw.)
Some leaders we respect and would follow into the gates of hell. Some leaders we follow grudgingly, because we detect that they lack courage or don't care about us or ..... (pick your reason).
Sounds a lot like normal people, doesn't it?
I gotta stick up for liberalrob here. I disagree with most of what he says, and I find him sometimes a little clueless. On the other hand, he does listen to people with something to say. So educate him if you wish, but leave the insults out. Gradually we'll bring him around to the dark side.
liberalrob said:
Do you have any evidence this is actually happening? I've been wearing a uniform for 22 years and have been pretty successful, but I've seen nothing of the kind.
Honestly, I think you're all so fascinated with the trees that you're missing the forest. First, if you take a close look at the combat training members of the U.S. military get, you'll find that a great deal of effort is expended to break down normal human behaviors (run away or shoot everything that moves) and develop the reflexes and discipline needed to behave morally when you don't have time to think.
Second, you're all flailing and speculating about Machiavellian behavior at the highest levels of the military, but do you have anything other than suspicions and innuendo to prove it's going on? I ask this because history belies the truth of the matter if you care to examine it.
For instance, if you look back on the history of where individual Americans went wrong at places like Abu Ghraib, My Lai and No Gun Ri, you'll find that the biggest failures were not that America's elected and appointed leaders were giving heinous orders the boots on the ground were blindly folowing. The biggest failures have always been that the leaders weren't adequately overseeing and enforcing moral standards and they were trying to supress the truth when it started to leak out.
This is, of course completely the opposite of the behavior of the leadership and followers in Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, the Soviet Union and a few modern day countries that I won't name here. In those cases, brutality was not merely permitted, but enforced from the top down. Americans have no doubt committed atrocities that have caused the deaths of hundreds or maybe even thousands of people, but it can be argued that the aforementioned bad actors systematically exterminated hundreds of millions.
Indeed, perhaps the biggest challenge the American military faces in combatting radical Islam is that we do have lines we will not cross.
This notion that warriors don't exist is just moronic. (Someone already mentioned the "wolf/sheep/sheepdog" analogy, which I think is as good as any.
The fact is that you CAN be a soldier and not be a warrior (Lynndie England seems like an apt example), and you can be a warrior without being a soldier ("Let's Roll!"). The distinction is important and useful. And simply because the term has resonance in antiquity does not make it an anachronism.
Those who are advancing the argument that the 'warrior' construct is "silly" are really advancing the argument that all modern militaries are made up of technicians.
Not the victorious ones.
Great soldiers have always known there is a difference between a soldier and a warrior. Napoleon said that the moral is to the physical as three is to one. When he said that, he was recognizing that an army of warriors can and will defeat an army of technicians three times its size.
I can't recall who said it, but another great captain also wrote that an army of sheep led by a lion is more powerful than an army of lions led by a sheep.
He was also recognizing that there is a difference between the warrior and the tree hugger.
David Hackworth, one of America's most decorated soldiers, also knew the difference and wrote about it extensively in the last 15 years of his life.
What's happening here is that the virtues of the warrior, or sheepdog - call it what you will - are so foreign to the sheep that they cannot even conceive of them. And so, in order to preserve their own misguided sense of self-worth, they will do their best to discount those hard-won honors that accrue to warriors. They dismiss the very term 'warrior' as "silly."
Warriors know different.
But trying to explain that to a sheep is like trying to explain "up" to a Flatlander.
Robert P., as I said before.... none of the warriors I've been privileged to associate with needs your college lecture on how they are not warriors, and that the concept is outdated, silly, or pure PR.
They CLEPd out of your class.
Oh, and I'd ask your college for a refund. The liberal arts weinies didn't serve you very well.
Jason, interesting point about Napoleon, given that his was the first technician army (he himself an artillery officer drawn from outside the traditional military caste). His French army, drawn up of recruits from all elements of French society, led by officers drawn from the middle classes, elevated based on merit and technical competence, positively trounced Prussia's "warrior-based" military drawn from the Junker aristocrats. If you don't believe me, read Clausewitz. He was there.
Saying we have a military of soldiers is not to denigrate the moral component. Indeed, it makes that component ever more important. Discipline is, fundamentally, a matter for a modern soldier army. By contrast, the warriors of old were just a step above a mob.
I apologize if this comes out as a double posting.
For thousands of years armies struggled against the warrior ethos to bring soldierly discipline to combat. The decisive element of this was shown in the modern era when the English spent some quality time learning to stand in formation and stab to the left with their bayonets. With this soldier's response to a direct attack, the English were able to destroy the Scottish warriors. Soldiers fighting together beat warriors fighting for their own glory.
The problem came about in the growing urbanization of modern societies when the barbarian virtues were smothered under the burden of bureaucratic loading. Today we work diligently to reawaken the best elements of the barbarian inside the disciplined framework of the soldier. When we say that our soldiers are warriors, we are saying they are more than irrational killing monsters...they are thinking, disciplined, skilled military athletes who can effectively explode with violence against the enemy as a team.
