Fired Navy Secretary Confirms He's Part of the Deep State, Pens Op-Ed

[JoeB131]

That is what the Secretary of the Navy failed to do. You don’t have to like the orders, you may even think they are idiotic. But when given an order, you obey. That is why our system works. That is why our Military is respected and feared. Because our troops obey the orders they are given.

Okay, here's the problem with that... (Ignoring the rest of your "war story).

The one thing I was taught was that you are not obligated to obey an illegal order... For instance, if your platoon leader tells you to kill a bunch of civilians, you have every right to disobey that order... as you should.

Spenser was trying to work out a deal where Gallagher would be gotten out of the Navy (because he's a dangerous fucking lunatic who HAD shot civilians) but still allowed everyone to save face. Instead, he lost his job and exposed what a clown show the Trump Administration is. The one where the Man Baby issues orders based on whatever got him worked up on Fox News and then they have to carry it out.

The way our system works is the Chief Executive decides what happens. Let’s take Syria as one example. The President decided. The order once given is binding unless it is illegal. There is nothing illegal about Trump’s orders to the Navy. It does not mean wise orders. It means legal.

I disagreed with President Obama on going into Syria. I voted for Obama twice. But I still thought that it was a bad idea. Not illegal. Just not smart.

In the Military the reviewing authority. That means the General or Admiral Commanding, has the power to review and either uphold the verdict and sentence or set them aside. Again this is legal.

But let’s take another issue. The feelings of the advisors. There are literally hundreds of examples where the advisors were wrong. President Carter and Desert One as a massive example. The experts drew up the plans. Carter approves them and got the blame when the overly complicated plans drawn up by experts failed miserably.

For Desert Storm the experts presented a conventional plan and it was rejected. It turned out that Stormin Norman was right.

Kennedy with the Cuban Missile Crisis and The Bay of Pigs. With the Bay of Pigs we know now the CIA expected the attack to fail and figured that JFK would throw good money after bad to save it.

One Constant through history has remained. The President gets the blame or the credit.

Wilson ignored his Ambassadors and advisors and their reports. He wanted peace. He did not want to hear it was impossible. He did not want to choose sides. Their truthful reports that his dream was impossible did not open his mind. He closed it even more firmly.

Time after time. Event after event. The President makes the decision and is saddled with the responsibility. We list the ones who end up being right with the greats. We list those who were wrong as the worst.

The job of Secretary if the Navy is not to defend the Navy from Trump. The job is to execute the orders and represent the Navy to Trump. In the end. It is Trump who is ultimately responsible.

I respect what you say, but when you have someone as fundamentally flawed as Trump is... do the normal rules really apply anymore.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

That is what the Secretary of the Navy failed to do. You don’t have to like the orders, you may even think they are idiotic. But when given an order, you obey. That is why our system works. That is why our Military is respected and feared. Because our troops obey the orders they are given.

Okay, here's the problem with that... (Ignoring the rest of your "war story).

The one thing I was taught was that you are not obligated to obey an illegal order... For instance, if your platoon leader tells you to kill a bunch of civilians, you have every right to disobey that order... as you should.

Spenser was trying to work out a deal where Gallagher would be gotten out of the Navy (because he's a dangerous fucking lunatic who HAD shot civilians) but still allowed everyone to save face. Instead, he lost his job and exposed what a clown show the Trump Administration is. The one where the Man Baby issues orders based on whatever got him worked up on Fox News and then they have to carry it out.

The way our system works is the Chief Executive decides what happens. Let’s take Syria as one example. The President decided. The order once given is binding unless it is illegal. There is nothing illegal about Trump’s orders to the Navy. It does not mean wise orders. It means legal.

I disagreed with President Obama on going into Syria. I voted for Obama twice. But I still thought that it was a bad idea. Not illegal. Just not smart.

In the Military the reviewing authority. That means the General or Admiral Commanding, has the power to review and either uphold the verdict and sentence or set them aside. Again this is legal.

But let’s take another issue. The feelings of the advisors. There are literally hundreds of examples where the advisors were wrong. President Carter and Desert One as a massive example. The experts drew up the plans. Carter approves them and got the blame when the overly complicated plans drawn up by experts failed miserably.

