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Group Writing: The Service of GO/FOs
GO/FOs are General Officers/Flag Officers. Pretty much the same thing, just service specific.
Retired GO/FOs seem to be worming their way into the public eye, of late, with their political views. The below observations are from an article by VDH, and I think nicely sum up our now perky GO/FOs deciding to ‘splain to us way the current administration is “bad.” My immediate takes on the comments below are in bold and italic.
Retired four-star general Barry McCaffrey for the past three years has leveled a number of ad hominem charges against the elected president. He essentially called the president a threat to American national security on grounds that his loyalties were more to Vladimir Putin than to his own country. McCaffrey later called the president “stupid” and “cruel” for recalibrating the presence of trip-wire troops in-between Kurdish and Turkish forces. He recently equated Trump’s cancellation of the White House subscriptions of the New York Times and the Washington Post to the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.
If you make ad hominem attacks, it means you have no real argument (a lesson gleaned from assimilating lessons learned from a former Commander of mine. A cat named Barry McCaffrey). Now that Turkey acquiesced to humanely conducting its affairs in Kurdish areas of Syria, POTUS’ course of action looks neither stupid nor cruel. And calling the cancellation of NYT and WaPo subscriptions the equivalent of Mussolini? Okay, Nancy, why don’t you grab some camomile tea and sit down on the (fainting) couch for a bit, until you regain your composure.
Retired General Stanley McChrystal—removed from command by the Obama Administration for inter alia allegedly referring to the vice president as “Bite Me”—called the president “immoral and dishonest.”
Okay. But how much can we credit the political acumen of a GO who got himself relieved because he gave full access to a Rolling Stone reporter, and didn’t know it was a hit job from the get-go? Too, reading that article (and adding to that everything military professionals whom I trust have told me on the subject), it looks like McChrystal was busier legend-building than solving the Gordian knot of Afghanistan.
Former CIA director Michael Hayden—a four-star Air Force general formerly smeared by the Left for defending supposed “torture” at Guantanamo—compared Trump’s policies to Nazism, when he tweeted a picture of Birkenau to illustrate the administration’s use of detention facilities at the border—a plan inaugurated by the Obama Administration—to deal with tens of thousands of illegal entrants.
Right. Trying to rehabilitate your reputation with the left, or the establishment, or the Ruling Class? Sir, your comparison is even more ridiculous than McCaffrey’s. Let me see if I’ve got this right: a policy conceived and implemented during a previous administration sets off no internal alarums. But when a new administration comes in and maintains that same policy, you start tweeting pictures of Birkenau. Well, that’s certainly some for-real moral consistency, there.
Oh, and since we’re all hot and bothered about POTUS lathering up, putting clothes pins on his nipples, and goosestepping around the Oval Office, may I ask, sir, what your remuneration is from Caliburn International, which is a defense contractor that runs the only remaining for-profit child detention center for migrants? Wow. If our current policy is Nazism, are you the guy that makes the trains run on time?
Retired Admiral William McRaven has all but declared Trump a subversive traitor. Apparently, in reference to fellow military also working in resistance to the president, McRaven remarked, “The America that they believed in was under attack, not from without, but from within.”
Yeah, because BHO was such an incredible champion for the military. Man, that President Trump just slashed the defense budget compared to the heyday of the Obama years. And he shows no deference to the sacrifice and efforts of the military. For the love of God, he doesn’t even like military working dogs! Oh. Wait…
Says McRaven, “[I]t is time for a new person in the Oval Office—Republican, Democrat or independent—the sooner, the better. The fate of our Republic depends upon it.”
Of all the remarks of retired GO/FOs I’ve seen–whether in the linked article or anywhere else, this is the most disgusting, and the saddest, and the one that is most pernicious. You may like President Trump; you may hate him. Fine. But after the proctological exam of the Mueller Report, there is no doubt that the current Commander in Chief was duly, legitimately elected.
If the average, every day American is angry at that, refuses to accept that, or protests that, fine. But for a retired 4-star admiral to even give a hint of a whisper of an intimation that the duly elected President of the United States should be replaced by any means possible–“the sooner, the better” (and all that portends) is absolutely despicable.
