Submitted by: Terry Payne
BIG NEWS - CHAIN OF COMMAND IN THE US - role of the JCS
Thought at least a few of you might be interested in some comments about the US military chain of command. For the original sender, I have added a thought or two and tried to clarify a few sentences. Maybe you want to re-read.
This Gen. Milley story, if it proves true and as portrayed by the upcoming Woodward book, seems to me a very alarming event, likely illegal if not worse. With a Democratic President, House and Senate led by Biden, Pelosi and Schumer, it seems likely there will be no effort whatsoever to follow up, pursue the facts and prosecute any illegalities or at least fire people. In fact, excuses and cover up already are underway led by a press seemingly making excuses and without any grasp of the law or chain of command..
If proven, perhaps it will wake up some voters who, in elections next year, can seek to restore some questioning, accountability as well as some check on the Congress and President. Had this happened, as alleged in the Woodward book, under President Biden, my guess is the Biden group and whoever is writing the script and shutting of his mic when he appears to be about to wander off script, would have fired Milley in a picosecond, and probably court martialed him as well.
Perhaps it is overblown or thus far we only have one interpretation of what happened and what was done. So far, it seems the Pelosi appeal to Milley did happen and his contacts with the Chinese did happen. The claim is he set Pelosi straight and his contacts with the Chinese were neither unusual or untoward. There is much more to learn.
In response to a note from a friend on the supposed actions of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Milley, I sent the following note largely concerning the military chain of command. In my view, the point is civilian control by elected officials making decisions about the military and its use on behalf of the people, rather than placing the power in the hands unelected military officials or bureaucrats. This was also the point of not having a king or dictator, but forming a government to carry out the will of the people and accountable through elections as well as checks and balances among the several branches of government.
Hi xxxx
IF the report on Milley’s actions are true, mostly true or unexplained by some new facts like actions taken at the direction of the President, then …..? Did Milley violate the law or commit a crime? Did he freelance military or foreign policy. If so, will anybody be held accountable? Will anybody lose their job?
Just out of curiosity, do you know specifically where the CJCS, Gen. Milley and the other service chiefs fit in the chain of command with respect to giving or passing along operational orders or carrying them out?
If not, then you may not fully understand my concern, if the Woodward book claims are true and turn out to be proven. The Joint Chiefs don’t fit anywhere in the operational chain of command nor do they set policy or originate Foreign Relations positions.
Gen. Milley and the Joint Chiefs have absolutely NO role in issuing or executing orders to the military to act in any theater or take and action. Their only role is an advisory one. They also have no role in implementing Foreign Policy, also a power reserved to the executive.
As is abundantly clear in the Constitution, the Commander in Chief (CinC) is the President an elected executive. His advisors are the National Security Council and any others whose advice he chooses to seek.
The National Security Council was established during Harry Truman’s Presidency in the 1947 National Security Act and is part of the Executive Office of the President. It is the principle advisor to the President and coordinates the President’s policies among the various government agencies.
The authority to order ANY use of the military flows from the President. He is the decision maker. His orders to take or withhold military action flow through the Secretary of Defense to the 11 joint operational combatant commanders. They are Africa, Central, Cyber, European, Indo-Pacific, Northern, Southern, Space, Special Operations, Strategic and Transportation Commands. These are the warfighters.
Note, no service “chiefs” nor their chairman are anywhere on that list nor do any orders flow through them.
If one of the operational commanders disobeyed orders or moonlighted on his own, it would be a failure to obey orders, a UCMJ violation or a mutiny.
If somebody tried to usurp power and control from outside the chain of command, that would, in my humble opinion despite not being a lawyer, be treason and an attempt to overthrow the government of the United States in a coup.
The CJCS is an advisor representing the advice of the other joint chiefs who are also advisors. Thy are also planners and paper shufflers. Their role, by law codified by the Goldwater/Nichols act in 1986, is advisory with NO role in commanding troops or operations. They are supposed to ensure personnel readiness, policy, planning and training of their respective services for the combatant commanders to utilize. It is up to them to plan for, obtain budgets for and provide resources from any branch to any of the joint commanders when requested. Those operational commands are “Joint” because they can and usually do have relevant and cooperating units from all brances integrated into a warfighting force. The Operational Commands work for the President through the Secretary of Defense, not the Pentagon.
The Joint Chiefs and Chairman have no role whatsoever in when, where or how the operational commanders are directed or how they perform military missions other than their advice which the President may seek. They work on current and future budget proposals to Congress in support of the needs of the operational commanders, future weapons needs, and obtaining Congressional funding for personnel, hardware and maintenance needs.
The joint operational commanders are the ones who request resources, deploy them IAW the orders of the President and utilize them. It is not up to the Joint Chiefs in the Pentagon to decide what they should have or how they should use the resources. It is up to them to have planned for, budgeted for, and gotten the resources built and trained so they can be provided when, as and if the operational commands need and request them.
IF Milley tried to insert himself into command of operations, saying no orders should be carried out without his approval, that is a military coup. It is particularly outrageous because he is not an operational commander. He has no troops, planes, ships or missiles at his disposal. He would be usurping not only the power of the President but also control of the joint operational commands over which he has no authority or control.