It is a degree of refinement of military culture beyond the comprehension of our primary enemies who are barbarian warriors incapable of higher coordinated functioning. It bothers a lot of us in military service that the self-proclaimed academic elite are so satisfied with their own comprehension but still cannot accurately observe or describe what we are. It bother us that we have brutal barbarians we are at war with abroad and insipid bureaucratic twits at home who cannot comprehend the degree of expertise we have achieved.
Well said, Patrick.
But to lay another historical contextualization on top of everything else, there was nothing new about the British learning to stand and fight in formation. This concept was already highly developed by the ancient Greeks, among others.
The hoplite phalanxes of antiquity were an effective means of harnessing the strength of the conscript. One did not need to be a warrior, as we think of it, in order to hold his place in the phalanx - at least so long as they perceived that things were going well.
The real slaughter came during the pursuit, though. When one side lost its nerve - either because it had become outflanked, or because it was poorly motivated and poorly led (e.g.,, led by a nonwarrior), the phalanx broke. And then the poor hoplites were mowed down by the hundreds by cavalrymen, acting as part of a combined arms team.
The side that had the greater preponderance of warriors to frightened conscripts eager to skedaddle at the first opportunity has the advantage. Always has, always will.
The man in the British formations, and the man in the Greek or Roman or Macedonian phalanx, or the conscript in Napoleon's Grande Armee, was under no obligation to close with and destroy the enemy under his own initiative.
The modern professional army that this republic is blessed with, however, is composed of soldiers that ARE expected to do just that - and expected to do so as part of a very small unit: A platoon, a squad, a fire team.
Frequently, in urban fighting such as we see in Iraq, and most noteably Fallujah, a squad involved in a firefight may have only an occasional glimpse of the other squads in a platoon.
If your squad is storming a house, it may be the only element in the house. At that point, it is a war to the death, and frequently a war to the death between individuals, or three Marines on a fire team that happen to be first through the door.
The fight is over by the time the rest of the squad makes it down the hall.
True, you have to have some technical skills to keep your gear working and your Humvees maintained and your PAC-4 zeroed on your weapon.
But Robert, and liberalrob, if you think these men who took Fallujah are primarily technicians and can not be described as warriors, well, you're the insipid bureaucratic twits that Patrick described.
Lt.Cdr. van Avery:
In the absence of perfect information, an analyst must extrapolate on the basis of what information is available. There is a chance that the analysis will be wrong; but when some kind of analysis is required, you don't back off from it because there is some chance you might be wrong. You minimize it as much as you can, make your point, and then wait to see if you were right.
Do I have any evidence that more ambitious, ruthless, driven officers are enjoying more success in their careers than more careful, thoughtful officers? Not a lot. I do know that Gen. Shinseki retired (and likely was forced to retire) because his opinions on the required force levels for a successful occupation of Iraq were not palatable to the civilian leadership (and that he has been proven correct in every respect). I do know that Gen. Franks resigned as soon as he could because his advice on how to proceed with the invasion and occupation was constantly disregarded by that same civilian leadership. I do know that there has been an almost constant parade of generals retiring and then blasting the administration for their arrogance and incompetence. I do know that Col. Geoffrey Miller enjoyed promotion to Major General following his "innovation" of the interrogation tactics used at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, now widely suspected to involve techniques considered illegal under international law. And I do know that Gen. Petraeus has enjoyed significant career advancement (and was just promoted to CENTCOM commander) while obsequiously reaffirming every pronouncement of an administration that has been proven to be the most prevaricating, secretive, and incompetent in recent memory. So if I've made a mistake in my analysis, by all means point it out.
I agree with your statement about the way troops are trained. I think I alluded to that very point.
If we are flailing and speculating, and you have information that would straighten us out, you need to present it. I respectfully disagree with you that "history belies the truth of the matter." In fact history appears to overwhelmingly confirm the truth of the matter: our civilian leadership at the highest levels authorized and perhaps ordered the implementation of policies that encouraged, and perhaps explicitly required, the commission of war crimes; and our military commanders faithfully carried out those directives apparently without question. Do we have ALL the details? No; but they are coming out, slowly, despite the furious and quite effective efforts of the administration (aided by a compliant, obedient military leadership that they have carefully cultivated) to prevent it.
It's interesting that you lump in Abu Ghraib with My Lai. Let's for the moment accept your analysis that it was a case of "the leaders [not] adequately overseeing and enforcing moral standards." Would they have had to oversee and enforce moral standards if the operation had not been ordered??? Was it not perhaps foreseeable that such an operation ordered in that environment might in fact get out of hand? Given that it did get out of hand, doesn't that constitute criminal negligence? I hope you're not trying to minimize the atrocities committed at My Lai and Abu Ghraib by asserting that, essentially, "mistakes were made?"
When it comes to Abu Ghraib, I'm not particularly interested in the photographs and Lynndie England. I'm more interested in Gen. Geoffrey Miller, Gen. Karpinsky (who should have complained more loudly), Col. Pappas (who was a scapegoat along with Karpinsky, albeit a deserving one), Gen. Sanchez, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, and Vice President Cheney. What did they know, what did they authorize, what orders were given at each level. No, we don't have all the information, but what we do have stinks to high heaven. It needs to come out, and eventually it will.
