I worked for Hugh Clausen in the Pentagon, and then, of course, when he became The Judge Advocate General, we all worked for him. He was a lay-back, easy going guy, but when you are that smart, you can act any way you want.
My previous boss in the Pentagon, Brigadier General Tenhet, had been all business and when you were called into his office you knew it was time to get busy. There was no doubt that a sensitive issue needed to be addressed (most tasks did not require a visit to his office). I probably never had a meeting with him that lasted much over three minutes. “Come in, sit down.” Then he would lay out the facts and the legal issue and what he needed us to do. Then he would say, “Any questions?” And, out I would go.
When General Tenhet announced his retirement, I went over to his office to wish him good luck. He said, “Come in, sit down.” I said, “Sir, this is more of a social visit.” He paused, and then said, “Oh, would you like a cup of coffee?”
General Tenhet’s direct approach did not prepare me for General Clausen. The first time General Clausen tasked me on an important issue, he wandered into my office, put his feet on my desk and started telling me about having a conversation with his old buddy, the Director of the Army Staff. He said that something had been mentioned and that if I had a chance, I might want to check into it. The bad news was that I had been tasked by my boss and because of his casual manner in telling me, I had missed it! Needless to say, the matter was not handled as it should have been and I just barely survived. But, like with my earlier writing on “Whoa, Fool me Once,” I never made that mistake again. We could be having drinks at the club or playing golf, but if he said I might want to look into something, I was all over it.
After General Clausen retired from the Army, Clemson University hired him to be the Vice President for Administration and Executive Secretary to the Board of Trustees. They hired him, even though he told them he was a grad from the University of Alabama and didn’t care much for tigers.
Well, after they had been at Clemson for a number of years, the University cared so much for Hugh and Betty that they gave them a 50th wedding anniversary party. While Carole and I could not attend, we sent the following poem.
The Anniversary
Listen to the noise, hear all the cheers,
Betty and Hugh together for, yes, 50 years.
A day long remembered, a day of blue skies,
Full of fond memories, shining in their eyes.
So many memories of early days in green,
Traveling round the world, so much to be seen.
Hugh in the Army, of building his career,
Betty with the family, skinned knees and wiping tears.
Hugh rose through the ranks, destined to be a star,
But he still had time for golf, chasing after par.
As the T(ee)JAG, he ran the show, in charge of all but a few,
Betty remained her wonderful self, in charge of only Hugh.
With adieu to the Army and a new life unfurled,
Say hello to Clemson and the academic world.
He helped pick his boss and she picked out the flooring,
For a beautiful house on Hermitage Mooring.
He looks like a Tiger with the orange jacket he sports,
but, if you dig deeper, you’ll find roll-Tide red shorts.
The special day has arrived and friends gather near,
With love in their hearts for two people so dear.
Not everyone can be there, but all understand,
Their thoughts are with them across the land.
So with glasses raised high, we hope you can hear,
Here’s a toast to you both for each and every year.
Category Archives: My Military Daze
Big Daddy’s Seventy-Fifth
In all professions, there are those who become legends. Major General Lawrence H. Williams, Big Daddy, was a legend in the JAG Corps and the Pentagon. Even as a Lieutenant Colonel, many things in the Pentagon only happened after Big Daddy’s approval. His temper was also well known. There were times when his temper got the best of him. Many times it was justified, once in a while, it was not.
I wrote this poem for his seventy-fifth birthday. There was a luncheon given by many of the officers who served under him. General Williams died a year later and his wife, Margaret, asked me to read the poem at the funeral reception.
This is one of my favorite poems in that I felt I captured a lot about this unique man in just a few lines. He had little sayings (always with a purpose), like, “if you saw the wood in front of you, it will warm you twice. First, when you cut it, and then, when you burn it. He also said, “Never wrestle with a pig because you will get dirty and the pig will enjoy it.”
When I was in the Pentagon working in the Administrative Law Division, all of the Army regulations were kept in three-ring binders (now everything is on line). Rather than take the whole binder, officers would just pull out the regulation they needed. Sometimes they got lost. One day, General Williams was looking for a regulation and it was missing. He let it be known that anyone removing a regulation from the binder would be fired. That got our attention.
He was a combat aviator during World War II flying missions in North Africa, Italy and France. On D-Day, he flew a glider loaded with troops inland from Normandy.
After his retirement, when someone would ask how he was doing, he would say, “quite well, thank you.” Then, after a pause, he would smile and say, “all things considered.”
Big Daddy’s Seventy-Fifth
Three quarters of a century, seventy-five years,
We’re gathered together to shout out our cheers.
He’s climbed to the top and the journey is done,
He’s enjoying the view in the warmth of the sun.
