General Martin Dempsey is Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. He says: "If someone uses the uniform, whatever uniform, for partisan politics, I'm disappointed because I think it does erode that bond of trust we have with the American people." This statement allows him to appear politically non-partisan.
He’s used his uniform in a form of partisan political influence concerning his own participation and advancement in a system allowing him to rise to the top of his field. NO General would be where he is if it wasn’t for the lip service he must pay to the backside of any incumbent president. In order to ascend to the level of GENERAL and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff any general officer must associatively and realistically attach himself at the hip to the political stance of any incumbent. The history of the officer corps in military organizations show the “pecking order” in force and enforced as an obeisance younger officers must pay to older more established officers. Purely and simply: “if you want to get along you must learn to go along”.
Nobody gets to be Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff without political connections. No man has ascended to this level of command based solely on his record and without political connections. George Washington was a favorite of the southern members of the Continental Congress and advertised to others such as John Adams as a frontiersman and great military leader. Truth be known, Washington suffered military losses before and during the French and Indian War hardly making him Caesar’s heir.
Generals aren’t elevated to General status without permission of Congress. They’re deemed to be “an officer and gentleman” by Congress’ right of recognition and the fact there are just so many people allowed to become general officers. At present there are only 12 Generals in the Army (all others are of lesser “general” rank – Brigadier/Major/Lieutenant-General). This is a very shallow gene pool when it comes to the selection of “one above all”. It’s evident politics rears its ugly head in the selection process.
While it’s sure a man/woman’s personal qualifications and achievements are taken into account, it must be understood favoritism is adjusted to find the person most aligned with the incumbent President nominating/advancing the individual to the post. It would be stupid to place a politically adversarial individual in charge of the army. Ask Abraham Lincoln about George Meade as Commander of the Army of the Potomac. Meade’s undisguised egotism guided him to believe he was Presidential material. His lack of desire to re-engage Lee after the Battle of Gettysburg proved he was a detriment to the army, his president and the nation. His early incompetence led to unnecessary combat losses at the beginning of the war.
General Dempsey has a unique stance on the matter of former Seal Team members commenting on their belief Beaurat Obama is responsible for security leaks. They appear to believe Obama’s garnering attention and votes for his faux-militaristic stance and ordering the mission to take out Osama bin Laden. The FORMER Seals (thus private citizens) accuse Obama of politicizing and taking unfair advantage of the works of Seal Team members while he remains safely in absentia. Obama’s lackeys (Joe Biden) claim he “killed Osama bin Laden”. The General protests weakly about the discussion: “It’s not useful to me.” But it might be important to a man in the field going under fire.
The good general no longer travels under arms. He’s beyond all that now. He directs the operation of the Army and coordinates efforts with the other services to get America’s best interests militarily represented and accomplished. He cares about all service members. But he doesn’t engage in combat. I don’t know if he ever did.
He’s taking a neutral stance, choosing to err on the side of personally protective prudence by not supporting men he knows are better equipped experientially and personally to comment on the EFFECTS of security leaks in the field. His answer to questions on this subject shows his balancing act.
And that’s the definition of politically correct expedience.
Thanks for listening