Agreed, and it's critical to have bright lines, not dim and gray ones that we assert don't apply due to technicalities.
liberalrob,
GEN Shinseki served four years as Chief of Staff of the US Army, the highest rank in the Army and then he retired. He was not forced to retire. The maximum term of service for Chief of Staff of the Army is four years. It is traditional to retire after four years in that position. It is the pinnacle of the entire military career.
Secretary Rumsfeld may have hated him, but he did not alter his career path in any significant way. Now, in 1990 the Air Force Chief of Staff was caught leaking sensitive information and fired immediately, so precedent exists for removing the senior officer in a service branch. That did not happen with GEN Shinseki. Admiral Fallon recently retired with time left in his tenure as CENTCOM and is being replaced by GEN Petraeus. That did not happen with GEN Shinseki
This is one of those thing you think you know that is not so. There are a lot of people in the military who are pretty tired of know it alls repeating gossip as if it were fact.
I've talked to a lot of people who've spent time in Abu Ghraib and been seriously tortured...but by Saddam's goons, not the US Army. Abu Ghraib was an atrocity and a failure of leadership by a variety of officers, almost all of whom paid for their failures. The criminals involved received a fair trial and far more leniency than their acts deserved, which is far more than what happened to Saddam's goons. The US Army never has and never will have an squad of designated rapists like Saddam did, which is the kind of depravity you are equating our military with.
Your commentary strikes me as particularly ignorant. You really prove my earlier point about the intellectual failings of civilian "intellectuals".
Patrick:
Then those people need to get out here and refute it. I'm not omniscient, and there's always some bird who doesn't get the word. Quit hiding behind "oh we can't be seen as political, we can't criticize the civilian leadership, we can't publicly question the reasoning behind their orders, we can't be whistleblowers." There are many ways to get the correct information out, if you truly want to correct the record. Lambasting some random ignorant liberal civilian "intellectual" (with insulting "heh heh" quotes) on a blog isn't going to be particularly effective, though I welcome the discussion.
Be very careful about what you accuse me of equating "our military" with. I've been very specific on which parts of "our military" I am discussing; I'm not attacking "our military" as a whole, and never have. And I never said word one about rape squads.
Some of the tactics known to have been used in interrogations under Gen. Miller's "innovative" leadership can easily be construed as rape. So I'm not sure you want to go down that road.
Your commentary strikes me as particularly condescending and insulting. Have a nice day.
liberalrob-
If you do in fact "know that Gen. Shinseki retired (and likely was forced to retire) because his opinions on the required force levels for a successful occupation of Iraq were not palatable to the civilian leadership."
Then why was his succsesor named in April 2002, 10 months BEFORE his statements to the Senate Armed Services Committee concerning troop strength?
liberalrob,
Jason Van Steenwyk has been blogging since 2004, when he was in Anbar province doing the hard work as an Army officer. Google "Blackfive", "Greyhawk", "Michael Yon", "Major John", "Blog of War", "Thunder Run", "Outside the Wire", "Armorgeddon", "David Bellavia", and my business partner "Michael Totten". These people and many others have been telling the soldier's stories from inside and outside for years, accurately and with great insight. Several of these fine people have written books, like Michael Yon's current bestseller "Moment of Truth in Iraq".
We have been putting out the facts and the truthful stories for years. Take some time to read us.
"antimedia":
Pretty good distillation, "antimedia." Although I don't accuse even all of the leadership of being complicit; just some at the very top.
It's too bad that "antimedia" had to preemptively ruin this moment of clarity with misinformation like this:
Perhaps because it wasn't torture. I plugged in "waco torture" on Google and the only thing I found was some nut named Kouri who claimed that blasting loud music at the compound constituted "torture." I suppose that means we were also "torturing" Manuel Noriega when we were trying to get him out of the Papal Legacy in Panama. On second thought, from what I know of the playlist used it might indeed have been torture.
Same can be said of conservatives. No points to "antimedia" here.
Upon further review (because you guys forced me to dig into it) I see that Gen. Shinseki did indeed retire in a traditional manner. Therefore my entire argument falls apart, you win, Iraq is an awesome success, and the dead are all living. You may now do your happy dance. It's 5 PM and I have to head home now.
Seriously, "liberalrob", is this what you think passes for reasoning?
You say
In response to this that I wrote:Then you respond with this "reasoning":So, even though I pointed out that the things done at Waco were not called torture, you searched for "waco torture" and then were surprised to find nothing?It becomes even more clear why you are so confused about factual events that can easily be checked. You repeat the Shinseki canard without so much as an inkling that you've actually checked the story out. You repeat the Guantanamo canards, the rendition canards, the torture canards, without having given a second's thought to actually doing any useful research.
I'm absolutely certain that you also think that Bush lied about uranium in Niger and that Dick Cheney "outed" Valerie Plame when neither is remotely close to the truth.
