Lt. Colonel Allen B. West For President
When tolerance becomes a one way street it certainly leads to cultural suicide. We are on that street. Liberals cannot be trusted to defend our Republic, because their sympathies obviously lie with their perceived victim, Major Nidal Malik Hasan.
I make no apologies for these words, and anyone angered by them, please, go to Ft Hood and look into the eyes of the real victims. The tragedy at Ft Hood Texas did not have to happen. Consider now the feelings of those there and on every military installation in the world. Consider the feelings of the Warriors deployed into combat zones who now are concerned that their loved ones at home are in a combat zone.
Ft Hood suffered an Islamic jihadist attack, stop the denial, and realize a simple point.
The reality of your enemy must become your own.
More here. A must read.
I like Col. West a lot. This is the same Col. West who got drummed out of the military because he interrogated an Iraqi (while in combat) by threating to shoot him (he did not shoot the guy)? That was deemed a mock execution (too bad these JAGS were not focused on what was happening at Abu Graib, but I digress).
Joe – yes, that’s the one and, no, he didn’t shoot the guy, but I think the little coward (the terrorist) wet himself. Colonel West is a true hero and patriot. He also ran for Congress and, unfortunately, lost. I hope he runs again. He’s got guts and he loves his country. He also “looks” very Presidential.
Someone who is not afraid to speak truth even if someone might like him less? That would be a refreshing change in the White House.
Shall we start a “Draft Col. West” website?
;o)
At least one of our military officers can still identify an enemy when he sees it. So why is he retired?
Colonel West was forced to retire by his gutless, PC superiors. I just discovered he does, in fact, intend to run again for Congress in 2010. Pray for his victory.
Wikipedia has an entry about him. Quite an interesting man.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allen_West_(former_U.S._military_officer)
This is the first I have heard of him and he seems great.
It seems though that based on some intense discussions here in the not too distant past, the story mentioned by Joe and Davy in the first comments should fun afoul of some folks qualms about torture (though not mine).
I even got Andrew Sullivan to admit back when Abu Graib was blowing up that what Col. West did on the battlefield was not torture. I wish I saved his email response.
There is a huge difference between staging a mock execution to a detainee in formal custody and grabbing an insurgent you just captured minutes earlier on the battlefield, holding a gun to his head and asking him where the other insurgents are (so as not to get American’s killed). Col West did not beat the Iraqi, and he certainly did not shoot him, as Davy said at best the guy wet himself (and he did in fact disclose the enemy position).
Actually I may still have that email.
This man means what he says and backs it all up with incredible leadership. I suggest you check out his web site: http://www.allenwestforcongress.com and see some of his videos and listen to his radio interviews. Should be Speaker of the House by 2012.
One side note on Sully. He went off the rails with his attacks and bizzare conspiracy theories on Sarah and Trig Palin, but I agree with him on the ban on torture and coercive force. He was right on that. I do not think we should use such techniques on detainees in formal custody.
That said, on the actual battlefield every benefit of doubt has to go to our soldiers. They need to be kept safe. They need to protect themselves. I recognize some events have to be investigated. But remember how Hadditha turned out (first a war crime then as the facts came out each Marine was aquitted). How about that apology to the aquitted Marines from Ex-Marine John Murtha? All I hear are crickets.
Joe,
You said:
“This is the same Col. West who got drummed out of the military because he interrogated an Iraqi (while in combat) by threating to shoot him (he did not shoot the guy)? That was deemed a mock execution (too bad these JAGS were not focused on what was happening at Abu Graib, but I digress).”
You didn’t digress, you spewed a metric butt-load of ignorant stupidity. When I was with the War Crimes Investigation Team we were co-located with 3rd MP Group CID (Forward), the Army CID unit that participated in the investigation. The abuses at Abu Ghraid were being investigated prior to December 03, several months before the story broke nationally and were amply aided by competent judge advocates. Judge Advocates were doing their Job in both cases while you enjoyed your safety in the comfort of your climate controlled home/office.
If you don’t know what you are talking about then you should just shut up.
Joel, I knew you were military, but I didn’t know that.
