General Mattis Departure - Symptomatic or Systemic

[Flagg]

Originally Posted by Badger52

Get it here. (and yeah, shamelessly linked to smile.amazon, so set yours up to support GBF, or some other worthy outfit you think Bezos should kick in some bucks for).

Looking forward to it; my small town library - with a Rottweiler who handles inter-library loan searches - has it on the way. Winter ist lang, Kamerad.

I really, really rate the book. Right up there with Special Forces Berlin on DET-A.

It provides some definitive closure for me on exactly how and where the US led west shattered the Warsaw Pact and eventually the Soviet Union.

President Reagan led the effort to win the ideological war between capitalism and communism.

I hope we can achieve a refocusing on clear ideological battle lines, after or concurrent with the necessary US domestic battle that must be won.

In some respects, I think the Covert Action book is worth reading to see how the same non kinetic political warfare battle plan is being applied against the US.

But with modern social media tools that cross borders easier and with greater precision than 80’s era UW logistics reaching into Poland.

[doctom54]

Originally Posted by GratefulCitizen

Suspect that the general knows his stuff, and advocated for the best interests of the mission associated with his appointment.
Also suspect that the POTUS knows and has considered this.

However, the POTUS has a larger scale mission, and the general's mission has to fit within a larger set of priorities.
Mattis had views consistent with his SECDEF mission, and Trump made decisions consistent with his POTUS mission.

Trump is accountable to the people.
Time will tell which calls were the right ones.

Well said.

It may be like Gen McArthur and Truman. In hindsight it looks like President Truman was correct.

[WarriorDiplomat]

Originally Posted by doctom54

Well said.

It may be like Gen McArthur and Truman. In hindsight it looks like President Truman was correct.

One thing McArthur and Truman did not have much like Mattis and Trump today do not have and that is ground truth....they only know what is reported

I can tell you right now that the short memory of Americans to recent events is killing us as citizens holding accountable our poor leaders....the CENTCOM debacle and GEN Austin being relieved.....why? the dishonest reporting and the unqualified personnel from top to bottom who were changing reports, white washing etc....to the point that the disconnect from the POTUS and Pentagon briefings compared to ground truth was alarmingly.....it took the senate arms committee to drag Austin and his staff so the General could look foolish because as we all know you can't possible know the truth if your staff takes self serving liberties with truth and bend, twist and change a commander is only as good as the quality and character of those under his command.


I as well as others have seen hyperbole reporting, substandard and qualified but incapable analysts, exaggerated wordsmithing to justify the need for contract support and you name it. I don't think Mattis has enough truthful information to know what the best decision is and that means Trump doesn't either but IMO Trump is correct to pull the plug on this life taking bottomless money pit with no end in site

[lindy]

Originally Posted by WarriorDiplomat

I as well as others have seen hyperbole reporting, substandard and qualified but incapable analysts, exaggerated wordsmithing to justify the need for contract support and you name it. I don't think Mattis has enough truthful information to know what the best decision is and that means Trump doesn't either but IMO Trump is correct to pull the plug on this life taking bottomless money pit with no end in site

The “machine” sidelines those who have disparate opinions and don’t submit to the group think. After the years of pay freezes and low raises, managers use the power of negative evals and promotions to stifle disagreement.

[bblhead672]

Originally Posted by Ret10Echo

Trump is not part of the "system". That scares the collective because he doesn't give a shit about breaking things. He's the modem day version of the fire ship drifting into the political safehaven of Washington DC.

By the way, I hate all political parties of which there is really only one.... so I don't have a horse in this race. Only the American people and the Constitution.

Couldn't agree more.

[Box]

The physics of defense strategy is quite easy to understand…
Let me break it down for everyone:

Newton's First Law suggests that a General Officer at war will remain at war until acted upon by an external force.

Newton's Second Law suggests that escalation of war is dependent on the forces acting upon the General Officer and the General Officers support in congress. For any given General Officer, when the net support in congress is increased, the escalation of war is increased.

Newtons third Law suggests that for every action (force) in nature there is an equal and opposite reaction.


In short –Gen Mattis was retired - AT REST if you will - and he would have stayed that way. Instead, President Trump acted upon him – as a result, Gen Mattis got to be at war again…
In his natural state of war, Sec Mattis would have found reasons to stay at war indefinitely. It doesn’t matter how many “dwell time” reviews are sent down by the OSD. It doesn’t matter how passionately he might talk about pressure on the force and “getting to a 2 to 1” for the good of the force; Sec Mattis would have kept folks going in and out of Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Niger, or for that Matter, he would have probably even tried to put troops in the local Food-King in Newark New Jersey if there had been reports that somebody spilled some ISIS on aisle 7…
...because, 'ter'ists

But the POTUS told him to stop. He was acted on by an external force – his equal and opposite reaction to “stop” was “I’ll go”
So he quit…
…Trumps opposite reaction was: “no, you’re fired”

Yet, the USA is full of four-eyed academics that cant seem to tie this to the basic physical laws of the universe

It’s science

[Badger52]

Originally Posted by Box

It’s science

That opens a whole new set of windows & mirrors; I bet one could extrapolate those immutable laws & apply them to the forces that act on the GO; like the politicians, congresskritters, lobbyists & such. This is... almost nuclear.

[Penn]

BOX

The physics of defense strategy is quite easy to understand…
Let me break it down for everyone:

Brilliant, an interdisciplinary education exampled in all its simplicity. Thank you.