A man of all seasons, an adviser, a leader,
When placed under pressure, he never would teeter.
His accomplishments many, and quotes with a zig,
Like “sawing the wood” and “never wrestling with a pig.”
He could roar like a lion, and get wound up tightly,
He was mission oriented, and didn’t suffer fools lightly.
But, he admired the young JAG, the day-to-day grinder,
But whoa be the one who lifts the Reg from the binder.
Who flew a glider a half century ago?
Who excels at table tennis, I’ll bet you don’t know.
Who spent years in the Pentagon, most people would go batty,
You’re right, you guessed it, it’s our own Big Daddy.
So it’s Happy Birthday on the seventy-fifth year,
With Margaret at your side, she’s such a dear.
You’ve had a great life, a life not frittered,
And you’re doing quite well, thank you, all things considered.
It’s a German Thing
When I joined the Army, the JAG career management officer asked me where I would like to be assigned. I told him Fort Carson, Colorado. He said, “that’s in the Southwest, so put that down as your first choice.” I put down Southwest and they gave me my first choice by sending me to Fort Hood, Texas. Fort Hood was located right between Dallas and Houston (178 miles from each).
So, when it was time for my next assignment and I requested to go to the language school in Monterey, California to study German and then be assigned to Germany, you can imagine how surprised I was when it happened. My next door neighbor at Monterey (Fort Ord) was also studying German. They shipped him to Italy. Now, that’s more like it. He was an intelligence officer, and when we visited him in Italy, he was wearing Transportation Corps insignia. But that’s another story.
I was assigned to the 4th Armored Division with its headquarters located in Goeppingen (not too far from Stuttgart). Cooke Barracks had been a German flugplatz (airfield) during WW II. Goering was fond of the Goeppingen flugplatz and gave rousing speeches from the balcony of the officer’s club. I must interject that I am not an historian, but I heard the same story from so many drunks at the O’Club bar that there must be some truth in it.
All buildings in Germany are built to last forever and the quarters we were assigned to live in were no different. The building was substantial, consisting of three stories, with four apartments on each floor. You entered the building through one of the two massive stairwells. This is referred to as “stairwell living.”
Shortly after we moved in, one of our neighbors came down to explain to me that he was the senior officer of the building [SOB], and that he collected money each month to pay the putzfrau who cleaned the stairwells. Nobody wanted to be the SOB. He was also responsible for anything that went wrong in the building. But, it didn’t occur to this captain to ask me for my date of rank. So, for eight months, I dutifully paid him a small number of Deutchmarks for the putzfrau. His six-year-old son explained to me one day in the parking lot, that his dad was in charge of all of us. I just smiled. One day the SOB showed up in my office and said, “Rice, what’s your date of rank?” I told him and he said he would have the money box and the ledger to me within the hour. Rank has its privileges, but also its responsibilities. I became the SOB.
During a very bitter winter, the family right above us moved out. The apartment was due to be painted, so the German painters arrived with their paint and their beer and proceeded to give the apartment a new coat. When they finished, they left all of the windows open so the windows wouldn’t seal. After two days, we could no longer keep our apartment warm. I decided to go over to the post engineers, borrow the key to that apartment and close the windows.
Cooke Barracks was a very small installation and the post engineer was a second lieutenant. I entered the office and there were three German civilians in the front office. I explained that I was Captain Rice, the Senior Officer of the Building and that the painters had left the windows open and I needed a key to get in to the apartment and close the windows. They explained that only the lieutenant could give out a key and that he was in Stuttgart. I explained that my apartment was cold and I needed the key. One of the ladies got up and went into another room to brief her supervisor. She came back out and told me that the lieutenant would be back in two days and I should return at that time.
The friendly approach doesn’t always work with the Germans. It isn’t fair to stereotype, but on a number of occasions, I felt that my pleasant, friendly approach was being viewed as a sign of weakness. I then explained to them that as soon as they found a military officer senior to me to tell me that I couldn’t have the key, I would leave, but not before. The same woman got up and went in the back. Shortly, she and another German came out of the back. He ask me to explain the problem. After I explained, he said to all present, “Oh, he only wants to borrow the key. That is no problem.” The problem was the unnecessary elevation of my blood pressure.
On another occasion, a fellow officer flew me to Nuernberg and was supposed to pick me up at the end of the day. But the weather turned bad and I had to take the train back to Goeppingen. I took one train from Nuernberg to Stuttgart and then had to transfer. I knew the track number and was heading toward it when a train conductor asked where I was going. I told him Goeppingen and he directed me to a different track and told me to hurry. When I got to the track, I asked about Goeppingen and another conductor told me to get on.
