September 29, 2004 7:09 AM

Four more years of seagulls?

“Leadership Matters” (from Without Reservation: A biweekly column by Karen Kwiatkowski, Lt. Col. USAF (ret.))

…[I]t is not politically correct to point out the fact that the locals are not only disliking us more and more, they are growing increasingly upset and often overtly hostile. Instead of addressing the reasons why the locals are becoming angry and discontented, we allow politicians in Washington DC to give us pat and convenient reasons that are devoid of any semblance of reality.

  • Al Lorentz

Few people know leadership better than a professional soldier. These people live and die by the quality of leadership they encounter, so it would stand to reason that few are better equipped to discuss the failings of leadership than soldiers.

The perception is that the US military is overwhelming Conservative and pro-Bush. While Bush may enjoy a majority within the American military community, to say that soldiers march in lockstep behind George W. Bush would be horribly inaccurate. There are those soldiers who see Bush for what he is: a “Seagull” President. If you’re unsure what I mean by “Seagull”, just keep reading.

Believe it or not, “Leadership Matters” is a key theme of the Bush/Cheney re-election campaign.

As a political slogan, it is very nice. Highly paid political consultants, advertisers and Extremely Smart People in Washington picked a fine one. Pithy, eye-catching, looks sharp in red, white and blue.

For people who serve in the military, leadership is beyond important; it takes on an almost mystical and compelling value, becoming a holy grail of sorts. Officers and NCOs seek to be known as leaders, to embody leadership qualities, to be seen as those with leadership potential. We spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about it, reading about it, talking about it.

We know it when we see it. We talk about it when we don’t see it. In fact, knowing what leadership is not is a key part of our professional education.

Leadership is rarely seen in the senior officer who doesn’t know his core skill area, whether that is flying airplanes, killing the enemy in ground combat, whether engineering or accounting. Incompetence can, of course, be remedied by the ability and willingness to learn. Incompetence without an observable ability to learn was bad news. Any sign that the suspect officer had simply no clue that he might be in severely bad kimshee and hence might possibly need to learn something was even worse news.

Some smart person ought to have mentioned this to George W. Bush when they approved the “Leadership Matters” theme.

An absence of leadership qualities in our military leaders gives rise to terms like “Seagull” Colonels and Generals, a species known to swoop in, make a lot of noise, crap all over everything, and then fly away. But our seagulls had an advantage over Bush and Cheney. Regardless of the mistakes made and not remedied, regardless of the illogic, stupidity and sheer idiocy of our present unit’s existence under a seagull commander, at least we could be 100% sure they wouldn’t be around for long.

Leadership is not making a maximum decision based on minimum information and then refusing to consider alternatives because you want to appear “resolute”. When this President makes a decision, you can almost hear his mind slam shut. Yes, it is important to be decisive, but narrow-minded and hasty on the trigger, while it can be spun as “resolute”, is just plain dangerous. Successful leadership requires a decisive, agile, and FLEXIBLE mind, one that is open to all possibilities, and yet still able to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Yes, Bush may look good in a flight suit, but that is hardly the stuff of effective leadership. A little more than a year ago he stood on the flight deck of an aircraft carrier and proclaimed “Mission Accomplished”. It was a great photo op, but it was also a bald-faced lie. The mission wasn’t “accomplished” then, and it STILL hasn’t been accomplished almost 17 months later. In the interim since Bush proclaimed the “end of major combat operations”, 900+ American soldiers have died, apparently in “minor” combat operations. And yet Bush has the gall to tell us that we need to “stay the course”. How many more young Americans will have to die in support of his failed policy and his inability to own up to the mess he has created?

High level incompetence seems to be the natural sea-state of our militarized foreign policy, launching forth with the proud Guardsman George W. Bush at the helm and Dick “Other Priorities” Cheney as navigator.

This track record of sheer stupidity, hubris and other seagull qualities is marred only by the existence of rare officers, like retired Marine General Tony Zinni, who knew their job, led their men and women, and spoke the truth to power about the inanity of the plan to invade Iraq early on. Looking further for aberrations to the rule, we find retired Army General William Odom, conservative through and through, who speaks the truth about Bush’s fantasy adventure in Iraq, politely but publicly calling it “a strategic error.”

Now Bush is running as the candidate who will do the most to make this country secure. Frankly, the one thing he cannot protect us from is himself and his refusal to own up to his miserable policy failure in Iraq. How many more Americans will have to die while serving as a Bush campaign backdrop? How many lives will be ruined because this President is dispositionally incapable of admitting that his policy is an abject failure? Hey, as long as someone else’s children are dying, right?

On the truth about Iraq, Bush and Cheney have told us it’s going just fine, we are killing the appointed number of “terrorists” and “evil doers.” We are winning, they say. From the key top officers, whether General Casey, General Abizaid, General Meyers or any of the lesser flag officers on active duty today, we hear only a ricochet of the President’s fantasies, or else deafening silence.

But from lower ranking soldiers and marines, we hear plenty. One former marine refers to Iraq as “Bush’s Magical Middle Eastern Mystery Tour.” He explains why we will leave Iraq, eventually, with nothing. It is one of the rules that should have been learned early on by all leaders, even mediocre ones. Apparently Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld missed the lecture called “Nobody wins a shitstorm.”

Another eyewitness to the “leadership” of the Bush/Cheney team, writes from Iraq about what is really going on and what it means….

Devoid of any semblance of reality. Pat and convenient reasons. Politically correct.

Leadership matters, all right. Competence, intelligence, humility, and devoted consistent brutal honesty means lives saved, objectives met. It produces everyday demonstrations of courage at all levels that inspire and motivate. Leadership improves recruitment and retention in an all volunteer military, and makes that military both awesomely fierce and awesomely proud. Leadership preserves the Constitution and strengthens the Republic.

Leadership does matter. The Bush/Cheney campaign should be ashamed of itself.

Certainly, they should be ashamed. Their stubborn insistence on “staying the course” so that they may appear “resolute” is a recipe for continued disaster. In reality, though, they are convinced that they are the only thing standing between Americans and complete and utter terrorist tyranny.

More “Seagull” leadership? Not if we don’t grant Bush and Cheney four more years.

WE DESERVE BETTER.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on September 29, 2004 7:09 AM.

Yeah, but it may just win a Presidential election was the previous entry in this blog.

So why not go where everyone knows your name? is the next entry in this blog.

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