But it's truth for you, because you choose to be partisan rather than informed. You're the quintessential reason why it's a waste of time to "talk" to liberals. Facts are irrelevant. Liberal "truthes" are all that matter. If the country goes to hell in the process, who cares? You can always blame it on the conservatives.
liberalrob,
I must agree with Antimedia, and obviously, Patrick Lasswell mopped the floor with you.
Alas, we're not done.
You see, you haven't lost the argument because you didn't realize that Shinseki did, in fact, retire on schedule. The fact is that your ignorance on this matter is not the disease itself, but a symptom of a greater failure on your part.
Your failure is in your critical reasoning ability. Your failure is in your inability to discern good sources from bad. Your failure is in your inability to realize that there are a number of commenters on this very thread with decades of military experience between us, and yet you continued to blather on in the face of informed individuals telling you you're wrong.
You've obviously done a lot of this, over the years. Because your fund of information sucks, and your critical faculties are so lacking, you've been led to reach absurd - absolutely ABSURD conclusions, such as your decision that General Karpinsky, one of the most useless oxygen thieves ever to wear a star, is an object of some sympathy, while excoriating a truly remarkable soldier like General Petraeus as an obsequious 'yes man.'
That curious juxtaposition alone should be enough for informed observers to toss you around like a midget on a velcro wall.
But no. You're not a serious thinker. You can't learn from the experience. You can't even concede the Shinseki point gracefully, but Shinseki's the least of your intellectual shortcomings.
You claim that you can't be omniscient, which is fine. Nobody can. But we expect intellectually honest people to be responsible for their own assertions of fact. But this is too much for you, too.
Chief among your shortcomings as a practitioner of critical reasoning was your clinging to Hollywood as a source of your information on and impressions of the military and the people in it.
Honestly, I was flabbergasted. As Andy Sullivan would say, I was gobsmacked. That totally took the cake.
Military people get a kick out of that movie, sure. But not because it's an accurate portrayal of military life. We enjoy it because we recognize Nicholson's character as a charicature. A fictional construct, recognizeable, but with certain qualities exaggerated exponentially beyond the reality in order to provide a dramatic foil for someone else.
In other words, liberalrob, we're mature thinkers, most of us, who can tell the difference between fact and fiction.
You got smoked on the Shinseki point. But rather than do the mature thing, and take a close look at the same media sources who lied to you about Shinseki, you are choosing to believe them, still, on everything else.
Well, them and those Hollywood movies.
Sorry, Rob. Reasoning with you is like talking to a petulant teenager. You're not a serious thinker, so go on back to the kiddie table in the basement, and shoot spitballs through a straw at the other milk-throwers.
I'm done.
I have to go off on military duty for a couple of weeks tomorrow.
I've been doing that for 16 years, now...which is one of the reasons I don't need to rely on Hollywood and Huffpo for my information on the military and the people in it.
Meanwhile, I've assembled a good Iraq reading list, so I can educate myself further while I'm away. Primary sources, all, except for Insurgency and Counterinsurgency in Iraq, which was written by a professor of the Naval War College.
That's where I try to get my information.
Enjoy your movies.
Good luck, Jason. Keep your head down. I'll still be here when you get back.
Fine, then you tell me what actions at Waco would have been proscribed by the Geneva Conventions as torture. Because I have no idea what you're talking about.
You can call them "canards" all you want, there is plenty of evidence that all of these "canards" in fact happened. There's simply no credible debate anymore.
Yep. Got that right.
Armitage fell on his sword to end the investigation, but it's got the stink of a Rove/Cheney operation. Why did Libby feel it was necessary to obstruct justice if his boss wasn't involved?
If by "not remotely close" you mean "probably incredibly close." But keep going...
Same goes for you and "conservatives." Once again, no points for you.
liberalrob: "Fine, then you tell me what actions at Waco would have been proscribed by the Geneva Conventions as torture. Because I have no idea what you're talking about."
NONE of them!!!! Dude. He just explained it to you! Are you really THAT dense?
As for the Uranium in Niger, go ahead. Point out the lie.
Make my day.
Christ. You'd think you'd learn something from your Shinseki moment. But you're going to beclown yourself yet again, by relying on the same pack of baying hyenas that lied to you about Shinseki.
That is, if they haven't written you off as hopelessly obtuse.
"Same goes for you and "conservatives." Once again, no points for you"
Good luck with the second grade debating skills, dude.
Lasswell was grounding his argument in facts, and he's got you pegged. You walked right into the propeller blade and you don't even know what happened.
God, I hope you're not a teacher.
See ya.
Rob,
I think part of the problem is you don't understand this aspect of how the military works, so let me give you some information that might help you put some things in perspective. The most junior officers are promoted, with a few exceptions, based solely upon time in grade. Once you're up for promotion to "field grade", or major, lt. colonel or colonel or their equivalent, the services convene "selection boards" of more senior officers that select officers to be nominated for promotion based on a "best qualified" standard. You can see what the Navy interpretation of "best qualified" was for this year's Captain selection board here.
Members of the boards are chosen mostly by what jobs they've held and whether they have the time in their duties to sit on a board. Only rarely does an officer get tapped to sit on a board more than once.
