ALLEGATIONS

 It reared its ugly head again as it always will now and there is no answer or solution that I can see to the problem and it is a very ugly problem. Once again a Presidential appointment was tainted by the allegations laid by some person who had no direct knowledge and no proof at all of anything she was talking about were all set to derail the nomination and appointment of the new Secretary of Defense. You remember this vile game, it was played by the left on Justice Kavanaugh and it was the same sort of thing, allegations about something that allegedly happened decades ago with no proof, no witnesses, nothing at all to back it up and suddenly the man's appointment to the Supreme Court was in jeopardy because, allegations.

I was reading today one of those things about the huge number of fully qualified Army officers that were point blank refusing command of Battalions. In the old days the only way to be a general was to have commanded a battalion along the way and now officers wanted nothing to do with it. The article explored some of the reasons for that but it all boiled down to the fact that any officer's career and pension and reputation could be destroyed by just one person making allegations without any proof or evidence. That's all it takes to be gone and a non-person in the modern military.

As a youngish Lieutenant I remember one of my Department Heads on my second ship telling me that he had turned down command of a minesweeper. Back then those were Lieutenant Commander commands and could be a plum for any officer wanting to make Captain and then Admiral. He described it as stepping into Hell because all it would take on a pathetically undermanned, underresourced ship was one sailor screwing up and it would be curtains for his career and he'd be what's known as a terminal Lieutenant Commander with no hope of promotion. That was a considered risk for advancement and he figured if he did all right and kept his nose clean he would make Commander and retire happy because there really aren't a lot of retired Limited Duty Officer Commanders who were promoted up from E1 to E8 and then to 05. They were very rare in 1986.

I have to admit it never even entered my mind when I was offered command because at that point it had not grown to anything like the basilisk it has become today but back in 1990 we also didn't have anything like "toxic leadership environment" and endless command surveys. We happily charged along never thinking that someone with their hate on would stab us in the back. OK, I was perhaps more clueless than most but it certainly never occurred to me.

Now I personally know people that would cheerfully stab you in the back if they discovered that you voted for Trump. Cheerfully, because you deserve it!