By now, you have figured out that the train wasn’t going to stop in Goeppingen. Ordinarily, it would stop, but this day was a German holiday and it wasn’t even going to slow down or toot its horn. We were on our way to Augsburg in Bavaria. The good news was that I wasn’t the only one who had been misinformed. A young 16 year-old German was coming back from a skiing trip and he also had been directed to this train. We were told to get off in Augsburg and to find the conductor in the red hat. He would send us back to Goeppingen at no cost. I was pleased that the young lad was along, because he was fluent and could better explain our plight.
We got off in Augsburg and found the man in the red hat. My young friend was explaining our situation. The longer the conversation went on, the clearer it became that we had a superior/subordinate situation. Mr. Red Hat was in a position of authority and my spokesperson was probably a high school student. It was going down hill. Finally, I understood Red Hat to say, “All the children in Deutchland know that the snell train doesn’t stop in Goeppingen on holidays.” I immediately said, “Ich bin kein Kind aus Deutchland” (I am no child from Germany). He was startled. It was the first time that he realized that I understood what he had been saying. He looked at me in my Army green uniform and new major’s hat (scrambled eggs outranks red) and, after a pause, he only said one word. “Come.”
Well, we got our free trip back to Goeppingen and my young friend was probably thankful that I was along.
Some years later when I was at the Department of Transportation, I was invited over to the White House for a briefing on universal health care. The speaker was addressing all the countries with universal health care and explaining the different problems with each system. When he got to Germany, all he said was, “The German system works pretty well as long as all the participants are German.” Jawohl!
SOLO in Dallas
You can’t imagine how wonderful I feel when I see our Nation honoring member of our Armed Forces. Regardless of how individuals feel about Iraq, no one is taking it out on our fine soldiers. It wasn’t that way during the Vietnam War.
I never understood it, but during Vietnam, people despised us because we wore the uniform of our country. The war and the uniform were indistinguishable. We didn’t make policy, we just honored the oath we took to serve our country. It may have been worse for JAG officers. The military appeals court was extremely liberal (and goofy) and we had to advise commanders, in certain cases, that prosecution was not a good idea, because we couldn’t get a conviction or the conviction would not survive on appeal.
When the commanders were called upon during the Vietnam War to explain why discipline was so poor, many of them blamed JAGs and the non supportive military legal system. There were a lot of better reasons, but that was the world I found in the summer of 1971 when I departed Vietnam and started my next assignment as an instructor at the JAG School in Charlottesville, Virginia.
The JAG generals in the Pentagon had explained to Colonel John Jay Douglass, the School’s Commandant, that the JAG Corps had a crises in credibility. Colonel Douglass was tasked to come up with materials to explain to the Army the military legal system and how they could make it work for them. Drastic times call for drastic measures. Somewhere around forty graduate students who arrived in August found their school year pushed off into late October so that they could assist in preparing the necessary materials to address the crises in credibility.
By the time the World Wide JAG Conference met in Charlottesville in October, we had prepared “The Legal Guide for Commanders” and a number of other pamphlets including a Soldiers Guide. The materials were a big success and The Legal Guide for Commanders is still a best seller. These materials (along with the end of the war) made the crises in credibility disappear.
Another carefully conceived plan was to set up a special course for senior officers to educate them on the military legal system and to teach them just like we teach our JAG students. The course, which would be three days long, was called the Senior Officers Legal Orientation (SOLO) Course. The original course was limited to colonels and we packed the course with thirty from all over the country. It was an instant success.
It was taught by four senior JAG officers. Lieutenant Colonel Hugh Overholt and Major Dick Boller taught the criminal law side and Lieutenant David Fontanella and I taught the administrative law side. We were all career officers and could relate to our “student.” One of the colonel students was a post commander and had some labor issues he wanted to discuss. Neither Dave nor I had any expertise in labor law. So, we brought in an extremely bright captain named Barney Adams to answer the questions. His answers were impeccable. As an impartial observer and a student of teaching technique, I thought Barney was brilliant. But when the critiques came in, we all did well, except Barney. Most all said that the captain had a bushy mustache and needed a haircut! Barney’s mustache and hair were within Army Regulations, but it really didn’t matter. They were definitely too long and bushy for our “students.” The lesson was it really doesn’t matter how good you are if your audience can’t stand how you look. That was Barney’s last SOLO (Barney did go on to become a successful law professor at Case Western Reserve School of Law – no hair cut requirements).
