Washblog || "Our generals are not worthy of their soldiers." Lt. Col. Paul Yingling, Active Duty

"Our generals are not worthy of their soldiers." Lt. Col. Paul Yingling, Active Duty

By Lietta Ruger
Sat Apr 28, 2007 at 10:51:15 AM PST
Section: United States Topic: Military

Lt. Col. Paul Yingling is quoted in an article he wrote published in the Armed Forces Journal yesterday (April 27, 2007 - By days end, every major news media publication internationally is carrying his article, including the Seattle Times).

'Our generals are not worthy of their soldiers'

And while the article he writes has much else to say and so does Washington Post article citing his article -- I couldn't agree more with this one statement from Lt. Col. Paul Yingling. And I thank him for his courage to say it.

I am utterly in astonishment and awe of our young troops who valiantly face deployment after deployment to Iraq in a never ending revolving door that recycles the same uniformed men and women over and over again. Utterly astonished at their amazing courage while (generally speaking) the country that sent them there from citizen to Congress to the 'Civilian' Administration that sent them into war exercises something akin to cowardice, apathy, lack of respect, disregard, callousness, or just flat out an ignorance of the situation at hand.

But let's don't hear from me; please go and read it directly from Lt. Col. Paul Yingling in his article
'A Failure In Generalship' published Friday, April 27, 2007) in Armed Forces Journal.

ARMY LT. COL. PAUL YINGLING is deputy commander, 3rd Armored Calvary Regiment. He has served two tours in Iraq, another in Bosnia and a fourth in Operation Desert Storm. He holds a master's degree in political science from the University of Chicago.

Washington Post gives a review of his article - excerpts;

Army Officer Accuses Generals of "Intellectual and Moral Failures"
By Thomas E. Ricks
The Washington Post
Friday 27 April 2007
An active-duty Army officer is publishing a blistering attack on U.S. generals, saying they have botched the war in Iraq and misled Congress about the situation there.
"America's generals have repeated the mistakes of Vietnam in Iraq," charges Lt. Col. Paul Yingling, an Iraq veteran who is deputy commander of the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment. "The intellectual and moral failures . . . constitute a crisis in American generals."
Yingling's comments are especially striking because his unit's performance in securing the northwestern Iraqi city of Tall Afar was cited by President Bush in a March 2006 speech and provided the model for the new security plan underway in Baghdad.
He also holds a high profile for a lieutenant colonel: He attended the Army's elite School for Advanced Military Studies and has written for one of the Army's top professional journals, Military Review.
The article, "General Failure," is to be published today in Armed Forces Journal and is posted at http://www.armedforcesjournal.com. Its appearance signals the public emergence of a split inside the military between younger, mid-career officers and the top brass.
Many majors and lieutenant colonels have privately expressed anger and frustration with the performance of Gen. Tommy R. Franks, Lt. Gen. Ricardo S. Sanchez, Lt. Gen. Raymond T. Odierno and other top commanders in the war, calling them slow to grasp the realities of the war and overly optimistic in their assessments.
Some younger officers have stated privately that more generals should have been taken to task for their handling of the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison, news of which broke in 2004. The young officers also note that the Army's elaborate "lessons learned" process does not criticize generals and that no generals in Iraq have been replaced for poor battlefield performance, a contrast to other U.S. wars.
Top Army officials are also worried by the number of captains and majors choosing to leave the service. "We do have attrition in those grade slots above our average," acting Army Secretary Pete Geren noted in congressional testimony this week. In order to curtail the number of captains leaving, he said, the Army is planning a $20,000 bonus for those who agree to stay in, plus choices of where to be posted and other incentives.
Until now, charges of incompetent leadership have not been made as publicly by an Army officer as Yingling does in his article.
"After going into Iraq with too few troops and no coherent plan for postwar stabilization, America's general officer corps did not accurately portray the intensity of the insurgency to the American public," he writes. "For reasons that are not yet clear, America's general officer corps underestimated the strength of the enemy, overestimated the capabilities of Iraq's government and security forces and failed to provide Congress with an accurate assessment of security conditions in Iraq."
Yingling said he decided to write the article after attending Purple Heart and deployment ceremonies for Army soldiers. "I find it hard to look them in the eye," he said in an interview. "Our generals are not worthy of their soldiers."