Help - Need to clear up ques w/ Clark and his military record

[Captain Sunshine]

I saw my dad this past week, and being the only liberal in the family, we of course got into it over the current crop of Democratic candidates. We do every time I go.

Now, I haven't made my decision on whom to support. But my dad said something for which I had no info to respond. He told me that he would NEVER vote for Clark, because he disobeyed a direct order from his superiors and you just don't do that. He said that when Clark was overseas, he went around the Joint Chiefs of Staff to Clinton to have an order to him overturned or contravened. Dad was an Air Force man a long time ago, so he states this as a Law of Nature.

I have never heard of this particular story. Even if there's some truth to it, with all the mudslinging already going on it's like trying to find a single piece of poo in a large pile. But I'd like to know if

1) anybody else has heard about this;
2) can supply an article (I didn't find one here at DU, but I haven't Googled for it yet);
and
3) can report on the truth of this, for and/or against.

My dad's pretty conservative, but he's also pretty reasonable. He'll admit when he's wrong. So if anyone can help me out with some info, I'd appreciate it very much.

CS

[KittyWampus]

1. Clark Was Supreme Allied Commander Europe (NATO)

As well as the Commander-in-Chief, United States European Command (US Military).

He did NOT step out of bounds. The American NeoCons and Politicos tried to tie his hands.

As Supreme Commander of NATO he had DIRECT access to every head of state including Clinton.

[A-Schwarzenegger]

2. It might of had to do with the Motor Pool Incident.

[ArkDem]

14. Yes, I'm sure you are right about that.

Please, discuss that for those who are uninformed!!!! I think you have a way with words!

[in_cog_ni_to]

3. Nevermind.

It's explained below. You should print those artiles below and give them to your dad. Clark was right in doing what he did.

[Spazito]

4. This could be the issue of having ground troops on the ground...

at the ready, if needed, after the Kosovo air campaign. I believe there was a difference of opinion between Clark and others at the Pentagon on this. Clark wanted troops on the ground and the Pentagon wanted only an air campaign. I believe Clinton was the one to approve the addition of ground troops and the Pentagon was NOT happy about that.

[wyldwolf]

5. Here's the story...

Clark directly crossed Admiral Leighton Smith, the four-star commander of Mediterranean nato forces. Although NATO demanded a full Serb withdrawal from the besieged city of Sarajevo, Smith urged that a brief bombing pause in early September be extended indefinitely, since, as he explained to Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, he thought the United States had no business intervening. This was in defiance of the NATO order.

But Clark, then still a three-star, insisted in a heated telephone call that the bombing should continue as planned. As Holbrooke writes in To End A War, "I could tell from the noises emanating from Clark's cell phone that he was being scolded by a very angry, very senior American naval commander." Smith quickly alerted his superiors (Shelton and Cohen) to Clark's "insolence." But Clark was right, and he won: The bombing resumed and caused the Bosnian Serbs to withdraw from Sarajevo within two weeks of Clark's clash with Smith. That November, the warring parties met at Dayton to negotiate a peace accord. Clark was soon afterward awarded his fourth star.

http://www.farcaster.com/mhonarchive/hauserreport/msg00467.html

During the above-mention events, President Clinton seethed, privately calling Admiral Smith insubordinate, and eventually agreeing with Clark and forcing the admiral to resume action.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/books/2001/0109.thompson.html

So, we see, Clark defied Admiral Smith, won Clinton's backing, and resumed the campaign. The intervention ended less than two weeks later.

So here's the setup. Clark defied Admiral Smith. Smith alerted his superiors to Clark's "insolence" (but apparantly not Bill Clinton, who agreed with Clark and disagreed with Smith.) Those superiors were most likely Richard Cohen and General Shelton.

Shelton, Smith, and Cohen were angry. Not only had they been defied, but they were proven wrong and were not backed by their Commander in Chief.

[rumguy]

6. So is this why Clark was "fired"?

Several people have asked me about this, and I'm never sure exactly how to answer it. I know there was tension and that he sided with Clinton...etc...did he step down just to alleviate the tension, etc?

[wyldwolf]

7. Yep! He defied the neocons...

And for that, some DU'ers call him a neocon.

The long version:

We've all heard the story by now. A few weeks back, Gen. Hugh Shelton, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was at a forum in California where he was asked, "What do you think of Gen. Wesley Clark, and would you support him as a presidential candidate?"

"I've known Wes for a long time. I will tell you the reason he came out of Europe early had to do with integrity and character issues, things that are very near and dear to my heart. I'm not going to say whether I'm a Republican or a Democrat. I'll just say Wes won't get my vote." Shelton replied.