Once officers have been selected for nomination, the list of "selectees" must be vetted by the services to make sure the requirements of the law were met and there isn't any bias in the list. Assuming the list makes it up to the service secretaries, the officers on the list are then nominated for promotion by the President, and the Senate gets to review and approve the list. You can see all the checks in the process from selection to confirmation here. An officer cannot get promoted beyond Captain or Lieutenant without Senate confirmation, and they have rejected or refused to act on nominations in the past.
Some recent examples of who the Senate has refused to confirm are a number of Navy and Marine Corps officers involved in the Tailhook shenanigans and Cmdr. Kirk Lippold, the former captain of USS COLE.
For promotion above Captain or Colonel, there's a selection board to nominate officers to get their first star, but after that the Secretary of Defense and service secretaries and chiefs make recommendations to the President, who then nominates them to the Senate. Again, no confirmation, no promotion.
So, basically what you're suggesting is that not only is the military leadership and the executive branch conspiring to promote the "ruthless", so is the U.S. Senate.
Time for another lesson. The only legal authority held by the Vice President is to preside over the Senate. If he comes aboard my ship, I will call him "sir", salute him and break his personal flag at the main truck as signs of respect, but he's not in my chain of command and doesn't have the legal authority to order me to tie my shoes. The law, including not just the Constitution but also the Goldwater-Nichols Act, is very clear on this.
So, while you can passionately assert that the Vice President had evil in his heart and wanted to see people tortured, you can't say he ordered anyone in the military to do so.
As for the rest of the Abu Ghraib issue, the circumstances were investigated by the Ispector General of the Army. Then the investigation was investigated by the Inspector General of the Navy (and believe me, that guy has no institutional loyalty to anyone in green). Assuming you believe that no appointee of the current administration, despite being confirmed by the Senate, has the impartiality, can you nominate a person with no partisan political ties or thoughts to do the job right? Perhaps there's a Mongolian yak herder who's never even heard of America that will do.
There's not much point in continuing this charade, but there is one aspect of the "conversation" that I want to address in parting. The idea that politicians who want to send the troops to war should have "some skin in the game" is detestable beyond belief.
Dick Cheney has "skin in the game" of the oil business. It shouldn't be too much mental gymnastics for anyone to figure out that Cheney working on energy issues involves, at a minimum, a potential conflict of interest. (That's why politicians are required to have blind trusts for their assets, btw.) I doubt there's anyone who would say that Cheney should have the final say on energy issues, if for no other reason than it smacks of impropriety. (That, btw, is why Al Gore's obscene profiting from the global warming farce is so utterly disgusting. Carbon offsets my ass!)
Yet, liberals don't bat an eye when insisting that politicians should have "skin in the game" when they send us to war. The truth is, they're hoping that the politicians' vested interest in not seeing their own flesh and blood harmed would make them more hesitant about committing the troops to war. (Watch them not bring that subject up with McCain, whose own son is a Marine.)
IOW, what they want is corrupt politicians who can be manipulated by self-interest. Mind you, they're looking for the kind that can be manipulated by the same self-interests that they have, but the bottom line is, they see political corruption as a good thing.
That's troubling at a whole 'nother level of troubling. It should trouble anyone who gives more than an inkling of a damn about America and what the future holds for her.
I'll take a principled Joe Lieberman, as troubling as some of his positions are, over 10,000 Al Gores, Bill Clintons, Larry Craigs, Duke Cunninghams or any other of the manifest scalawags that infest our Capital these days.
This thread has fallen off of Megan's front page, so it's not going to get much traffic from now on. I'll check back every once in a while for a few days, but after that it's time to move on. You're welcome to come over to my nice little trafficless blog and continue my education if you wish.
Jason:
I am a 41-year-old web programmer for a small (but growing) Internet security company. I have a BA in Political Science, a strong interest in history (particularly military history), and I believe in the Constitution. Is there anything else you'd like to know? I thought you were going to be on a transport to Iraq at this time.
Lt.Cmdr. van Avery:
Yes, I do believe that. The Senate was controlled by the Republican Party from 2002-2006, and they would have used that control to approve whatever nominations the Republican administration set before them. I have no direct knowledge of course; but given what I do know from publicly-available sources about this administration's commitment to their partisan ideology and their demonstrated efforts to advance that ideology by all means at their disposal, I feel fairly confident that facts would bear out my suppositions.
Now it seems you're the one who needs the lesson. It is literally true that the Vice President's authority is quite limited as you describe. What is different about this Vice President (and what is so troubling, in fact dismaying to myself and others) is the extent to which the President has delegated his authority (formally and informally) to the Vice President. Perhaps the VP doesn't have the legal authority to order you to do anything; but the President does, and the President has made it quite clear that he fully supports and backs the VP and will sign off on anything the VP requests. So if you refused the VP's order to tie your shoes, you would soon find yourself tying your shoes on an Arctic icebreaker (or whatever you would consider as your most undesirable post).
On the contrary, I think I can in fact say that. The full proof is not out yet, but more and more little details are coming to light. For example, we now know that the "Principals Committee" met at the White House and discussed and approved interrogation procedures. What those exact procedures were has not been revealed; but if they were the procedures used at Guantanamo, at least some of them fit commonly-accepted definitions of torture.
