Posted on 04/27/2006 8:28:14 AM PDT by catholicfreeper
Donald Rumsfeld has a notorious vindictive streak. How low will he stoop to pursue it? Let's put him to the test. If he wanted to get really brutal, Rumsfeld could convene a court-martial and prosecute the six retired generals who have been calling for his head. Military law, if read literally, permits him to do this. So, will he? One of the assumptions surrounding the recent criticism of Rumsfeld is that the retired generals, unlike active-duty officers, are free to criticize the defense secretary without fear of reprisal. Surprisingly, this assumption is untrue. Under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, one of the many activities deemed punishable by court-martial is "contempt toward officials." This code of laws applies not just to active-duty officers but to retired ones, too. .....
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
OR Dec Def Rummy could just re-call all 8 of them and put them in charge of some dank ugly office in the basement of the Pentagon reporting on their "progress" directly to him.
Is this what passes for "journalism" over at Slate?
YEah the first line isnt't that great. However the rest of the article was pretty interesting.
It's the sort of thing a troll would post, basically. Next time put a "projectile vomiting alert" in brackets next to the title and we won't get any crazy ideas.
And as for the substance of the article - is Slate still talking about those two-star generals who Rumsfield didn't promote? Did their books come out yet? Has anyone brought a copy?
Or he could let these crybabies suck their thumbs in the corner, while he does his job winning the war.
According to this Barracks Lawyer/Journalist.
Could Howard Dean mount a military coup?
If you hear a retired Gunny say it, it's gospel.
Ok I will do that next time. I guess I just assumed everyone knew what bias Kaplan had from his past writings. ANyway, I am curious from any ex military if anything of this sort has ever happen. I suspect if it has its way back in our past.
I'm retired USMC. On active duty, the generals can't be ignored, whether or not they are a loose cannon. In retirement, like ex-Presidents, the advice generals give should be given in private. Overt, partisan involvement in politics only serves to diminish the reputation they earned on active duty. If they choose to go public, they deserve the same fate as ex-presidents that overstay their welcome on the public stage: diminished esteem, irrelevance, and obscurity. Courtmarshalling them would provide the stage they seek. They are being ignored which, IMHO, is the proper handling of the matter.
It's true. I've read the same claim from countless other Rumsfeld haters. ;-)
However improbable it might be, it's still a delicious thought: courtmartialing the traitorous, whiney retired generals...
Again, is this what passes for "journalism" at Slate?
Rum isn't going to prosecute these guys, thats a straw man propped up by a writer with space to fill.
Its a shame that guys who spent their lives preparing for war would leave the service when their supposed skills are finally required. Officers and soldiers alike are re-enlisting in record numbers to return to battle. Whats with these generals, who bail when their men are signing on to stay in the fight?
The skills it takes to rise in the ranks during peacetime aren't the same skills required during wartime; during war its the warriors who matter, and I suppose its inevitable that some of these generals will be pushed aside.
Something similar has to happen over at CIA. A peacetime CIA can't fight its way out of a paper bag, there is a lot of housecleaning to be done over there. They have done little except demonstrate convincingly that they can't be trusted in a fight.
Talk about simply creating a news.
Who needs a real negative story breaking about the other side, when you can just write the story in loving detail anyway, by throwing in a "what if he does this".
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