Why Our Best Officers Are Leaving (The US Military)

[roo_ster]

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/01/why-our-best-officers-are-leaving/8346

by way of

http://pajamasmedia.com/instapundit/112637/

“Increasingly, the military is creating a command structure that rewards conformism and ignores merit. As a result, it’s losing its vaunted ability to cultivate entrepreneurs in uniform.”

Also, it’s become extremely PC, which is no fun for the kinds of people who make good military officers.

UPDATE: A reader emails: “Gee, take away merit, enforce conformism and political correctness and the best of the best check out. I wonder if this same kind of thing could happen in the country at large? What’s that Ms. Rand? You have insight on that?” Like I said, it’s Ayn Rand’s world, we’re just living in it.

"When I asked veterans for the reasons they left the military, the top response was “frustration with military bureaucracy”—cited by 82 percent of respondents (with 50 percent agreeing strongly)."

From an Army War College Report:
“Since the late 1980s … prospects for the Officer Corps’ future have been darkened by … plummeting company-grade officer retention rates. Significantly, this leakage includes a large share of high-performing officers.”


Yep, I figured the best Os I worked with had no long-term future in the Army.  OTOH, a few of the turd-burglar Os were perfectly suited to a stultifying bureaucracy.

Like anything else, the Army survives because the top 20% (who remain) are dedicated beyond reason.  The other 80% are mostly dead wood, at best.

I still think my kiddos would be well-served by a hitch in the .mil, but that a .mil career is a bad move for anyone with some gumption.  Make that hitch with the toughest, best-trained contingent and then move on when your enlistment is up, before you burn out on dealing with the bullshinola.

[RevDisk]

I agree 100%.   

Too much bureaucracy, office politics (encouraged by the command structure), etc.  It's not conformism per se.  It's conformism to stupidity, cronyism, papershuffling, zero tolerance of mistake, and brass rewarding of all previous terms.   Any decent officer I ever had, I knew they'd never make above Major.   Show me an incompetent papershuffler with no command ability, and I'd give even odds on full bird or light bird.   Backstabbing political suckup and CYA-master who would happily sell out any soldier under him?   Stars, baby, stars.

[Scout26]

M.T. Uniform

http://www.usar.army.mil/arweb/organization/commandstructure/USARC/OPS/200MP/Leadership/Pages/Freeman.aspx

[Angel Eyes]

M.T. Uniform

http://www.usar.army.mil/arweb/organization/commandstructure/USARC/OPS/200MP/Leadership/Pages/Freeman.aspx

Do you have personal experience with Col. Freeman?  I know nothing about him other than what's at the link.

Four Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart: I'd like to know what he did to get those.

[Leatherneck]

today--no matter which service-- it takes politics to make GO/FO. Case in point: Mike Mullen. When he came to OSD as a Captain, I trained him in the best practices of getting things done in OSD. Look what he went on to do. He became very political; still a good guy at heart, but he took on the attributes that John Boyd always referred to as "careerism." Now he's as completely political as Eisenhower was, but without the distinguished war experience.

TC

[Sergeant Bob]

One of my Leadership school instructors said most people are promoted to their level of incompetence. From what I saw during my career it often went way beyond that.

[dogmush]

Do you have personal experience with Col. Freeman?  I know nothing about him other than what's at the link.

Four Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart: I'd like to know what he did to get those.

Without commenting on Col. Freeman's awards (I don't know him) I would point out that Bronze Stars have been given to officers as a participation award in OIF/OEF.

[French G.]

From my lowly career as an E I agree with the advice to do a hitch and get out. From my experience I wish I had joined combat arms and probably the Marines looking back. The best times in my career were the ones with the most mission and the farthest away from home base. The flagpole military is just a place for the ones that go along to get along.

Oh, and I count for squat as an E-6, but I left. 14 years active, finish my retirement on the one weekend side. Ridiculous experience counting for nothing, slimy incompetents promoted past me and a navy that sees a senior(11 years TIR) E-6 as not a precious leadership asset but as a member of the dreaded "E-1 to E-6" group that we talk down to and handhold out of trouble.

[geronimotwo]

i thought this thread was going to be about privitized security companies hiring all the good ones.

[Waitone]

Clue.  Exactly the same things could be said for the civilian side.  I am continually amazed at how the best are routinely exited from organizations.  It is quite easy in organizations to identify people who are obviously better than the system into which they report.  Too many years ago I was an unwilling participant in a seriously radical restructuring of a company.  Without exception those ID'd as  leaders and managers of high potential were shown the exit.  Those who survived were marginal performers. 

