Let's Weaken the Authority of Military Commanders - No?

 
"... military officials united in opposition to Gillibrand’s proposal, which would take away commanders’ authority to determine whether sexual assault cases go to trial. “If you’ve heard each of us suggest that the role of a commander is central in solving this problem, it’s because we believe that the role of the commander is essential to any change we will be able to make on this issue,” Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey told the committee, defending the current processes. Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force and Coast Guard leaders testified Tuesday on a panel convened by the Senate Armed Services Committee to hear opinions on pending sexual assault bills.  Politico

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The notion that military society is or should be closely analogous to civilian life is just ignorant and silly.

The military life and military society exist for the sole purpose of doing violence in service of the foreign, and if need be, the domestice policy of the US Government

The military does not exist for the purpose of creating opportunities for "self-actualization" for people in the forces.  This is true without regard to gender, race, status as a membe of a protected minority or whatever.

In pursuit of combat power in the service of the country, nothing can be  allowed to exist in the US armed forces that detracts in any way from the generation and maintenance of that power.

 A key factor in the generation of combat power is the unity and integrity of what is called the chain of command.  By this is meant the undivided authority and responsibility of commanders at all levels from squad leader to theater commander over all that occurs within their commands.  The principle enunciated by the Commandant of the USMC today that both the authority and the responsibility of commanders can not be diluted without threatening the capability of the force is absolutely correct.

Both the functioning of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) and the Inspector General system are command functions.  There is no separate judicial system,  in the military, nor should there be.  A court-martial is a command function.  It sits in the name of the commander and represents him or her and acts for him.  The commander should continue to have the right to reduce sentences recommended by a court-martial that was authorized by him.

To take judicial power away from commanders is to weaken the power and authority of all commanders and to court battlefield disaster when in some future combat service members question that authority.

It is amusing to hear draft dodgers like Christopher Matthews opine on how the armed forces should be run, but it is much more serious to hear senators who know little of the reality of war treat this crisis of criminal activity as an issue left over from the feminist culture wars.

Solution:

What needs to be done is to hold commanders responsible in terms of promotion and assignment for failure to enforce existing militsry law.  In other words, commanders who do not fully investigate, prosecute and punish malfeasants should be penalized in term of their careers.  As soon as it becomes clear that this is true, the rate of such misbehavior will drop to a low level.  All that will be required to achieve that effect will be for some general or admiral to be heavily penalized for failure to act or for retaliation.  pl 

http://www.politico.com/story/2013/06/military-sexual-assault-hearing-92196.html

Comments

[kao_hsien_chih]

What's next? A corps of political commissars for the US Army, to enforce "appropriate" politics as defined by socio-cultural elite?

[Fred]

You have put the solution succinctly:

"What needs to be done is to hold commanders responsible in terms of promotion and assignment for failure to enforce existing military law."

I would point out to Senator Gillibrand of New York, Senator McCaskill of Missouri and Senator Ayotte of New Hampshire (she's got a bill in the mix too) that the Commander in Chief, as he has repeatedly reminded us for five years, is Barrack Obama. How many general officers did President Obama hold accountable for this egregious state of affairs in the armed forces in his first year of leadership? His second? His third? His fourth? His current year? Zero?

Senator Gillibrand made the case quite eloquently in the linked article: "“You have lost the trust of those men and women who rely on you… they are afraid to report, they fear their careers will be over… that is our biggest challenge right there. Right there,”

Surely such dereliction of duty by the CIC is deserving of a vote of 'guilty' in the Senate should the House of Representatives impeach him? If no does that not mean this type of leadership is acceptable by the Senate of the United States?

Well I'm sure all the democrats will rally around this CIC who's leadership has brought a record number of assaults against women in the armed forces - just as they are rallying around PFC Bradley Manning. Because they all know the job of a PFC is reading the emails of every senior officer in a war zone and leaking them to the press? Isn't that just the thing a man of integrity and courage would do while on active duty at war? Just ask those Senators, only don't ask Senator Ayotte of New Hampshire, she deleted the entire email history of her time as Attorney General of that state and issued a fine CYA memorandum to ensure no-one was coming after her. Just the kind of integrity we need in the Senate.

[Alba Etie]

Col Lang
Why is there no penalization of career opportunities for General officers now ? Is it because of the current administration lack of moral leadership ? Or has the issue of rape been a long standing problem in the Military ? I remember scandals like "Tailhook " but this problem appears to be more pervasive now in our Military .

[The Twisted Genius]

I agree. Do not dilute military command authority or responsibility. General Dempsey and the service chiefs have to not only hold commanders responsible. They must decide what, if any, part of military culture must change to support full enforcement of military law in this area. At some point the hunt for the "bow legged woman on a ferris wheel" has to stop. The trick is to have the discipline to know when to stop.

