All Marines are elite therefore how could one marine be more elite than the other?

That is excellent logic and reason enough to relieve the Corps of any further Special Operations requirements and leave that to the other Services.

I believe we would risk national security if we detracted from the Marines’ core task of beach assaults. As I recall their last beach assault in Somalia 93 was met by CNN cameras which is where the marines perform best, in front of the camera, and, oh, they have great commercials too. Go get ‘em cowboys.

was that you at the counterinsurgency leadership conference yesterday? so, you’re a coinista now? there was a lot of intellectual testosterone floating around the room. what a true gentleman bgen draude is in representing the marine corps university foundation so well.

mr wagner,

gina’s response as regards the baby brigadier is spot on. there was no dis-respect intended. she can be a bit tongue in cheek.

this issue is NOT about marsoc and their role in the specops world. the issue is one of honor amongst officers. the marine corps court of inquiry regarding this affair is shrouded in unwarranted secrecy which has nothing to do with protecting the national interests. the marines were rightly held to account for their mistakes. bg nicholson (and other senior officers) has not been held accountable for his mistakes. bg nicholson knows what his mistakes, and the attendant results, were. he is a west pointer who is not living up to the code. gina is not re-writing history. her facts are just that. the answers rest in the marine corps court of inquiry. moaa should be doing a foia inquiry to marcent about this.

mr diehl is absolutely correct in his assessment that bg nicholson needs to come forward with an apology. what gina has only marginally indicated in her previous posts is that bg nicholson is also a member of a prominent and powerful american catholic family. his actions throughout this whole affair are not the sort of behaviour we expect of firm catholics and west point alumni. he is a disappointment.

good job gina! stick with this nicholson story!

kh

That all notwithstanding, sometimes war is necessary to confront and defeat evil and oppression, and the needless loss of all lives should be avoided. But sometimes, it can’t be; humanity isn’t perfect and precautions to prevent unintended casulties can’t be perfect. Our judgement must be reserved to whether or not our fighting force acted ethically in minimizing casualties while accomplishing the necessary task, so as to lessen the evil and oppression present.

I daresay that innocents have died in every conflict in human history, and to presume that we can preclude innocent deaths, or that we should gushingly apologize when they do happen, is willful disregard of reality–and again I daresay, not ethical in itself.

I wrote the title, and there is no link. I usually keep titles closer to the topic, but sometimes I try something different. Sorry for any confusion.

Mr. Wagner,

Though I rarely single out individuals like thus, I have written about Brig. Gen. Nicholson (and Lt. Gen. Kearney) for some time regarding their role with the Marine Special Ops incident and the Marine court of inquiry.

Now, BABY Brigadier simply means a junior brigadier general, (which at this point Nicholson really no longer is.) BUT he remains a junior and a baby brigadier relative to his father. I covered the family connections in an earlier post.

Questions recently again have been raised about Nicholson’s actions (inaction) following the incident that may have needlessly ruined the lives of a group of Marines. Yes, these things happen, but this one seems a bit more vexing.

The question of Marine Corps Special Operations (which has long existed in practice) is a valid one. But this is a Me Too! environment and your observations about the Marines translate to capabilities other services may oddly possess.

The opinions of “Inside the Headquarters” are not necessarily those of MOAA.

I appreciate your comments and they assist with future topics.

Gina

Finally, the Marines were essentially ordered to contribute to special ops, so they did what Marines always do. They said, “Aye, Aye, sir,” and did it to the best of their ability. The Marine special ops commander is, naturally, top notch.

I salute the Military Officers Association of America for throwing a spotlight on this formerly unheard of relief of an entire American unit in combat.

Thank you. Thank you so, so much.

Gina