Marine generals to Cheney: Knock it off, mac

Two very fine and distinguished Marines that I would expect no less from. Whose core values, like fine steel such as found in a Masamune katana, were forged and tempered long ago.

Anecdotally: when I look at Gen. Krulak, I see a lot of the General's late father, who once spoke his mind to LBJ, knowing the risk to his career - and accepting it.

Today I happened to read that at the time of 9/11 (and Tora Bora), our former VP was recovering from his 4th heart attack.

Any major cardiovascular event has a high risk of diffuse neuro-trauma, the full effects maybe playing out over time. As with TBI blast trauma, a strong body and determined mind can repair itself, adapting and rewiring around major and micro-damage. However, as with too many boxing, football or IED hits, the neuro networks ability to reinvent itself is reduced by repeat trauma.

Soldier-diplomat Scowcroft, who knew him as SecDef in trying times, pointedly said "I consider Cheney a good friend – I've known him for 30 years. But Dick Cheney I don't know anymore."

Personality change is a common sequala to acquired brain injury. Diminished capacity can be hard to judge, and harder to accept. Old people get cranky.

We should all wish the man a peaceful, productive retirement, and hope for a factual, thoughtful and well edited memoir. Those who encourage him to sacrifice the dignity of his many high offices for a role in the sharky snarky news circus are maybe not his best friends.

...for making their views quite clear.

Since they're taking a humanistic tack, it might be worthwhile for them to peruse this relatively current news story (June 2009) for the way modern war-fighting methods (as well as prehistoric ones like torture) create unnecessary enemies LONG AFTER a military conflict ends:

US bombs (UXOs) still killing civilians in Vietnam (AFP)

Quite a number of years ago (at least 10) I read a similar news story about how a previously unexploded ordinance had gone off in a Vietnamese schoolyard killing a teacher and a number of elementary school students.

I commented on that to a Vietnam Vet friend of mine (then the Chaplain at Anti-War VFW Post, Bill Motto #5888).

He looked down and said, cynically, "War. The gift that keeps on giving"

As a former marine officer myself, I am heartened that these two men of the "Old Corps" called the fascist out for his criminal acts. The most horrible aspect to all of this, is he had a large amount of government employees and contractors helping him. "Old Corps" understands accountability. Through all of the training I underwent regarding this matter, the USMC made it clear to all, that anyone in violation of laws and regulations concerning the treatment of prisoners (torture especially) would be prosecuted to the full extent of the UCMJ. NO EXCEPTIONS.

"First to fight for right and freedom, and to keep our honor clean...."

For you folks that spend most of your time inside the Beltway, I would suggest that you talk with a few of us folks in mid-America (you know, us drones that go to work everyday and send in our taxes to support the idiots working in the Pentagon). If you did, you might find out that a significant majority of us:

1) Don't consider scaring a detainee with a power drill, faking an execution in an adjoining room or perpetrating a little waterboarding constitutes torture.

2) Could care less what "World Opinion" thinks about us, when those same "Opinion Leaders" can't bring themselves to denounce any of the numerous atrocities committed by the various Terror Groups.

3) Don't think that it is a very smart idea to be completely gutting the effectiveness of the CIA by deciding 5 years after the fact that interrogation techniques declared legal back then, are now going to be declared illegal and retroactively punished. POTUS better hope that we don't have another terrorist attack on home soil, or he can forget about what will happen in 2012. . . he'll be impeached before then.

In closing I would suggest that Generals Krulak and Soar expend some of their manifold talents finding out from some of their active duty buddies what the hell went wrong on the eastern Afghanistan border a couple of weeks ago, where 4 marines and a dozen ANA soldiers were sent to their early graves during an ambush because their higher ups wouldn't authorize any supporting artillery fire, etc.

My youngest is graduating from Marine TBS in 7 weeks and guess where he will probably be 6 months from now. I hope to hell that Gen McChrystal has come up with some more realistic ROEs by then, because I don't cotton to sacrificing my son's life by making him go into battle with one hand tied behind his back.

Semper Fi
SBG

is the strategic heart of the matter.

'Look, a radical Cheney' is a tactical misdirect, draws the argument off-center. Like the conclusion of "The Firm" (Gresham's ), paleo conservative John Dean argued that taking out the supporting cast of lawyers is maybe the best tactic. He would know. The lesson that the future VP drew from Nixon was to get more compliant even less principled lawyers.

The question isn't whether bad stuff got done that we would prosecute if tried against our troops. The pirate ship Revenge sailed in 2001, with Geraldo as figurehead. Bagram, is where things derailed, not Gitmo or AbuG.

The strategic question is whether selected WH and Justice lawyers illegally authorized torture. If they issued illegal orders, if the breach was conscious conspiracy, and it's not adjudicated against, then it will happen again. Or worse. People that trusted Team W in this, and don't trust Obama are operating on a logic I can't penetrate.

Like a trademark or right of access, our Constitution is only valid if the rights and limits are exercised and upheld. By any measure, no torture is a foundational US departure from British law, and now a matter of ratified international treaty. Sometimes the tree of liberty has to be watered in court.

But the former Pres. and his understudy are more or less immune, so we need to lower our fire and ire to the 'experts' who waved the constitution while breaking it in letter and spirit. It's not about jail-time for uniformed or contract thumb-twisters. Let the military and civil courts handle that. It's about disbarring unfaithful civilian legal officers, and re-setting executive precedent.

No one should be telling the President that Article 2 gives Gordon Liddy Jr. the power to go out and fix things.