Do you think the Army’s handling of it was proper? By some standards [not mine] it was a slap on the wrist—a reprimand, a $5000 fine, and it appears he was forced into “voluntary” retirement in pleading guilty and accepting this “non-judicial” punishment. He did get full retirement benefits, but just short of his 20 years, where the real dough kicks in.
However, it was clearly a discipline; the Army didn’t bury the incident. Was justice done?
And of course there’s the larger question—by his account, lives were indeed saved by his “harsh” interrogation. Do we ban these things, render punishment, yet in our more thoughtful and less public moments, say that breaking the law [in this case, violating the Uniform Code of Military Justice] is still sometimes the right thing to do?
And that enforcing the UCMJ regardless of good intentions and/or good results is also the right thing to do?
I thought the case of Col. Allan B. West was far more meaningful in the gray area of “harsh” interrogation than the abstract “ticking bomb” scenarios that occupied the national discussion. This was a ticking bomb scenario writ into the real world. That Col. West was a sympathetic defendant—with apparently real results—might have had something to do with the media largely ignoring his case, and certainly opinionators.
I reckon you might be limited in what you can say while you’re still in active service, Joel, but I’m damned interested in your thoughts, whatever you’re able to say.
West should have been given a medal and a promotion. Hopefully, he’ll end up Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. That would be such sweet poetic justice.
Based on what I know, the LtCol West Case was handled appropriately. While I personally believe he did what he believed was necessary and had justification for those beliefs It is also clear that we, the military, are not permitted to use such methods.
He took the actions he felt were necessary to save the lives of his men. He knew the price and took the steps anyway knowing the consequences. He paid that price. That is the definition of a hero. Thankfully the price did not include a dismissal.
I find interesting the strong opions expressed on this subject by people who have never spent a day of their life in uniform.
Joel, I served in the Marines (the reserves during peacetime granted but I did wear a uniform for more than a day). I also have lots of friends or kids of friends who served or are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. There is a degree of discretion that prosecutors (even JAGS under the UCMJ) have in pushing an investigation into a prosecution. I am sorry, but that did not happen in Col. West’s case. If anything he was scapegoated because of Abu Ghraib.
And Joel, while I appreciate your service, I do not want to see good officers drummed out of the military. If my son chooses to serve, I want my son serving under the direction of an officer like Col. West. Sorry. I want to see these young men and women come home safely and with the mission accomplished. And while I am opposed to torutre and coercive force against detainees, the battlefield is sufficiently dangerous place to warrant a very high level of benefit of doubt.
I appreciate your input. It is valuable. However your service, while worthy of great respect, does not give you the right to shut the conversation down for the rest of us.
And Joel, while there were many JAGS who undoubtably did their jobs with distincition (and I am sorry for offending you personally because I am sure you were one of them)–how was justice served in Col. West’s case?
Joe,
First of all, judge advocates have absolutely NO prosecutorial discretion. We can provide input and suggest courses of action but at the end of the day we are just advisors. The convening authority (commander) makes the decision wether to pursue charges or drop the matter.
Secondly, while I appreciate what LtCol West did and why, and respect the hard call he made, the simple fact is that the military cannot condone the abuse of foreign police (or anyone for that matter). You can’t just discharge a firearm by someone’s head and expect no ramifications. You might be surprised to find out that LtCol West himself appears to have understood this. That is why he turned himself in. The Army simply could not turn a blind eye to what he did, or praise it because that would inevitably inspire someone to push the boundaries under more questionable circumstances. Again, LtCol West appears to have understood this when he made the decision he made. He knew there was a price to be paid and he was willing to pay that price for his men. I think that makes him even more heroic. Nevertheless, lets not forget that he was allowed to retire at his current rank with full benefits. Things could have been a lot worse for him.
I am sorry If my initial reaction was too strong. I am simply tired of people attributing all sorts of ill motives and incompetence to judge advocates. It has been my experience that some of the best attorneys I have ever known have been judge advocates. When you realize that these people could be making a lot more money in the civilian world but remain in the military to serve their country they deserve more than the shoddy treatment they get from the uniformed.
Thx for the reply, Joel. What is right and what is legal are not synonymous, and sometimes even in conflict.