For Desert Storm the experts presented a conventional plan and it was rejected. It turned out that Stormin Norman was right.

Kennedy with the Cuban Missile Crisis and The Bay of Pigs. With the Bay of Pigs we know now the CIA expected the attack to fail and figured that JFK would throw good money after bad to save it.

One Constant through history has remained. The President gets the blame or the credit.

Wilson ignored his Ambassadors and advisors and their reports. He wanted peace. He did not want to hear it was impossible. He did not want to choose sides. Their truthful reports that his dream was impossible did not open his mind. He closed it even more firmly.

Time after time. Event after event. The President makes the decision and is saddled with the responsibility. We list the ones who end up being right with the greats. We list those who were wrong as the worst.

The job of Secretary if the Navy is not to defend the Navy from Trump. The job is to execute the orders and represent the Navy to Trump. In the end. It is Trump who is ultimately responsible.

I respect what you say, but when you have someone as fundamentally flawed as Trump is... do the normal rules really apply anymore.

LOL you don't get to change the rules cause you don't LIKE the President. Tell me did that ever work with Officers you didn't like?

 

[SavannahMann]

That is what the Secretary of the Navy failed to do. You don’t have to like the orders, you may even think they are idiotic. But when given an order, you obey. That is why our system works. That is why our Military is respected and feared. Because our troops obey the orders they are given.

Okay, here's the problem with that... (Ignoring the rest of your "war story).

The one thing I was taught was that you are not obligated to obey an illegal order... For instance, if your platoon leader tells you to kill a bunch of civilians, you have every right to disobey that order... as you should.

Spenser was trying to work out a deal where Gallagher would be gotten out of the Navy (because he's a dangerous fucking lunatic who HAD shot civilians) but still allowed everyone to save face. Instead, he lost his job and exposed what a clown show the Trump Administration is. The one where the Man Baby issues orders based on whatever got him worked up on Fox News and then they have to carry it out.

The way our system works is the Chief Executive decides what happens. Let’s take Syria as one example. The President decided. The order once given is binding unless it is illegal. There is nothing illegal about Trump’s orders to the Navy. It does not mean wise orders. It means legal.

I disagreed with President Obama on going into Syria. I voted for Obama twice. But I still thought that it was a bad idea. Not illegal. Just not smart.

In the Military the reviewing authority. That means the General or Admiral Commanding, has the power to review and either uphold the verdict and sentence or set them aside. Again this is legal.

But let’s take another issue. The feelings of the advisors. There are literally hundreds of examples where the advisors were wrong. President Carter and Desert One as a massive example. The experts drew up the plans. Carter approves them and got the blame when the overly complicated plans drawn up by experts failed miserably.

For Desert Storm the experts presented a conventional plan and it was rejected. It turned out that Stormin Norman was right.

Kennedy with the Cuban Missile Crisis and The Bay of Pigs. With the Bay of Pigs we know now the CIA expected the attack to fail and figured that JFK would throw good money after bad to save it.

One Constant through history has remained. The President gets the blame or the credit.

Wilson ignored his Ambassadors and advisors and their reports. He wanted peace. He did not want to hear it was impossible. He did not want to choose sides. Their truthful reports that his dream was impossible did not open his mind. He closed it even more firmly.

Time after time. Event after event. The President makes the decision and is saddled with the responsibility. We list the ones who end up being right with the greats. We list those who were wrong as the worst.

The job of Secretary if the Navy is not to defend the Navy from Trump. The job is to execute the orders and represent the Navy to Trump. In the end. It is Trump who is ultimately responsible.

I respect what you say, but when you have someone as fundamentally flawed as Trump is... do the normal rules really apply anymore.

Absolutely the rules still apply, even for Trump. That is why we exist as a nation.

Let’s take any event in history, and really any era. The Generals and Admirals hated JFK. They hated Secretary of Defense MacNamara. The Navy called him Infante Terrible. The Army hated him. But because of MacNamara, we got a good. Plane for the services, the F-4 Phantom, we got rid of the M-14 in favor of the M-16. We got a lot of good equipment that was superior to what it replaced.

The Army tried to cheat on the evaluations for the M-16 and MacNamara exposed that. I mean the services fought him tooth and nail trying to get around his orders. They hated the Kennedy’s. The Generals and Admirals honestly believed that JFK and his people would just hand the country over to the Russians.