That kind of nonsense has never made any sense, but it surely is consistent.

[roo_ster]

Backstabbing political suckup and CYA-master who would happily sell out any soldier under him?   Stars, baby, stars.

I see you've met the second XO I served under.

[roo_ster]

Clue.  Exactly the same things could be said for the civilian side.  I am continually amazed at how the best are routinely exited from organizations.  It is quite easy in organizations to identify people who are obviously better than the system into which they report.  Too many years ago I was an unwilling participant in a seriously radical restructuring of a company.  Without exception those ID'd as  leaders and managers of high potential were shown the exit.  Those who survived were marginal performers. 

That kind of nonsense has never made any sense, but it surely is consistent.

Yes, but to a lesser extent.  Reality intrudes on corporate weenies every once in a while.

I recall when they were offering early retirements & such during the last round of layoffs, the best senior engineers & mgt took the packages & ran.  Then, some came back as consultants, as the ywere the only folks on Earth who knew the program as well as they did.   

[RoadKingLarry]

From my lowly career as an E I agree with the advice to do a hitch and get out. From my experience I wish I had joined combat arms and probably the Marines looking back. The best times in my career were the ones with the most mission and the farthest away from home base. The flagpole military is just a place for the ones that go along to get along.

Oh, and I count for squat as an E-6, but I left. 14 years active, finish my retirement on the one weekend side. Ridiculous experience counting for nothing, slimy incompetents promoted past me and a navy that sees a senior(11 years TIR) E-6 as not a precious leadership asset but as a member of the dreaded "E-1 to E-6" group that we talk down to and handhold out of trouble.

I bailed after 12 years an an E-6. 6+ years time in rate, went to the cheifs board 4 times ( I made 1st early). Wanted nothing to do with the reserves but other than that almost a carbon copy of my experience.

[French G.]

So far I've been lucky in the reserves, good duty, fix planes, go play in the desert pretty much whenever, I can have a good attitude and ignore the BS because it gets switched off on Sunday afternoon. I also liked active despite the problems, I was 3 years geo-bach, looking at 6 more of that to retire with most likely a 14 year sea counter. I'd be there now if I thought every other aspect of my life wouldn't be #$%^'d

[RoadKingLarry]

I had already done pretty much everything I was going to do, Sea duty, instructor duty at Sub School Groton, back to sea duty as an LPO. Detailer was suggesting another tour as an instructor in Groton as my only choice. In '92 they came around with early outs with a buy out and I bit the first time my numbers came up.
Bonus was it made the XO so mad when he heard I was thinking about it he called me out in front of god and everybody on the mess decks and called me a sorry SOB and a worthless POS for wanting to quit the Navy. I calmly told him I hadn't made up my mind yet but his input would definitly be considered in my decision.
I really thought his head was going to pop.
The very next thing I did was submit the paper work to take the early out.

[Devonai]

As a squared-away but complacent E4 for the last six years, I've never had to deal with any officers above company level.  Our COs and XOs have always done right by the line platoons,  but our 2LTs have been a mixed bag.  I don't think they have been in the system long enough to be a product of the problems mentioned here, especially since most of them came from ROTC and not prior service.

I'm friends with our current XO, so I hear about this kind of stuff second-hand.  I see some of it first-hand at my day job with the CT Air Guard, but I'm mostly shielded from it as a civilian sub-contractor.

[Fitz]

I hear they're tapping General Dempsey from TRADOC as the next Army chief of staff

If that's true, I'm getting the hell out of the reserves.

That man's rewrite of TRADOC 350-6 is directly responsible for the current Drill Sergeant culture, which can be summed up in one sentence.

"No matter what, the private is going to graduate."

Drill Sergeants are afraid to do their jobs now because the chain of command is after hats and badges, largely because of the "hug a private" attitude that General Dempsey helped cultivate.

[RevDisk]

I had exactly two officers I respected.   The Major and the Lt.  The Major had his faults, but overall he was a good man, a good officer and gave everyone a fair shake.  Good guy.  He kept me from having to execute one officer and two senior NCOs.  I'll always remember that.

