The FReeper Foxhole Profiles General Creighton Abrams, Jr. - Aug. 2nd, 2003

http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/abrams.htm ^

[SAMWolf]

Dear Lord,

There's a young man far from home,
called to serve his nation in time of war;
sent to defend our freedom
on some distant foreign shore.

We pray You keep him safe,
we pray You keep him strong,
we pray You send him safely home ...
for he's been away so long.

There's a young woman far from home,
serving her nation with pride.
Her step is strong, her step is sure,
there is courage in every stride.
We pray You keep her safe,
we pray You keep her strong,
we pray You send her safely home ...
for she's been away too long.

Bless those who await their safe return.
Bless those who mourn the lost.
Bless those who serve this country well,
no matter what the cost.

Author Unknown

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FReepers from the The Foxhole
join in prayer for all those serving their country at this time.

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General Creighton Williams Abrams, Jr.
(1914-1974)

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Born in Springfield, Massachusetts, General Abrams would have been sixty on September 15th. He had worn his country's uniform for over forty-two years, for four years as a cadet at West Point, and for thirty-eight years as an Army officer.

A veteran of three wars, General Abrams rose to the Army's highest leadership position because he was preeminently a leader and commander of troops, particularly in wartime. From platoon to corps, he commanded at every Level and finally served as Joint Commander of all U.S. Forces in Vietnam. Commissioned in the Cavalry in 1936, General Abrams served initially with various cavalry and tank units of the 1st Cavalry Division and the 1st Armored Division. Joining the newly activated 4th Armored Division in 1941, he remained with the Division throughout World War II. As a battalion commander, and then combat command commander, he participated in every campaign the Division fought and became widely known as one of the Army's most aggressive and successful Armor commanders. It was Lieutenant Colonel Abrams, in a conference on the banks of the Moselle, who pointed east and remarked: "That is the shortest way home." It was a tank unit called Task Force "Abe" that led the thrust across the Moselle; it was a tank unit commanded by Abrams that broke the German encirclement at Bastogne. It was Abrams' unit that tore from Bitburg to the Rhine including an attack of over forty miles in less than two days. Time and time again Abrams led the thrust across the German homeland and into Czechoslovakia, often at the head of the column. His World War II commander, General George S. Patton, Jr., once said: "I'm supposed to be the best tank commander in the Army but I have one peer - Abe Abrams. He's the world champion."

The 4th Armored Division is now inactive, but its former members still meet from time to time. To these men, General Abrams was always one of them. At a 4th Armored Division Association convention last year, General Abrams was introduced to the gathering as "the Chief of Staff of the United States Army, Colonel Abe!"

During the Korean War, General Abrams served successively as Chief of Staff of I, IX and X Corps. He participated in the defense against the last major Communist offensives of the war. He remained to help set up I Corps as a key link in the United Nations Command organization.

Following his duty in Korea, General Abrams served for a period as Chief of Staff of the Armor Center at Fort Knox, Kentucky. Returning to Europe in 1959, he was assigned as Assistant Division Commander, 3d Armored Division, and later as Commanding General of the Division. After another tour in Washington and yet another in Europe, this time as a Corps Commander, he received his fourth star and was selected as the Army's Vice Chief of Staff.


General Abrams, commanding U.S. forces in Vietnam, confers with General Forsythe, commander of the 1st Cavalry Division, in Phuoc Vinh, 1968.

In 1967, he became Deputy Commander of the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam; a year later, he was appointed its Commander. For the four years General Abrams commanded in Vietnam, it was his task to reduce direct U.S. military involvement and to transfer increasing defense responsibilities to Vietnamese forces, as they became capable of assuming them. By the time he left Vietnam in 1972, that job had been virtually completed.

After his extensive service in Vietnam, General Abrams was nominated to be Chief of Staff, United States Army, and was confirmed by the Senate on October 12, 1972. Since that day, General Abrams' principal challenge was to knit together an Army that had suffered the double trauma of rapid reduction in size and massive repositioning of forces, both occasioned by the end of U.S. military operations in Vietnam. To add to the challenge, it was during this same period that authority for induction ended, and the Army shifted to an all-volunteer footing.

