You Will Anyway: Whatever happened to civilian leadership at the DoD?

Tuesday, December 8, 2020

Whatever happened to civilian leadership at the DoD?

US President-elect Joe Biden has chosen Lloyd Austin, who helped spearhead the US invasion of Iraq in 2003 and rose to head the US Central Command, as the first Black defence secretary, US media reported.

A veteran of conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the retired four-star army general, 67, beat out the favourite for the job, former under-secretary of defence Michele Flournoy, amid pressure on Biden to nominate more minorities for positions in his cabinet.

alJazeera

Just like seating Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court bench, I ask: Could they find no other black man?

Biden had also considered Jeh Johnson, a former Pentagon general counsel and former secretary of homeland defence.

Well, there you go. Seems qualified.

As a career military officer, Austin is likely to face opposition from some in Congress and in the defence establishment who believe in drawing a clear line between civilian and military leadership of the Pentagon.

Although many previous defence secretaries have served briefly in the military, only two – George C Marshall and James Mattis – have been career officers. Marshall also served as secretary of state.

[...]

Congress intended civilian control of the military when it created the position of secretary of defence in 1947 and prohibited a recently retired military officer from holding the position.

[...]

Like Mattis, Austin would need to obtain a congressional waiver to serve as defence secretary.

And since they gave it to Mattis, they'll be reluctant to deny it to Austin. Oh, what am I saying? We're talking about Republicans. Particularly Mitch McConnell.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.

UPDATE: Never mind Jeh Johnson. We don't want him anyway.

Johnson served as DHS secretary from 2013 to 2017. Early in the Obama administration, he was a Department of Defense general counsel, Reuters notes.

However, his efforts to expand family detentions and accelerate deportations came under question, according to an opposition book circulated around Capitol Hill. His approval of hundreds of drone strikes that hit civilians was also called into question.

Johnson was also reportedly under consideration to be attorney general. Now, Sen. Doug Jones (D-Ala.), who lost his reelection bid last month, is seen as the top contender for the job.

The Hill

UPDATE:

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"What we have is a foreign policy which is essentially a marketing strategy for selling weapons." -- Jill Stein

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"America: just a nation of two hundred million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable." ~ Hunter S. Thompson

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"What matters in journalism isn't politics, which are as universal and inescapable as breathing. What matters -- along with a fundamentally adversarial attitude toward government, without which "journalism" is simply public relations -- is integrity, transparency, evidence, coherence, and principle. These are the principles on which we should evaluate the quality of journalism, and their absence is why some journalists are so desperate to get you to focus on something else." ~ Barry Eisler

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Life, as Explained in "Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead"

GUILDENSTERN: What a fine persecution---to be kept intrigued without ever quite being enlightened.

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ROSENCRANTZ : The only thing that makes it bearable is the irrational belief that somebody interesting will come on in a minute.

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GUILDENSTERN: But for God's sake what are we supposed to do?!

PLAYER: Relax. Respond. That's what people do. You can't go through life questioning your situation at every turn.

GUILDENSTERN: But we don't know what's going on, or what to do with ourselves. We don't know how to act.

PLAYER: Act natural. You know why you're here at least.

GUILDENSTERN: We only know what we're told, and that's little enough. And for all we know it isn't even true.

PLAYER: For all anyone knows, nothing is. Everything has to be taken on trust; truth is only that which is taken to be true. It's the currency of living. There may be nothing behind it, but it doesn't make any difference so long as it is honoured. One acts on assumptions.

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GUILDENSTERN : We act on scraps of information... sifting half-remembered directions that we can hardly separate from instinct.

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PLAYER: Life is a gamble, at terrible odds-if it was a bet you wouldn't take it.