War, What Is It Good For?

A Critical Retrospective on 28 Years of Military Service

Disclaimer - I am a retired member of the Air National Guard. The views herein are my own and not necessarily the opinions of the Departments of the Air Force or Defense.

Being in the military means learning the skills for a job you hope you never have to do.  And, unlike firefighters, paramedics, or police officers, many veterans never do serve in the battlefields to which their training applies.  But we do serve our country in useful ways and get experiences that provide insight about national policies. I retired in early March after 28 years of military service, both on active duty and as a reservist, including stints in in three domestic operations and three overseas operations.  Looking back, I see lessons for us as a country in each operation.

Domestic Operations in 1996, 2006, and 2021.  We must train people to do the jobs we want them to do. Domestically, the National Guard is our country’s 911 force.  However, unlike first responders, the Guard rarely has the training for specialized work.  Instead, we work as a well-organized but temporary labor force, with broadly useful skills in problem solving and managing systems.  I fought wildfires above Oakridge and worked in hospitals during the pandemic.  In each case, we backfilled critical roles, relying on our efficiency and adaptability as a team to manage general systemic tasks, and freeing the specialists to operate in the roles requiring technical and professional expertise.  In contrast, we excel at the missions we train for. I worked as the legal advisor to the commander who had to decide whether to shoot down an airliner if it was hijacked.  While no one should ever have to make that kind of decision, it was clear that we gave those commanders every possible support and everyone there was well-trained for their job. 

Qatar and Kuwait in 2004.  Overseas missions should include the vision of a definite and realistic end state before we send people to fight and die for those missions.  General David Petraeus famously posed his challenge, “Tell me how this ends,” when he was the commander in Iraq.  My job was the less glamorous cat-and-dogs legal work of supporting a large overseas base.  It included everything from prosecuting criminals to figuring out how to avoid being robbed blind by contractors.  For both of us, however, the challenge was seeing how we could complete the mission, not just move it forward.  Eventually, in Iraq, General Petraeus decided that we were going to leave the Iraqis with a government that they wanted and that could generally maintain order, even though it wasn’t particularly friendly to the US.  His vision was practical and doable, if not ideal. Sadly, we still deploy an awful lot of people to the base I helped build in Qatar, a country with a human rights record that leaves a lot to be desired. 

Responding to tent fires in 2004.

Bosnia in 2008.  Peace cannot be achieved without accountability.  By the time I unexpectedly deployed to Bosnia, its civil war had been over for 13 years. My job was largely to help find and prosecute war criminals and come up with plans to close Camp Butmir in Sarajevo.  Of my overseas missions, this one was the only one I never doubted the need to do.  Indeed, I returned twice to help continue anticorruption and human rights work, even after we shut down the base.  While I was there the first time, we captured genocidal ex-President Radovan Karadžić, who stood trial in the Hague.  I often read in the stories about the war in Ukraine that the soldiers who commit crimes against humanity are unlikely ever to stand trial.  I respectfully disagree.  The capture of Karadžić and other major war criminals showed our willingness to prosecute and enabled major forward progress on resolution of the remaining conflicts in Bosnia. 

Teaching human rights in Bosnia on a return trip in 2019.

Afghanistan in 2011.  Only good governance can end an insurgency.  The ultimate failure of the Afghan government comes as no surprise to anyone who worked with it.  I first wrote “Karzai = Diem” about two weeks after arriving in Kabul to work on NATO’s Rule of Law team.   I meant that the corrupt Afghan president did not enjoy the support of his people any more than South Vietnamese President Diem did before his assassination.  Neither Karzai nor Diem took care of their people, as all people expect leaders to do. When people wonder how Palestinians can possibly support Hamas, which most see as a terrorist organization, I remind them that Hamas is not corrupt and it delivers services to the people.  Fatah/the Palestinian Authority does not engage in terrorism as a matter of policy, but it is massively corrupt and does not deliver services for its people.  In retrospect, I certainly could not say that I knew we were going to “lose” in Afghanistan, but I did know the Afghan people would never “win” under the corrupt government then in power. 

Flying on a C-130 in Afghanistan.

My activations and deployments gave me a perspective on world events that I’ll always treasure.  As a country, we tend to forget the harsh lessons of history quickly.  Too many of our young servicemembers die because of it.  We can honor them by remembering the limits of military power and using it sparingly and thoughtfully in the future.