We gave a SOLO every other month and after about three, we had commanders calling in and asking us to bring the SOLO to their installation. So we took SOLO on the road. We took it to Fort Lewis, Washington, Fort Hood, Texas and Fort Sill, Oklahoma. By then, we realized that SOLO didn’t work as well in the field. First, it was too close to the flag pole. Students kept receiving messages regarding problems with their unit or office and they would get up and disappear for a while. The bigger problem, however, was that at Fort Sill, for example, every officer would agree with whatever the Fort Sill Commanding General had to say. There could be no free exchange of ideas. That may be a good career move, but it wasn’t what we were trying to accomplish.
It sure is taking me a long time to get to Dallas. As you might expect, it was a side trip off of our Fort Hood SOLO class. When we finished the classes, we could spend the night at Fort Hood and then take a puddle jumper to Dallas and fly home, or take a rental car to Big D for the night and fly out early. We took the second option.
By the time of the Fort Hood SOLO, Fran Gilligan had replaced Dick Boller on the team. Upon arrival in Dallas, the two colonels went off to find some cultural event and Fran and I started looking for some fun. We ended up going to a place called the Dog Patch. All of the bar maids were dressed like Daisy Mae from the comic strip, Lil’ Abner. They were walking around barefoot. This place would never survive an OSHA inspection. Anyway, we had a good time and shut the place down about 1:00 AM. Everything seemed shut down. We finally ended up at a place called the Playgirl Club next to Love Field.
We walked in and there was all kinds of noise. We couldn’t see anything because of a big tarp hanging by the door. Some sweet young thing collected our cover charge which entitled us to two free drinks and live entertainment. We paid and walked in. The place was empty! The bartender was showing a loud raucous movie on the other side of the tarp. We laughed at how we had been snookered. When we ordered our drinks, we asked about the live entertainment. She said, “Coming right up,” and disappeared into the back of the bar. Fran and I are now convinced that she went into the back and woke up the dancer.
The waitress came back with our drinks. The bartender shut off the movie and flipped a switch illuminating a stage right in from of us (we had the best seats in the house!). Then, some scantily dressed gal came wandering out of the back. She climbed up on the stage and posed herself on a piano bench that was covered by an artificial leopard skin rug. As the music started, she raised her arm into the air, then there was a crash and she disappeared! Both Fran and I looked to see if the bartender had seen what happened. He was nowhere. Fran and I stared at each other. We were pretty sure she had fallen off the back of the stage, but we were in a strange town, in a strange bar at two in the morning. Regardless, we felt compelled to help her. If we were being set up, so be it. As the song continued, we climbed up on the stage and peered into the abyss behind the stage. We couldn’t see her. Finally, we asked if she was OK. She said, “I thank so.” We asked if she could get up. She said, “I thank so.” Then we saw her climbing back on the stage. She smiled. We smiled. We went back to our seats and she finished her dance. The song was over. Overall, she probably danced for less than thirty seconds. Then, she wandered toward the back of the bar. We decided that we had had enough excitement for one night and got out of there.
The next day, the colonels asked if we had had a good time in Big D. We said, “We thank so.”
I checked with the JAG School and 36 years later, SOLO is still going strong. The School gives the course five times a y
ear and it is now four and a half days in length. Each class had 50 students and it is a mandatory class for all brigade and separate battalion commanders. It has sold the rest of the Army on the JAG Corps. Is that a success story? I thank so!
Why D’you Do It?
Life can be something like your golf game. Just when you think it is all coming together, it implodes. In 1982, I was a colonel getting ready for the best year of my life. I was just starting in as a student at the Army War College. We had been assigned great quarters and life was good.
It was the first week of school and I checked my school mail box right before heading home. There was a phone slip telling me to call Mr. White at the Criminal Investigation Detachment (CID). It was after 1700 hours (5:00 PM), so I decided to call him the next day.
Shortly after I got home the door bell rang. It was the officer from the CID and he had with him a special agent from the Secret Service. They showed me their credentials and said we needed to talk. I took them into the dining room where we all sat down. I was really confused, but I had handled any number of criminal matters in my career and perhaps this had to do with some prior matter. Suddenly the Secret Service agent said, “OK, why d’you do it?” Now, I was not only confused, but really shook up. Having been an Army Lawyer for 20 years, I knew that they were screwing up whatever they were trying to do. But I didn’t think that this was the time for me to go into my “Miranda 101” tutorial. I guess if someone really felt guilty about something, he might just blurt it out (even if it is not what the agents are investigating). But, I was clueless and really wanted to know what they suspected me of doing.
So I told them that I was completely confused and asked what was it that I had supposedly done. The agent said, “Why did you threaten the President’s life?” I was still totally confused, but I knew I had never threatened the President’s life. I told them so. Little by little, I found out the facts. They had received an anonymous phone call from a public phone at the Kansas City International Airport that I had threatened the President’s life. It supposedly happened at my last assignment’s going-away party in Manhattan, Kansas. That had been a few weeks back. That was all they knew. No identification on the caller, no facts as to what I had said.
