REVOLTING GENERALS

In every army, there are (a few) Grants and (many) McClellans. The key to success in war is to find and promote the Grants. Keep this in mind as you examine what Time magazine calls the "Revolt of the Generals."

Six retired Army and Marine generals have called for the resignation of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.  There are about 4,700 retired flag officers. For every general speaking out against Secretary Rumsfeld, there are more than 780 who are not.

Many who aren’t speaking out agree with the six, claimed the Washington Post’s David Ignatius in his column last Friday:

"When I recently asked an Army officer with extensive Iraq combat experience how many of his colleagues wanted Rumsfeld out, he guessed 75 percent," Ignatius said. "Based on my conversations with senior officers over the past three years, I suspect that figure may be low."

But Secretary Rumsfeld doesn’t lack for enthusiastic defenders in the ranks: "My assessment from extensive and continuous contact with young field grade officers…is that Secretary Rumsfeld is considered the finest Secretary of Defense in the last 40 years," said an Army lieutenant colonel in an email to the Web log RealClear Politics.

Record re-enlistment rates do not suggest widespread dissatisfaction among the rank and file with the secretary of defense.

Retired Marine generals Anthony Zinni, a former commander of CENTCOM, and Gregory Newbold, once the Operations officer for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, criticized Rumsfeld because they think the war in Iraq was a mistake.

Retired Army generals Charles Swannack, a former commander of the 82nd Airborne Division; John Batiste, a former commander of the 1st Infantry Division; and Paul Eaton, once responsible for training Iraqi troops, are silent about the wisdom of the war, but critical about how it has been fought.

Virtually all the complaining generals oppose Secretary Rumsfeld’s plans for military reform, and are angered and offended by his management style. (The secretary is often brusque with subordinates he thinks reason or perform poorly.)

The generals speaking out may have reasons other than patriotism for doing so. Gen. Zinni is flogging a book. MajGen. John Riggs was busted a grade and forced to retire because of a procurement scandal. MajGen. Eaton oversaw the rebuilding of the Iraqi army in 2003-2004, when everyone now agrees this was a disaster.

"When Swannack, for example, blames Rumsfeld for Abu Ghraib, he gives up the game," wrote retired Army Col. Andrew Bacevich, now a professor at Boston University, in the Los Angeles Times. "By pointing fingers at Rumsfeld, the generals hope to deflect attention from the military’s own egregious mistakes."

Retired Army Col. Douglas Macgregor, whose book "Breaking the Phalanx" is a rough blueprint for the organizational reforms the Army is making now, agrees military leaders deserve at least as much blame for mistakes in Iraq as do the Pentagon’s civilian leaders.

Many generals, especially in the Army, are overly bureaucratic and risk averse, Col. Macgregor said. Excessive caution nearly denied the U.S. a quick victory in the march on Baghdad, and excessive use of force after the fall of Saddam by, among others, MajGen. Swannack, fueled the insurgency, he said.

The complaining generals said Mr. Rumsfeld doesn’t listen to his subordinate commanders, a criticism rebutted by the retired generals who dealt with him most frequently, former CENTCOM commander Gen. Tommy Franks; his deputy, retired Marine LtGen. Michael Delong; and Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

The real problem is Secretary Rumsfeld pays too much deference to generals who are demonstrably incompetent, Col. Macgregor said. The night Baghdad fell, Mr. Rumsfeld asked the Army ground forces commander how long it would take to get an armored brigade to Saddam’s home town of Tikrit, Col. Macgregor recounted. The answer was 10 days.

Mr. Rumsfeld then asked the Marines, who got there in 12 hours.

The Grant of the Iraq war was then Marine MajGen. James Mattis, who thinks as well as he fights.

"Immediately advancing Mattis to three stars…would have sent a powerful signal that professional competence and character under fire trump all other considerations in wartime," Col. Macgregor said. "Unfortunately, the civilians in charge bowed to service parochialism and appointed an Army general, because Army troops constituted the majority of the ground force."

I should though let two friends have the last word on the Revolting Generals.  Most revolting of all is General Hypocrite Tony Zinni, who was nailed by Brit Hume on Fox News:

Former Clinton CENTCOM commander, Anthony Zinni–the most prominent of the retired generals attacking Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld–now says that, in the run-up to the war in Iraq, "What bothered me … [was that] I was hearing a depiction of the intelligence that didn’t fit what I knew. There was no solid proof, that I ever saw, that Saddam had WMD."

But in early 2000, Zinni told Congress "Iraq remains the most significant near-term threat to U.S. interests in the Arabian Gulf region," adding, "Iraq probably is continuing clandestine nuclear research, [and] retains stocks of chemical and biological munitions … Even if Baghdad reversed its course and surrendered all WMD capabilities, it retains scientific, technical, and industrial infrastructure to replace agents and munitions within weeks or months."

Then there is the question asked by Judith Klinghoffer:

To hear two and three star generals whine that Rumsfeld is too intimidating causes one to ask who else can so easily intimidate them? Are we talking perhaps of the insurgents, Ahmadinejad, Assad Fils, the North Korean or China? Imagine being a soldier who has served under the command of so easily intimidated a general. Their retired generals’ contention that they are speaking for their active duty colleagues merely makes matters worse.