In Chapter 13 of these sacred Meditations, there was a reference to one of the basic principles of the American Army. If the Army possessed a stone tablet reflecting the Ten Army Commandment, high on that list would be the injunction about not thinking. Simply put, soldiers would be warned that they don’t get paid to think. Thinking in the Army is done at great peril to one’s own body, brain and career.
Thinking about the sinfulness of Army thinking has led me to other examples of screw-ups in the Army establishment which may or may not involve the wickedness of thinking. Here are three examples which precede the merciful thoughts of General Omar Bradley, a learned gentleman from Missouri, of all places.
Verse 1: General Casey Trying to Bat
It is quite clear that there are factions at the White House which have fundamentally different agendas. Last week, General George Casey, the commander of forces in Iraq, got caught in the middle. His failure to speak truthfully about the troop situation in Iraq, earned him knots on both sides of his head.
Some of the people at the White House understand the public pressure for some sign of American forces leaving Iraq. Apparently, they told Casey that he should recognize this political response. So Casey called a press conference to announce that if the political situation in Iraq stabilized, if the Iraqi elections worked out well together with some other caveats, Casey hoped to reduce the American forces in Iraq by about 30,000 perhaps next spring of summer.
Listening to Casey’s announcement was an exercise in “If everything works out.” Casey hoped to please his political White House bosses by suggesting that if everything fell into place, we could reduce our forces by about 30,000 troops. He emphasized that everything had to fall into place, which in a war rarely happens. But to please his White House political shot callers, he suggested that sometime in 2006, some of the troops could start home.
Please remember General Casey made this semi-good pseudo announcement in person. No anonymous sources at all.
This must have angered the other faction in the White House who demands that “we stay the course.” So they over-rode the “feel good” faction and told Casey in effect, that there would be no reduction in American forces in the foreseeable future. Bush came down on this side.
One sentence from Tom Oliphant’s report in the Boston Globe says it all.

“This formulation angered many of Bush’s conservative supporters which produced fresh instructions to poor Casey to switch to a say-the-course pessimism. The result was a story in the Washington Post quoting a senior military official in Baghdad as saying no way Iraq’s ‘leaders’ would be ready to lead some operations against the insurgency until next summer, if not later. The anonymous official was the same General Casey.”

Two things emerge from this continuing fiasco. The first is that when there is some sort of good news to announce, the principals wave their arms and take several bows. When the news is less than superb, those same officials hide behind “anonymous sources.” This, of course, is the essence of the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame by Bush’s brain, Karl Rove.
The second fact to emerge is that when military people start to play a political game, the soldiers will almost always be the losers.
There is no full blown sorrow in this quarter for General Casey. He was simply following orders from two opposing camps in the White House. If Casey feels used, he could resign. He won’t do that. After all, he has four stars on his uniform. But soldiers don’t get paid for thinking. Those that do usually get burned. The mighty Casey seems to have struck out.
Verse 2: Base Closing May or May Not Save Billions
Recently, the Pentagon’s Base Closing Commission announced the proposed closing of a high number of military bases. Some of the more famous military bases were on the list to be shut down. The Groton Submarine Base and the Ellsworth Air Force Base were among the more famous bases which the U.S. military said were no longer needed.
Closing bases would have devastating effects on the economy of the surrounding towns. Politicians of all sorts have now banded together to save the bases in their territory. It seems that the politicians have an ally in Anthony J. Principi, who had been the Secretary of Veteran’s Affairs and is now Chairman of the Base Closing Committee.
When Principi and his helpers analyzed the list of base closings, they concluded that the Pentagon had inflated the savings of closing the bases by a factor of 50%. Simply put, the Pentagon lied and were caught in it by Chairman Principi.
Since the Principi group made its counter claim of the reduced savings that would flow from base closings, the Pentagon has been mysteriously quiet. It is reasonable to expect that the Pentagon will be back gnawing on the same old bone at a later date, but getting caught in a lie will not help them to make their case.
Verse 3: Anyone in Favor of a Draft?
The Army has done about everything to encourage people to enlist. Education and age limits have been expanded to make less well educated and those up to nearly age 40 eligible to enlist. Bonuses are enticing, and yet, recruitment goals have been missed repeatedly. The answer is, of course, that young men and women are not eager to be blown apart in Iraq or some similar place.
There are commentators who suggest a draft for the military. They argue a draft imposes an equal obligation on everyone to serve. The current all-volunteer Army is peopled often by young men who are not equipped educationally to compete in the job markets of the 21st century. Joining the Army is viewed in many quarters as a respectable job where if things work right, the Army experience may lead to opportunities in education and future civilian employment. Maybe so, but not many students are eager to become freshmen at age 23-27 years and not many employers are eager to hire new workers whose main talent is shooting a machine gun. So the volunteer army becomes an army of “lifers” who have no other employment opportunities.
Now if we are ever to spread the responsibility among a much larger pool of Americans, it appears a draft would be one way to do it. There are many reasons to support a draft because it imposes an obligation on all young men. But curiously, the chicken war hawk factions particularly in the Republican Party either say nothing or they oppose any idea of a draft.
George Bush, Tom DeLay, Richard Chaney and Bill Frist have nothing to say about equal opportunity to get killed in Iraq. Nothing to say. But when the ghouls gathered to prolong Terri Schiavo’s misery, they were all leading the parade. Bush even flew back from Texas using hundreds of gallons of aviation fuel to sign the unconstitutional bill to extend the misery of Ms. Schiavo. But not a word about a draft for which he has two daughters who seem to be going nowhere.
A draft is fine for poor people, but certainly not for kids of the country club set.
Verse 4: Omar Bradley’s Thoughts
For those who do not know of Omar Bradley, he was in many minds the most successful General of World War II. Bradley’s credentials are too long to summarize here, but he led Army forces in North Africa and in Europe in the 1942-1945 period. Your ancient author became aware of Bradley in early 1943 when he had a leading part in directing allied forces in the Battle of Kasserine Pass in Tunisia which led to the surrender of Rommel’s Afrika Korps a short time later.
Bob Herbert, a columnist for the New York Times has a new book called “Promises Betrayed.” It is largely a collection of his essays. It is very worthwhile reading, particularly if you abhor war.
On page 306, Bob Herbert cites a quotation from a speech made in Boston 57 years ago. Herbert quotes a news release on a paragraph of Bradley’s speech.

“General Omar Bradley , a hero of World War II, delivered a speech in Boston in 1948 that is remarkably appropriate for the violent and chaotic world of today. ‘The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom,’ he said, ‘power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical midgets. We know more about war than we know of peace, more about killing than we know about living.”

For me, there is nothing whatsoever to add to Omar Bradley’s speech except to state that he came from the hills of Missouri, home of Howard Davis and Harry Truman.
E. E. CARR
August 20, 2005
~~~
I feel like Bradley does a good job of summarizing why we don’t need bases OR a draft; the U.S. should endeavor to do less occupying and killing in general. Aiming to have fewer bases and fewer troops, regardless of the cost savings associated by closing them, is a great goal. I’d agree that the socioeconomic component to the army is frustrating, though. It obviously shouldn’t be the poorest Americans that have to be the first to die. But even more obviously, no Americans should be dying overseas in the first place when there’s no real war to be waged, and we’re just trying to control oil interests.