Knowing what the charge was gave me some relief. At that time I was pretty well satisfied that they would conclude I hadn’t done it. I gave them a written statement (still no Miranda warning), and a list of people who attended the party that they could contact. My wife, who was at the party, also talked with them. Even though I knew they would decided the complaint was unfounded, I still felt terrible. I had become aware that someone at Fort Riley, my last assignment, disliked me so much that he would make such a vicious phone call. I spent the next couple of days trying to remember who I could have upset at Fort Riley. Such activity is not a good idea and I don’t recommend it.
The other reason I felt terrible was with my military legal background, I knew that what had happened would constitute “criminal information” that would stay somewhere buried in my file. Even if the investigation concluded, as I’m sure they would, that there wasn’t a shred of truth to the accusation, it still stays in my file. The rationale for this is if someone, for example, is accused of peeking in windows, but it is decided it can’t be proved, it would be nice to have that “criminal information” when the individual is picked up a second or third time. If the first unfounded complaint gets thrown away, then the second complaint becomes the first. I requested that if the agents concluded that it was a crank call, they would be doing me a great favor if they could keep the complaint from going into my file (nice try). I never heard from them again. The Army War College year turned out to be as great as advertised.
Fast forward ten years. I’m retired from the Army and working as the Chief Counsel, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). Nancy Miller, at the White House, interviewed me for the position and we stayed in contact during my time at NHTSA. In 1992, she invited me to join her for breakfast in the White House Mess. I had been through the White House check-in process three or four times without a hitch, but this time it wasn’t working. After about 15 minutes, some security personnel in fatigue uniforms showed up and “casually” stood around. Finally Nancy came out to see why I was so late. I told her I couldn’t seem to get through security.
Nancy disappeared for about five minutes and than came back and I was permitted to enter. We had an enjoyable breakfast. She told me that the bogus complaint was still there. She assured me that I wouldn’t have any more problems. And, I haven’t. Of course, I haven’t been back to the White House.
Oh Yes, The Old Class Q Allotment
I don’t remember his name. All I know is he was the oldest looking PFC I had ever seen. And, of course, he was talking to me because he was in trouble. The Army wanted to kick him out. Sometimes the Army can really screw over a person and this was a classic case.
The thing that was most impressive about my PFC was that he was wearing the Combat Infantry Badge with two stars. That meant he had seen combat in three wars, World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War. I don’t know how it is today, but you didn’t see many CIB’s with two stars back then. These guys were really special.
About that same time, there was a chief warrant officer in the JAG Office with a CIB. He was telling me about the conversation he had with a first lieutenant who was proudly displaying his Expert Infantryman Badge ( EIB ). He was explaining to the chief all of the tests he had to successfully complete to be awarded the EIB. The lieutenant then asked the chief what he had to do to be entitled to wear the CIB. The chief said, “All I had to do was stay alive.”
The Army was determine to get rid of my PFC. He had prepared false official documents. Many years back, he had married a woman, who unbeknownst to him, was already married. They had lived in government quarters on post and when he was shipped overseas, she received an allotment called a Class Q Allotment. This allotment was mandatory. The Army wanted to insure that wives were supported while the soldiers were overseas. Later, she left him telling him that she was going back to her “real” husband. So our PFC went to the JAG Office and asked a young military lawyer whether he was, in fact, married. The young lawyer advised him that if his wife was already married, then their marriage was illegal and he was a free man.
Well, he had been dating this sweet young thing and since he was a free man, they got married. This second marriage was legal, but Army Records still showed him married to the first woman. In fact, she was still receiving the Class Q Allotment (the devil is in the paperwork). His inquiries led him to a military clerk who explained that the only way he could stop the allotment was to show the Army a divorce decree.
So everything rocked along until our soldier received overseas orders and he wanted to make out an allotment for his present wife. The allotment clerk advised him that he could only have allotments to relatives and that he should list his present wife as his cousin, since he already had an allotment going to his first “wife.” So, he did just that.
When he returned to the states, the Army would not assign him to military quarters to live with his “cousin.” She got fed up and left and he went after her. That AWOL cost him some stripes and then when he tried to explain, they decided he had “falsified” allotment documents and to process him out of the Army.
I was a young captain, but I felt certain that we could explain away any supposed misdeeds. I was in the process of obtaining his first wife’s first marriage certificate (to prove she was a bigamist, and that it wasn’t my guy’s fault), when he decided to disappear.
This would have been a great story if I could have saved his career and gotten everything squared away, but it just wasn’t to be. The only good news is that when he went AWOL for the last time, the Army probably stopped the bogus Class Q Allotment.
