Ending Rumsfeld's Reign

[Mr_Jefferson_24]

By John Peebles
Online Journal Contributing Writer

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_726.shtml

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Rumsfeld has turned our military into an instrument serving the political needs of the executive. The uniformed leadership of the Pentagon has grown tired of the influence of politics in Rumsfeld's decision-making, and the secretary's self-righteous leadership style (like that of his superior, Bush).

Like Bush, Rumsfeld demanded total loyalty from his inner circle. So, in one of his first challenges to the status quo, he supplanted the traditional command hierarchy in the Armed Services using the secretaries of the service branches with a tiered array of personally selected, highly trusted, controllable minions.

For the Old Guard, an end to Rumsfeld's controversial tenure connotes a return to a more conventional military, where decisions were made by senior officers using more traditional assumptions. Buried in Rumsfeld's departure is the hope that the military may be able to avoid political influence from White House, or at least minimize it. Theoretically, less politicized leadership would allow the Pentagon to address with an apolitical eye the administrative and political problems in Iraq, and, thereby, be able to resolve them more favorably.

For far too long the military leadership has been eager to tell Rumsfeld what he wanted to hear, rather than face the truth that the insurgency was worsening. As in Vietnam, bad news has a hard time working itself up the chain-of-command. For career preservation, silence was prudent -- the outing of three-star General Shinseki showed that no one in the military was immune from the influence of politics. Likewise, Shinseki's outing sent the message that analysis would be judged more on its acceptability to political sensitivities than its accuracy. This could explain why the Iraq problem grew worse as Rumsfeld told Bush and the press that things were improving -- a style of politically sapient media management which ultimately set up big problems for our military later.

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[cliss]

1. That is a very good article.

For the sake of our military, Don Rumsfeld needs to go.

Thanks for posting.