I would invite you to read this blog post from SF author, scientist and futurist David Brin:
The GOP vs. the U.S. Military: Part Six- Purging the Officer Corps, Indoctrinating the Ranks
It's an example of the writing and reporting (via his linked articles) on which I've based my thinking on this issue. Not the only example. One of many.
Even less in beginning it.
That pretty much says it all.
Admittedly, I'm just picking up the scraps here, because you guy have already chewed Rob's ass to the bone on the issues of significance, while skillfully ignoring his attempted misdirections. But just for the sake of completeness, I'm going to point out how silly the attempted misdirections were...
"It's interesting that you lump in Abu Ghraib with My Lai. Let's for the moment accept your analysis that it was a case of "the leaders [not] adequately overseeing and enforcing moral standards." Would they have had to oversee and enforce moral standards if the operation had not been ordered???"
Golly, your right. If we never had military operations, we would not need our military leaders to oversee them, and there would be no risk of anything ever going wrong. Wouldn't that be nice?
"Was it not perhaps foreseeable that such an operation ordered in that environment might in fact get out of hand?"
It's not exactly clear what environment (Iraq?) or operation (taking prisoners?) you are refering to, but I think it's safe to say that any military operation has risk. So what? Military operations should not be undertaken if there is a "foreseeable" chance that "things might get out of hand"? You must be joking.
"Given that it did get out of hand, doesn't that constitute criminal negligence?"
If so, then every brave commander who has ever lead troops into the uncertainty of combat (where things inevitable and very quickly get out of hand) is quilty of criminal negligence.
"I hope you're not trying to minimize the atrocities committed at My Lai and Abu Ghraib by asserting that, essentially, "mistakes were made?"
No, we're not. But neither are we trying to "maximize" the attrocities by trying to use them as an opportunity implicate our political enemies throughout the entire chain of command.
"I'm not particularly interested in the photographs and Lynndie England. I'm more interested in Gen. Geoffrey Miller, Gen. Karpinsky (who should have complained more loudly), Col. Pappas (who was a scapegoat along with Karpinsky, albeit a deserving one), Gen. Sanchez, Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, and Vice President Cheney."
See what I mean?
(Have you ever stopped to ask yourself WHY it is that you are NOT interested in the actual evidence of the case (photographs and testimonies of the troops involved) but VERY interested in conspiracy theories that might implicate people you don't like? And, having thoroughly discredited yourself by making this cofession, why should anybody take anything you say seriously?)
As has been pointed out, the investigations have been done, the quilty parties have been determined by legal proceedures, the punishments have been handed down. But the findings did not put the blame on those you want to blame, so...
"What did they know, what did they authorize, what orders were given at each level. No, we don't have all the information, but what we do have stinks to high heaven. It needs to come out, and eventually it will."
Yeah. OK. Sure. In the mean time - can we agree to limit ourselves to talking about things we DO know, instead of wild conjecture and politically motivated slander?
"liberalrob" writes
The GOP vs. the U.S. Military: Part Six- Purging the Officer Corps, Indoctrinating the Ranks
For the benefit of readers who don't want to waste their time reading this garbage, here's a sample quote.
Shades of Jesse MacBeth.I CHALLENGE anyone to find ONE documented case of this ANYWHERE in the US military.
"liberalrob" is prone to saying, "That's all we need to know about you."
In this case, I completely agree.
Rob, do you ever stop to wonder why your information sources quote people who have no names, so that the accuracy of their claims cannot be checked? Who is this "recently-serving Army NCO"? How do we check or verify his story? With all the basic training soldiers in Kentucky going through this indoctrination, it ought to be easy to get hundreds of collaborating witnesses, don't you think?
The sources that you refer to underline Jason's point - you are misinformed because you choose to be. You know your sources are lying to you, but you keep reading them, and believing them. Why?
I'm glad we understand each other. Any comments on the rest of the article? There's a lot more to it than that one piece.
Did you know your handle links to a link-farming site?
Because I don't believe that they are lying to me. I'm not going to take it on your word that they are, because you have no credibility with me (any more than I have with you). If you point to administration sources to refute mine, they have little credibility with me either; they have squandered it completely, primarily when they lied us into invading Iraq on what turned out to be trumped-up evidence. I used to trust the government, even the Bush Administration, to be straight with me when it came to national security; no more. You're going to have to come up with some pretty convincing evidence that my guys are lying to get me to reconsider. I'm not sure that's possible (which makes sense, I think).
We can't. But I trust David Brin's judgment in posting that anecdote, just as I'm sure he trusts his source who related it to him.
Look, at some point you have to make a decision: do I trust my sources or not? There's no way a civilian web programmer is ever going to be able to know what really goes on in a boot camp in Kentucky or at a "Principals Committee" meeting inside the White House or in an interrogation shack at Gitmo. You read the reports that come out, and if they come from sources you trust, you believe them. It's that simple.