Soldiers with Prior Criminal Records
It shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone that the Army is having a difficult time meeting their recruitment quotas. That happens when there is an enemy out there trying to do us harm. In order to meet the need for new recruits, the Army is granting more waivers to young men and women who have criminal records. In 2003 and 2004, only four to five percent had waivers. Now the number has climbed to over 11%.
This has some of the media hollering that the sky is falling. They have trotted out experts who have said that people with criminal records are more likely to get in trouble in the Army, than people with no criminal records. Duh! How do I get a job as an expert? I could make profound statements like that.
Ordinarily, the “do-gooder” media would be supporting the proposition of giving a person a second chance. But that is not the case if the opposite view will put the military in a bad light. Well folks, don’t worry about the military. Our military services are in the best position to take a troubled youth and square him or her away. We have a lot of practice. Since before we were born, judges in large and small communities have been telling young people in trouble, “either join the Army or go to jail.” The Army unknowingly accepts these youths and in many cases, the Army is the best thing that ever happened to them. They just need a lot of supervision and discipline, which is not in short supply in the U. S. Army.
A friend I went to law school with had just such an experience and at the request of a local judge, spent three years in the Marine Corps. He gave the Marine Corps credit for turning his life around. After he got out, he finished undergraduate school and law school and became a well-respected lawyer and community leader in Springfield, Missouri.
Accepting as soldiers these individuals who committed crimes when they were young and immature is, for the Army, a piece of cake. We were really challenged back in the 1960’s. Secretary McNamara came up with the idea of Project 100,000. These were recruits who were mentally challenged. To enlist in the Army, you need a minimum score of 31 out of 100 on the Armed Forces Qualification Test. Some of McNamara’s 100,000 had scores as low at ten. Now these characters were a challenge. Of course, the Vietnam War was in full tilt and these unfortunate individuals helped fill the ranks. All of the Project 100,000 soldiers had special service numbers, so it was easy to identify them.
I was in Germany from 1966 to 1969. For part of that period, I was a 4th Armored Division defense counsel. I got to know some of Secretary McNamara’s boys. One, whose name was Jake, got in trouble about every other week. He should have kept me on a retainer. I kept getting him out of trouble, but I wasn’t sure that was to his benefit. A separation from the Army would have been better. First, Jake got drunk and started a fight in a local gasthaus. It was a tough place and there was plenty of blame to spread around. Later, Jake beat up a German taxi driver. Jake claimed the driver pulled a weapon on him (probably because Jake refused to pay for the ride). I won’t elaborate on the many times he missed formations and was disrespectful to officers and NCO’s.
The last time I saw Jake was when he came by to thank me and tell me he was on orders to Vietnam. His arm was in a sling. I had to ask. He said, “Oh that, it happened when I flipped the jeep. I stopped right there.
I read that one of McNamara’s 100,000 (in reality, there were over 300,000) was awarded three Silver Stars for heroism in Vietnam. He didn’t want the third one because it was the same color as the other two. He said he would rather have the Army Commendation Medal, because it had a green ribbon. The Army Commendation Medal, known as the “Green Weenie,” was no where near as much of an honor as the Silver Star.
So, Mr. and Mrs. John Q. Public, don’t worry about the Army. We will do just fine with those soldiers with prior criminal records. In fact, the Army will send them back to their local towns and cities much better citizens than when they got them.
Telephone Colonel
Making a military phone call in Germany in the late Sixties was maddening. I was stationed in Goeppingen, which is 30 miles East of Stuttgart and about a hundred miles South of Nuernberg. I was assigned to the 4th Armored Division and our troops had relocated around Nuernberg and Bamberg. So every call to the field was a real adventure.
First, I would dial O to get a Goeppingen operator (all were military or German civilians working for the US military). I would say, “Hello Goeppingen, give me Stuttgart.” Then, if I were lucky enough to get a Stuttgart operator, I would say, “Stuttgart, give me Nuernberg.” Each connection seemed to drain the energy out of the line. If I actually got a Nuernberg operator, the voice would be distant and low. I would be shouting, “Nuernberg, give me Bamberg (or Erlangen or Ansbach). The funny thing about Ansbach is that it is only 50 miles up the road, but you had to run through 250 miles of telephone wire to call them. I can remember telling my wife as I left for work, I have to call Bamberg this morning.” It was that big a deal.
Sometimes, everything would click like magic. I would give the Bamberg operator the number and the next thing I would hear was a busy signal. Then, I would try to compose myself and start over. “Hello Goeppingen, give me Stuttgart.” Whenever anyone in the office was making one of these calls, everyone knew it. Shouting to be heard on the other end was business as usual. Screaming when the call went dead was also quite common.
