Quote (Thor123422 @ May 5 2018 03:48pm)
Go ahead and Link the exact quote for me please, because I'm pretty sure you are taking it out of context as Mattis is far too smart of a person to make such a simplistic criticism.
I will say though Trump is doing decently on the military exactly because he has all but removed himself from it.
This is one of the fundamental differences in ideology and administration between Trump and Obama. Its not necessarily a criticism nor is it anything you can brush aside.
To deny that Obama micomanaged operations and centralized powers in the executive and favored federalism is to be completely ignorant of everything that happened under the Obama administration.
http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-mattis-military-strategy-obama-syria-raqqa-news-2017-7Quote
Early one morning, Secretary of Defense James Mattis called Trump to ask about a troop deployment in ISIS-held Syria, according to Graham.
"We're asking permission to send 50 of our soldiers into a village outside Raqqa," Graham quoted Mattis as having said.
"Why are you calling me?" replied Trump, "I don't know where this village is at."
Graham said Mattis answered that, "Well, that's what we've done for the last 8 years."
Graham said that Trump then asked who wanted to send troops to that village, and Mattis replied that a major who was first in his class at West Point had made the request.
"'Why do you think I know more about that than he does?'" Trump replied, according to Graham. "And then he hung up," said Graham.
For former Obama administration defense officials, this story highlights a stark contrast. Obama famously micromanaged the Pentagon, insisting on a very granular level of detail for even relatively minor military decisions.
"You know, the president is quoted as having said at one point to his staff, 'I can do every one of your jobs better than you can,'" said former secretary of defense Robert Gates, who served under eight presidents, told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" in 2016.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/transcript-defense-secretary-james-mattis-on-face-the-nation-may-28-2017/Quote
JOHN DICKERSON: One of the things you have mentioned in this new accelerated tempo is that the president has delegated authority to the right level. What does that mean?
SECRETARY JAMES MATTIS: When you're in operations, the best thing you can do at the top level is get the strategy right. You have to get the big ideas right, you have to determine what is the policy, what is the level of effort you're willing to commit to it? And then you delegate to those who have to execute that strategy to the appropriate level. What's the appropriate level? It's the level where people are trained and equipped to take decisions so we move swiftly against the enemy.
There is no corporation in the world that would, in a competitive environment, try and concentrate all decisions at the corporate level.
But I would point out here that we have not changed the rules of engagement. There is no relaxation of our attention to protect the innocent. We do everything we can to protect the civilians, and actually lowering-- delegating the authority to the lower level allows us to do this better.
https://www.military.com/daily-news/2014/11/17/gates-and-panetta-blast-obama-for-micromanaging-military.htmlQuote
"It was micromanagement that drove me crazy," Gates said at the Reagan National Defense Forum at President Ronald Reagan's library in California over the weekend.
Gates said he had to deal with members of the NSC staff who directly called four-star generals on matters of strategy and tactics. The White House also attempted to make direct contact with Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), Gates said.
"I told JSOC if they got a call from the White House you tell them to go to hell and call me," Gates said to a round of applause from the audience.
Gates said the Obama White House too often let politics influence the policy when it came to the Defense Department.
"I think when a President wants highly centralized control at the White House, that's not bureaucratic, that's political," said Gates, a Republican.
At the same forum, Panetta, a Democrat, had similar criticisms of Obama and his staff on military matters, and singled out the current campaign against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in which Obama has ruled out the use ground combat troops.
"Never tell your enemy what the hell you're going to do," Panetta said.
Panetta and Gates were essentially renewing the criticism they aimed at Obama in their recent books – Panetta in "Worthy Fights" and Gates in "Duty."
Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, who was on the panel with Gates and Panetta, charged that the White House was picking targets to be bombed in the airstrikes against ISIS.
"We've seen this Vietnam movie before," McCain said in a reference to former President Lyndon B. Johnson picking targets in Vietnam.
Gates also made a brief reference to Johnson, in whose administration he had his first government job.
Of all the presidents he served, Gates said, Obama and Johnson were the most inclined to micromanage when it came to the military.
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