One of the problems with a president who never served in the military is he tends to way overestimate the military brass. Even Trump must be having second thoughts. Let's look at the records of our best military minds.
At the top of the list has to be David Petraeus, who somehow achieved fame as the architect of our disastrous Afghanistan debacle. Appointed to head the CIA by no less than Obama himself, Petraeus was disgraced by revelations that he had turned Top Secret materials over to a married former junior officer whom he was banging. He should have been prosecuted and sent to prison but he probably knew enough embarrassing secrets to get off with a wrist slap.
His successor in Afghanistan, another self-identified philosopher king named Stanley McChrystal, was fired by Obama after he and his staff talked shit to a reporter from Rolling Stone. Perhaps Anthony Scaramucci was advising them on media relations.
Then there is the curious case of Marine Gen. John Allen. He was one general who knew how to stroke Obama and his leftwing aides. He sailed from one prestigious post to another but got tripped up in, of all things, Petraeus' sordid sex and secrets scandal. How? As top US commander in afghanistan, he became friendly, too friendly as it turned out, with a Tampa woman and apparent social climber named Jill Kelley. Kelley had wormed her way into the good graces of another Marine Gen., one Maddog Mattis, who ran US Central Command, based in Tampa. Somehow Paula Broadwell, Petraeus' paramour, got the idea that Kelley was trying to get in on her action and started sending her threatening albeit anonymous emails. Kelley went to the authorities, which led to Petraeus getting unmasked. It later came out that the married Gen. Allen had exchanged literally thousands of emails with the comely Mrs. Kelley. Further investigations revealed that Kelley, who was born in Beirut, had ambiguous middle eastern ties that suggested she may have been acting as a foreign intelligence asset when she became so close to two top Marine generals running our most critical overseas engagement. Allen was eased out and now is a big shot at Brookings.
But what of Gen. Mad Dog Mattis? He of the colorful nickname allowed a woman, Kelley, with sketchy middle eastern ties to insert herself deeply into the affairs of Central Command. No worries, he is now Sec. of Defense, where he has taken it upon himself to undermine Trump's policies on things like having transsexuals in critical military roles.
We have Gen. McMasters, now National Security Advisor, who seems principally known for writing a book 40 years ago critical of the Vietnam war strategy. You mean our strategy was bad? Who knew? Wow, he must really be a Big Thinker. As NSA his principal role seems to be acting as the Deep State representative in the WH and culling any Bannon sympathizers from government.
He is ably assisted in the latter role by Gen. John Kelly. Kelly is a widely respected former Marine four star who was initially tabbed by Trump to run Homeland Security. It was a disappointing pick to Trump's supporters, who wanted an immigration hawk like Kris Kobach in the role of defending our borders. Kelly compounded matters by making gratuitous remarks about his commitment to allowing "Dreamers" to continue to evade immigration law. After a few months he was brought into the WH as chief of staff, an odd role for a guy who did not support Trump in the election. He managed to get one of his people, a Bush era amnesty advocate named Kristjean Nielson, appointed to his old role at DHS.
And who can forget Gen. Flynn? He holds the distinction of being fired by both Obama and Trump, perhaps an unprecedented achievement. His career was in military intelligence and is shrouded in secrecy. According to reports, he was either an incompetent administrator in the Obama administration or he was a roadblock to their plans to politicize intelligence and weaponize it to use against the republicans. Either way Obama canned him and he emerged as a high profile Trump surrogate.
He was running a "consulting" business, with clients like the Turkish government. Trump fired him for supposedly misleading VP Pence about his contacts with Russians, which he apparently undertook at the behest of Jared Kushner. One can understand his annoyance at getting fired for this, but he seems to have shown remarkably poor judgment in (a) not disclosing large contracts with foreign entities and (b) lying about conversations that any Tom Clancy reader would know were being intercepted. I mean, who did he think he was, a Clinton?
I could go on. For example, we have the "Fat Leonard" Naval scandal where scores of senior officers sold out secret fleet schedules for romps with Asian hookers and money.
Seriously, is this the best we can do? No wonder our military actions seem to careen from one disaster to another. Our military leaders show a consistent pattern of poor judgment, personal hubris and self-aggrandizement. Trump unfortunately has fallen victim to the republican obsession with confusing patriotism with iconization of military brass. I have a lot of time for the actual troops, the enlisted people, NCOs and junior officers. The brass? Not so much.