It’s the invasion of the Bay of Pigs. The Invasion stalls on the beaches. The Cubans are getting more and more people there increasing the odds against the ill equipped invaders. Kennedy refuses to allow the Military to intercede. This is the fight of the generation. The fight against Communism. The Fight against the hated reds. The fight against everything the military believed they stood against.

The Generals believing that Kennedy is wrong, order the troops to go ahead and help out and invade Cuba. The way you feel about Trump is the way that Curtis LeMay felt about Kennedy. Only LeMay had authority.

Imagine if LeMay had decided to hell with it, we’re bombing Cuba and going to drive the Reds from this Hemisphere. Treason? No. Mutiny.

The rules and laws applied to those who served under Kennedy, and hated him, just as they apply to everyone serving under Trump, and hating him. Just as they applied to the soldiers I supervised as a lowly Sergeant when Clinton was President. Either the rules are always there, and always apply, or they aren’t rules, and then what do we have?

Japan, May 15 1932. A bunch of low ranking officers decided they knew better than everyone else. They went and assassinated the Prime Minister of Japan. Eleven of these young officers went on trial, and screamed much as you are, that they were loyal to the Emperor. Your screams are that you are loyal to the nation.

Those young officers received a light sentence, by popular cry from the people. Just as anyone who killed Trump would be lauded by the left in some places.

And if you wonder how we ended up in World War II, then look no further than this event when the conscience of a few supposedly loyal officers changed the entire direction of a nation. From then on, any Politician who was not ultra nationalist was quietly warned that if they were not with the program, they could be removed from the program. Like Union Leg Breakers running a nation. Fear, and intimidation.

Our nation works, so long as we hold true to our ideals and principles in bad times, as well as good times. When we sacrifice them, usually for the best of reasons, we suffer as a nation. Our greatest mistakes, and errors in history, happen when we ignored our ideals and principles and the constitutional foundation of this nation because we couldn’t afford it in this emergency.

The language you are using, is the same sort of language people used to justify rounding up the Americans of Japanese descent after Pearl Harbor. The Supreme Court agreed it was reasonable. I mean, it was war right? We were fighting for our very survival right? Now of course, it is a source of incredible national shame, and a black mark of racism in our history. We knew it was wrong, and we did it anyway. Because we had to do this and other wrong things to fight a war.

This is why the rules matter. This is why the Constitution must be inviolate, and treated as the next best thing to holy text. Because every time we step away from it, we suffer in the long run.

The orders may not be wise, but so long as they are legal, they must be obeyed.

 

[JoeB131]

LOL you don't get to change the rules cause you don't LIKE the President. Tell me did that ever work with Officers you didn't like?

We managed to get one officer reassigned because he kept trying to pull shit like forging signatures on chow forms and not properly accounting for ammo.

 

[JoeB131]

Absolutely the rules still apply, even for Trump. That is why we exist as a nation.

Let’s take any event in history, and really any era. The Generals and Admirals hated JFK. They hated Secretary of Defense MacNamara. The Navy called him Infante Terrible. The Army hated him. But because of MacNamara, we got a good. Plane for the services, the F-4 Phantom, we got rid of the M-14 in favor of the M-16. We got a lot of good equipment that was superior to what it replaced.

Okay... except MacNamara was also responsible for getting us into Vietnam... so not so much.

JFK wasn't a crazy person who pardoned war criminals and sold out our allies.

 

[SavannahMann]

Absolutely the rules still apply, even for Trump. That is why we exist as a nation.

Let’s take any event in history, and really any era. The Generals and Admirals hated JFK. They hated Secretary of Defense MacNamara. The Navy called him Infante Terrible. The Army hated him. But because of MacNamara, we got a good. Plane for the services, the F-4 Phantom, we got rid of the M-14 in favor of the M-16. We got a lot of good equipment that was superior to what it replaced.

Okay... except MacNamara was also responsible for getting us into Vietnam... so not so much.

JFK wasn't a crazy person who pardoned war criminals and sold out our allies.

