Top Officer Urges Limit on Mission of Military

[struggle4progress]

Source: NYT

By THOM SHANKER
Published: January 12, 2009

WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Monday that senior officers must work to prevent the militarization of American foreign policy, and he urged generals and admirals to tell civilian leaders when they believed the armed forces should not take the lead in carrying out policies overseas.

Adm. Mike Mullen, who as chairman is the nation’s highest-ranking military officer, also called for more money and personnel to be devoted to the civilian agencies responsible for diplomacy and overseas economic development.

The military is engaged in deep soul-searching over the proper role of the armed forces in foreign policy. The debate has been inspired by the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which have forced the military to take on responsibilities far beyond combat, including tasks like economic reconstruction and political development that are often described as “nation building” ...

Admiral Mullen acknowledged that the nation had “reached for the military hammer in the toolbox of foreign policy fairly often.” But he underscored a lesson learned during his time in uniform, dating to the Vietnam War, which he described as “an acute understanding of the finite application of force abroad — as well as its impact at home” ...

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/13/washington/13military.html?_r=1&ref=world

[elleng]

1. 'Admiral Mullen also offered

a rule for proper behavior among senior military officers, both in active duty and retirement. He commended those senior military leaders who “provide strong opinions to leaders in private, when it counts,” but he said generals and admirals should “maintain purity from partisanship once their time in service is over.”

In the spring of 2006, as the war in Iraq risked spiraling into civil war, a group of retired officers openly called for firing Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in what became known as “the generals’ revolt.”'

[laylah]

2. IMPORTANT...k&r nt