My last active duty post was at Fort Jackson. The commanding general established a zero tolerance for misconduct of any kind for permanent party personnel. Everyone knew this and acted accordingly. It was a far cry from the situation at Fort Jackson today. The commanding general is charged with sexual misconduct.

[turcopolier]

TTG

It's a matter of discipline among commanders at all levels not just generals.. I have long thought that the professional ethic has been in decline. This is proof. pl

[mbrenner]

Does not the President as Commander-in-Chief have the prerogative - indeed responsibility - to superimpose his judgment on those commanders who have used their authority to act in a manner that the President judges contrary to the good order and effectiveness of the country's military?

To put it frankly, I find it difficult to comprehend General Dempsey's argument made in testimony today that the proposed revisions would make it harder to recruit and to retain high caliber officers. I believe that simple logic suggests just the opposite. That pertains to men of integrity as well as women who may see the present environment as lacking integrity.. Too many officers of every grade clearly have serious emotional problems that prevent them from dealing with women professionally. As long as women serve, those men should be weeded out in the national interest.

[turcopolier]

mbrenner

What a great idea! Let's have a political purge of the officer corps over this. Just what we need after a decade of war. Excellent thinking. pl

[The Twisted Genius]

PL,

True. I believe what happens in the company area is more important that what eventually happens in the Pentagon. But it would be nice to know that the brass have your back.

[jerseycityjoan]

One of the problems here would be that many Americans -- including those in leadership positions in Washington - would not agree with much of what you said above in Paragraphs 1-7.

We've seen the military take on many jobs and roles that lay outside its traditional responsibilities in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Much of the recruitment efforts are focused on what the military can do for its people (e.g. job training) versus what the recruits will do for the country by serving. The idea that the military can and should do just about anything seems quite prevalent to me. The public has been encouraged to think that way by many people and groups in recent years.

All in all, I am afraid you are going to have a devil of time keeping the application of civilian standards at bay.

Maybe a positive of shrinking military budget will be a greater emphasis on the military as fighters vs. jacks of all trades.

[turcopolier]

JCJ

We may end up with a highly politicized and "correct" military that will be combat ineffective. pl

[Bill H]

PL, your comments keep reminding me of Beria, Stalin and 1941. You know what I'm talking about and, no, it isn't the same, but you can't blame me for having it pop into my head. That purge of Russia's officer corps was such a success, for Russia, wasn't it? And it led to a highly politicized and "correct" military that led Hitler's army right to the gates of Stalingrad.

[mbrenner]

Colonel

i make no reference to any sort of 'purge.' Commanders who exercise arbitrary power in a way that undermines good order should be removed - that's all. If some officers - for whatever reason - cannot tolerate a military that enforces its own standards and rules re. the treatment of women, I fail to see the virtue in appeasing them

[turcopolier]

mbrenner

Some of the best combat officers who ever lived were utterly opposed to the idiocies of political policy. i would cite Patton and David Hackworth as examples. you are unqualified to judge what is important in an officer and what is not. pl

[Tyler]

This is just an attempt to insert a commissar class into the military to make sure 'progressive thought' is being carried forward.

What was the metric on sexual assault? Was it the same bullshit one that led to the much touted (and eminently false) 3 out of 4 women will be raped stat? I heard on NPR this morning how its ESTIMATED that 6 out of 7 women will be sexually assaulted in the military with no description of how they came up with that stat.

Some other uncomfortable hate facts.

Male on male sexual assaults through the roof:

http://frontpagemag.com/2013/dgreenfield/gay-men-responsible-for-most-military-sex-assaults/

"When the Defense Department released the results of its anonymous sexual abuse survey this month and concluded that 26,000 service members were victims in fiscal 2012, which ended Sept. 30, an automatic assumption was that most were women. But roughly 14,000 of the victims were male and 12,000 female, according to a scientific survey sample produced by the Pentagon.

“It appears that the DOD has serious problems with male-on-male sexual assaults that men are not reporting and the Pentagon doesn’t want to talk about,” Elaine Donnelly, who heads the Center for Military Readiness, said. She noted that only 2 percent of assailants are women."

Flys in the face of the narrative, so you won't hear it reported except to be sneered at by the MSM.

False sexual assault complaints incrase over actual sexual assaults:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/12/false-reports-outpace-sex-assaults-in-the-military/?page=all

"During the same period, the number of what the Pentagon calls “unfounded allegations” based on completed investigations of those reports rose from 331 to 444 — a 35 percent increase."

This is just yet another pillar of traditional Western society under attack by the Left and their cultural marxist mouthpieces in the name of equality. I'm surprised the generals didn't roll over on their backs and piddle themselves for another medal.