“Colonel West was forced to retire by his gutless, PC superiors.”
Davy, do the circumstances surrounding his forced retired have to do with his–patriotism? If so, that would be good information to bring to light.
Oh, and you can bet I’ll be praying for him. Imagine, we now need divine intervention to restore patriotic leadership.
How did we come to this?
After reading Joel’s comments, I would have to admit that my characterization of his superiors was over the top, though I still believe he did the right thing. But why should doing the right thing–especially in this situation–result in his forced retirement and a fine?
Let’s play “what if.” What if he had not resorted to firing the pistol and men under his command had died? The terrorist would not have had to suffer ringing ears and wet underwear, but we’d have more dead soldiers, widows, and fatherless children. Logic would dictate, based on the military’s actions, that that would have been the proper course of action. That’s ludicrous.
His actions were justified. He was right. He saved lives. Despite Joel’s opinion, justice was NOT served.
It is worse than ludicrous, it is immoral.
Let’s face facts here, Col. West would never ever have faced this under circumstances in any prior wars. Certainly not in WWII, and dare I say not Korea, Vietnam, or any of the actions since then (all post the changes to the Geneva Conventions). This was done because of the backlash of Abu Gharib. And while I think far more careers should have ended over the Abu Ghraib scandal, to do this to Col. West under these circumstances was wrong. Justice was definitely not served.
I recognize there need to be rules. I supported John McCain on that. But there is always discretion allowed in when to enforce them and proper discretion was not exercised here. It was only because conservatives started to scream that the results were not even worse for Col. West.
There was a time, and not so long ago, when ‘having guts’ was as distinctive a trait in our military as is the uniform.
Craziness, too, rolls downhill. If the highest ranks don’t have a firm grasp of reality, our national defense is doomed and, subsequently, so are we.
Davy,
You asked if justice was done in LtCol West’s case. I was not assigned to his case or participated in it on any level so all I can offer is my opinion based on what I have read about the case and what I know from my own experience.
To begin with, coercive interrogation techniques such as discharging a loaded firearm right beside someone’s head is strictly prohibited by a whole laundry list of orders and regulations , not to mention the Geneva Conventions. Consequently, such actions, right up front are prohibited. Furthermore, they should be. Unless you are willing to say that our service members or law enforcement, as a general rule, should be subjected to the same treatment in similar circumstances then you have to recognize there is something wrong with such actions. Potentially blowing someone’s eardrums out may not be something we want to endorse.
Although, as I stated before, I believe LtCol West probably had a defensible reason for the actions he took that doesn’t mean that what he did was legal. Furthermore, if the Army was to excuse or endorse such actions with no ramifications for such illegal conduct what sort of example does that set? Where does the military draw the line on illegal and prohibited conduct that it will tolerate? Where do we draw the line on detainee mistreatment? What does the Army do when another commander, looking to LtCol West’s example, pushes the envelope in even more questionable circumstances to get information? You see where this can lead, right?
I am glad that LtCol West was able to retire at his current rank. I am glad that he retained all his retirement benefits. I believe that was just. I wish him success with his political career. However, there had to be some ramifications for what he did for the reasons I noted above. I may have wanted to see the case handled a bit differently. Nevertheless, a poor example would have been set and a dangerous message sent had absolutely nothing happened to LtCol West or, as some have suggested, he be decorated or promoted for what he did.
Just because someone did the right thing doesn’t mean there isn’t, or shouldn’t, be a price to pay.
I don’t think anybody’s wrong here, and that’s what makes for a good and honest discussion. No villains, no black vs. white.
I’ll weigh in for Joel, because I think he provides the most clarity here, and as Prager says, clarity is more important than agreement.
I hate word games and semantics, because they are unconcerned with truth. That’s sophistry. But legal is not same as right or good, or even just, not the same as honorable or heroic.
Joel’s only saying that what Col. West did was illegal, and he even turned himself in because he knew that.
And he took his punishment for breaking the law.
Does this make him a hero? I think Joel said that it did.
