Donna Diane

The games that have been afoot over choosing the next Commandant of the Marine Corps were for naught. Those within the Navy who have a negative agenda for the Marine Corps and an administration that wants gays openly admitted to the military have been bested by fate. For that I say “thank you” to General Stanley McChrystal.

Regarding General James F. Amos

I’m sure that six months ago the thought of being selected as the next Commandant of the Marine Corps had not entered General Amos’ mind.  That job just never goes to aviators and we are fighting a ground war so reasoning dictates that General Mattis or Lieutenant General Dunford would have been a better choice. They are, in the parlance of the Marine Corps, “grunt” generals, and more connected to the Marines on the ground doing the face to face fighting than our aviator General Amos.

With that said, I believe General Amos won’t be the push-over that our Secretary of Defense believes he is. That is after all the reason Robert Gates selected Amos over Mattis and Dunford.  Gates, or someone he is fronting for wants to make some significant changes to the Marine Corps and they know that the current Commandant General Conway, and General Mattis and Lieutenant General Dunford will strongly oppose those changes.  Gates knows Conway, Mattis and Dunford are tenacious and victorious in battle so he selected the guy he thinks he has the best chance of defeating.

Honestly, I believe Gates has sorely underestimated General Amos because he is an American and a Marine first. If he damages the Corps he also damages our country and our Marine aviators, I just can’t see a Marine General doing that. But what is a small minded adversary to do when your choices are limited to Marines to lead the Corps! Perhaps Gates and the people for whom he is a proxy would have preferred to choose an Admiral to lead the Marines.

Regarding General Stanley A. McChrystal

He was a poor fit with leading the war in Afghanistan from the beginning. Don’t construe that to mean he’s not a good General, however few Generals are good at all things.  For the last twenty years General McChrystal’s career has been focused on special operations. When it came time to command regular ground forces any connections he may have had with traditional ground forces were twenty years old and like brain synapses, when connections are not used they deteriorate. He failed to connect with his troops, his immediate subordinates and just about anyone except for those in his specialty. That failure made him ineffective as a leader and vulnerable.

Regarding General David Howell Petraeus

Oh this fellow is easy to talk about. First and foremost he is genuinely respectful of all branches of our military and all ranks. As an excellent leader he knows how to exercise control over subordinates so they feel respected and compelled to do their duty. Plus, who knows if he likes our current President or not and that’s exactly the way it should be, our military should exhibit no politics. President Obama is his boss and Petraeus respects that.

Petraeus’ is no prima donna. His intent is to win and thus he is open to ideas that may enhance his chance to win. If winning and securing America and freedom means having tea with bin Laden then that option will be on the table and he will execute it with authority, dignity, and prowess.

Geeze, what a mess General Petraeus has to clean up!

Regarding General James N. Mattis

I am pleased that my favorite four star, Marine General James N. Mattis, has been selected to head CENTCOM, it’s the circuitous route that carried him there that I find disheartening. He should have been selected as Commandant of the Marine Corps with Lieutenant General Dunford as the Assistant Commandant. After all, Dunford is a young man and we can have him as the next Commandant. I like to get all the mileage I can out of my excellent Marine Corps Generals. But oh my God, a Mattis-Dunford team would have been impossible for the Navy and Gates to control! Their combination in Iraq proved they are a formidable pairing.

The Mattis-Petraeus pairing is also formidable. Someone asked me today if General Mattis’s selection to CENTCOM made him General Petraeus’ boss. I suppose so, but the two will act synergistically with neither having to impose one’s will over the other. That’s what they do.

Lieutenant General John R. Allen

Well, this fine general has been royally screwed by SECDEF Gates. Had all things gone as they should have Mattis would be Commandant, Petraeus would have taken Afghanistan, Allen would have been the next commander at CENTCOM, and Amos, another fine general who has served with honor would have retired or been selected for a command commensurate with his experience.