Our Deputy Staff Judge Advocate was Major Joe Donahue. After I had been in the office for about six months, Joe was promoted to lieutenant colonel. Both colonels and lieutenant colonels referred to themselves on the phone as colonels. So, the former Major Donahue was now a telephone colonel. Pretty heady stuff.
On the particular day in question, one of our legal clerks was talking to a battalion legal clerk in Bamberg. When a battalion completed a special courts-martial, they had to assemble the record of trial and send it to us for review. The trial had been completed for over two months and we were still waiting for the record of trial. Our clerk was very loud, as required, and very annoyed. Joe Donahue heard the commotion and asked our legal clerk what was wrong. After he found out about the late record of trial, he took the phone. He said, “This is Colonel Donahue, let me speak to your Adjutant.” The battalion adjutant ran all the administrative duties such as processing record of trial. When the lieutenant got on the phone, Colonel Donahue told him that he wanted the record of trial at Headquarters (Goeppingen) the next day and hung up. The crowd that had gathered, including me, was really impressed at how Joe had got things done.
Of course, things didn’t get done and it is great when you can learn tough lessons without being the subject of the lesson. The Adjutant went to his battalion commander to report that he needed to send a vehicle the next day to Headquarters to deliver a record of trial. The battalion commander was mad and reported to his brigade commander, who was also upset that someone at Headquarters was jerking them around. The brigade commander called the 4th Armored Division’s Chief of Staff (both full colonels) and asked, “Who the hell is Colonel Donahue?”
Joe had to go explain to the Chief of Staff what he had done. I suspect Joe spent most of his time listening. I learned that promotions are great, but you need to be cautious, because there is always someone out there senior to you. Also, I had been chewed out on the phone any number of times by senior officers. Sometimes, I deserved it, and sometimes, I didn’t. But, I could usually tell when the officer on the other end was playing for the crowd in his office. I resented that and made a decision. Whenever I had to call a subordinate on a difficult subject, I made sure that no one else was in my office.
The good news is that the little blip didn’t keep Joe from having a fine career, and I became a real student of human nature.
Yes, Five Sides and Very Large
Four years was the longest I ever stayed in one place during my military career. It was the Pentagon. The first challenge is to figure out how to get to your office (and back out of the building). Then, little by little you learn how to get to other places. Most who have worked there will be glad to explain how to navigate the building.
The Pentagon has ten corridors and five rings. It is generally agreed that the first thing you do is go to the center most ring (A Ring) and circle around until you find the numbered corridor you want. The corridors are like spokes on a bicycle wheel. They connect the A Ring with the B, C, D, and E Ring. The outer most E Ring actually has windows that look out on the world.
Being a JAG officer, I was assigned to the Office of The Judge Advocate General of the Army (Administrative Law Division). The Admin Law Division acts as legal adviser to the Army Staff. My first week on the job, my boss came into my office. He handed me a single sheet of paper which I was certain was one of our Ad Law interpretations. He directed me to read it. This is one of my worst scenarios. I read ever so slowly and if I hurry, I read poorly. Having someone wait for me to finish reading puts me in a panic mode! I read quickly, but didn’t understand. I had to say something. So, I said, “This is really something.” He smiled and said, “We do this kind of exciting work every day.” After he left my office, I read the interpretation two or three more times. It still didn’t make any sense to me.
My office had a door. My room was carved out of a much larger bullpen and was smaller than the cell space required for Federal inmates. The problem with partitioning off rooms like mine was that it had no ventilation and the light switch was in another room. I could be working away and all of a sudden the room would go pitch black. When, after three years, I turned over my little office to my successor, I presented him with my flashlight.
I was a major for my first year and a half. The problem with that is that the typical worker bee in the Pentagon is a lieutenant colonel. So, every day I would be dealing with senior officers who were directing me to review their request next. Every requester claimed to be handling the most important issue in the Army. They would tell me, “This has to be on the Chief of Staff’s desk this morning,” or “They are voting this matter in the Tank this afternoon.” I didn’t even know where the Tank was. To be completely honest, I didn’t know we had a Tank. One Lt. Col. told me that his issue had general officer interest (I assumed that every matter in the Pentagon had general officer interest).
The good news was that I had great support from my bosses. I would tell the demanding Lt. Col. (very courteously) that if his matter really had to be handled next, he should go back to his office and have his Executive Officer call the JAG Executive Officer about the importance of the matter. By the time our Exec had notified my boss, we would be grinding away on the project. In my four years, Colonel Bob Clarke, our Exec, never got a call.
