Posted on 04/17/2006 5:48:39 AM PDT by .cnI redruM
There is a great furor over whether the opinions of a number of retired high-ranking officers should tip the balance in the ongoing debate over the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.
But the question really isn't whether Rumsfeld should resign. He has already resigned several times and had President Bush tear up his letters of resignation. He clearly is taking responsibility for his actions on a continuing basis.
But now that a galaxy of flag officers are raining down on Rumsfeld demanding his resignation, no one seems to have bothered to ask which, if any, of these generals had ever submitted his own resignation in protest against the conduct of the Iraq war, or the bumpy transition we are locked in now. The demands for Rumsfeld's resignation began with Gen. Anthony Zinni.
(Excerpt) Read more at suntimes.com ...
And I'm not arguing the gist of the article. Not at all. Merely pointing out one exception I happen to know about.
Thank God for Rummy!
Donald Rumsfeld should only resign to accept the GOP nomination for President of the United States!
He certainly bore a lot more of the responsibility than he has been willing to own up to.
I think he's an armchair quarterbacking putz. But to each his own! :-)
You don't go against your superiors at time of war, or damage the morale of our troops.
Shame on the Generals!
Further, people that worked with Newbold speculated it was because he did not like Rummy's management style (too hands on for his liking). Newbold at the time said he didn't want to put his family through yet another move, which would basically be a guarentee with the 4th star.
And you make Brit Hume's point.
What they're complaining about took place 3 or 4 years ago...
...Why didn't they complain then???
That's been my thoughts all along. The only people these generals are hurting are the military men and women they are supposed to care about. I am appalled at their willingness to hurt the war effort and stab our President and Commander in Chief in the back.
I hope this backfires and that they'll retire with a traitorous lable on their military careers by their peers and the majority of Americans.
"Marine LtGen Newbold did resign, in essence, although he didn't speak out against Rummy when doing so. He had been rumored as possible Commandant of the Marine Corps material, but decided to retire rather than get his fourth star (citing fatigue and family concerns, IIRC)."
Rumored? There are lots of rumors. Read my tagline.
Except for Zinni who retired before 9-11 and Riggs who was forced out, they did resign. They also retired but in effect they resigned.
It's a congressional election year, they likely have been swayed by the DNC to speak out. I agree that if they had such deep concerns, they should have resigned then, showing some spine.
Because going public with dirty laundry while you're still a general would probably have ramifications
No, retiring is not the same as resigning.
>>>>Because going public with dirty laundry while you're still a general would probably have ramifications
Like what? Being made to resign?
General Matthew Ridgeway retired two months before his term was up because he was unable to agree with the Eisenhower administration on the proper size of the U.S. Army. He wanted a big army fueled by the draft; Ike and his sec of defence Charlies Wilson wanted a smaller one (800,000 by the way!). He even got his book out a couple of years later, explaining his views. Not incidentally, twenty years later General Ridgeway was saying that the volunteer army would never work. We, of course, have the case of General MacArthur. The predecessors of the same Democrats who defended Truman on the basis of the principle of civilian supremacy over the military--a cornerstone of our constitutional system, are now put in the position that the Republicans were in 1951, which is to criticize the policy and applauid the servive of the generals without acknowledging the right of the military to determine public policy.
Good letter. One quibble: I wouldn't call six retired generals "a galaxy". They're more like a constellation. Let's call them "The Big Dipper."
I have heard of threats (no, I have no proof) regarding pensions. Whether they could be pulled off is another story, but at the general/flag officer level that's a significant amount of money/privileges.
Kind of gives a glimpse of the ideology of our congress critters.
Semantically you are correct, but that's it.
Guilt association?
Zinni was week in his command, he couldn't help him self, his former commander in chief trained him to be weak.
How do you know that he was not allowed to resign to save face? It is well known that wartime leadership requires different skills than being a peacetime general. The latter are promoted for political manuvering, and what these men are doing is all political. No surprise they were not needed in the WOT.
An extremely remote possibility.
I'm not arguing that. :-) Especially watching him in action now. But he did hold a high profile J-3 position (I think) on the Joint Staff.
I wouldn't care to go to IBM, EXXON, Mobil, GE, Westinghouse
are any other company and I would find many of these know it all generals. But we all know who holds the power as long as there is success in these corporations.
Rumsfeld will be known in history as one of the best military CEO America has ever had.
If I were him I would be very careful who else is lurking in the back ground, there will be others, Hillterbeast has found something to get her canines into for her campaign.
Did any of the six get a 'bump' before retirement?
When Newbold refused to continue giving briefings to the press after being kidded by Rumsfeld and Myers about saying the Taliban had been eviscerated he showed his hand of being a thing skinned, immature, weasel. Any stock he had prior to that went right down the s****er.
Bump? You mean a promotion? There's a service obligation if you accept a promotion (generally two years, although it might be more at the general/flag level).
I remember reading about that, but do not recall it as it actually occurred. :-)
"Resigning and publicly stating why you are resigning is laying it on the line."
Now you're adding your own definition.
Nothing anywhere says you have to make a big noise when you leave. Actions are sometimes enough.
BTW, we don't know what any of these generals said to the Army CofS on their way out the door.
The ppor babies got their feelings and egos hurt when Rummy demanded they have their stuff togetehr when they went in to see him. They're used to trampling on subordinates, not having it done to them for being less than 100% competent.
If a person is going to ask for someone else's head on a silver platter, they had better offer their own necks up first or their credibility equals zero.
In the Army; certainly. He's attempted to reinvent that service's entire culture. No Old Boy network ever dies a peaceful death.
It is dangerous to have a person in charge who has quit not once but twice. Rumsfeld needs to be replaced.
Admiral Zinni is an anti-Semite Democrat.....a real Israel hater.
No, Zinnie was the officer who decided that Yemen was a safe port for our ships. Of course, that was right before the Cole bombing. The guy really doesn't have good judgement and was a failure at every job he was given after the Cole.
So says you.
It may be years before we know what happened at the time of their exit. I stand by my original words, "in effect."
1) No it's not.
2) Offering to fall on your sword and having your offer rejected is not quitting.
Rumsfeld needs to be replaced.
No, he doesn't. But keep telling us how he should. Maybe the President will sacrifice the GWOT to appease your concerns. :-D
There is a famous case of a general under LBJ who was going to resign and tell the press how badly the Viet Nam War was being run. He did not and later regretted it. I do not know the man's name.
People turn against those who do the right thing. We are more comfortable with letting things go.
These generals are chickens and traitors. They should not be doing this during a war.
Zinni was a Marine general.
I find the headline disturbing and dumb. A General - like every soldier - isn´t serving a special DefSec but his country.
If a General/Private votes Republican and the Democrats win, shall he resign? No, he shall do his duty for his nation!
If a General/Private votes Democratic and the Republicans win, shall he resign? No, he shall do his duty for his nation!
That´s democratic - we accept the outcome of elections. That doesn´t ban a state employee to express his disapproval with politicians or orders (given he obeys the special regulations for that, as it was done in the mentioned case).
If these objections had been voiced through the chain of command, as you suggest, do you think for one minute that Seymore Hirsch's moles in the Pentagon would not have had him screaming this from the rooftops?
Sheeeesh!
Did Patton resign, even though he had more than his share of beefs with Ike and FDR?
Nope! He go murdered instead.
I think it's obvious why the generals made no complaints four years ago.
Because they weren't working a book project, consulting to the mainstream media, or trying to get a Democrat nomination back then!
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