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November 26, 2010America@war [Greyhawk]
I think anyone who's ever pondered the "comment" option - once only available on blogs and bulletin boards, now ubiquitous on almost any web site - will appreciate this:
The so-called faculty of writing is not so much a faculty of writing as it is a faculty of thinking. When a man says, "I have an idea but I can't express it"; that man hasn't an idea but merely a vague feeling. If a man has a feeling of that kind, and will sit down for a half an hour and persistently try to put into writing what he feels, the probabilities are at least 90 percent that he will either be able to record it, or else realize that he has no idea at all. In either case, he will do himself a benefit. That's wisdom from the past, captured for posterity at the US Naval Institute, shared via the web on the institute's 137th anniversary. From their about page:
"The Naval Institute has three core activities," among them, History and Preservation: The Naval Institute also has recently introduced Americans at War, a living history of Americans at war in their own words and from their own experiences. These 90-second vignettes convey powerful stories of inspiration, pride, and patriotism. Take a look at the collection, and you'll see it's not limited to accounts from those who served on ships at sea, members of the other branches are well-represented. I'm fortunate to have met USNI's Mary Ripley, she's responsible for the institute's oral history program (and she's the daughter of the late John Ripley, whose story is told here). She also deserves much credit for their blog. ("We're not the Navy nor any government agency. Blog and comment freely.") We met at a milblog conference - Mary knew (and I would come to realize) that milbloggers are the 21st-century version of exactly what the US Naval Institute is all about. Once that light bulb came on in my head, I mentioned a vague idea for a project to her - milblogs as the 21st century oral history that they are. "Put that in writing," she said (of course - see first paragraph above!) - and here's part of the result. Shortly after the first tent was pitched by the American military in Iraq a wire was connected to a computer therein, and the internet was available to a generation of Americans at war - many of whom had grown up online. From that point on, at any given moment, somewhere in Iraq a Soldier, Sailor, Airman or Marine was at a keyboard sharing the events of his or her day with the folks back home. While most would simply fire off an email, others took advantage of the (then) relatively new online blogging platforms to post their thoughts and experiences for the entire world to see. The milblog was born - and from that moment to this stories detailing everything from the most mundane aspects of camp life to intense combat action (often described within hours of the event) have been available on the web... And et cetera - but since you're reading this on a milblog, you probably knew that. And you know that milblogs aren't just blogs written by troops at war, that many friends, family members, and supporters likewise documented their story of America at war online in near-real time, as those stories developed. The diversity in membership of that group is broad, the one thing we all have in common is the impulse to make sense of the seemingly senseless, and communicate the tale - for each of us that impulse was strong enough to overcome whatever barriers prevent the vast majority of people from doing the same. Everyone at some point has some vague idea they believe should be shared - we were the people who, from some combination of internal and external urging, found and spent those many half hours persistently trying to write it down. But where will all that be in another 137 years? Or five or ten, for that matter. That's something I've asked myself since at least 2004 - when I wrote this:
Membership in the ghost battalion has grown in the years since, and an ever growing majority of those abandoned-but-still-standing sites are vanishing. Have you checked out Lt Smash's site lately? How about Sgt Hook's? If you're a long-time milblog reader you know the first widely-read milblog from Operation Iraq Freedom and the first widely-read milblog from Afghanistan are both gone from the web. If you're a relative newcomer to this world you may never even have heard of them - or the dozens upon dozens of others who carried forth the standard they set down. If you have a vague notion that something should be done about that, (a notion I've heard expressed more than once...) then you and I and the good folks at the US Naval Institute are in agreement. Preserving the history documented by the milbloggers is just one of the goals of the milblog project, the once-vague idea that we're now making real. And it's a big idea, if I say so myself - too big to explain in one simple blog post, so stand by for more. Likewise, it's too big a task to be accomplished by just one person. So if you're a milblogger (and exactly what is a milblogger? is a topic for much further discussion on its own) I'm asking for your help. All I'll really need is just a little bit (maybe just one or two of those half hours...) of your time, and your willingness to tell the tale. We've already made history, it's time to save it. (More to follow...) Posted 4:02 PM | Permalink |
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The Mudville Gazette is the on-line voice of an American warrior and his wife who stands by him. They prefer to see peaceful change render force of arms unnecessary. Until that day they stand fast with those who struggle for freedom, strike for reason, and pray for a better tomorrow.