The Lt?  Hell.  When she gave orders, it got done.  We'd get yelled at for being way way too driven and efficient (Lt had a few words with the folks who did so).  I'm not kidding.  We had to do X, that should have taken 2 weeks.  3 days, we were done.  I nearly put a round through another soldier for making inappropriate remarks about her appearance.  She'd occassionally bring in all kinds of stuff she baked herself, and damn could she bake.  She'd always claim they were "leftovers", that she needed to get rid of.  Considering she was a fitness freak from hell, none of us exactly bought that but would always acknowledge our appreciation for the "leftovers".  That said, she could tear a strip off someone's hide better than any drill sergeant I've ever met.  "Command presence", I honestly thought it was a sick joke until I met her. 

She had to resign due to office politics.  She should have made stars.  If she ordered it, I would have assaulted the Gates of Hades itself with a stick and stacked the corpses of demons a half mile deep. 

The fact that she was driven out and Beck made stars was enough to make me want to get the hell out of the Army.   FTA.

I hear they're tapping General Dempsey from TRADOC as the next Army chief of staff

If that's true, I'm getting the hell out of the reserves.

That man's rewrite of TRADOC 350-6 is directly responsible for the current Drill Sergeant culture, which can be summed up in one sentence.

"No matter what, the private is going to graduate."

Drill Sergeants are afraid to do their jobs now because the chain of command is after hats and badges, largely because of the "hug a private" attitude that General Dempsey helped cultivate.

That was the moron that instituted that policy?   A number of people should not be in the Army, and TRADOC has the responsibility of weeding them out.

[Fitz]

Read the new TRADOC regulation 350-6

His handiwork.

It's sickening. Might make you throw up.

[T.O.M.]

When I became interested in the military, and got accepted at West Point, I was lucky enough to have friends whose fathers had all served as enlisted, many with combat time in Viet Nam.  They taught me that a good officer was one that led from the front, not the back.  You got respect by giving respect, and by being willing and able to do what you tell your troops to do.  Go to bat for them when called for, stick your neck in the noose for them as necessary, and you'll get their support.  When I got to the academy, I found that the prior service guys were exactly that way, and the rest were mainly asshats who enjoyed the hazing/harassing/yelling for the sake of doing it, not because it was necessary.

When I switch grey for green, I was lucky enough to get put with senior NCO's that I listened to, and just like I was told prior, I gave respect and got it back.  Problem?  Yep, I didn't play well with the other O's.  I passed on a round of golf to go shooting with the guys.  Went to unofficial unit cookouts instead of the CO's wife's charity event.  Drank beer and vodka straight up instead of martinis.

Promotion times came and went.  Switched to Reserved and crawled up to O-3, and saw that with the end of the Cold War, cuts were imminent, so I took my leave.

My only regret was that I didn't try Nat. Guard.  Some of those guys I trained with hat their sh1t straight, including some of the senior brass.  Working in the private sector kept many heads on straight.

[roo_ster]

That was the moron that instituted that policy?   A number of people should not be in the Army, and TRADOC has the responsibility of weeding them out.

Truth.  Needs to be on the front cover of the manual.

Also would prevent so many problems on the back site of Basic.

[Fitz]

Gather around, folks. I have a story to tell.

My first cycle as a drill sergeant, we had a kid named Nusenko

Nusenko was a piece of *expletive deleted*it. He refused to do pushups when I smoked him, saying "I want to talk to the chaplain!!!!"

He constantly dimed out his battle buddies for infractions. He was a pathological liar who claimed prior marine corps service.

He had an aunt who was a US senator. We thought this was a lie. We found out quickly that it was not.

The first sergeant said, about halfway through the cycle, "Leave him alone. I don't care what the *expletive deleted*ck he does from now on... Nusenko graduates."

And nusenko, the worst soldier I've ever seen, graduated. Then he got to AIT and *expletive deleted*ed up. He wore awards from his "former marine corps" service, and some commander investigated. Found out the guy had never served in the marines, and chaptered his ass out of the Army. He was confined for 45 days prior to that.

Another one: Pvt Casas. Gangbanger, but clearly not a tough one. Probably some thug's bitch back home. Used to talk about "the streets." and continually got in trouble.

Attacked a drill sergeant (me), and summarily got embarrassed.

He graduated.


There are many more, but suffice it to say, TRADOC is destroying the *expletive deleted*ing army.

[Zardozimo Oprah Bannedalas]

I haven't even sent in my OCS app yet and people are already running.

[Phantom Warrior]

Zardozimo (and anyone else), if you are thinking about Army OCS send me a PM.  I'm an OCS grad and I moderate on a great OCS forum.

[Fitz]

Speaking of officers ... my direct commission packet is headed to usarc today!