Here’s one take that seems plausible
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Leaving Vietnam vs AFG
- Thread starter jmcquate
- Start date
A short colonel makes a Facebook post and gets fired, a 4 star loses a war and gets a job on lockheed's board.
I don't spend a noteworthy amount of time in the Opinions sections of news media websites, but I enjoyed this read. Obviously we'll be talking about the trees for some time to come, but eventually it'll be time to talk about the forest. Interested to see how the nation decides to back up/project its values moving forward (i.e., whether we continue to utilize military to support human rights/diplomacy objectives, etc.).
www.google.com
Opinion | Let’s Not Pretend That the Way We Withdrew From Afghanistan Was the Problem (Published 2021)
Our ignominious exit reflects the failure of America’s foreign policy establishment at both prediction and policymaking.
Yup
I know we planned to keep our embassy open after the mil forces left, as part of our negotiated agreement. Left us vulnerable during the drawdown, and here we are.
It’s worth reading the agreement. We gave away a lot of leverage. It’s bizarre to see the doc keep referring to “The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan which is not recognized by the United States as a state and is known as the Taliban” as we negotiate the future of the state with the actual AFG left out of process.
4 stars don't lose wars, politicians do. The reason 4 stars are 4 stars and get those jobs, is because they don't post career ending rants on Facebook.
Perhaps we needed some 4 stars willing to end their careers.
If folks in leadership positions never speak up, we will indeed repeat these recent mistakes and service members will continue to perish. This leader is asking questions that if answered honestly, can and will save lives in the future. Citizens of the US deserve accurate and honest answers to these questions. Avoidable deaths should never be an acceptable outcome.
I don'r disagree, But the manor in witch he asked it was unacceptable. He's a LtCol in the Marine Corps, and that means certain options of regress are not permissible. You should know that.
TBH, he doesn't have enough juice for his opinion to matter to a policy maker. When 4 stars start resigning, people will take note. When rando O5 does it, he gets his 15 minutes of social media fame, but ultimately has no impact on the policy he seeks to influence. I'm sure he'll land on his feet, once he gets that 20 year check in the box.
I'd just like us to note what an incredible sentence this is!
The problem is, if you throw your stars on the table, you no longer have stars. And when you no longer have stars, you no longer have the ability to directly influence what's going on. It's not as simple as just saying "well, you need the stones to resign if civilian leadership is screwing up," because there's a good chance they'll just say TYFYS and press on. And sure, then you can be a gadfly, make a name for yourself on the speaking and cocktail party circuit, maybe snag a nice fellowship at some grad school or a seat on a few boards of directors . . . but you can't cushion the blow for folks under you and mitigate the bad policy to the best you can.
I don't disagree that there's a good chance that some of how this Afghanistan thing went was a result of "Message to Garcia" gone wrong. But the answer can't always be "I quit," either. I'd imagine for some of these GOFOs, the answer was "shit, POTUS picked the wrong COA, but I'm going to do my level best to make the best out of it, because I made [insert GOFO rank], so I'm the best qualified guy/girl to do that."
Except there’s always someone else. There are plenty of others. And we don’t need someone to formulate some crazy plan to defeat China or whatever. We needed someone to say “that’s a dumb fucking plan and if you won’t steer away from the iceberg, I have the integrity to quit”.
Of course it’s also possible they really didn’t know it was a dumb plan in which case they should resign out of shame. But I think you’re right in your last sentences as far as the mindset. After 30+ years thinking you’re the best man for the job, they likely can’t comprehend how badly they’ve failed.