Our Stained, Muzzled Military

It is hard to point to one thing as the worst element of the current scandal over the Benghazi cover-up. But there’s something that belongs on the list that has not been mentioned enough.

Obviously, it is a consuming matter to absorb the deaths of four Americans and a subsequent campaign of deceit designed to protect those in power now and those who may seek it later.

But politicians have a long history of lying to protect themselves. What is different here, and disturbing to a whole new level, is the capacity of this administration to plow well beyond its own corruption to corrupt others.

There is no more distressing victim of this phenomenon than the hierarchy and culture of the United States military.

This White House has very little use for our men and women in uniform, and no proper instinct for the respect they deserve.

They become useful props when it’s time to crow again about the killing of Osama bin Laden, but the war that made that possible is a cancer the Obama team is radiating into obscurity, as we cut and run from Afghanistan, Iraq and every theater where we had a chance to boost democracy with our stabilizing presence.

There is little doubt that the Benghazi terrorists were energized by this American surrender. Does anyone believe they would have pulled this off if we had maintained a strong presence throughout the Middle East?

But even with our Obama-depleted ranks in the region, we now know we could have mounted some response to minimize the damage done by the Benghazi terrorists.

But those response teams were told to stand down. Reaction throughout the ranks apparently ranged from fury to disbelief.

Both are warranted, among our armed forces and across the American landscape. How in God’s name were responding forces restrained? And by whom?

If Democrats can stifle their chant that all questions have been answered, they might work on that one. And then they might join the chorus of curious souls wondering how officials who knew better could continue to parrot that stupid story about a YouTube video as the catalyst for the Benghazi attacks.

But again, much has been written about that. Not enough light has been directed at the last shred of dignity stripped from our military by this White House. The intimidation of whistleblowers, the attempted muzzling of witnesses who might have more to tell, the stunning disregard shown to the forces who were begging to be loosed to help their countrymen-- this is the work of a wholly unfit Commander-in-Chief.

And yet because of that title, the aggrieved troops cannot speak truth to power. This tragedy demands answers from various military levels on questions about how their trust was trampled by the current President and the former Secretary of State who may wish to be his successor.

This is just the latest dishonor foisted on our armed forces by this regime. Here in the season of sequester, The budgetarily minuscule Blue Angels and Thunderbirds are grounded, silencing their ability to create goodwill. But far more seriously, a carrier group that should be patrolling treacherous Persian Gulf waters is stuck in port, all because this President chooses to strand them there so that an inattentive public can think this is what spending cuts do.

I can imagine the testimony of such a valiant figure. “The air shows did not need to be cancelled. Our ships certainly do not need to be shackled to their docks. This is pure politics.”

But this will never happen. The hierarchy of military power precludes all ranks from publicly highlighting the duplicity of the President, a rule which probably serves us well.

But we need more. We need military heroes to step forward with details of any effort by Barack Obama to spread lies about Benghazi and its aftermath. And we need for even more courageous voices to share any measures undertaken by Hillary Clinton to obscure the truth, including the question of who ordered the silencing of Benghazi survivors and key players.

The Benghazi hearings, thorough as they were, merely scratched the surface of what people did at the highest levels of power, to keep power.

They simply could not have witnesses spilling out with a story of a terror hotbed that Obama somehow had not fixed.

So the cover-up began, and it continues to this day, a corruptive stain that spreads across multiple figures.

Military personnel are not used to being caught up in political self-protection games. But they surely are now, and it sickens them. Or it should

I never had a problem with my superiors that demanded imagination and independence from their officers. Unfortunately, I served too few of these men. But it was my experiences with them that remain the best memories I have of serving my country.

First, God Bless for your service and you sound like they type officer I would have been proud to serve under. There are even fewer who want those under them to use their own brains and initiative - doing so is a sure career killer. It's also politically uncool to try to take care of your troops - you get more scooby points for showing a willingness to slam them than to stand up and protect them. I had more control over my people as a E-7 in the 90s than my current commander does over the folks in the squadron (I'm a DoD Civ now). The Group CC micromanages the squadrons and they have no choice but to carry it down the ranks - really sad to see the deliberate dumbing down of the ranks and attempt to instill a blind followership without effective leadership.

Actually, on several occasions I told my commander, “Put it in writing. I’ll get it cleared by Legal, then obey it.”

I was pretty lucky...I never had to resort to that.

There was a 2-3 week period I let it all hang out. I was the Maintenance Officer for a Chaparral/Vulcan ADA battery in Germany. The Friday prior to our ARTEP (Tac Eval), the Group Cdr visits our tac park, a 90 minute drive from Group HQ. I'm the only officer out there, and my mechanics are exhaused from several weeks of 80+ hours. If just one of my Vulcans or Chaps goes down, we fall below 75%, the minimum acceptable level.

I suck it up and ask the Group Cdr for a 2 week extension...he knew our maintenance status, too. He said, "LT, you know this is going to bring the entire world down on you, don't you?" I replied, "yes sir."

Two weeks later, we underwent the evaluation with 6 Chaparrals and 7 Vulcans. I had to assume the role of XO as well, as the XO was scheduled for a Security Officer class at Vilseck, and Battalion didn't want to send a replacement. My 1SG was new to the unit: he comes up to me and says, "LT, I don't know anything about ADA". He was 26 years Infantry with 3 tours in Nam. My reply? I laughed, and said "Top, you know how to run a company CP? You handle that, and I'll take care of the ADA BS."

The second of 3 days was an unmitigated disaster. One of my Vulcan platoons missed their morning mission time by 30 minutes...completely unforgivable. I was called out of the field to get my butt chewed by the Battalion XO over our unit's maintenance status. After about 5 minutes, I start tapping the receiver, "Major? Major? You're breaking up...click"

When I get back to the CP, the 1SG is sitting down with his head in his hands. When he sees me, he says "It's over, it's over." Apparently, the BC improperly encoded the coordinates to a mission for one of the Vulcan platoons, and the Platoon Leader didn't challenge him. First time in the history of ADA that a Vulcan platoon provided a 10 KM long route defenxe. Pretty tall feat, considering the max effective range of a towed Vulcan was 1000 meters.

The BC was catatonic during our evening meeting...I was already piSSed. I was allowed to speak after his monologue, and I lit into the Platoon Leaders for a good 10 minutes. I told them what they would do the following day, down to what each of their squads would do when visited by the evaluators. I knew exactly what needed to be done, as I had passed 4 ARTEPS as a Platoon Leader, more than the current platoon leaders combined.

Those of you who had been in ARTEPs knew that, to pass, all you had to do was show significant improvement by the end of the third day. Considering our first two days, that was a slam dunk.

As I left the CP, who should I meet 10 feet outside the CP? None other than the Chief Evaluator. I thought, "crap". Instead, he gives me a big smile, and said "LT, that was beautiful!"

We passed, thanks to the efforts of the NCOs and EMs that worked for us. For my effort, I received the worst OER of my career.

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