I had forgotten about the knock on commitments of going to AWC. They gave him some time to do the right thing an get on with his life somewhere else. Getting him out of NSC was not irrational at all even considering his upcoming posting to AWC.
Why would he want to waste time with AWC knowing, if he is more rational than arrogant, he won’t be on the O-6 list with this whitehouse. His stock with the left wont be higher than it is now.
Got him dangling on a thread and it is fun to watch.
Hopefully, it will be as you say and he will submit his papers.
If he does stay and attend AWC, things will be awkward. I imagine the promotion rate to COL for AWC graduates is darn near 100%. Wouldn’t be fun answering how you graduated from the AWC and managed to not be automatically selected for COL.
The regular Army selection rate for COL is reported to be 50%. So he could possibly go and serve in the field Army for a real change of pace.
Of course, once you are psssed over, the above zone selection rate is increasingly smaller single digit percentages with zero being reached pretty quickly. Then you take up residence in annual above-zone-not-selected-again Hell.
Ultimately, the officer either hits 30 years and can be forced into retirement or he/she manages to figure out they actually have been working fulltime for just a fraction of their paycheck (since the rest is guaranteed by having already become eligible for retirement).
(Of course, there are some that truly love the service and the only way they are ever leaving is either feet first or by being taken at gunpoint to the front gate and thrown off post. LTC Vindman does not strike me as being that kind of soldier.)
Even if he were to be promoted, there would be the issue of his likely downgraded security clearance and what kind of assignments an officer of his unique character is suited for.