The Dignity of an Officer

The Dignity of an Officer

September 3, 2019

By Jim Culp

As I watched the news in the last two years, one instance caught my attention over many others. It was the swearing in of General James Mattis as Secretary of Defense under the Trump Administration. I couldn’t believe that a general that I had admired for years was taking a retirement job from an idiot like Donald Trump.

I was on my way to Iraq in 2003 when General Mattis relieved an officer for not doing his duty, which in this case was relieving junior officers that could not do their jobs. Mattis was a two-star (called a Major General) general in Iraq and relieved Lieutenant Colonel Joe D. Dowdy, a full bird colonel that disagreed with Mattis’ “charge forward and take Bagdad” plan.

I was astonished at the time to read about this while I was sitting in a deployment camp in Kuwait waiting for the “GO” to cross the border. The reason it hit home for me is that I knew at least ten field grade officers in Kuwait and Iraq that should have been relieved; and it never happened to them. I personally witnessed officers that were pulled from the Army Reserves and place in positions that they knew nothing about, and the results were disastrous. These officers didn’t ask for help, they tried to “John Wayne” their way through. Mattis recognized that (at least in the Marines) that sorry ass officers need to be relieved. No one in the Army had the balls for that, and that is why the Army became a place I no longer wanted to be when I returned home.

Being an NCO now meant treating troops like they were in pre-school, checking the “excellent” block on their evaluation reports when they were worthless, and assigning them to tasks that were so simple that a first grader could accomplish them.

In 2018, when Secretary of State James Mattis disagreed with President Trump on military issues and climate control, he respectfully resigned his post. To this day, he has not spoken ill of the president while he remains in office; the true mark of a gentleman and a career soldier. My faith was restored. I quietly spoke “that-a-boy Mad Dog” to the TV screen.

All is not lost.

-Jim  

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