Character Issues

What did Gen. Hugh Shelton have in mind when he told an audience said about Gen. Wesley Clark that " 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."?

The Man Without Dirt is wondering (and I see the InstaPundit is, too). Well, straight from the pages of TIME, we have a story with which Gen. Hugh Shelton is undoubtedly familiar:

Clark had a charmed career in the military, but, associates say, it began stalling out after he won his second star with his promotion to major general in September 1992. Bill Clinton gave him a third star in 1994. Two years later, then Lieut. General Marc Cisneros recalls hearing that Clark was seeking to win the four-star billet as head of the U.S. Southern Command — after the service had nominated Cisneros for the post. Cisneros would have seemed the ideal candidate: a Spanish speaker who had taken Manuel Noriega into custody in 1990 when the Panamanian leader surrendered to U.S. troops. Clark, in contrast, speaks Russian and had never held a Latin American post.

"When I was told by the Army that he was maneuvering to politically usurp my nomination, I visited with Clark," Cisneros says. "I said, 'I hear you're competing for the Southcom position also'--but he denied it. He told me, 'You're the nominee, and you're the one who's going to be selected, and I'm not trying to get that job.'" But within weeks, Clinton had nominated Clark. "I could have taken a 'Yes, I'm applying for the job,'" Cisneros says. "But when I confronted him, he was dishonest to me."

While Clark declined to respond directly to Cisneros, he told TIME, "People are entitled to their own opinions. The Army and the armed forces are very competitive institutions."

Althogh I am not a military man myself, my impression is that for one general to lie directly to another's face is a bit of a no-no. Presumably Gen. Shelton has other stories in mind as well, since he did mention Clark's departure from Europe. Whether we will get more details, only time will tell. Obvious places to look - who told what to whom about the incident with the Russians at the airport; and did Gen. Clark resolutely refuse to get on the same page with Gen. Shelton on the question of the Apache helicopters.

This TIME story also addresses the question of whether President Clinton was deceived into dismissing Gen. Clark three months early. TIME's source is Samuel Berger. We smilingly recall Mr. Berger's talk therapy with TIME a year ago, when he explored his fantasy that Team Clinton had a serious, thought-through plan to Get Osama, which the Bush people dropped it after the transition. The Man Without Mercy was delightful on that point.

We have more!

MORE: Gen. Cisneros is les forthcoming with Knight-Ridder:

Retired Lt. Gen. Marc Cisneros, who was the Army brass' nominee for the SouthCom job but lost it to Clark, said: "He was a training-focused leader but did not appear to care about people, only himself. I value honesty and integrity in a person . . . and I felt that Wes was lacking in this. He is extremely competent, but self-serving to a fault."

Newsweek discussues Apaches:

As chief of U.S. and NATO forces in Europe during the 1999 Balkan war, he pushed to send ground troops into Kosovo. Neither President Bill Clinton nor the top brass at the Pentagon had any stomach to see body bags come home. The Army chief of staff, Gen. Dennis Reimer, resisted Clark’s urging to use Apache helicopters against the Serbs. The large, low-flying craft were too vulnerable to shoulder-held anti-aircraft missiles, Reimer insisted. When Clark persisted by talking to reporters and trying to run a back channel to the White House and State Department, Defense Secretary William Cohen was furious. General Shelton, chairman of the JCS, delivered Cohen’s message to Clark: “Get your f—king face off of TV.”

Nice language for Newsweek. We are especially appalled (in a proper Republican way) by the language Clark uses in doing his impression of a Bush official. Read it!

Comments

[Bill Johnson]

I have to question this "CIA" agent named Larry Johnson who made his comments on PBS last night.

He stated that Ms. Plame was working undercover for 3 decades with him. He has been represented as having four years undercover. She is only 40 years old and has two 3 year old children. That means she was working undercover for the CIA at the tender age of 7 years.

There is a great credibility gap here. It has not been questioned by the press or the left. The right doesn't dare question it for fear of being charged with COVERUP.

[sophy]

I do not know how to use the Cheap metin2 yang ; my friend tells me how to use.

[LOTRO Gold]

When you have LOTRO Gold, you can get more!