MacNamara wanted Special Forces, which JFK formalized, to do the work in Vietnam. That is why the Special Warfare Center is known as the JFK Special Warfare Center. MacNamara never wanted tons of troops there. He wanted our Military to train theirs and get them able to fight the war successfully.

Remember what we were talking about? As certain as you are that Trump is doing all those things, is just as certain as the Generals and Admirals were that Kennedy was doing the same to the nation. They honestly believed that Kennedy was timid and essentially surrendering to the Big Red Dog that was digging in our backyard. The Generals opposed removing obsolete missiles from Turkey, because there was no plan to replace them with upgraded or new missiles.

They honestly believed that Kennedy would send the US Military in during the Bay of Pigs. When Kennedy stood firm in his refusal, the Generals and Admirals felt certain that Kennedy was betraying the country to the Communists. Later during the Cuban Missile Crisis, they were just as angry that he refused to order the invasion.

History has shown that Kennedy was right. But it took decades to find out everything, and learn the entire picture, because we just did not know at the time. We did not know that the Russian Submarines were carrying nuclear tipped torpedoes. We did not know that the Cubans had under Soviet Control, short range tactical nuclear weapons that were going to be deployed, used, if the Marines stormed ashore.

But the good and bad. Listening to the Advisors, and taking their advice, or not, depends on the President and the situation. Reagan was told to take the deal and shut down the Star Wars research to get rid of Ballistic Missiles. None of his advisors thought that keeping SDI was a good idea when the chance to get rid of the Nukes was on the table.

History showed Reagan correct. The continuation of the research coupled with the exposure of the failures of the Soviet Systems like Chernobyl led to the collapse of the Soviet Union. History could well have shown Reagan wrong.

We mentioned Carter and Desert one. The same advisors strongly opposed Carter’s plan to travel to Three Mile Island. It was too dangerous. It was too risky, and would be viewed as a publicity stunt. But Carter knew more about Nuclear Power than they did, and ignored their advice. To this day, Carter appearing in person at the Nuclear Power Plant in trouble, is considered one of the great examples of personal courage and leadership. He wasn’t in the Oval Office urging Calm. He was there. He placed himself in danger to reassure the country that there would not be a meltdown. This was when most people’s understanding came from hyped movies like The China Syndrome.

Today’s bullshit is in many ways, no different than the bullshit from decades gone by. The Espionage Act was passed during Woodrow Wilson’s administration. Why? It wasn’t to protect the nation. It was intended to protect Wilson personally. Wilson had overruled the Secretary of State in allowing the Germans to use American Cables to transmit encrypted messages. This was a violation of the duty of Neutral Governments. Britain could have declared war on us, because that was tantamount to taking Germany’s side. It was the American Cable that transmitted the famous Zimmerman Telegram. If that information had gotten out Wilson could have been impeached.

Now, think about that for a moment. Technically Wilson’s orders to allow the cable to be used were questionable at the least, and flatly illegal at the most. But the Secretary of State did it anyway as ordered. Knowing it was a treaty violation to do so, he did it anyway.

The more you learn about history, the more you realize that much of the current nonsense is just recycled crap from ages gone by. THere are some differences. But when you boil it down, honestly, you see it is the same old recycled crap.

 

[JoeB131]

Remember what we were talking about? As certain as you are that Trump is doing all those things, is just as certain as the Generals and Admirals were that Kennedy was doing the same to the nation. They honestly believed that Kennedy was timid and essentially surrendering to the Big Red Dog that was digging in our backyard. The Generals opposed removing obsolete missiles from Turkey, because there was no plan to replace them with upgraded or new missiles.

They honestly believed that Kennedy would send the US Military in during the Bay of Pigs. When Kennedy stood firm in his refusal, the Generals and Admirals felt certain that Kennedy was betraying the country to the Communists. Later during the Cuban Missile Crisis, they were just as angry that he refused to order the invasion.

Kennedy was sane.. Trump, not so much.

I give you a better example. In 1944, a few German officers were involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler and depose the Nazis before Germany was completely crushed by the allies... Most of the German officers refused to go along with it, and in fact helped put down the coup attempt.

After the war, they asked one of them, why they didn't go along with it, and he replied, "A German Officer doesn't act like that."

Now, I doubt that our officers would pull a coup against Trump, either...