There are two problems with that statment. The first is unless Shelton reveals what those "integrity and character issues" are, the charges are meaningless and they show a lack of integrity unto themselves. Afterall, how can Wesley Clark possibly rebutt them if he doesn't know what the issues are? This is like someone telling you on your wedding day, "I wouldn't marry him/her if I were you... I'm not going to say why... just trust me..." Huh? How does one respond to that?

The second problem is the assertion that Clark came out of Europe early based on the mysterious and vague charges of "integrity and character" issues. In all actuality, Clark was relieved of duty based on personal vendettas carried by General Hugh Shelton and Admiral Leighton (Snuffy) Smith. It was Shelton who called Clark to inform him that his nato assignment would end early. (According to Waging Modern War, Shelton would not even show Clark the courtesy of extending the phone call a few minutes to work out a face-saving exit.) President Clinton privately told Clark, "I had nothing to do with it." http://www.farcaster.com/mhonarchive/hauserreport/msg00467.html

So what drove General Shelton to the decision to recall a very successful General from the field after executing a very successful war?

He directly crossed Admiral Leighton Smith, the four-star commander of Mediterranean nato forces. Although nato demanded a full Serb withdrawal from the besieged city of Sarajevo, Smith urged that a brief bombing pause in early September be extended indefinitely, since, as he explained to Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, he thought the United States had no business intervening. But Clark, then still a three-star, insisted in a heated telephone call that the bombing should continue as planned. As Holbrooke writes in To End A War, "I could tell from the noises emanating from Clark's cell phone that he was being scolded by a very angry, very senior American naval commander." Smith--who quickly alerted his superiors to Clark's insolence--had the inclinations of nato policymakers on his side; after all, heads of state had neglected Bosnia as long as was politically tolerable. But Clark was right, and he won: The bombing resumed and caused the Bosnian Serbs to withdraw from Sarajevo within two weeks of Clark's clash with Smith. That November, the warring parties met at Dayton to negotiate a peace accord. Clark was soon afterward awarded his fourth star--despite ferocious resistance from the Army, which would have preferred his retirement. http://www.farcaster.com/mhonarchive/hauserreport/msg00467.html

During the above-mention events, President Clinton seethed, privately calling Smith insubordinate, and eventually forcing the admiral to resume action. http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/books/2001/0109.thompson.html

So, we see, Clark defied Admiral Smith, won Clinton's backing, and resumed the campaign. The intervention ended less than two weeks later.

So here's the setup. Clark defied Admiral Smith. Smith alerted his superiors to Clark's "insolence" (but apparantly not Bill Clinton, who agreed with Clark and disagreed with Smith.) Those superiors were most likely Richard Cohen and General Shelton.

Shelton, Smith, and Cohen were angry. Not only had they been defied, but they were proven wrong and were not backed by their Commander in Chief.

They fought Clark being awared his Fourth star - wanting him retired instead. They had been out manuervered by Wesley Clark and Clark won the Kosovo intervention. Embarassing to be sure.

I don't know how thick Admiral Leighton W. Smith and General Shelton were during the Kosovo conflict, before it, or after it, but they have both been guest speakers at the Patterson School of Diplomacy and International Commerce.

http://www.uky.edu/RGS/Patterson/faculty.htm

I would suspect their association goes back a bit further.

As for Clark and his "character issues," he "risked his career to confront the uniformed reluctance to use force in defense of human rights."

Clark was disliked (even hated?) by the upper Pentagon brass because...

1. Such liberal/progressive views like humanitarian missions and nation building for the military made the Pentagon uneasy...

Despite his credentials as a warrior - 34 years in the Army, including a Silver Star, two Bronze Stars and a Purple Heart earned in Vietnam - {Clark} argues that the U.S. military must learn how to perform such nontraditional functions as peacekeeping and even nation-building, because that's what it will be doing in the 21st century, like it or not. And, since it's no small task to turn gung-ho soldiers into order-keeping policers, it's all the more urgent that the entire military start rethinking its doctrine immediately.

Paradigm-shifting views such as these did not make Clark popular with his superiors at the Pentagon, including former Secretary of Defense William Cohen.

http://www.newamerica.net/index.cfm?pg=article&pubID=528

2. Wesley Clark welcomes homosexuals in the military

I'm not sure that I'd be in favor of policy. I supported that policy. That was a policy that was given. I don't think it works. It works better in some circumstances than it does in others. But essentially we've got a lot of gay people in the armed forces, always have had, always will have. And I think that, you know, we should welcome people that want to serve. - MSNBC

Former NATO supreme commander Wesley Clark says it is time for the ban on gays in the military to be lifted. - gayPASG


3. Clark was/is too intelligent for the military "culture."

...General Barry McCaffrey told the Washington Post: "This is no insult to army culture ... but he was way too bright, way too articulate, way too good looking and perceived to be way too wired to fit in with our culture."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1044318,00.html

I would say these sound like integrity and character issues I admire.