At the top of the list has to be David Petraeus, who somehow achieved fame as the architect of our disastrous Afghanistan debacle. Appointed to head the CIA by no less than Obama himself, Petraeus was disgraced by revelations that he had turned Top Secret materials over to a married former junior officer whom he was banging. He should have been prosecuted and sent to prison but he probably knew enough embarrassing secrets to get off with a wrist slap.
His successor in Afghanistan, another self-identified philosopher king named Stanley McChrystal, was fired by Obama after he and his staff talked shit to a reporter from Rolling Stone. Perhaps Anthony Scaramucci was advising them on media relations.
Then there is the curious case of Marine Gen. John Allen. He was one general who knew how to stroke Obama and his leftwing aides. He sailed from one prestigious post to another but got tripped up in, of all things, Petraeus' sordid sex and secrets scandal. How? As top US commander in afghanistan, he became friendly, too friendly as it turned out, with a Tampa woman and apparent social climber named Jill Kelley. Kelley had wormed her way into the good graces of another Marine Gen., one Maddog Mattis, who ran US Central Command, based in Tampa. Somehow Paula Broadwell, Petraeus' paramour, got the idea that Kelley was trying to get in on her action and started sending her threatening albeit anonymous emails. Kelley went to the authorities, which led to Petraeus getting unmasked. It later came out that the married Gen. Allen had exchanged literally thousands of emails with the comely Mrs. Kelley. Further investigations revealed that Kelley, who was born in Beirut, had ambiguous middle eastern ties that suggested she may have been acting as a foreign intelligence asset when she became so close to two top Marine generals running our most critical overseas engagement. Allen was eased out and now is a big shot at Brookings.
But what of Gen. Mad Dog Mattis? He of the colorful nickname allowed a woman, Kelley, with sketchy middle eastern ties to insert herself deeply into the affairs of Central Command. No worries, he is now Sec. of Defense, where he has taken it upon himself to undermine Trump's policies on things like having transsexuals in critical military roles.
We have Gen. McMasters, now National Security Advisor, who seems principally known for writing a book 40 years ago critical of the Vietnam war strategy. You mean our strategy was bad? Who knew? Wow, he must really be a Big Thinker. As NSA his principal role seems to be acting as the Deep State representative in the WH and culling any Bannon sympathizers from government.
He is ably assisted in the latter role by Gen. John Kelly. Kelly is a widely respected former Marine four star who was initially tabbed by Trump to run Homeland Security. It was a disappointing pick to Trump's supporters, who wanted an immigration hawk like Kris Kobach in the role of defending our borders. Kelly compounded matters by making gratuitous remarks about his commitment to allowing "Dreamers" to continue to evade immigration law. After a few months he was brought into the WH as chief of staff, an odd role for a guy who did not support Trump in the election. He managed to get one of his people, a Bush era amnesty advocate named Kristjean Nielson, appointed to his old role at DHS.
And who can forget Gen. Flynn? He holds the distinction of being fired by both Obama and Trump, perhaps an unprecedented achievement. His career was in military intelligence and is shrouded in secrecy. According to reports, he was either an incompetent administrator in the Obama administration or he was a roadblock to their plans to politicize intelligence and weaponize it to use against the republicans. Either way Obama canned him and he emerged as a high profile Trump surrogate.
He was running a "consulting" business, with clients like the Turkish government. Trump fired him for supposedly misleading VP Pence about his contacts with Russians, which he apparently undertook at the behest of Jared Kushner. One can understand his annoyance at getting fired for this, but he seems to have shown remarkably poor judgment in (a) not disclosing large contracts with foreign entities and (b) lying about conversations that any Tom Clancy reader would know were being intercepted. I mean, who did he think he was, a Clinton?
I could go on. For example, we have the "Fat Leonard" Naval scandal where scores of senior officers sold out secret fleet schedules for romps with Asian hookers and money.
Seriously, is this the best we can do? No wonder our military actions seem to careen from one disaster to another. Our military leaders show a consistent pattern of poor judgment, personal hubris and self-aggrandizement. Trump unfortunately has fallen victim to the republican obsession with confusing patriotism with iconization of military brass. I have a lot of time for the actual troops, the enlisted people, NCOs and junior officers. The brass? Not so much.
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