So, to the GO/FOs that would now be our moral exemplars, and hand down from on high what we should think and why, I have two questions.
- When’s the last time we won a war? A war that, after we won, we could redeploy home and put the rehabilitation of our vanquished enemy into the hands of the Department of State and not have to worry about it again?
- If the failure was in “civilian support” or “not being allowed to do what we need to do,” when is the last time a GO/FO resigned? Resigned because he was shackled by the politicians, or wasn’t given the authorities required to do what needed to be done to accomplish the mission and actually win.
From my foxhole, we haven’t won a war lately. And, all the GO/FOs whining and moaning about the current Commander in Chief, never resigned from anything.
Anything.
So, you must’ve felt like you had all the tools you needed. We didn’t win any wars.
Ergo, you are inproficient at your profession.
Let’s talk about what it takes to become a GO/FO. From here on out, I’m going to use Army ranks and terminology; if I try to describe all the ranks and terms used by all the services, it’ll get gooey.
- You do not have to decide that you want to be a GO the day you get commissioned. In fact, you could (possibly) go through your whole time as a 2LT and a 1LT and not be sure that that’s the path you want to follow. But, the day you wake up pursuant to your promotion to Captain, you better know you want to be a GO, and align all follow-on assignments, and all accrual of mentors, to that goal.
- Did you know that GO/FOs that have served as a GO/FO for four years (number of stars is immaterial) retire at 100% of base pay? Whenever there is a pay-hike for the troops, the retired GO/FOs get the increase, too. Only fair, right. So, every four-star listed above is pulling down an annual income of $186,998. Speaking “truth to power” has a whole different meaning when you and yourn will not be put at financial risk. Every other rank retires at 50% base pay.
- Merit is only a wee slice of achieving GO/FO status. No one gets to be a GO based solely on merit and accomplishment. When you hear a GO walk into a room and exclaim, in a humble country boy accent, “well, I know I’m not the smartest person in this room.” It means that he’s absolutely sure that he is the smartest person in the room. Know why? ‘Cause he figured out how to get to GO. So he’s the smartest person in the room.
- GOs are surrounded by people that tell them how right they are. Those people aren’t necessarily lickspittles, it’s just the way the system works. There’s a green hard-cover notebook that most Army officers carry. I must have 27 or so totally full, squirreled away somewhere. But I made it a habit, early on, to start on the back page and then work my way forward with tick marks, making a tick every time I heard someone say, “Yes, sir, you’re absolutely right,” to a GO/FO. I have pages and pages of those tick marks. After a year or two of hearing “yes, sir, you’re absolutely right,” how susceptible are you going to be to thinking, “Hey, I’m absolutely right most of the time! I must truly be awesome!”
- Rush Limbaugh is, famously, almost always right 99.8% of the time. One of the things that holds his stats back is that he splits GOs into “Political Generals” and “Warrior Generals.” He’s wrong. All GO/FOs have to have their promotion approved by the Senate. So they are, by definition, political creatures. Now, some are better at warfighting, without thinking about the implications of whether/when they’ll get their next promotion or command, and some are constitutionally incapable of going to war without that being foremost in their minds.
- I hope I don’t sound too anti-GO/FO. I think anyone given that much power should be viewed with a gimlet eye. The personnel referenced above anger me because I believe they have an agenda other than what is best for the support and defense of the Constitution.
- There are some GO/FOs out there that could hand me a bucket of warm spit and say, “Hey, Mongo, use this to assault the gates of hell.” And I’d do it without batting an eye.
For the incompetence of letting the Far East Air Force get wiped out on the ground 10 hours after the Pearl Harbor attack, he should have been locked in a room and given a pistol with a single round of ammo.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitchell_Red_Cloud_Jr.
#E4MAFIA4LIFE
The best part not specifically mentioned in the citation
God grant me the strength to belt myself to a freakin’ tree, while I bleed out, so that I can continue to pour fire onto the enemies of my country.