I don’t know if General Mattis and Lieutenant General Allen get along, but I’m sure that because they are Marines they will come together as a team and leave the job better than when they found it. – Hard to do considering they are following Petraeus!

Regarding the Press

Holy cow! If I read one more story focused on General Mattis’ remarks in 2005 I’m going to gag. The press fixates on things that are often misinterpreted. Those 2005 remarks by Mattis showed that he respects freedom and women enough to fight for them.  I have a story that demonstrates General Mattis’ personality and command skills far better but is rarely repeated. I’m telling it from memory so you will get an abbreviated version.

During Desert Storm Colonel Mattis who was commanding the 7^th Marines at the time came upon a few of his Marines who had found the body of a badly mutilated Iraqi woman. His Marines were quite ready to kill some Iraqi soldiers they had found nearby because they were sure these soldiers had committed the atrocity. Colonel Mattis, himself enraged by the act, suppressed his anger and urge to revenge her horrible murder by killing the Iraqi soldiers and simply detained them. As it turned out the Iraqi soldiers were innocent of the woman’s murder.

– Ladies and gentlemen of the press, that is leadership at its best… That IS Jim Mattis. He does the right thing even when he is experiencing rage.

So, the fate referenced by General David Monroe Shoup, another favorite Marine, has bested our SECDEF and those to whom he is proxy. They may have placed General Amos at the helm of the Marines, but Mattis is still active duty and trust me, the Marines will support each other and do the right thing for our Corps and our country.

Is another Chowder Society needed? My gut says yes!

Updated June 15, 2010 to reflect on Gen Amos.

Robert Gates does not like the Marine Corps. From needing a committee to decline a Medal of Honor for Sergeant Rafael Peralta to canceling a vehicle that the Commandant of the Marine Corps has supported for the Marines, the warning signs have been there all along.

Is Gates obfuscating the true issue? The Department of the Navy wants to use the existing and unprotected LCAC to land Marines because Gates and the Department of the Navy claim we will never have to land Marines on a hostile beach again. How totally absurd to believe that you can accurately predict how warfare will unfold and that every thug who initiates hostile action against the US and our allies will abide by Gates’ assessment. It seems likely to me that we will indeed need the capability to land on a hostile beach so what is actually at play here with Gates and cutting the EFV?

Cutting funding for the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle gives Gates the appearance of being fiscally responsible. But it goes further to open the door for finding other ways to reduce the size and power of our Marine Corps under the guise of saving money, and therefore places our freedom and country in greater danger. Why greater danger? Because only the Marines can be sent to war with Presidential approval alone, congressional approval is not necessary for the initial deployment of Marines to protect us from eminent danger. Thus they defend us while our government decides how to proceed in the long term.

The Marine Corps accounts for approximately six percent of our military budget and the cost per Marine is $20,000 less than the cost of a serviceman from our other services. Our Marines are already on a strict budget with very little fluff. They are not trying to expand and take over the duties of the Army, Navy or Air Force. They are simply trying to make their force more efficient and effective. Getting Marines to the war quickly and in good shape certainly makes them more effective. Tinkering with the Marine Corps budget and equipment needs makes no sense to me at all, why would you want to weaken the one military service that can defend us at a moments notice, especially in this dangerous era?

Since it makes no sense to attack the Marine Corps budget in the face of the other services who never run lean, I ask: is there something more afoot here than budget cutting? What is Gate’s ulterior motive and is he the front man for someone else?

For those who read history, I see signs that we may be in need of another Chowder Society. I think whoever becomes Commandant will certainly need the behind-the-scenes support of the other contenders to help defend and strengthen the Marine Corps. In fact, all of our Marines need to be united in this effort.

I do believe that Gates respects the sacrifice of our service members. I once saw a video of him amid caskets returning from Iraq. The emotions on his face revealed a man who felt deeply for our fallen warriors. However, it’s evident that he’s weak and easily persuaded to do the bidding of other high level officers and politicians.