More...

After prosecuting NATO's first war by uniting its 19 countries and defeating the Yugoslav Army with no alliance casualties, the four-star general had ruffled enough feathers at the Pentagon that his career abruptly ended.

"Wes could not possibly be a better leader," Taylor said. "I really respect Wes in a very special way for his brilliance. But he's also a man of real character and high personal values."

Any problem Clark had with higher-ups in the Pentagon was due to "professional jealousy" by officials who had trouble with a highly intelligent man who made his case with solid evidence and debated vigorously, Taylor said.

"The guy, when he starts doing something, is exhaustively focused on achieving the mission," said retired Gen. Barry McCaffrey, who has known Clark since the two taught at West Point decades ago. He preceded Clark as commander of U.S. Southern Command.

The tension with Washington stemmed partly from the failure of bureaucrats to give Clark resources he needed as the commander on the scene, Grange said.

During and after the conflict there was friction between Clark and his superiors, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Hugh Shelton and Defense Secretary William Cohen, apparently over Clark's high-profile persona and his willingness to challenge them.

At the root of this conflict, Taylor said, was jealousy of a "superstar" by Clark's superiors at the Pentagon. "Shelton and Cohen didn't like Wes being direct with them, arguing his case," Taylor said. "They wanted someone they could tell what to do."

more...

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/News/Nation/AB925B9C76D6B82686256DBC00375519?OpenDocument&Headline=Clark\'s+rise+in+military+impressed+and+rankled+observers

and more...

U.S. News Online
Outlook 8/9/99
the real reason for Clark's ouster may be that the famously political general was impolitic. Pentagon insiders say Clark's frequent and public complaint that politicians had tied his hands during the Kosovo war irked his boss, Defense Secretary William Cohen. Cohen reportedly also was none too pleased that Clark's aides called him "Senator Cohen," a mocking reference to his past as an elected official. The bottom line, says one Pentagon official: "You don't piss off your boss and get away with it-

1999 UNIVERSAL PRESS SYNDICATE
No wonder these generals and admirals in what once was called the War Department got rid of the one genuine military thinker and hero we have, Gen. Wesley K. Clark. What did he think he was doing, insisting upon winning?

The simple truth right now is that nobody says that Clark was wrong. In fact, the respected German Gen. Klaus Naumann, just-retired head of the NATO military committee, told a group of us here recently, in his review of the still-unresolved conflict, that "the reluctance to use overwhelming force allowed Slobodan Milosevic to calculate his risks. ... I would press harder for visible preparations and visible planning."

But it was the "go-slow" guys, the "they'll give in with a just little more punishment" chaps (in fact, the very same mentality that gave us Vietnam!), the ones who would rewrite all of the dictums of von Clausewitz and Sun Tzu about the need to strike hard, fast and unrelentingly, who were unquestionably and provably wrong -- and whose political caution cost tens of thousands of lives and came close to losing the war for NATO.

So who goes? Wesley Clark!


Levin Statement on Departure of General Wesley Clark
July 28, 1999
WASHINGTON Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., issued the following statement today following the announcement that General Wesley Clark would step down as NATO supreme commander in April, 2000:

"I have known and worked with General Wes Clark for many years. He is an outstanding military officer. We all owe him a debt of gratitude for his tremendous leadership of NATO's military forces during the recent Kosovo conflict. I look forward to working closely with General Clark through the end of his term as SACEUR."


By: EDWARD N. LUTTWAK
Published in the LA Times August 6, 1999
Edward N. Luttwak is a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington

Defeated generals are sent home in disgrace, but it is most unusual to dismiss victorious ones. Whatever the future may hold for Kosovo--and it looks rather grim at present--there is no doubt that NATO's war against Serbia ended in victory. Nor is it in doubt that its military commander, Gen. Wesley K. Clark, was very much the victorious general of that war.

NewsWeek
By John Barry and Christopher Dickey,
Aug. 9, 1999

Gen. Wesley Clark, supreme Allied Commander in Europe, waged and won NATO's campaign for Kosovo without losing a single soldier in action. For the U.S. military, the victory was uniquely—historically—bloodless. Last week Clark learned it was also thankless.

