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BOOK REVIEW: the Generals BOOK REVIEWS end simply is wearing stars, not leading of the institution and concerns over the the military properly into the next century senior leader’s career compete for consider- and candidly rendering their best military ation in the decision space. In an effort to advice to our nation’s civilian leaders. demonstrate an example of “doing it right” Ricks convincingly traces modern in the modern era, Ricks reaches deep failures of generalship to their origins below the senior-leader level to examine in the interwar period, through World the relief of Colonel Joe Dowdy, USMC, War II, Korea, Vietnam, and Operations the commander of First Marine Regiment Desert Storm, Iraqi Freedom, and Enduring in the march to Baghdad. Dowdy’s (not Freedom. He juxtaposes successful Army uncontroversial) relief demonstrates that and Marine generals through their histories there is no indispensable man, and if a com- with the characteristics of history’s failed mander loses confidence in a subordinate, generals. Ricks draws specific, substanti- the subordinate must go. In Ricks’s view, if The Generals: American Military ated conclusions about generalship, Army it is a close call, senior leaders should err on Command from World War II to Today culture, civil-military relations, and the the side of relief: the human and strategic By Thomas E. Ricks way the Army has elected to organize, train, costs of getting that call wrong are virtually Penguin Press, 2012 and equip itself in ways that ultimately unconscionable. Ricks rightly concludes 576 pp. $32.95 suboptimized Service performance. Specifi- that too much emphasis has been placed ISBN: 978-1-59420-404-3 cally identifying the Army’s modern-era on the “career consequence” of relief for reluctance to effect senior leader reliefs as individual officers. For leaders who ascend a departure from the pattern of history, to flag rank, the Armed Forces must rewrite Ricks paints an image of the ultimate the “promotion contract” with an unspo- Reviewed by country club, self-righteously convinced of ken clause: if you accept this position, and ROBERT BRACKNELL its own infallibility—an Army for the sake things go wrong on your watch, you will of The Army, rather than for the sake of the be sacrificed on the altar of generalship, om Ricks is no stranger to Nation. The result is an outline of what ails regardless of whether it was your “fault.” criticizing the modern crop the modern Army, with lessons to be con- This clause is not unfamiliar; our senior of generals. A fellow at the sidered not only for that Service to correct leaders talk about it a lot, but enforce it very Center for New American itself, but also for all the Armed Forces little. Wanat springs to mind.1 T and their civilian leaders. Convincingly, Security, Ricks decisively established his If Ricks comes up short anywhere in national reputation with Making the Corps, Ricks identifies history’s A-list of gener- this tome, it could be that he attempted to followed by two successful analyses of the als—George C. Marshall, George S. Patton, write a neutral and unbiased analysis on Iraq War, Fiasco: The American Military Dwight D. Eisenhower, Matthew Ridgway, a topic that he feels so strongly about. It is Adventure in Iraq and The Gamble: General O.P. Smith, Creighton Abrams, William no secret that Ricks has taken his disdain David Petraeus and the American Military E. DuPuy, and David Petraeus, among for the professional failures of Franks, Adventure in Iraq, 2006–2008. Along the others. Not surprisingly, on his B-list of Sanchez, and their cohorts and elevated way, Ricks became a cynic, relentlessly general officer failures, Ricks singles out them to a level of malice that approaches a critiquing the decision to go to war in Iraq, Douglas MacArthur, William Westmore- personal grudge. Ricks’s writing on Franks the conduct of the conflict, particularly the land, Norman Schwarzkopf, Franks, and and Sanchez is a bit like trying to take seri- generalships of Tommy Franks and Ricardo Sanchez, suggesting strongly that their ously a critique of Red Sox pitching written Sanchez, the utter dysfunction of the stra- failures in generalship have amounted not by Don Zimmer. Moreover, while Ricks’s tegic decisionmaking and interagency pro- only to massive strategic failures, but also book was complete and published prior cesses required to make America’s modern to unnecessary loss of American lives, from to Petraeus’s spectacular fall from grace, conflicts successful, and, most saliently, the Korea through Afghanistan. Ricks’s loving treatment of Petraeus sug- failures of the conflict’s most senior mili- Ricks works to identify tangible, quan- gests that he views generalship more like tary leadership. Ricks weaves critiques of tifiable historical trends and specific stra- being an accountant—a brilliant technical Army leadership, in particular, into a fluid, tegic, operational, personnel, and program specialist—than being a priest, whose prin- meticulously researched tapestry, but leaves decisions that yielded undesirable short- cipal currency of authority is moral. Ricks room for debate about his ultimate conclu- and long-term effects. He bemoans the underestimates the moral component nec- sions. Ricks’s focus on the technical and Army’s gravitation away from the concept essary to maintain the respect of privates, strategic prowess of generals causes him to of meaningful relief (performance-based sergeants, captains, and colonels, a shortfall gloss over the moral and ethical compo- firing, as opposed to mere conduct-based) roundly and regularly on display on the nents of leadership that have eviscerated as a leadership-shaping mechanism. Once front pages of the Washington Post. True the legacies of a number of senior generals. upon a time, senior leaders fired generals generalship is an ability to borrow elements Even so, failing to consider and evaluate the because they believed line Soldiers deserved of Patton’s technical military competence themes that Ricks identifies risks maturing to be well led and not to have their lives and the moral pureness of Ghandi, mixed a crop of generals for whom the professional squandered. Now, suggests Ricks, the needs with Bill Clinton’s artful communication, ndupress.ndu.edu issue 69, 2 d quarter 2013 / JFQ 99.
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