SFTT, Moral Courage!

[Guest guest]

Moral Courage is the First Commandment

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

BY DAVID H. HACKWORTH

Napoleon was right on target when he said, " In war the moral is to

the

material as three to one. "

Since Desert Storm, I've watched our Armed Forces go steadily

downhill. Yet

for 10 years, not one general or admiral has had the moral courage

to sound

off to the citizens of the republic about what's been going on.

Nor has one (and that includes Air Force Gen. Fogleman, who

quit not

over principles but for very personal, private reasons) stood before

Congress and told the truth: It's not lack of funds that's busting

the

forces, but wrongheaded, ever-expanding missions like Bosnia and

Kosovo;

misguided, politically correct social engineering; and the constant

lowering of training, discipline and leadership standards --

mistakes that

our warriors will pay for in blood on a future battlefield.

Has the moral courage from stand-up guys like Hale,

and been blown completely out of our military and

America?

Have these giants of moral resolve been replaced by people who don't

care

how they trample on values and principles, just as long as they get

to the

head of the line?

Even though the two-fisted straight-shooters seldom make it to the

top

anymore, I prefer to think moral courage in America is down but not

out.

It's true the slickies who put self and bottom-line first seem to be

running America from the White House to Congress to virtually every

big

business in the land. Less those few, brave, family-owned concerns

that

haven't yet exchanged their values for fast-lane stock options.

I naively thought this sickness just prevailed in our military but

gradually changed my mind because of the responses to a book I

wrote. Over

the years, I've received thousands of letters from folks in every

walk of

life in this country saying: What you described in " About Face " as

the

sickness that destroyed our military and caused us to lose in

Vietnam is

rampant across the board in the United States.

These letters bear witness that the same cancer that struck our

Vietnam-era

military now infects almost every American entity -- from Wall

Street to

education, from medicine to the media, from the police and fire

departments

to the unions, etc., etc., etc.

But these letters also convinced me that there are more than a few

good men

and women out there who aren't afraid to " Stand up and be counted "

-- once

a standard Army officer fitness-report rating question in the

pre-Vietnam

era, when speaking out was encouraged -- and fight for right over

wrong.

Take Air Force Maj. Sonny Bates. He recently single-handedly took on

the

Pentagon over anthrax. It was roll up your sleeves and take the

needle or

go to jail. When the Air Force leaned on him, he chose to take a

general

court-martial -- which in the military is about the same as spitting

in the

judge's face and expecting a fair trial. Married with three kids and

only

seven years from retirement, Bates had a lot to lose. Yet he fought

for

what he thought was right and steered through the anthrax flak as

smoothly

as he's flown his airplane during his brilliant career. And the

good news

is the brass backed down.

Another moral hero is Army sergeant Gloer. After serving in

Korea

since 1994, he decided to retire. Petty people in his chain of

command

bumped back his paperwork, saying " no way. " For absolutely no

reason, just

an uncaring bureaucracy doing its thing. After 20 years of

exceptional

service, 13 of those in a South Korea on perpetual war-footing, a

few jerks

arbitrarily told him to get lost. He pulled all plugs -- the media,

Congress -- and even took his case to the Army chief of staff. He

fought

for what was right, and like Sonny Bates, he won. So Gloer's

retiring from

the Army with a smile and a positive thought: " All that rule are not

evil. "

Moral leadership should be the top plank in the presidential

elections.

It's more important than Social Security or campaign reform. Without

the

right moral stuff, America is going to join Napoleon's France --

which

swapped the moral for the material and ended up at the bottom of the

heap.

***

Http://www.hackworth.com is the address of Hackworth's home

page.

Sign in for the free weekly Defending America column at his Web

site. Send

mail to P.O. Box 5210, Greenwich, CT 06831.

c 2000 H. Hackworth

Distributed by King Features Syndicate Inc.

Hack

Http://www.hackworth.com is the address of Hackworth's home

page.

Sign in for the free weekly Defending America column at his Web

site. Send

mail to P.O. Box 5210, Greenwich, CT 06831.