In a midnight call from Washington, Clark was told he'd be relieved of his command at NATO next April, a few months earlier than he'd anticipated. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Hugh Shelton, presented the decision as a simple matter of giving the post to another deserving officer. Clark, who got the call in the middle of a quick trip to the Baltic republics, was caught off balance. He'd seen Shelton in the United States just the week before. Not a word had been breathed of his replacement. According to one source privy to the conversation, Clark told Shelton the move would be read as a vote of no-confidence in his leadership.

Shelton, brisk and businesslike, said there was no way around it. His replacement—Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—would be forced by law to retire if he weren't given a new slot by April. Clark wasn't buying it. In two conversations that night and again the next day, sources say, he argued that his replacement would be a blow to U.S. efforts to reshape NATO. Shelton wasn't moved. Clark, the 54-year-old warrior, was going to have to step aside for Ralston, the 55-year-old Washington insider.

there's more articles from Wash Post/Dana Priestly, Seattle times, etc...
http://wesleyclark.h1.ru/departure.htm

[rumguy]

9. thanks for that info...

I'm going to bookmark this thread

[Donna Zen]

10. I'd never heard that one

Who was Supreme allied commander at the time, 1995? Clark was J-5 and as such was a policy advisor and liason to the WH. NATO had every right to call the shots, and Clark had every right to inform the WH.

Look, I was happy to have Clinton in the WH, but his relationship with the Pentagon was very bad. Clinton thought putting Cohen, a repub. at defense would be a good move; he was wrong. The place turned into a hen house.

The brass always wanted Clark on the team because they knew how good he was. Clark has always been able to see the big picture while the rest of them were lost in the trees. They needed him, but they resented him. He was right in above instance, and he was right in Kosovo.

Tell your Dad that Rummy has been stacking the E ring with his yes men and women. If for no other reason, voting for Clark means cleaning house and moving people into positions who actually have some convictions and smarts. The situation today and tomorrow is dangerous. Presidents without military clout end up being tools just to keep the peace.

BTW, Shelton has since commented that he wished he had not said what he said about Clark. Why? Because he cannot back it up.

Oct. 1989 - Oct. 1991 Commanding General, National Training Center, Fort Irwin, California
Oct. 1991 - Aug. 1992 Deputy Chief of Staff for Concepts, Doctrine, and Developments, United States Army Training and Doctrine Command, Fort Monroe, Virginia
Aug. 1992 - Apr. 1994 Commanding General, 1st Cavalry Division, Fort Hood, Texas
Apr. 1994 - June 1996 Director for Strategic Plans and Policy, J-5, The Joint Staff, Washington, D.C.
Jun. 1996 - July 1997 Commanding General, United States Southern Command, Quarry Heights, Panama
Jul. 1997 - May 2000 Supreme Allied Commander, Europe, Supreme Headquarters, Allied Powers Europe, Belgium

[TorchTheWitch]

12. i haven't heard this before...

BTW, Shelton has since commented that he wished he had not said what he said about Clark. Why? Because he cannot back it up.

Is this new info? I hadn't heard anything about Shelton backpeddling on this. Do you know of a link or other DU discussion I may have missed about this? (I'd like to gloat further over Shelton inserting foot in mouth ;) ).

Thanks in advance.

[Donna Zen]

15. Someone wrote about it at the blog.

I'll post asking for a link.

What is even more telling is Shelton's inability to support what in the military is a very bad charge. But that was never the intent was it. Providing proof is for Democrats. Ass hole! The intent was to smear Clark and thus insure that those big fat defense contracts to Red Cap.

[BootinUp]

8. As Supreme Allied Commander NATO...

He needs to have access to the highest levels of governments in my humble opinion. If you or your father really want to know more details, probably the best place to get it would be the book Clark wrote about it: Waging Modern War.

I am still reading it, but the reason for disagreements with the Joint Chiefs and the Secretary of Defense had to do with political risk back in the states as Clark frames it. Clark's position was that the air war prosecuted by jets at 10,000 ft + had gone as far is it could and he wanted to use Apache helicopters that could be more precise because he was concerned with civilian casualties. He also pressed for having a ground option if necessary to finish the job, and this was not popular for obvious reasons back home.

In the final analysis its hard to second guess Clark as a military leader and strategist, as he didn't lose one American to hostile fire, and the campaign was very successfull. He displayed real diplomatic skills as the NATO commander and dealing with the Allied governments involved.

I don't think there were any orders he disobeyed as your father understood, but there was disagreement on strategies.

[Captain Sunshine]

11. THANK you

I'm all set. Thanks for the info!

CS

[Kahuna]

13. If Clark went over heads to save lives, because others..

were playing politics (much like the current administration), is that wrong? I don't think so.