All the ranges at Ft. Stewart, GA, are named after Red Cloud. Red Cloud #1, #2, etc. They’re referred to generally as the Red Cloud Range Complex.
God bless that magnificent bastard.
He sits above the salt in the feasting hall of Valhalla.
Dunno about daddy issues but MacArthur was regarded as something of a mama’s boy—his lived in the West Point. Hotel for two years to be near her cadet son while his father was still in the Philippines.
i don’t blame him for leaving a doomed command behind at Corregidor. As I understand it, there was an order from POTUS that he be evacuated because his death or capture would be too big a propaganda coup for the Japanese.
Yeh, she stayed at the Thayer Inn the whole time.
Yes. But he had a chance to be the biggest symbol of freedom and sacrifice the world has ever seen. Instead he hauled ass. Nope, Dougie Mac was totally willing to disregard orders when he didn’t like them. He could have stayed in the Philippines and made a huge difference. He chose, instead, to scarper.
Grenada. Pretty sure it was Grenada.
Or the Cold War. Maybe that.
The original plan had been to have all forces fall back to Bataan and hold until relieved. MacArthur bucked that strategy. That might have been a mistake, but in the end there wasn’t going to be any relief. George Marshall insisted on giving him the MOH in an attempt to deny the Japanese a propaganda victory.
Eisenhower once quipped “I studied dramatics under MacArthur.” Pity he didn’t study strategy instead. Might have been handy.
(MacArthur shot back: “[Eisenhower] was the best clerk I ever had.”)
Grenada was a war?
Close enough. A group of Cuban “advisors” tried to surrender to an AC-130.
Not true. Here’s how retirement works according to military.com:
Most commissioned officers below the rank of general have to retire at the 30 year mark or even sooner because of the “up or out” promotion policy the military has, mandated under federal statute.
There are E-9 enlisted personnel (which is the highest enlisted grade you can attain) that choose to retire at the mandatory retirement age of 65, and may have served for 40 years or more. Under the above rules, they too would get 100% of base pay.
Most Generals do serve beyond 30 years, though they may not make 40 years of service. If you’re right that they still get 100% of their base pay, then that’s different from what is stated above from military.com. But since your statement regarding all military personnel retiring at 50% of base pay is not just a little wrong, I’ll take your assertion with a grain of salt.
Technically, all commissioned officers are approved by the Senate. The way it works is for 2nd Lt (paygrade O-1) through full colonel (O-6) whole promotion lists are sent to the Senate for approval. Sometimes a promotion list is held up to pressure the military to do something or other. But it’s usually pro-forma.
After that, it’s done individually, but obviously a 4 star gets more scrutiny than a 1 star. Beyond the rank of Major General (2 stars) the position the GO/FO holds is also scrutinized, not just the rank. The Senate approves nominations to all 3 star and 4 star positions, usually commands. And if a 3 or 4 star general officer doesn’t hold one of those positions after being relieved of a previous such position, that person reverts to 2 star rank.
Lastly, any retirements beyond 2 star rank, have to be submitted to the Senate for approval, otherwise the person retires at a 2 star rank.
It’s very political. But it’s also a necessary feature that encourages civilian control of the military.
I’m reading much criticism of D MacArthur. Could we have won w/o him?
a
I retired as a 1SG with 24yrs for pay. 22 yrs ad. Who knows what the case would be if I retired today. Anyway I would do it all again. I was in some crap assignments working for some crap officers but it worked for me.
And mommy issues. The story is his mother took an apartment from which she could look in with a telescope and see MacArthur’s window at West Point, confirming whether he was in his room studying in the evening.
Cheers to @bossmongo for writing a piece on Thanksgiving weekend that grabbed peoples’ attention and provided real insight. This post is part of the November theme, “Service.” December’s theme is “Memories,” and it is rapidly filling.
Yes we could have and there’s no doubt we would have. We didn’t win WWII because of tactical brilliance. We won because we had the industrial capacity and the willingness to deal with the Russians, who sent a large amount of soldiers to their death. We actually had room to make more mistakes than we did.