Evidently Nancy Pelosi was trying to get him to deny the CinC the specific role mentioned first in the Constitution under duties and responsibilities of the President, that being the Commander in Chief of the armed forces. The Constitution says he MAY require the opinion principal officers of Executive Departments. (Article 2, Section 2, Clause 1). It does not say he is commander in chief unless or until Gen. Milley decides to overrule him, or Nancy Pelosi decides he is wrong. It certainly doesn’t say he serves at the pleasure of or is subordinate to the whims of the Speaker of the House.
If Pelosi really thought Pres. Trump had gone wildly insane and was about to precipitate a nuclear war, she has a remedy. It is the 25th amendment to the Constitution. But that requires the VP and Cabinet to conclude there is some actual, real, not political reason to remove the President. It is not up to her, in collaboration with the CJCS to make that judgment or take unordered action.
Somebody has a lot of “splainin’” to do.
It would be a very different story if the President had asked the Secretary of Defense to ask Milley (why him and not the Sec. Def. or one of the operational commanders) to call China and tell them all was well. In fact, the President was hardly shy about personally calling and engaging with any leaders, including Xi in China.
So far, I see no claim that Trump was even aware the CJCS, colluding with the Speaker of the House, was making policy or communicating with any current or potential adversaries on any subject. There is certainly no evidence he asked Milley to do anything nor does it seem likely.
If this were some diplomatic initiative or assurance flowing from the Chief Executive, that would have flowed through the Secretary of State, again an Executive Branch officer and like his Military chain of command has nothing to do with the Pentagon, Gen. Milley or the Speaker of the House in so far as implementing the policy of the President. .
Thus far, I see no evidence the Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, knew anything about the end run contacts with China or Milley trying to insert himself into foreign policy or the military chain of command.
It is true that the timing of the Woodward book, his revealing this explosive accusation immediately before publishing and his history all suggest he has his inflammatory and sometimes questionable factual challenges.
This is the same Gen. Milley who was wanting to understand “white rage” and assuring the military was properly “woke” and who apologized for being seen with Trump, walking over to historic St. John’s Church in Lafayette Square when a mob had tried to burn in down and Trump walked over from the White House to see the damage and offer his support. The rioters were BLM types burning and looting following the George Floyd death in custody of police in Minneapolis. Those were armed and dangerous mobs, burning and looting, which the 6 Jan Capitol Hill invaders were not. They were a mob trespassing where they shouldn’t have been. They weren’t armed, set no fires, weren’t looters and nobody was killed except an unarmed woman trespasser.
It has, for many years, been my opinion (with which many certainly disagree) that the denizens of the Pentagon have become far too political, pandering to politicians and power centers in industry, devoted to promotion and retention, playing for future board positions with major Government contractors, and far from warfighters who are what the service should be all about. A very large number of “warfighters” were dismissed from senior ranks and positions during the Obama years, in my opinion to the major disadvantage of our fighting capability and spirit. The job of the military is to deter enemies, and if called upon to fight and win as quickly, lethally and definitively as possible against enemies, not be social experimentation venues or quasi political nation builders or police forces in foreign lands or made targets in protracted, rope-a dope wars.
Too many Pentagon leaders are all too willing to go with the flow, play for political approval and “atta boys” and unwilling to express contrary views, opinions or advice. What good is advice if it is only to go with the flow and endorse whatever others are saying, rather than to present alternative views and interpretation or present new facts for consideration. Diverse views or challenging ideas are unwelcome in a highly politicized environment.
Often it is the contrarian voice which has it right in matters in which an absolute cannot be proven and a consensus of opinion is viewed as the probable correct view or interpretation.
An example might be the long held thought Osama bin Laden was holed up in some remote cave or even dead. In fact, he was alive, well, communicating in undetected ways and plotting farther attacks and terror. Few analysts took the contrary view, but they were right. There he was in Abbottabad, in a large fortress only miles from the Pakistani military academy and likely well known to the Pakistani ISI. But all our Over the Horizon means such as electronic intercepts, banking and financial tracking, satellite and drone surveillance, spies, social media, our leadership didn’t know where he was or what he was doing. He even managed to pull off a lethal attack on the CIA which thought they had a Jordanian doctor who could eventuall lead them to bin Laden, but turned out to be a loyal Salafist jihadist who carried out a bombing at Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost Province in Afghanistan near the Paki border.
That “follow the herd” and agree with the boss, never argue, and “conventional wisdom” or “we never saw that before” practice has the potential to lead to future surprises, unforeseen attacks on our US interest, and lack of preparation for future, new and different threats.
Our history is littered with preparations for the last war, assumptions which prove wrong, misunderstanding of the motivations and intent of others and wishes that bad things wouldn’t happen despite the evidence.
The list is long, but to mention just a few surprises, Pearl Harbor, the North invasion of S. Korea, the Soviet missiles installed in Cuba, the TET offensive in Vietnam, the overthrow of the Shah of Iran and the following hostage crisis when our embassy was overrun, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, the first and second (9-11) attacks on the World Trade Center, and now the supposed surprise at the collapse of the Afghan government and army when we withdrew our intelligence and air support.
Evidently Sgt. Schultz was in charge. “I see nothing. I hear nothing. I say nothing. I know nothing. NOTHING!”
Cheers
Chuck Capt. USNR-Ret
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