[Tyler]

History dosen't repeat but it sure rhymes. We're seeing the Left trying to shove in comissars because sex crimes are oh so very bad and we must protect the women.

On the other hand sending them into the thick of combat to be raped by the enemy is 'progress'.

[optimax]

Tyler

Men have also been raped in the military. It could be some type of perverted hazing ritual such as has been reported in some high school locker rooms. Whatever, rape is a crime and needs to be prosecuted. I agree that women shouldn't be mixed with men in the front lines but many of these incidents took place outside of combat areas.

Feminism doesn't accept the cultural imperative that a man's role is to protect women and children, but I don't agree and will protect them whether they want it or not. That is our most basic duty to life.

[optimax]

I heard that sexual assault prosecutions hindered a commander's future promotion. If this is true, then the col. is right that promotion needs to depend on the commander's willingness to fairly prosecute rapists and not sweep it under the rug. I don't know if the metrics for promotion are written or unwritten but the Commander in Chief needs to set the guidelines instead of giving one of his "this is unacceptable" speeches.

[Fred]

"... the Commander in Chief needs to..."

While I agree completely President Obama has had half a decade to provide leadership. This is the result.

[Tyler]

Optimax,

As I posted below, male on male sexual assaults make up the bulk of the complaints, so we agree there.

I'd just like to know the metric used. The discredited study that led to the oft quoted "3 out of 4 women have been raped" defined "a sexual experience you regretted" as rape.

Feminism is Marxism in a bikini, and its an attempt to inject the state into the family formation. Cultures generally went to war to PROTECT their women. Any society that sacrifices their women isn't one that will last for long.

[jerseycityjoan]

Yes.

And look at how our allies are cutting back and blithely assuming that we will pick up the slack.

Everybody has all these great expectations and demands on the US military's resources, our troops and our money.

We can't afford all these commitments. We can't fulfill the fantasy of being the solver of all problems. We sure can't solve our own.

I see many parallels here to the shifting and increasing role played in our government affairs and society by the Supreme Court since the 1950s. We have made the Court decide many things that we lacked the courage to.

But the shifting of responsibilities from the civilian world to the military, while convenient and reassuring to those who have lost faith with the civilian government, just won't work.

We have allowed the people in charge in business, government and other institutions to shift and shirk responsibilities so long that it seems many our "leaders" no longer know how to lead, or want to. And when some of them do, they are immediately jumped on and condemned. This will have to change.

Frankly we have wrenching days ahead. We have been living in a fantasy world for over 30 years. The pain is more than worth the gain, but that's not a popular appeal anymore, is it?

[John Minnerath]

The Commander in Chief and his followers and underlings are engaging in social reengineering, meddling in their attempt to create a society they seem to see through their rainbow tinted glasses.
All at a net loss to traditions and morals of society.

[Lord Curzon]

"...commanders who do not fully investigate, prosecute and punish malfeasance should be penalized in term of their careers."

Pour encourager les autres!

[VietnamVet]

Colonel,

As a member of the last cohort of American males to be drafted, I never served with a female in the US Army. There was no rapes period. On the other hand, anything loose of value was gone in a flash; in my case, an 8 track tape deck and a portable international radio when I got back to the States. I never saw any physical harassment. Like “Full Jacket Metal”; the drill sergeants in basic training picked on the weakest recruit to wash him out of our cycle to build unit cohesion with the rest.

The Baby Boomers are never going to be called “The Greatest Generation”. If we allow the Elite to continue to screw us and our families, we are going to end up as “The Real Losers”. My ex-wife’s brother, a Vietnam Vet, just died of untreated pneumonia and her nephew killed himself because of no job.

Instead of jobs for Americans the priority is a headlong rush to initiate a jihad between Sunni and Shiite Muslims to benefit Israel and war profiteers.

The endless wars required privatization of logistics and a volunteer army. To get even these diminished numbers females are needed. DOD is going to need commissars and more to keep the troops going back to the Middle East, tour after tour, and stop acting out inappropriately when briefly back home.

[Fred]

I watched part of the senate hearings on CSPAN yesterday. Not one of the Senators on the committee showed any concern that men were being raped. Apparently that's ok with them.

[Laura Wilson]

You make a lot of sense. It really isn't about politicization...rape (of men or women) is a crime. It is a crime in the military and it is a crime for civilians. A convicted rapist would be losing their job (or advancement) in either situation. It's just wrong--it is just violent--it is just about inappropriate power relationships--it hurts the military and the military chain of command must address each case appropriately and quickly. It's NOT about hormones, it is about aggression against your fellow soldiers--probably a REALLY bad move for unit cohesion.

I also find it a little odd that the victim doesn't just shot the rapist---they all have guns and know how to use them, right?