I’m not as critical of MacArthur as some, and am not as hard on him for leaving Bataan. In the end, however, he was a mediocre tactical general (good enough but not brilliant), but a very smart political one.
Where MacArthur may have been indispensable is the post war occupation of Japan, especially how he handled the Emperor.
In the end he overreached in dealing with Harry Truman, and he also scared the heck out of the politicians of the time after Truman fired him.
They never promoted a GO/FO to 5 star rank again.
MacArthur was already linked with the Republican Party, and the MOH was a sop to the opposition party in the midst of military disasters that lay at FDR’s feet after already in his third term, having violated the unwritten term limit created by General, then President Washington’s example. If FDR was indispensable, then he was responsible. Hence the MOH to a darling of the Republican senators.
Yes, given that the Pacific theater was a long series of maritime and amphibious operations. It was Admiral Chester Nimitz who was setting and directing the strategy, with which Gen. MacArthur had to keep up on the west flank.
In the end, however, he was a mediocre tactical general (good enough but not Wrilliant), but a very smart political one.
Who was a good general?
<sigh>
Okay, Al, here we go.
I’m right, GOs retire at 100% if they’ve served four years as a GO. If they’re at 1, 2, 3, or 4 stars when they retire, that’s their retirement fund.
I’ve known guys that absolutely sucked, and everyone knew, after their first GO/FO tour of 2 years that they weren’t going to go any further, and the military put them out to pasture at some BS job so that they could clock out.
The high 3 that you refer to is that the retiree gets 50% of the average of the highest three years (okay, be a stickler and average it out from 36 months) at 20 years. So you’re right and I’m wrong.
And, for every year after 20, you can add on 2.5% of that high three, until you hit MRD (Mandatory Retirement Date).
And, when you go in to do your final out, you have to bring your spouse with you, because if you opt out of the payment plan, taken from your retirement pay, where if the SM croaks before the spouse does, she gets a percentage of a percentage until she croaks, she has to sign of on it. At my high 36, plus an additional 6 years over 20, when the lady showed me the percentage of base pay that would constitute my retirement pay, I said “Oh, look honey, we’ll be taking home the number of the beast, because the numbers worked out so that I would be bringing home .666 of my base pay.
And, we say base pay because the military shoehorns in everything it can under entitlements, like (and I’m sure you can double check me at military.com) VHA, IMF, Sep Rats, CDP, LPP, Hazardous duty pay, Airborne; Hazardous duty pay, HALO; Hazardous duty pay, SCUBA; Hazardous duty pay, Demolitions. The reason they’re entitlements is that then they don’t have to pay you when you get out.
And, I probably screwed up some of the acronyms above because I didn’t give a damn about how much I was getting paid, and I never put on my green accountant shades, either during my service, afterwards, or through the writing of this post.
And, I didn’t want to bore the snot out of the reader, so I kept it at wave-top level instead of doing a deep dive on the esoterica of military pay scales. But, feel free to cover down on the boring part for me, Al, and pull up as many juicy details as you can find from military.com–especially since that was a throw away detail and had little to do with the thesis of the post.
Obama threatened our national security with the sequester, which cut military spending. Trump rebuilt the military.
BTW, which officer said that global warming was the greatest single national security threat a couple of years ago? What BS some of these folks talk.
I always did what I did and never once thought about pay. Recruiting pay, hazardous duty pay , what ever. I got what I got. Officers were always thinking about pay and how to get more. As an enlisted swine, I had no say. So if i got more I was happy. If I got less I was sad. But I never thought about it like officers did/
I made E5 about the same time base pay transitioned from draft era levels to the new volunteer Army rates plus newly boosted off-base housing costs reimbursement. Felt like being suddenly rich. Cha-Ching, baby!
As I recall, the Army went from over a million to 750,000 almost immediately after Vietnam but the number of generals held steady/increased slightly. That right? And it seemed like there were hundreds of generals at Fort McNair alone.
For the same reason that when a company faces collapse due to a dearth of new business, every segment of the company contracts except for Marketing.
