President Obama agrees with me:
General McChrystal is not guilty of insubordination. “Stan
McChrystal has always shown great courtesy and carried out my
orders faithfully” [emphasis added],
Obama said Wednesday.
But what about “bad judgment”? Were General McChrystal and
his staff guilty of saying and doing things that, although
technically permissible, nonetheless reflected poorly upon them
and the U.S. military?
I don’t think so. It seems to me that the political and
pundit class have overreacted to remarks that are rather tame and
innocuous.
Yes, I said tame and innocuous. We keep hearing about the
general’s “reprehensible” and “inappropriate” comments. But what,
exactly, did the general say that is “reprehensible” and
“inappropriate”? Can anyone really cite a specific incriminating
remark? I don’t think so.
Here, for instance, is what McChrystal said about
Obama:
“I found that time [meeting with Obama for the first time
last fall] painful. I was selling an unsellable position.”
And here’s what he said, with a laugh, about Vice President
Biden: “Are you asking about Vice President Biden? Who’s
that?”
And so it goes, with McChrystal expressing mild
disappointment in his civilian superiors. Big deal. Yet, everyone
just blithely assumes that McChrystal was “out of line.” No, he
wasn’t.
Sure, the general’s aides were more blunt in their
criticism: “Biden?” suggests a top adviser. “Did you say: ‘Bite
me’?”
But given the context of that comment — what was said,
when it was said, and how it was said (in a casual conversation
filled with good cheer, mirth and joking, light-hearted banter)
— the comment clearly is not contemptuous of the civilian
leadership. To the contrary: as Peter Worthington points out in
“An Unnecessary Firing” at FrumForum:
The unidentified quotes in the Rolling Stone article
that were snarky about many of the people around Obama, and on
whom Obama depends, were not by McChrystal, and had the flavor
of a bunch of guys sounding off over a beer.
They were the sort of cracks about management that happen
in every office.
Let me suggest an alternate hypothesis: It is not General
McChrystal and his aides who exercised “bad judgment,” but rather
the political and pundit class. They’re too thin-skinned; they
don’t appreciate the importance of public dialogue and debate;
and they adhere to stereotypical notions of military
subordination and command and control.
I say stereotypical because to listen to some of the
pundits, you’d think that the only good military man is a stupid
military man — one who doesn’t think, cogitate and reflect, or
who does so only “privately.” But in a free and open society,
thinking and analysis aren’t done in solitude. They’re done in
the public square and through the media, in the public
prints.
That’s because the media and the public prints allow for
the type of vigorous dialogue and debate that make our collective
efforts better and stronger.
Indeed, Americans’ frank, candid and yes, public talk about
contentious public-policy matters is not a weakness, but a
strength; and military personnel
should vigorously
partake in our public dialogue. The U.S.
military, after all, is not the Nazi military. We do not (or at
least should not) cultivate robotic automatons who mindlessly
follow orders.
Sure, American Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines follow
orders — of course. But we also contest orders — when, for
instance, orders are illegal or unlawful. And we pride ourselves
on having an educated and professional military.
Yet, the minute U.S. military men and women dare to think
for themselves, we hear overwrought cries of concern from the
Washington political and media elite. Such thinking “threatens
civilian control of the military,” they cry.
No, it doesn’t, not even close. The principle of civilian
control of our military is so deeply engrained in the U.S.
military culture that no one need worry it’ll be overturned or
ignored. That simply ain’t gonna happen, not now or ever.
A more legitimate concern is that we’ll cultivate a
military of mediocrities who are incapable of producing fresh and
original thought. Yet, if our political and pundit class continue
to punish military leaders like McChrystal, that’s exactly what
will happen. Talented and creative military officers, after all,
are unlikely to remain in an organization whose members are told,
in effect, to shut up and be quiet.
Talented and creative military officers want, of course, to
have the freedom to think, create and explore. They want the
freedom to engage intellectually with the outside world and to
partake in the public dialogue and debate. And if they can’t
achieve that within the U.S. military, then they’ll leave the
institution altogether. But is that really what we want? Would
that be good for America?