As the Chief of the (Admin Law) General Law Branch, my office was the repository for all the crazy letters that came to the Army. The Chief of Staff’s Office would send all crazy letters to the JAG. The JAG would send them to Admin Law. Admin Law had three branches, Legislation Branch, Personnel Law Branch and General Law Branch. So, I got them. Some of these people were getting messages from other planets through the tin foil on their TV rabbit ears. Sounded like an Air Force issue to me. We didn’t answer many of these letters. We had one major general who became unhappy with the Army leadership. So, he resigned (it would have been less crazy to retire at full pension, but he resigned). We would hear from him every time his name appeared in print stating that he was a retired major general. He was convinced that stating that he was retired was part of an Army conspiracy and it would make him crazy (that’s just a figure of speech, he was already crazy).
During my fourth year in the building, I became the Chief of the Administrative Law Division. I actually had a window looking out at Arlington Cemetery and the heliport. Many years after I left the Pentagon, this office was destroyed on 9/11.
The Judge Advocate General was Major General Wilton Persons. Also, he was the only other officer who had been the Chief of the Admin Law Division as a Lieutenant Colonel (it’s a full colonel’s slot). He gave me some great advice. He said, “Jack, 95% of the stuff that comes across your desk is not important. But, we have to be right on that other 5%. So, don’t sign anything you don’t understand.” And, I didn’t. If I was confused, I had a number of smart attorneys to help me out.
For the first 13 years of my military career, whenever the Army came up with a really dumb policy, I blamed it on the Department of the Army. After working at the Department of the Army, I came to realize that the really dumb stuff came from DOD.
Wow – It’s All Becoming Clear
I hired my first secretary at Fort Riley, Kansas. The trick to surviving and succeeding is gathering good people around you. I think having the right secretary is a big deal.
When I arrived at Fort Riley, I inherited a sweet elderly lady, who had been an institution at the JAG Office. She wanted to retire, but was kind enough not to walk out the door as I was walking in. After a comfortable period of time, she let me know that she was retiring and we started the process to select her replacement.
I don’t understand the process. Don’t have to. Eventually, some admin office on post sends over a bunch of personnel files for us to review. These files have already been reviewed by someone and it has been determined that the individuals whose files were forwarded are “qualified for the job.”
One of the good people in the office was my Admin Officer, Mr. Frank Maloney, a young warrant officer. Mr Maloney and I selected three or four of the applicants to interview. A couple had been on post for a number of years and had excellent reputations, so I was fairly confident I would end up with a really good secretary.
Another woman, who was working over at the Army Reserve Headquarters, had excellent evaluations, but had changed jobs about five times in the last six years. Frank and I were concerned about that, because we were looking for stability. What we were doing was a time consuming drill and we didn’t want to be doing it again in a year.
The first couple of interviews went very well. Frank seemed to know the right questions to keep everything on track and I was feeling fairly comfortable with the process. Then, the young lady from the Army Reserve Headquarters showed up (thankfully, I don’t remember her name, but I will never forget the interview). She was a very attractive young woman wearing a see-through blouse and a lace bra! Mr. Maloney and I struggled through the interview. Have you ever tried to make eye contact throughout an entire 30 minute interview?
We asked her about changing jobs so often, and she explained that she also had been going to school. Her class schedule sometimes would interfere with her work schedule causing her to change jobs. She assured me that schooling and scheduling were no longer a problem and that she would be a devoted secretary. Egad!
I used to refer to the prettiest secretary in the office as the “Queen Bee”, because there was always a lot of activity buzzing around her desk. The males in the office could always come up with some bogus reason to be there. If we had hired this gal, I think the JAG Office would have become the most popular building on post. We might have had to set up a “take-a-number” system.
After she departed, Frank and I just stared at each other. Finally, I said, “Frank, if I hire her, I think the next 90 days will be the most exciting in my military career. I also think they will be my last 90 days.” We agreed that another applicant was better qualified and put the matter behind us.
Two weeks later, I dropped by the Officers’ Club for Friday night Happy Hour. There she was, sitting at the bar, wearing a bright red tube top. She was looking right at me and pouting. I walked over to her trying to look sad or sorry or something. Frankly, I was trying to look appropriate for a person who had not hired her. She finally spoke. She said, “It was Mr. Maloney, wasn’t it?” What could I say? I said, “Yes, it was Mr. Maloney.”
After a few minutes, I finally got around to telling her that she raised issues by dressing the way she had. Always the teacher, I explained that she should probably dress a little more conservatively when she is interviewing. I should have saved my breath. She knew exactly what she was doing and if I didn’t appreciate the way she dressed, it was best that we both knew it up front. I realized that one of the purposes of the interview process was to inform and she believed in full disclosure.