Speaking of Accountability…

https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2023/03/oregon-lawmaker-floats-proposal-to-allow-further-delays-of-states-long-awaited-paid-leave.html

Oregonians deserve to have a functional paid family and medical leave program, which is why I’ve opposed attempts to delay it and advocated for moving to an agency better equipped to deploy it. I once overheard a conversation in which a progressive lobbyist bemoaned voter’s lack of support for Democratic governors.  His conservative compatriot replied, “Oregon used to be a small government, low tax, low services state.  Now it is a big government, high tax, low services state.”  While I don’t 100% agree, we need to improve on our state’s poor history of delivering services to the people efficiently and effectively. 

Poor Planning, Part 2.  https://www.oregonlive.com/environment/2023/03/oregon-to-suspend-electric-vehicle-rebates-as-money-runs-out.html

Everyone will eventually receive their payments.  However, a more sensible approach would be to either allocate or lend more funds to the program so that folks can actually receive their rebates in a timely manner.  On the bright side, it’s good to see EV adoption proceeding so quickly in Oregon.

Welcome!  https://www.opb.org/article/2023/03/13/university-of-oregon-names-john-karl-scholz-president/

Welcome to the new UO President, John Karl Scholtz.  I was glad to read of his early focus on student success and the sciences.

Saying Farewell to the Military. 

Here’s what I said to my colleagues in my retirement speech.

As I was volunteering at Egan Warming Center this morning, I struggled with what to say here in my retirement ceremony.  There’s a guest there, C, who is unhoused and lives out of a shopping cart.  He’s a kind fellow of about my age.  He often helps clean up and lets us know about the other guests – who has mental health issues, who struggles with addiction, and that sort of thing, so that we know how we can help them.  He was taken away to the hospital by ambulance today, suffering from severe hypothermia.  I’m glad we were able to help him, but I thought about how he got where he is today and how I got here today, because that could have been me or maybe he could be here before you today.  Mostly, I’ve gotten here today with help from a lot of you.

First, my parents gave me a loving home.  Then, my teachers gave me a great education.  My JAG family took care of me, including General B, Cols M, A, S, W, A and L, Major S, and retired Cols G and V  I wouldn’t be here without those paralegal NCOs who mentored me through the years – MSgts P and S; SMSgt A; CMSgt A.  I’ve had some great commanders, from Generals Petraeus and Allen in Afghanistan, Generals S, P, C, and G, and so many more.  I wouldn’t be here today without my wife, Major Monique Carroll, and my kids Bella and Griffin.  It is the people in my life who have helped me serve and come before you today, more than anything I have done.

This is the last time I’ll get to talk to you, so I’d like to leave you with something I hope you’ll remember.

Let me take you back to October 25, 1415.  No, I wasn’t there personally, although I think maybe General C was.  That day, English King Henry V was vastly outnumbered by the French army.  He had about 7,000 men, about 5/6 of them were archers most of the remainder dismounted infantry.  He had very little cavalry.  His troops were poorly regarded, little above criminals.  We get the word villain from villein, which was what they were called.  They had no particular reason to love or obey him.  Mostly, they were poor people who farmed a couple of acres, paid a tithe to the noblemen, and learned archery to put meat on the table for their families.  They were up against 25,000 French, 10,000 of them mounted, and many of them French noblemen serving as heavy cavalry.  Some of their horses even had armor.

Henry V had to do something to inspire his men to face what appeared to be insurmountable odds.  But he did not try to overawe them as their king or to compel them to his will.  Instead, he brought them together.  He made it clear that they were his brothers.

As Shakespeare put it in dramatizing his speech, he told them–

“From this day to the ending of the world,

But we in it shall be rememberèd—

We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;

For he to-day that sheds his blood with me

Shall be my brother”

His inspiration and the innovation of inclusion helped them win that day and lay the foundation for us here today.

In my years of service, that ability to come together as a team has let us become so much better than we were.  When I joined, no LGBT folks allowed to serve, and women not allowed in the combat arms.  Our official policies were, in a word, bigoted, and it made us less effective in defending our country.  In 1997, Only 3 people of 150 in my infantry company could meet the qualifications to go off to air assault school.  We’d reached a dead end because of our exclusionary policies.  We were not pushed to do better.

But, as we became more inclusive, as we judged people based on their performance and the content of their character, not their appearance or our stereotypes about them, we became a stronger team.

Today, our band of brothers includes many sisters and others who were excluded in the past.  As we’ve stopped excluding people based on their appearance, we’ve become better able to serve and protect our country.  It’s a small thing, but just today, I saw guidance allowing people with hand and neck tattoos to serve. 

I’m proud to have served with you all.  I’m proud to call you my brothers and sisters in arms.  And though I’m headed off into retirement today, if I can ever help you in the future, give me a call.  I’ll consider it a privilege to help.

Thank you for helping me become the man I am today.