(“But those are the knuckleheads that dug the hole” you object. Stop thinking. Just update your resumé.)
Thats where the golf course is.
Ft. Myer is where we do the funerals. Kind of depressing.
@bossmongo, I have to admit this post was a bit of a let-down. /:
You see, I read VDH’s article at American Greatness when it came out. When I caught the first two paragraphs of this post on the main feed, fireworks went off in my eyeballs as I thought “Boss Mongo’s gonna’ fisk Victor Davis Hanson ?!?!?” The most preeminent military historian of our time versus the finest military writer on Ricochet? This is gonna be great! The fireworks were accompanied by slight frisson of dismay at the idea that VDH screwed up such an important critique of those retired generals.
So, I dive into your first quote from VDH’s article and think “what’s wrong with this paragraph?” And then you go and agree with it! And supplement it!
Emotional Whiplash! Excitement, then disappointment, then relief that I wouldn’t have to pick between the two of you.
You are an incorrigible tease.
So I guess we’re going to forget the whole bugging out, “I shall return,” and the troops he abandoned to suffer the Bataan Death March. Oookay. He could have stayed and written a chapter in the book of Glory that resounded in people’s hearts for as long as does the chapter of the Spartans at Thermopylae.
But nah. I gotta go guys. Enjoy the Death March and imprisonment. Don’t worry, though.
–I notice you forgot to mention how he was ordered out of the country by Direct Presidential order of FDR, and that Mac threatened to resign and re-enlist as a infantryman. It was only at the urging of his troops that went into those camps that he did leave.
–If he didnt go, the Phillipines would probably be a communist country for a good long while. Also thousands of those GI’s who did live would have starved to death because Nimitz would have bypassed the islands to attack Japan directly.
–I am a fan of MacArthur and more importantly his Air Force Commander Kenny who did remarkable things in the Pacific and whos joint generalships probably shortened the war against Japan by several years.
–I also note that Eisenhower was nearly recalled in 1942 if it hadnt been for the British upper ranks we might never have gotten to like him very much.
–What was it FDR said, “i am not in the habit of promoting losers,” because of the delays in the Tunis campaign.
And it was a viable threat, too…because there was such a need for 60+ years old infantrymen.
I find this very difficult to believe, given that the only use he had for troops was that they provided fodder for his soaring rhetoric–after they were dead. Sounds like more of that MacArthur legend building.
Make no mistake: I freely admit, under no threat or intimidation, that my distaste and disdain for the man will ever color my comments about him.
It is worth noting that MacArthur opposed a MOH for General Wainwright apparently because he thought Wainwright should have gone down fighting. It’s hard not to believe that at least, in part, the motive was that MacArthur expected others to die to protect his own honor. But he also clearly felt a lot of remorse for what Wainwright endured. It was a nice touch to make the Japanese surrender to Wainwright and (the utterly incompetent) Percival.
MacArthur is tough to understand. There is an enormous ego but some big undertakings to match.
I have never understood why it was necessary to take each pacific island once the Japanese navy was on the defensive. MacArthur’s argument about not leaving the enemy in the rear of your lines is not persuasive if the buggers are stuck starving on islands with no way to leave much less attack.
No need. I don’t think I’ve enjoyed a thunderous diatribe as much since the days when I used to listen to Dad’s unparliamentary fulminations, usually accompanied by smoke coming out of his ears, on General Mark Clark, to whose Fifth Army Dad somehow found himself attached, and with whom he marched into Rome on June 4, 1944.
I wish I could remember more details of Dad’s intermittent tirades on the subject, but when one is young one doesn’t always pay that much attention to stories of what happened before one was born, and one isn’t always beyond feeling a certain amount of mortification and embarrassment at the revelation of one’s father’s heroic exploits. (“Dad, why can’t you just be quiet and normal, like all the other Dads?”)
But as was usually the case with Dad, the overall effect was memorable, and I appreciate the trip down memory lane. It’s comforting, somehow, to know that the art of the principled, comprehensive, monumental takedown has not perished from the earth.