The major themes in the Army during those two years were Abrams themes, as plain and strong as the man who established them: the readiness mission; rethinking the Army's role; and taking care of the soldier. The actions that flowed from this guidance increased the readiness and effectiveness of the Army dramatically. At the same time, morale improved and disciplinary problems subsided, responding to the firm hand at the top. Just prior to his being stricken by lung cancer, General Abrams had set in motion a program to increase markedly the Army's combat capability without increasing its total strength. It was to be done the Abrams way, by cutting out entire headquarters, by making other headquarters - including his own - much smaller, and by making every element in the Army count toward the overall mission.



Direct and plain-spoken, General Abrams liked being around soldiers and was approachable by soldiers of all ranks. He understood them, and they respected and admired him. He was equally respected by his civilian superiors and by Members of Congress. Secretary of the Army Howard H. Callaway referred to him as "our number one soldier." Senator John C. Stennis, Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, made reference to General Abrams as "a real soldier . . . I always thought of him as having mud on his boots." Senator Sam Nunn, another member of the Armed Services Committee, referred to him as "a great soldier."

His military superiors also thought highly of General Abrams as he assumed positions of increasing responsibility. When Brigadier General Abrams was a young Assistant Division Commander in Europe in the early sixties, his Division Commander wrote: " . . . he has attained a rare balance between his natural characteristics of a colorful, decisive, driving commander and a calculating, canny, thorough planner . . . He knows soldiers as few men do and has no peer as an armored leader."

Abrams as Division Commander was, if anything, even more highly praised. According to his Corps Commander, ". . he is the outstanding armor commander of his generation . . He is open, honest, frank, sincere, completely dedicated to the Army and the highest ideals of service . . . He is tactful but firm."


COMUS HONORS CAV – General Creighton W. Abrams, commanding general United States Army Vietnam, presents the 69th battle streamer to the 3/4 Cav during ceremony at Cu Chi. (Photo by SP4 Joe Loper)

Throughout his subsequent career, General Abrams was repeatedly evaluated in terms such as "unequalled," "without peer," "the best." That he became Chief of Staff of the Army surprised none of those officers under whom he served.

Preferring to remain as far from the public eye as possible, he was well-known to the public and sought by the media, largely as a result of his straightforward, candid way of conducting the public's military business.

General Abrams was a private person, by preference. He enjoyed listening to classical music at home, and just being with his family. He tended to limit his public appearances and speech-making, but people liked to hear him talk. He had a modest, but well-polished, collection of stories, many of them autobiographical, at least in spirit. His favorite stories tended to hark back to earlier days, to the era when he played football at West Point and to his early cavalry days. The messages he brought to the military and civilian groups he talked to reflected the basic ideas he felt most strongly about: the safety of the Nation; the need for the Army to be ready, and the dreadful human costs of unpreparedness; the importance of simple integrity; and the needs the paramount needCof remembering the soldier and his immediate leaders, the people at the end of a long chain of command.



General Abrams is survived by his wife, the former Julia Harvey, and by their children; Noel, Creighton Jr., John, Jeanne, Elizabeth, and Robert Bruce. He is also survived by a sister, Bette (Mrs. William L.) James of Feeding Hills.

[snippy_about_it]

LOL, what are you doing, learning these from Nick at Nite?

[snippy_about_it]

Afternoon Victoria, good song.

[SAMWolf]

Afternoon Victoria. Good graphic and Mack the Knife too!

[Victoria Delsoul]

Hi guys, thanks. I'm back from tanning. Glad you liked the song.

[larryjohnson]

Gen Abrams was USMACV when I was there. My vault was in 7th AF compound but he was there often to receive his weather briefing from Det 14, First Wea Gp(SEA Fcst Center). I was offered the job to be his weather officer but I preferred running my satellite tracking site. The downloaded classified pictures were in Abrams' briefings. He was respected by his AF staff and respectful of air support. His letter of commendation to 1WG noted that "never in the history of warfare have weather decisions played such an important role in operational planning as they have here in Southeast Asia."