Is is possible that I'm completely wrong in every particular? Sure; but I think that chance is vanishingly small. I'm confident that my sources are telling the truth, which is why I'm so steadfast in my position. Just as you are.
I can't get any of Mr. Brin's links to load and he doesn't give any evidence of how the administration is pulling this off under the promotion constraints of 10 USC, which Congress oversees ruthlessly. The Law says how many officers you can promote, so you can't fire them all today and replace them tomorrow as Brin suggests.
Do you have the names of any more of these officers the administration has "purged", other than Gen Shinseki?
"liberalrob" writes
Sure, rob. They're opinion pieces not facts. Cite some facts, and we'll have something to talk about.The example I cited is classic liberal "proof". Quote one person, anonymously, give them an official-sounding title, and then assume what they said must be true.
Ever heard of Jesse Macbeth? He was an Army Ranger who served in Iraq and "testified" (to the press and liberal groups like IVAW) that he had both witnessed and committed war crimes in Iraq.
Unfortunately for Jesse, he was outed by some real military people, who uncovered his discharge papers. He wasn't a Ranger, never served in Iraq and washed out of boot camp. His story got him a conviction and a federal record.
Your source's "NCO" sounds just like Macbeth (or John Kerry, for that matter). All hat and no cattle, as we say in Texas. Never BTDT.
You people are constantly manipulated by the communists. You swallow any old story that fits your preconceived notion of either how things ought to be or how they simply must be. Facts are irrelevant.
I'm sure you're sincere, rob. But sincerity is no guarantee of truth.
The right question is, do I care?The answer is no. I quit blogging because it's a waste of time trying to change the minds of idiots who won't think for themselves - on both sides of the political fence. And there's far, far too many of them in this country now. In my opinion, America's days are numbered, and when it becomes a totalitarian state (as it almost certainly will), the bozos like you will be wandering around crying, "What happened???"
Lt.Cmdr. van Avery:
Brin's blog apparently has been "blacklisted" by some federal agencies:
Maybe your superiors don't want you accessing the material at those links.
I listed a number of generals who I felt were "encouraged" to resign (including Gen. Shinseki, who while he may have resigned in a traditional manner, was nevertheless disrespected by the civilian leadership and left on a sour note). It goes beyond individuals, however. What do you have to say about this article:
Control sought on military lawyers
Bush wants power over promotions
By Charlie Savage
Globe Staff / December 15, 2007
Is that business as usual in the military? Think a lot of JAGs are going to want to hang around in that environment, unless they are confident that their decisions will be in line with what their political minders expect?
Do you deny that a purge is going on? It sure seems like a goodly chunk of the army's mid-level officers are deciding to head for the exits, leaving only the most gung-ho lifers in place:
The Army's Other Crisis
Why the best and brightest young officers are leaving
By Andrew Tilghman
Really. I wonder why they're quitting. More than that, I wonder why some of those who don't quit are staying. Probably most of them are perfectly ordinary people who are in it for perfectly mundane reasons; but what is the proportion of those who stay who are very ideologically in tune with the current administration? If everybody makes light colonel (surely an exaggeration), what are the qualifications for bird colonel? Unknown; but at that level you start getting kind of political, don't you? And this is the administration who hired people at the Department of Justice to a greater or lesser degree based on their ideological committment to the Republican Party. You think I trust them not to meddle in the military promotions process as well?
Continued...
Revolt of the Generals
By Richard J. Whalen
(This article appeared in the October 16, 2006 edition of The Nation.)
September 28, 2006
Shortly after publication of that article, Rumsfeld got run; but the damage has already been done. It's been amazing how many generals have retired and bashed the administration the minute their retirements became official. How many were quietly encouraged to retire, how many saw the writing on the wall and decided to leave before the hammer fell, how many simply couldn't take the indignity any more and left so they could finally speak freely? A purge doesn't have to consist of mass firings.
Not a happy camper:
Coming home — disillusioned
By Christopher H. Sheppard
Special to The [Seattle] Times
So there's another couple of anecdotes on the pile. Is it enough?
"Antimedia":
The answer is no.
So you're just here to yank my chain, is that it? Just jacking me around for the fun of it?
If you don't care, why should I?
"liberalrob" writes
No, I'm here in the vain hope that someone reading your idiotic tripe will think twice about believing it once they've read some facts. Faint hope, I know, but I cling to it anyway. rob, you didn't care long before I got here. If you did, you'd read facts, not opinion.All the "examples" you've posted above are the anecdotal opinions of people who disagree with the administration. In any given population of people, on any given topic, I can self-select those who "prove" my point and "prove" anything I want to prove. That's what your cited articles do.
Of course, you don't care, because they say what you want to hear.
When the NY Times tells you that our troops are coming home to rape, pillage and murder in ever-increasing numbers, you believe it, because it fits your template.
When I read it, I think, "What was the rate in the past? And how does it compare to the civilian population?"
Then I go do the research and discover (without much surprise - the Times has been lying for decades to support their agenda - look up Walter Duranty if you don't believe me) that precisely the opposite of what the Times claims is true.
You, OTOH, believe it without question. After all, it's printed in the greatest newspaper in the world!