 
 
 Furthermore, I will occasionally use satire or parody herein. The bottom line: it's my house. I like having visitors to my house. I hope you are entertained. I fight for your right to free speech, and am thrilled when you exercise said rights here. Comments and e-mails are welcome, but all such communication is to be assumed to be 1)the original work of any who initiate said communication and 2)the property of the Mudville Gazette, with free use granted thereto for publication in electronic or written form. If you do NOT wish to have your message posted, write "CONFIDENTIAL" in the subject line of your email. Original content copyright © 2003 - 2011 by Greyhawk. Fair, not-for-profit use of said material by others is encouraged, as long as acknowledgement and credit is given, to include the url of the original source post. Other arrangements can be made as needed. Contact: greyhawk at mudvillegazette dot com  Tending Distant Far from hearth and home, watching What tales we'll tell When things grim Some distant sunset, vision fading Saluting fallen friends whose names - Greyhawk, Baghdad, December 2004 |
It took years to undo the damage the man did, and much is yet to be done.
Didn't McPeak start the whole "Quality"/TQM thing in the Air Force? I spent so much time at "off sites" on "tiger teams" in those days I never got anything done.
I'm not kidding, there was a 12-step process to improve every damn thing we did. The slow-down was unreal.
I posted a bit on this topic at my blog, as well as a link to a TNR piece, the gist of which is former Generals should stay out of politics. This would be bad for the GOP because so many in the military -- and so many officers -- reflect their party affiliation. But I think Generals should stay apolitical, for the most part. Clinton asked at least one General officer what his party affiliation was (from the TNR article) and I'd rather Generals are promoted on their ability to kiss ass rather than their voting record. Hmm... maybe that's how we got Clark...
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No problem with retired Generals being political. In fact, I wish McPeak had retired and turned political much sooner than he did.
Total loser. Father of quality, airline style uniforms and many other idiotic ideas. First and only Chief of Staff USAF to have his successor publicly state that his first job was to undo what his predecessor had done.
I'll never forget sitting through one of his idiot quality courses on consensus building. As an example, I asked the instructor at what point in time I should build consensus in my squad after receiving orders to take an objective. Response: this stuff is only for peacetime. YGBSM!
The Air Force of today is still recovering from McPeak's tenure as Chief of Staff (COS). By a fluke, McPeak (the ACC Commander)was appointed COS after Mike Dugan (a great leader) was forced to retire after some appropriate yet not politically correct comments.
Here are some McPeakizms for you to digest:
As COS a Fighter Jet was parked and ready for him to fly around DC in at any time.
McPeak literally pulled the chair out from under the CINC PACAF and had it flown by military transport jet to DC for his office in the Pentagon. He happened to have grown fond of that chair when he was CINC PACAF.
McPeak hated Air Force regulations so now regulations are instructions that are broad in nature and lacking in specifics. Most of these have or are being rewritten to put some teeth back in the process.
McPeak once stated "it would make me happy if every command position in the Air Force was filled by a fighter pilot". This made the airlift, tanker and bomber drivers extremely happy and many left the service early after McPeak was annointed COS.
I recall a copy of the quote placed on a bulletin board in the airlift command post with McPeak's picture next to it and as airlift pilots walked by they would stick pins in the picture. It was hard to see McPeak's face after a couple of days.
Curtis LeMay, Jack Catton, Bennie Davis, and a host of other former Air Force Generals are waitin at the pearly gates for McPeak to arrive so they can kick his butt down under for what he did to their Air Force. The demise of SAC, MAC and TAC.
Thunderhead wrote:
Didn't McPeak start the whole "Quality"/TQM thing in the Air Force? I spent so much time at "off sites" on "tiger teams" in those days I never got anything done.
I'm not kidding, there was a 12-step process to improve every damn thing we did. The slow-down was unreal.
---
TQM invaded the government during the Clinton years. I don't know who invented it, but there's a special place in hell for him/her.
We may never fully recover from all the extra paperwork; methinks it would take a libertarian administration for three straight terms to get rid of that mess.
I remember complaining about "bathroom inequities" in our building many years ago (three stalls, two urinals, three sinks in each men's room; two stalls, two sinks in each women's room). What should have taken twenty minutes (to check the building plans as well as the employee male/female ratio) to make a decision took one process action team, two tiger teams, an agency-wide survey, and one testbed; all of which took more than three years, and the women's rooms still have long lines during peak periods.
May he/she burn in hell for eternity.
McPeak - Ughhh.... I should send him a bill for all the uniform changes I made - take off all my stripes / nametags and put on aircrew style nameplates (ASNP). Take off ASNP and put it on 1/2 inch higher. Put on stripes w/ ASNP. And don't get me started on class A's.
While standing in line at the USAFA clothing sales store, got in a conversation with a retired L/C who served on McPeaks staff... Said on McPeak's last day, the entire staff stood in the hallway to watch him leave - and they all had on thier old class A's... Sure would like to know if that is true...
McPeak - Ughhh.... I should send him a bill for all the uniform changes I made - take off all my stripes / nametags and put on aircrew style nameplates (ASNP). Take off ASNP and put it on 1/2 inch higher. Put on stripes w/ ASNP. And don't get me started on class A's.
