Posted on 02/20/2015 3:04:28 AM PST by Timber Rattler
A new study by Army War College professors found that not only is lying common in the military, the armed forces themselves may be inadvertently encouraging it.
The study, released Tuesday, was conducted by retired Army officers and current War College professors Leonard Wong and Stephen J. Gerras. They found that untruthfulness is “surprisingly common in the U.S. military even though members of the profession are loath to admit it.”
The paper’s release follows a series of high-profile incidents involving bad behavior across the services, including a still-widening corruption case involving senior Navy officers and at least two incidents in which Army generals were accused of sexual assault.
The new study found that many Army officers have become “ethically numb” in the face of overwhelming demands and the need to put their reputations on the line to verify that all required standards and training requirements have been met.
The issue affects the whole military, but the professors focused their effort on the Army because they are the most familiar with it, they wrote. They interviewed scores of officers, from captains to colonels, at several bases on the East Coast, many of whom bristled initially at the notion they colored the truth, the report said.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The current Commander-in-Chief being a serial, pathological liar. Period.
A military organization relies on a degree of rigidity in the behavior of its members because that is the only way to get a person to face live fire. Therefore, it is the unquestioned role of higher authority to set a high moral tone if that authority expects moral behavior in the lower ranks. OTOH, if the general and flag officers are just trying to get their next star, they end up obliquely justifying "whatever it takes".
When the troops have absolute confidence in the integrity of their commander, such as the Army of Northern Virginia had in Robert E Lee, we see an effective military force. The power of his integrity was illustrated more than once with the poignant, "Lee to the rear" moments when ordinary soldiers who had been retreating promised they would take an objective or would halt an enemy advance if Lee would only place his person in relative safety.
The late David Halberstam wrote an insightful book about the Vietnam War titled, All the Best and Brightest, in which he described the whiz kids under Secretary of State Robert McNamara who brought to the Pentagon and the Vietnam War the same methods he had used at Ford Motors. His method was grounded in the assumption that the accumulation of data would lead to correct decision-making so the commanders in the field, going down to quite junior ranks, were compelled to fill out forms, especially body counts, just as managers of far-flung Ford plants were required to fill out forms. Inevitably, both junior officers and plant managers began to fudge the numbers. Cooking the books became the order of the day.
We saw this phenomenon much worse in the Soviet Union which ultimately led to its disintegration. It is probable that we are watching the same phenomenon right now in China as its economy goes into eclipse. Certainly we see it at home in spades with Obamacare.
This is a very serious problem but it is one which no doubt quickens the heart of the Washington Post who in all probability would rejoice as the American military is discredited. So far, our military remains one of the few institutions in America untainted in the general mind with this kind of corruption.
However, we have seen how the Obama administration has sought to undermine the integrity of the officer corps and play politics through the ranks. This is an example of the application of the "critical theory" in which every institution must be destroyed to make way for socialist Nirvana. I fear the Washington Post will be only too happy to report his success.
I never heard of lying or falsifying any report the first six years I was in the Army. From 66-73 I was never asked to lie, cover up or falsify anything. In fact I was urged to turn in any such BS in Special Forces. In July of 73-July of 74 I was sent to Korea and the leg Infantry AKA 2nd ID. The lying was widespread. Drug use was everywhere troops under E-5 were. SSG’s, SFC’s and even 1SGT’s were sad ass NCO’s in that leg unit. The O-4’s and above all were used to lying. LT’s asked the BN CO how to become BN CO’s at night in the O club before they could lead a rifle platoon. I never saw such trash in my prior years in Special Forces. Hell, every SF NCO I had known was better then most of the officers in the 2ID. These LTC’s and O-6’s were sad ass officers who had their tickets punched in RVN. They needed one more for O-6 or BG.
“Lying in the military is common”......
Lying starts with the “Commander in Chief” (Odumbo) who is the most qualified liar of them all, he practices it every day and to no end. I wonder if he actually believes all the lies he tells.
Had you been a LT or CPT in RVN you would know it was not any junior officer who cooked the books.
I could have told anyone this years ago.
I have met and worked along soldiers and there is quite a few who have joined just to get their benefits and don’t give a damn about the country.
Then there is the lying Pentagon and the yes men like Kirby who has just gone.
We just don’t have the traditional values anymore in the military of elected officials sadly.
Just finished reading
“Honor and Betrayal” by Patrick Robinson
Deals with the false charges of prisoner abuse brought against SEAL Team 10 members PO Matthew McCabe and PO Jonathan Keefe.
In 2009 their team snatched the long sought “Butcher of Fallujah” Ahmad Hashim Abd al-Isawi in a lightning night raid without firing a shot. A textbook operation that brought the “Butcher” into custody without so much as a bruise.
Returning to base al-Isawi was placed into the custody of MA3 Brian Westinson pending transfer to Iraqi authorities and from there a trail of his leaving his post several times in the course of the night and his lies the train wreck for the two SEALS begins.
al-Isawi took those periods of absence to follow the Al-Qaeda “Manchester Manual” using US ROE and guidelines to accuse the SEALS of abuse.
