MILITARY: Report says Gen. Amos will be next Marine Corps commandant

North County Times ^ | June 15, 2010 | North County Times

[Lancey Howard]

Defense Secretary Robert Gates will recommend that Gen. James Amos become the next commandant of the Marine Corps, according to a report in Tuesday's Washington Post. The newspaper quoted an anonymous military source saying that Gates passed over former Camp Pendleton Gen. James Mattis as well as Lt. Gen. Joseph Dunford, head of the base's I Marine Expeditionary Force. The newspaper said that Gates would submit the Amos nomination to President Barack Obama in a few days, and that he also will recommend that Dunford be elevated to assistant commandant. Amos, currently assistant commandant, would be the first commandant to come from the ranks of Marine Corps aviators.

[Lancey Howard]

Nevermind.. (Google is my friend.)
Thanks for the heads-up.

It is speculated that Amos was selected by Mabus and approved by Gates because they see him as not “pushing back” on defense spending cuts. I don’t like the sound of that, but I suppose it’s better than destroying the military from within by pushing social engineering in the form of sanctioned perversion down the military’s throat. (Can you imagine how tied up JAG and CIC would be with “hate crime” prosecutions? Good freaking grief...)

FRegards,
LH

[Lancey Howard]

P.S. Yes, it is very clear to me now.

[lentulusgracchus]

It was in that original link. Read the whole thing and you'll see the comment about Mabus -- of course, he's SecNav so of course he'll have had input, but according to the blog article, naming Gen. Amos was his call, and Gates and the President signed off.

Interestingly, the blog article also adduces other reasons beyond DADT that were supposedly uppermost in Gates's mind during the selection process, to-wit, he wanted an FMF amphibious kind of guy more than a ground-pounding warfighter, someone who'd lead the Corps back to its power-projection role with the Fleet, among other things.

<Tiny little question: "What fleet, if we keep building down like this?>

</questions>

[Lancey Howard]

I have to wonder how much Mattis was tainted by the Haditha fiasco, and not only the sick railroad job that flew off the tracks under Mattis’ eye, but the dismissal of the charges against Chessani as a result of UCI. Mattis looked real bad, but I think he was caught between Scylla and Charybdis. That case (and there’s actually still one Marine left to be exonerated) was one of my biggest disappointments with Bush, who could have done the right thing at any time.

[lentulusgracchus]

I haven't followed Haditha since the original airing of the charges and gory details, except to note that the charged Marines have been exonerated. Of course, that invites questions (and would come back to the area force commander's desk, as you say), but my attention's been elsewhere.