BUILDING THE 21st CENTURY MILITARY, YOU’RE DOING IT WRONG: We’ve all seen the Photoshop of the WWII soldier fresh off Omaha Beach or Iwo Jima next to footiepajamas ObamaCare ManBoy; but alas, the latter image sounds like it’s a goal, not a warning for John M. McHugh, then-Secretary of the Army:
This, by the way, is the last Secretary of the Army’s priority list for 2014:
- Prevent Sexual Assault
- Balance and Transition the Army
- Champion Soldiers, Civilians and Families
- Bolster Army activities in the Asia-Pacific region
- Ensure personal accountability on and off the battlefield
- Tell the Army Story
- Implement Army Total Force policy
- Prudently manage reset, modernization, research and development
- Strengthen information assurance and cyber security
- Develop effective energy solutions
Anything there about getting ready to win wars? Er, no.
2015’s priority list is essentially the same. As Mark Steyn wrote a decade ago at the start of “It’s the Demography Stupid,” the dry run for his book America Alone:
Americans sometimes don’t understand how far gone most of the rest of the developed world is down this path: In the Canadian and most Continental cabinets, the defense ministry is somewhere an ambitious politician passes through on his way up to important jobs like the health department. I don’t think Don Rumsfeld would regard it as a promotion if he were moved to Health and Human Services.
Betcha the Secretary of the Army in the Obama administration would.