Robinson reveals how the PC rules and positions eventually drove the two honorable SEALS from the service they loved even after they were acquited at their court martial.
Uncovered is a long trail of scumbaggery from the 7 different versions of events testified to by Westinson, throught the JAG offices and up to the commanding General Cleveland. It is a sickening tale of CYA up the full chain of command in their efforts to railroad these men. At the same time it bears witness to the honor and courage of SEAL 10 members, the SEALS in general and the remnant of their honorable and unyielding defenders.
Patrick Robinson is also the co-author of Marcus Luttrell’s “Lone Survivor”.
I remember from 1983-84 seeing some unit status reports that stretched the truth almost to the breaking point. I was a company operations sergeant at the time. I knew what our operational status was and it was nowhere near what the reports claimed. It was a matter of interpretation, if a piece of equipment could be repaired in 24 hours it could be considered operational. I asked our maintenance officer about it. He told me that if he had the parts everything could be up and running in 24 hours. We didn’t have the parts and it often took over a month to get them. One day I was talking with our battalion commander when he brought up the subject. He couldn’t really believe the whole battalion for over 95% operational. I suggested he have “rollouts” to check. He’d call an alert and every piece of deployable equipment would muster on the beach. He straightened out the supply chain (rank has its privileges) and we were ready for Grenada. Our equipment was old and we had permission to salvage parts from the local Transportation Museum.
Everything. I’ve heard back from a number of my friends in the military, including company and field grade officers, and they say it’s all true. They just can’t say so publicly.
You hit the nail on the head as I went to Colin Powell’s BN in late Dec 1973 to check on his units APC’s . Having been SF for 7 years and a senior CPT, I ask the NCO’s for answers- not the officers. The BN motor pool NCOIC told me the spare parts were in ISREAL for their war. I had maybe a ten minute conversation with that old maintenance NCOIC and told him I was dead lining 90% of the APC’s. He replied-” I told the Major you replaced this for 6 months and he never reported the truth. When I saw that SF patch I was hopeful.” Good NCO’s hate lying. He wanted an officer to report the damn truth.
In my 20-yr plus career in the Air Force I have never seen anyone lie about C-status.
How many times were you asked; “So, are we on-board with this?” and you nod and say “yes sir” but you are not on-board with it (a “lie”).
Like I asked, what sort of lies and to what extent are we talking about. That is important to know. Are they lumping little lies like above with lies regarding mission and combat capability? If they are combining them then that survey is nonsense.
The time-honored concepts of CYA and FYB are institutionalized.
Back during my time as an O-1/O-2 in the mid-80’s, the rot that set in during the days of the Hollow Army was in full bloom. Unit readiness, evaluations, across the board the truth was more flexible than an Asian porn star.
But what REALLY entered the mix was just coming up to Desert Storm: Political Correctness slowly became the order of the day. Now it wasn’t enough to have your OER’s covered in glitter and gold stars from the teacher - you also had to check the boxes for MulticulturalDiversityTolerance. Social engineering was now a leadership metric.
As an NCO, I kept thanking whatever divine omnipotence got me out of the officer ranks - as a crabby old NCO, I was allowed to get away with more free thought.
I have no doubt in my mind, none whatsoever, that the current generation of troops and their leaders would obey the orders of The Obamessiah and open fire on Americans.
Yeah, that guy had a weapon and pointed it at me. Yeah, that’s the ticket.
The rules of engagement require lying to protect yourself and yet, stay out of the stockade.
The guy round the corner joined the NG, not for love of country but to get his benefits. H e wears his uniform to get his discount Chic-fil-a amongst other discounts.
My oldest son aged 17 who is in high school and ROTC went with the national guard for a weekend as part of a recruitment event at Camp Blanding. He came back and got top shot and beat adults . He then said there is no way he is joining them. he went on to say they are useless, lazy and, can’t even understand basic firearms safety . They were dressed like a sack of turds.
The night I saw a vehicle pull outside my house and two soldiers got out. I went out to greet hem and they were regular army who had seen my son at school in ROTC and wanted to talk to me about him joining.
They saw the photographs of me when I served and we got talking. Both has been to Afghanistan and Iraq and said it has changed, it’s got too PC now and, it’s not the army it once was.
This was recruiters! Yet they must have felt comfortable talking to me about it as they knew I had served too.
The whole military and the Pentagon is not what we grew up with. We now have cross dressers, lay abouts, fatties, women who keep getting pregnant in the Navy etc, those who want benefits and,homosexuals , plus the yes men and women like Kirby an dothers .
Camp Blanding - mugawd, I haven’t seen that place in years...
I was a Recruiter myself (79T) back on ‘04. Back then, we were bending the rules about felonies on the recruiting packets - anything to put corpuscles in boots. We were promising them the moon; college money, re-enlistment bonuses, cash gifts, anything to get them to Basic/AIT.
And that was WITHOUT stretching the age requirements! I had graybeards trying to come back in after Iraqi Freedom kicked off. I actually worked on one guy’s packet who was right at the borderline, he was 46 years old, prior service, and wanted one last shot.
And you’re right, the service WE grew up in is a thing of the past.
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