I’m sure you heard about the firing of Navy Secretary Richard Spencer for his handling of the Navy SEAL Chief Eddie Gallagher case, for ignoring President Trump’s orders, and ignoring the chain of command:
Defense Secretary Mark Esper has fired the Navy’s top official, ending a stunning clash between President Donald Trump and top military leadership over the fate of a SEAL accused of war crimes in Iraq.
Esper said Sunday that he had lost confidence in Navy Secretary Richard Spencer and alleged that Spencer proposed a deal with the White House behind his back to resolve the SEAL’s case. Trump has championed the matter of Navy Chief Petty Officer Edward Gallagher, who was acquitted of murder in the stabbing death of an Islamic State militant captive but convicted of posing with the corpse while in Iraq in 2017.
Borepatch has some strong opinions about Navy leadership and the JAG corps:
Remember how the JAGs screwed up the Gallagher case? Remember how testimony was dorked up, how the prosecution’s “star” witness admitted that he was the one who did whatever “crime” was committed? Remember the prosecution’s misconduct? Remember how they all gave themselves medals for what a bang-up job they did? Remember how President Trump revoked all the medals and pardoned Gallagher for the single chickens**t charge they got to stick?
Well guess how their prosecution of the U.S.S Fitzgerald’s CO went:
The trial would be allowed to go forward, but the judge admonished Richardson and his deputy, Moran, for violating a sacred tenet of military criminal justice: to not poison the system by making their opinions clear. By doing so, any potential jurors would know exactly what the top brass wanted.
A month later in January, the judge handed the Navy a final blow: The admiral in charge of the criminal proceedings was disqualified for improperly using his position to help the prosecution gather evidence against Benson.
The Navy’s case had collapsed, but more than three months dragged by before it finally dropped the remaining charges against Benson.
[blink] [blink]
And it gets worse, with the post clusterf**k ass covering from the Navy brass:
(The day the charges were dropped, ProPublica had informed the Navy it would be publishing a story detailing the extensive, troubling mistakes made by the Navy’s leadership in Benson’s case.)
The next day, the Navy took one more swipe at Benson, this time with a public letter of censure. The secretary of the Navy, Richard Spencer, wrote an admonishment that repeatedly used the same words and phrases, such as “failure” and “unworthy of trust,” basically restating the charges the Navy was unable to bring to court, without an avenue for appeal. In an email, Spencer’s spokeswoman declined to provide details about why he wrote the letter.
(Unless I’m mistaken, Borepatch served as a marine, so he has plenty of experience with the joys of naval oversight.)
He concludes: “The JAG corps needs to be nuked from orbit, and the Navy brass needs to get purged of the ass-coverers. Holy cow, it looks like Barack Obama was successful in fundamentally changing America’s Navy.”
Under the Obama Administration, war-fighting capability wasn’t a priority for our armed forces: social justice and social engineering was. President Trump’s moves in the Gallaghaer case was widely popular with the rank and file, but quite unpopular among many Obama holdovers. President trump is busy undoing all those Obama mistakes, so no wonder the people who benefited from the old arrangements are fighting him tooth and nail…
Tags: Eddie Gallagher, JAG, Military, Navy, Richard Spencer (Navy)
Just back from vacation, so this is a much delayed reply. I was not a Marine, but my co-blogger ASM826 was. However, I come from a family full of military types (as does The Queen Of The World) and so recognize Pentagon Bravo Sierra when I see it.