Posted on 04/07/2016 11:00:56 AM PDT by Kaslin
For years the Obama administration has been accused of micromanaging the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan from inside the White House. Now in an astonishing report from Fox News anchor Bret Baier, three former Obama Defense Secretaries are openly slamming him for his distrust of the military, his failure to lead and they're exposing his inexperienced and closest advisors for second guessing senior field commanders with phone calls to the battlefield.
"President Obama, he's one of the youngest presidents we've ever had. One of the most inexperienced presidents we've ever had. He has a staff around him that is very inexperienced. I don't think there's one veteran on his senior staff at the White House. I don't believe there's one business person. I don't believe there is one person who's ever run anything. Other than Vice President Biden, none of them have ever been elected to anything. You must levin the loaf, levin your advisors where you get a lot of experience at difference things where he, the President himself, is so inexperienced," Former Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said. "I think he's got to fundamentally understand and I'm not sure he ever did nor people around him, the tremendous responsibility the United States has. Not to be the world's policemen, but to lead and we're the only ones who can. The world becomes more dangerous, not less dangerous, when America gets less involved in the world. I don't mean invading and occupying and imposing, but leading."
"It was the operational micromanagement that drove me nuts of White House and NSC (National Security Council) staffers calling senior commanders out in the field and asking them questions, second guessing commanders," Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates, who also served under President Bush, said. "When I I was Deputy National Security Advisor, if I would have tried to, even as deputy, if I had tried to call a field commander, going around Dick Cheney who was Secretary of Defense or Colin Powell who was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, I'd have had my head handed to me, probably personally by the President."
"I told the combatant commanders and the field commanders, 'If you get calls from the White House staff, if you get a call from the President that's one thing, that's totally okay, that's the chain of command, but you get a call from some White House or National Security Council staffer, you tell them to call me instead and then tell them, oh by the way, go to hell and that's directly from the Secretary of Defense," Gates continued.
Rising Threats: Shrinking Military
"I think what I've seen in these last four years is almost this cautiousness and over correction which makes it appear that the United States is hesitant to take action and that sends, I think, a message of weakness," Former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said.
As if inexperienced White House advisors micromanaging the battlefield wasn't bad enough, late last year we learned from an exclusive in the Daily Beast intelligence reports were being scrubbed to fit the political narrative that terrorism around the world, including ISIS, was shrinking.
More than 50 intelligence analysts working out of the U.S. militarys Central Command have formally complained that their reports on ISIS and al Qaedas branch in Syria were being inappropriately altered by senior officials, The Daily Beast has learned.The complaints spurred the Pentagons inspector general to open an investigation into the alleged manipulation of intelligence. The fact that so many people complained suggests there are deep-rooted, systemic problems in how the U.S. military command charged with the war against the self-proclaimed Islamic State assesses intelligence.
The cancer was within the senior level of the intelligence command, one defense official said.
Two senior analysts at CENTCOM signed a written complaint sent to the Defense Department inspector general in July alleging that the reports, some of which were briefed to President Obama, portrayed the terror groups as weaker than the analysts believe they are. The reports were changed by CENTCOM higher-ups to adhere to the administrations public line that the U.S. is winning the battle against ISIS and al Nusra, al Qaedas branch in Syria, the analysts claim.
It should be noted that second guessing field commanders had severe and serious consequences in Afghanistan with 70 percent of U.S. troop casualties there occurring during President Obama's time in the White House.
Where were day during Obama’s reelection campaign?!!!!!!!!!!!!!
“for the rest of his natural life.”
His life has never been “natural!”
Typo in my previous post. I meant:
“Where were they during Obamas reelection campaign?!!!!!!!!!!!!!”