So, General Mattis, LtGen Dunford, LtGen Allen, and all other Marines: regardless of who is selected to be Commandant, your importance to the Corps extends beyond that position. We will need all Marines to act to defend and strengthen our precious Marine Corps. Even though I have no right to ask any Marine to do more than they have already done, I do ask my Marines to keep an eye open and if necessary emplace another Chowder Society.

The ghosts of Twinning, Thomas, Krulak, Hittle, Heinl, Edson, etal are watching….

On a final note, I hope to see LtGen Allen heading CENTCOM after Gen Petraeus.

Update: With Gate’s recommendation that General Amos be the next Commandant I see history repeating itself. Eisenhower selected David M. Shoup to be Commandant because he believed he could control him. Eisenhower was wrong. My guess is that General James F. Amos will take good care of the Marines.

An excerpt from the field notebook carried by Colonel David M. Shoup during the battle of Tarawa:

“If you are qualified, fate has a way of getting you to the right place at the right time – tho’ sometimes it appears to be a long, long wait.” For Shoup, the combination of time and place worked to his benefit on two momentous occasions: at Tarawa in 1943 and as President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s deep selection to become the twenty-second commandant of the Marine Corps in 1959.

From Utmost Savagery by Col Joseph H. Alexander, USMC (Ret.)

From left to right: LtGen Allen, LtGen Dunford, Gen Mattis.

Later this year a new Commandant of the Marine Corps will be selected and speculation is beginning to coalesce over who the choice might be. In January a short list of contenders emerged and was reported by the Marine Corps Times as:

-LtGen John R. Allen, deputy commander at Tampa, Fla.-based U.S. Central Command.
-LtGen Joseph F. Dunford, commander of I Marine Expeditionary Force at Camp Pendleton, Calif.
-Gen James N. Mattis, commander of U.S. Joint Forces Command out of Norfolk, Va.

The scuttlebutt I’ve heard has pared that list down to two contenders: General Mattis and Lieutenant General Dunford. You could read the official biographies of these men, but they are simply listings of jobs and commands held and provide no details that give insight into the character of these Marines.

Both Mattis and Dunford have been written about numerous times in the historical books of the War on Terror and both men have been described as inspirational and fearless leaders.

However there is much more available on the internet concerning General Mattis. Video and audio recordings of his speeches and interviews have allowed me to watch his face as he speaks and listen to the intonation of his voice. These experiences along with the text of speeches he has given, reveal clues about the fine character and integrity of this consummate warrior. I’ve watched, listened to, and read every scrap of information out there on General Mattis and I’ve hunted mostly in vain for such information on Lieutenant Generals Dunford and Allen. There is simply not enough public information on Allen and Dunford to make a good comparison of their qualifications.

However I wonder if it really matters which of these Marines is selected. In 1959 when Major General Shoup was selected to become commandant over more qualified lieutenant generals, the ulterior motive of President Eisenhower was to downsize the Marine Corps.

David Shoup had joined the Corps after passing through Army ROTC, and the President believed that the Major General would be sympathetic to his belief that the Marine Corps should be restricted to units no larger than regiments. By the time President Eisenhower left office in 1961 he had submitted a budget for a Marine Corps of three divisions and three air wings, numbering a total of 175,000 personnel. General Shoup had managed to reverse President Eisenhower’s opinion of the value of the Marine Corps.

Even though I have a personal bias towards General Mattis because I’ve followed him closely for six years and believe he is the finest military man to ever walk the face of the earth, history has shown us that Lieutenant General Allen, Lieutenant General Dunford, or another Marine may indeed be the right man for the job because as Colonel Shoup wrote in his field diary, “If you are qualified, fate has a way of getting you to the right place at the right time.”

Godspeed to the next commandant, may he preserve and strengthen our United States Marine Corps, America’s most precious resource.

Resources:
The Illustrated Directory of the United States Marine Corps by Chester G. Hearn
Utmost Savagery by Col Joseph H. Alexander, USMC (Ret.)