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GEN Odierno's Exchange w/Congressman Hunter


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I was an ALO with Gen O. During an exercise about 40 slides deep into a 100 plus slide briefing Gen O. Stood up and said "I don't care about all these useless f--king slides, just tell me who is winning the f--king war". It got pretty quiet after that and no more slides.

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I was an ALO with Gen O. During an exercise about 40 slides deep into a 100 plus slide briefing Gen O. Stood up and said "I don't care about all these useless f--king slides, just tell me who is winning the f--king war". It got pretty quiet after that and no more slides.

That is awesome. So many briefers are code 3 without powerpoint.

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More?

Yep. If you think the congressman didn't leave and sic his staff on finding a way to punish Odierno (deservedly), I think you are naïve. But I see Odierno with political ambitions a la Wesley Clark. Democrat with military experience and a favorite of this Administration.

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Dudes, I wish they could and would, but that's not how our system is set up. I see a lot of constitution thumpers around here (me included), so you cant really tell them to pound sand. The thought of the military standing up to our civilian leadership is a nogo for me.

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Odierno's behavior was wrong.

Regardless of what party the d-bag is doing the questioning, it is the military's role to answer factually and unemotionally. Se the one star calling Sen Boxer "Ma'am" for the correct TTP.

Here is where I start to put my spin on it vice just the facts: I believe Odierno was p.o.'d, but because Big Green handled DCGS-A badly and have been called out repeatedly by Congress in general and Hunter in particular. Odierno doesn't like having to explain himself.

I also believe he has political aspirations in his not too distant future with a big D after his name. This footage will be in campaign ad...

edited to spell DCGS-A correctly

Edited by brickhistory
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Agree that the military should and will always be subservient to civilian leadership. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that our highest ranking officers should automatically bend to the will of politicians. For instance, they should be insisting on BRACing superfluous bases regardless of who's district they're in. I admit, I don't know shit about DCGS-A, and Brick, you seem to, so I'll take your word that it was handled badly. I don't think that the general's tone was de-facto inappropriate however.

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Agree that the military should and will always be subservient to civilian leadership. However, that doesn't necessarily mean that our highest ranking officers should automatically bend to the will of politicians. For instance, they should be insisting on BRACing superfluous bases regardless of who's district they're in.

I believe they do insist on it, however, for those Congressmen, the benefit of keeping then base around in their district outweighs the benefit of, say, overall adequate military readiness. And that reflects the will of the voters in their district. For all the lip service given to "supporting the troops", there's not a single constituency in the nation that will sacrifice their jobs and associated economic activity for the overall defense of the nation right now.

That's America for you. Love it or leave it, I guess.

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