[SAMWolf]

I was offered the job to be his weather officer but I preferred running my satellite tracking site.Sounds like that would have been a big time paperwork assignment.

[Darksheare]

No, actually.
Both of my parents are in their 50's, and I was tortiued in my youth by having to hear them!
So they're stuck in my skull!

[Diver Dave]

Afternoon y'all. Just got back from our Support Our Troops Rally. We had 10 folks out today and the enthusiasm by the passing motorists was awesome.

A Marine Mom, just had her son at home on leave for a short while. He left last night and will be arriving in Japan later tonight.

One young man went out on the traffic island with a sign which read... "Support Our Troops - It Ain't Over."

dark, I believe I'll pass on your "recipe." I'll stick with my fresh ground beans, thank you. :)

Thanks for the song Victoria. :)

Since you've featured an Army guy today, Here's a new Army patch I got in an e-mail...

[Darksheare]

But, the recipe is best with fresh ground..
Oh well.
You can still 'accidentally' fix someone else a mug of it, and judge the reaction.

[snippy_about_it]

So, you liked Dark's coffee about as much as I did. LOL.

The patch is very funny, I'm going to borrow it and save it, okay?

Thanks Dave!

[SAMWolf]

LOL! Love the Patch DD.

You got to love the American sense of humor.

PS. Smart move on passing up Darksheares Coffee. You could have used that stuff to loosen rusted fittings onboard ship.

[Darksheare]

My coffee isn't that bad.

[Darksheare]

Loosen up rusted fittings?
C'mon Sam, it's not THAT bad.
Just because it kept you two up all night doesn't make it bad stuff.

[snippy_about_it]

Darksheare, if you want me to believe that then you will have to come back to Ohio and make me a cup yourself. LOL.

[Darksheare]

Fair enough.
;-)
Is there a reputable donut shop near you as well?
Cinnomon donuts go well with the stuff, as do the coffeecake like ones..
(I ask reputable, because the local donut shop near me got busted for foreign fluids and matter on the donuts once. Seems the one guy in there, a Pakistani, decided the donuts needed extra sauce.)

[snippy_about_it]

Ewww! You come on back to Ohio and I'll make homemade cinnamon donuts for you! Then we'll have a pot of that brew of yours. ;)

[Darksheare]

Eeew is right.
I make a note of NOT stopping at Dunkin' Donuts.
(That's where that happened.)

[SAMWolf]

Not that bad?

I've been diluting it and cleaning the rust off my bumper.

[PhilDragoo]

Everything about General Abrams shines. I wonder if some of that ability to lead and inspire was present in Schwarzkopf and Franks.

Certainly not in Wesley Clark who owes first loyalty to CNN.

For a look backward into hell, I recommend Dereliction of Duty: The Eyewitness Account of How Bill Clinton Compromised America's National Security, Lt. Col. Robert "Buzz" Patterson, USAF (Ret.)

Al Santoli's synopsis of the Clinton emasculation of the military (while tripling deployments) is a must-read on the eve of Hitlery's coup attempt.

The initial image of Clinton watching golf with Vernon Jordan and delaying the decision to take out Saddam's forces before they could butcher the Kurds is the necessary bitter medicine.

Still to come is the similar case of going AWOL when it was time to take Osama, whether to kill him in Afghanistan, or take him in handcuffs from Sudan.

General Abrams is proof that God loves America--and doesn't want it to suffer the stress of taking prisoners.

He approved of the M-60 machine gun with the cold, matter-of-fact terms of the professional soldier: ''Now my platoons can kill more men."

He listened intently as his men talked about the M-60 tank and its 105-mm. gun. "Someone who makes tanks finally started taking suggestions from the people who use them," said Sergeant Reuben Hawes. "I can shoot a country mile with this tank."

Bullet points of the kinder gentler armored.

[Darksheare]

It's not THAT strong... is it?