While standing in line at the USAFA clothing sales store, got in a conversation with a retired L/C who served on McPeaks staff... Said on McPeak's last day, the entire staff stood in the hallway to watch him leave - and they all had on thier old class A's... Sure would like to know if that is true...
Oh, I remember McPeak. In 1992, while tens of thousands of us were seeing our military careers come to an end due to the drawdown, he was busy redesigning the officer's dress uniform to look like airline pilots. Great set of priorities, General.
When I saw that he had endorsed Kerry, I just laughed. What an asshat!
Out-freaking-standing! Finally, that petulant gasbag is getting some of the right attention he so richly deserves. The most disliked CSAF in my 26 yrs in USAF (his CMSAF was an ineffectual lapdog,) one is hard-pressed to find anyone who served during his tenure who doesn't remember him as a jerk.
His classic bit about hating our old service dress uniform as "just an Army uniform dyed blue" all came during the post-Gulf War turmoil, the drawdowns, Clinton's gays in the military, etc. This guy's priorities always began and ended with himself.
Too bad that when American voters see McPeak's Kerry ads, they'll just assume the guy is some beloved old general. They might also forget that McPeak, along with Mikey Moore, endorsed Wes Clark in the primaries.
I'd be interested to know who retired Gen Ron Fogelman, McPeak's successor, is backing this election. If it's Bush, nothing would please USAF vets more than for the two of these guys to go at it!
I made a mistake about who McPeak endorsed -- apparently it was Dean, not Clark. Why I can't separate the two in my mind, I just don't know...
I made a trip with SecAF Donald Rice, a first-class individual. He was absolutely no BS. A friend of mine at the Pentagon told me a story which rang true knowing Rice. At a meeting, McPeak said something daft. Rice looked at him and said, "General, shut the **** up and just worry about your new uniforms."
I've been collecting info on Tony over at my site, as well. Haven't seen a single good comment, and his name has been the top search topic referral two months running.
During that TQ era I had the pleasure of hearing the first Chief Master Sergeant of the Air Force(by then retired) Paul Airey speak on that "TQ" topic. He was not a fan, and he was not shy.
Another Air Force guy I heard a couple years back was General John Jumper - now COSAF. His quote, addressing a crowd while still ACC CC:
"We used to have a quality Air Force - but it was destroyed by a program called 'Quality Air Force'. What we need is a chew-ass Air Force."
Two of a kind.
I saw McPeak on the PBS Newshour after some instructor pilots and cadets had died in McPeak's airplanes he had bought for the Air Force Academy. They had been using single-engine Cessnas for years with no deaths and on a good budget, and cadets were showing up ready for pilot training, so the good general had to change that program fast! Anyway, he actually had the gall to say that the deaths had happened because they put transport pilots (he may have said C-141 pilots, which is what my husband was flying at the time) in the instructor slots instead of fighter pilots!!!!! We later met a guy whose best friend/best man at his wedding was one of the former C-141 pilots who died in that plane. What a prick.
I do think that one Franks absolutely trumps one McPeak!
I think you are all being a little hard on General McPeak. The McPeak years weren't all bad. With my new uniform, most airport concessionaires would automatically give me the airline pilot's discount. And I wasn't even a pilot.
TQM in the Air Force was started by CINC MAC while McPeak was CINC PACAF. MAC really had a viable program and things were getting done in a positive climate. Then when McPreak became COS he embraced TQM as his own idea for the Air Force. TQM only works when leaders buy into the process from the top down. Now you can see why the Air Force was never successful at implementation. McPeak used it to validate his strange plans for the Air Force and never really used TQM as Demming ment it to be.
Gary "P" (for prick) tagged along with McPeak for at least four tours I know of and the enlisted force knew that "P" would know when McPeak was going to fart long before the general did. His nose was permanently affixed to McPeak's asshole. I can recall at least two DUIs for Gary that went unreported and were covered up by McPeak. Hey there might have been more I was only at Hickam for four years with this pair.
TQM in the Air Force was started by CINC MAC while McPeak was CINC PACAF. MAC really had a viable program and things were getting done in a positive climate. Then when McPreak became COS he embraced TQM as his own idea for the Air Force. TQM only works when leaders buy into the process from the top down. Now you can see why the Air Force was never successful at implementation. McPeak used it to validate his strange plans for the Air Force and never really used TQM as Demming ment it to be.
Gary "P" (for prick) tagged along with McPeak for at least four tours I know of and the enlisted force knew that "P" would know when McPeak was going to fart long before the general did. His nose was permanently affixed to McPeak's asshole. I can recall at least two DUIs for Gary that went unreported and were covered up by McPeak. Hey there might have been more I was only at Hickam for four years with this pair.