Meh it won’t do any god- Fox news has had several military big wigs making negative comments about dear leader for years now- the MSM just ignore the comments- and noone but fox news folks really care anymore because if the MSM doesn’t say it, it isn’t the truth- according to them
So while it’;s refreshing to conservatives to hear folks telling it like it is, it won’t amount to much because the MSM has protected dear leader for all these years- insulated him against all negative reports etc-
These and other commanders have been trying to raise the alarm that dear leader has been systematically dismantling and neutering our military, while coddling terrorism for years now- but the MSM simply won’t do their job and warn the public that our dear leader is trying to endanger this ocutnry- Sadly the MSM would rather protect him than alert the public to a growing very real threat that radical islamic terrorists pose- instead they criticizes those who try to warn the folks that dear leader is importing hte enemy right into our own country-
They did, Obama has run through four Secretaries of Defense in seven years:
Gates (holdover from G.W. Bush)- Jan ‘09- Jul ‘11
Pannetta- Jul ‘11-Feb ‘13)
Hagel (Feb ‘13-Feb ‘15)
Carter (Feb 15-Current)
He was easily Obama's best cabinet appointment. Still a Dem, but he always took national security stuff seriously. It's what makes Feinstein occasionally bearable.
Who on earth STILL doesn’t get that everything coming out of the Whitehouse is spun, an outright lie or propaganda?
Forget not letting a crisis go to waste. LAME DUCK OBAMA and his minions will twist the smallest notion into the biggest pile of crap anyone has ever seen!
They’ll lie when the truth would serve them better!
Panetta is a rare democrat that actually cares what happens to our country. Baraq has surrounded himself with people who are on a suicide mission for the US. They have been creating the conditions where the terrorists can attack us and hit us hard. When that happens, the baraqiis will be jumping for joy.
He was a Republican early in life, and worked for some Republicans.
BO looked furious in the Sit Room photo. Everyone else looked concerned or worried, he looked angry.
Yes, he’s a manboy, Panetta completely cuckolded him with that call.
I want to make this public prediction and hope you guys will be my witness when it is lroven true.
Obama is going to clise gitmo...not just where we house the terrorists...the entire naval base.
He is gling to give it back to the Castros by abandoning it.
He will also close the terrorist jail by dling this and those terrorists that he cannot find a way to transfer wlswhere he will leave behind and say he transferred them to the Cuban govt.
That is how hw both clses the Guantanamo terroists jail and gives back the naval base to Castro.
It all fits in line with his ideology and gets around congress saying he cannot bring them to the usa
This is why the existing MSM must be destroyed, they protected this idiot from day one and mny good people died.
You got it.
Yet all three of them bowed down to Obama every day instead of calling a press conference and resigning in protest.
Reminds me of that bastard McNamara who knew we couldn’t win in Vietnam, the way it was being fought, yet continued to send more troops in to die. May they all rot in hell.
McNamara held the JCS and the military at large in contempt. He was personally responsible for the strategy implemented in Vietnam. LBJ shares some of the blame.
McMaster’s Dereliction of Duty is maybe the best book on the subject.
http://www.c-span.org/video/?80828-1/book-discussion-dereliction-duty
Honestly, all the blame belongs on GOP Congresses which had a Constitutional obligation to shut down Obama’s illegal wars, and instead collaborated with him.
We should never have destroyed Libya.
We should not be destroying Syria.
We should not have overthrown the legitimate government of Ukraine.
We should not have wrecked Honduras to enable a despotism there.
We should not still be in Afghanistan 14 years later.
We should not still be in Iraq 13 years later.
In less than five years we will have young men (and, abominably, women) who will be fighting in wars in those two countries that started before they were born.
We should not still be in Germany and Japan 70 years later, and Korea 60 years later.
The defense of Germany is a German problem.
The defense of Japan is a Japanese problem.
The defense of South Korea is a South Korean problem.
The defense of Saudi Arabia is a Saudi problem. Those jerks deserve to all get beheaded anyway. The 28 pages show that we should have invaded and conquered them, not Afghanistan.
We should not be pledging nuclear defense of minor statelets on the borders of Russia by including them in NATO when we explicitly promised not to do just that.
The above facts are a damning and irrefutable indictment of post-Cold War US foreign policy.
None of these interventions have had a positive effect on US national security. All of them have had dramatically negative effects on our national fiscal position. There is no justification for the blood of a single American soldier to be spilled in defense of any nation other than the United States of America.
The US government needs to put the interests of Americans first, that is its lawful and moral duty and obligation. The rest of the world is not its responsibility and for the most part is none of our damn business. We have way too much to clean up here at home before telling anyone else what to do.
For later. Thx
Wow, gee, yeah, that takes a lot of balls NOW...
Too little, too late.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.