Dunno about Joel, but I’d vote for Col. West in a heartbeat to become a legislator, even if I agree justice was done in the Iraq affair. Law is law, and we may have the liberty to disobey it, but we offer ourselves to thake the consequences for violating it. That’s at the heart of “civil disobedience,” which still holds respect for the law. The alternative to respect for the law is making your own rules, and that’s anarchy.
Dunno if I’d want him to change the UCMJ to cover what he did, but there are a lot of our laws that are far less just or reasonable, and he might be able to help clarify them.
“War is cruelty,” Sherman declared (rightly), “and you cannot refine it.”
Avoiding the beast altogether would be, without doubt, the ideal, but let’s not start pouncing on these officers for behavior that is, let’s be honest, understandable under the circumstances.
Place hundreds of young soldiers in my care and you had better believe I’m going to do what’s necessary to protect them–that includes threatening to kill an enemy to give up information that I need to keep my men safe.
Joel – thanks for the explanation, though I actually didn’t ask, just stated my opinion. Your points are well-taken. Nonetheless, in this case, had Lt. Col. West obeyed orders and regulations, U.S. soldiers would have died. His actions saved their lives. Thus, what he did was justified. These mitigating factors should have played much more of a role in determining his fate, in my opinion.
What would have been West’s fate had he not violated rules and soldiers died as a result?
The good Lt. Col. West has got guts enough, alright, and he’s AOK in my book. A sad spectacle, indeed, to expect our military to apologize for behaving militantly.
“Nonetheless, in this case, had Lt. Col. West obeyed orders and regulations, U.S. soldiers would have died. His actions saved their lives. Thus, what he did was justified.”
You don’t know whether his actions saved lives or not. Reading the accounts, it happened inside an American base, when no combat was occurring, based on rumors of an attack that might have been days away. This was no firefight, no “heat of battle” situation. It was a way of extracting actionable intelligence to be used over the course of hours or days, not tactical information. Heck, they got the guy to come to the base by driving to his house and asking him to come along with them.
I agree the officer didn’t deserve harsher punishment, but he clearly crossed a line. If anybody thinks that line was drawn improperly, let the rules be changed.
Muskrat:
I believe the prevailing view is that West’s actions did indeed save lives.
Muskrat, I think we should agree for the sake of discussion that it saved lives.
But I agree with you:
I agree the officer didn’t deserve harsher punishment, but he clearly crossed a line. If anybody thinks that line was drawn improperly, let the rules be changed.
LTC West was punished. And not in a small way. He lost his career as a military officer, and a lotta pension $$$ falling short of his 20 years.
And we should change the rules if we don’t like them. But the law is the law. We can bend the punishment for humanitarian or good-intention forgiveness, but we cannot ignore the law.
I think Joel was very wise on this [no bleeding-heart he, eh?], but a military officer, a JAG, and a wise man.
[I see no legal or moral difference between this an an illegal immigrant crossing our border to make a few bucks with honest work to send some $$$ back to his starving family.
We all gotta do the right thing, the law be hanged. Would you do any less for your own family---refuse to break the laws of a country that you're not even a citizen of? Hah. I'd be over the border in a New York minute.]
Did these guys commit treason, or worse, by NOT using such torture techniques at a time when the information gained might have saved many multiples of the theoretical lives saved by LtCol West? http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/05/AR2007100502492.html?hpid=topnews.
No, there is no excuse. Not then, not now, not ever.
Lt Col. West , you’re a true hero , I admire and salut you . I wish you all the best .May god bless you and America .
Lt. Col. West. You run for President & I’ll vote for you. Further,I’ll get my friends to vote for you. You betcha!
just when hope was down to nothing and my confidence in our leaders was none existent,LT.COL. ALLEN WEST steps in.i’ve never known a man that has restored my faith in the future of
America as he.God has sent us a MOSES (IF YOU WILL) to lead us out of this valley of hopelessness.My grandchildren needs him,so they may have a country to be proud of .I need him,my town needs him,my state of Tennessee, and America needs him to be PRESIDENT.I’m telling everyone i know about him and going to donate to his campaign.GO-WEST,I;M 100% WITH YOU.Lets stand together to put this man in the White House in 2012.
I would love to see Col. West debate Obama. Obama would not know what to do with a real man in front of him.