You see, rob, ignorance comes in many forms. Some is caused by the inability to access the facts. Yours comes from willful blindness caused by partisan bias. You're not unique. Some conservatives suffer from it as well.
Our country suffers most of all. Ignorance and partisan bias are destroying this country.
First of all, Mr. Brin's site loads, as do most of his links. There's only one that leads to a "not found" error. Second, is there anything you don't think is a conspiracy?
As for your link to the story in the Globe about changing the way officer promotions are managed, it sounds to me like the law is doing a pretty good job of keeping politics out of the promotion process.
I think this is because most of them are unaccustomed to deploying for long periods of time rather than because of any purge. The article states,
I've got news for you. I was commissioned in 1990 into a Navy that for decades had been routinely deploying its members for six to ten months. I went on two such deployemts - to Iraq and Bosnia - in my first three years. At the end of my obligated service, 73% of my peers had left the service. The Navy would kill to retain 42% of its line officers at their first opportunity to "jump ship".
Finally, as for your (and Mr. Brin's) assertion that there's a "purge" going on, maybe you should learn what a purge really looks like. From Wikipedia:
Thus far you haven't even been able to give me enough names to populate my fingertips.
Lt.Cmdr van Avery:
Your statement was, "I can't get any of Mr. Brin's links to load." Are you deliberately jacking me around too, now? You started off very sensible and I thought we could have a good discussion. This is not a welcome development.
Oh, please.
If the new JAG rules were implemented as described, that "law" would be circumvented. I don't have any information on what happened; were the new rules in fact put in place?
In any case, the mere fact that the administration would even propose such political oversight, essentially instituting a system of Commissars for the military's legal system, is illustrative of just what this administration's attitudes and inclinations are. This is how far they are willing to go to get their way.
That's interesting. I'll have to look at retention rates a little more. I had not heard that the Navy had such a problem.
You're being willfully obtuse. What is being suggested is a "purge" in the sense that ideologically-moderate officers are being encouraged to leave while ideologically-radical officers are encouraged to stay.
Well, that's all you're going to get. It took a ton of comment space to get even those few examples up. I've given you enough evidence that indicates the truth of what I'm asserting. If you can't directly refute those examples, and you haven't, there's little point in going to the trouble of digging up more. I have other things to do with my time.
"Antimedia":
What facts? You've cited ZERO facts of your own, spending all your time dismissing mine as though no evidence were necessary. I have posted a bunch of evidence supporting my statements. You are entirely fact-free.
Just a few little problems with your theory, bub: The NY Times doesn't tell me that, I don't believe it, and it doesn't fit my "template" whatever you think that is. Other than that, that sentence is correct.
It's hilarious watching you attribute motivations and opinions to me that I've never even heard of, let alone share. You're a real piece of work.
Take a good look in the mirror. You are Exhibit A.
"Look, at some point you have to make a decision: do I trust my sources or not? There's no way a civilian web programmer is ever going to be able to know what really goes on in a boot camp in Kentucky or at a "Principals Committee" meeting inside the White House or in an interrogation shack at Gitmo. You read the reports that come out, and if they come from sources you trust, you believe them. It's that simple."
OK. That is an acceptable excuse – to a point. As a civilian web programmer, you do not have experience or inside information on a military boot camp. I’ll buy that. But then you read something on the web (from a guy with a very obvious political leanings and motivation) about how he heard from somebody else that there was widespread religious indoctrination going on. Meanwhile, you have the direct witnesses of many people (myself and the others in this conversation) who have actually been to military boot camps, and served many years in the military, and who know the limits placed on both the drill sergeants and the chaplain corps. We will all tell you that there is NO WAY soldiers are being forced to attend Sunday worship services. So, who are you going to believe? Several primary sources that all agree, and can give personal testimony with collaborating evidence or one secondary source (at best) who cannot backup his story? (A story which, if it were true, should produce thousands of witnesses every year!!)
“Is it possible that I'm completely wrong in every particular? Sure; but I think that chance is vanishingly small. I'm confident that my sources are telling the truth, which is why I'm so steadfast in my position. Just as you are.”
I’m not saying you are completely wrong in every particular. The best lies are mixed up with truth, to make them go down easier. I’m just asking you to be a little more discerning. We all have our biases, and tend to give more credence to sources that support our biases. But in this case, you KNOW (if you didn’t before, then you do now) that this guy is wrong. And if he didn’t know he was wrong, he sure as hell should have, because all you have to do is ask somebody – anybody.
Seriously, I don’t mean to beat a dead horse here, but just THINK about it for a moment. THINK!!! If the author talked to this supposed NCO, and believes his story, why didn’t he include his name? Does he not know his name? If so, why not? What kind of reporting is that? If he doesn’t even know the guys name, why would he include his testimony in his paper? And if he DOES know the guys name, why not include it in the paper? Really, there is no explanation other than the obvious fact that even the author did not believe this guys story - but he liked the sound of it, so he included it anyway. Either that, or he just made the story up himself, and created a fictional character to give it credence. Either way, it tells you a lot about the author, and how he handles “truth”. (If you care.)