The D2D Guide To General James Mattis

Retired Marine Corps General James Mattis has been selected by President Elect Trump for Secretary of Defense. That's a lot of official titles right there. General Mattis still has some hurdles to overcome, including getting a waiver from Congress to bypass the National Security Act of 1947. This shouldn't prove too difficult, as Congress granted waivers for that within years of the Act passing.

For me, this has been the first and only cabinet pick by Trump that is remotely acceptable. I'm not special in that sense, that seems to be the running thought of most Americans. But there has been some pushback, mostly because of quotes attributed to General Mattis. Even someone I am a big fan of, Robert Reich made a worried statement on facebook about the pick.

Off the bat, I understand why there is pushback on the pick. First, and likely the biggest reason for the pushback is how horrible virtually every other pick of Trump's has been. In my personal opinion, a democracy lasts only as long as you can keep money from getting infused into politics. The more money that gets put in, the less avenues average citizens have to vent pressure. All governments need pressure valves where regular Joes can let off steam, make noticeable changes, and feel like part of the system and not a subject under it. Someone who doesn't feel like part of a society will either knowingly, or unknowingly work to destroy it. It's human nature. With the long list of billionaires and millionaires that are taking over our executive branch, I am worried along with the rest of you that money will become even a larger part of politics than it was before, and it is hugely incorporated into politics already.

I know, I know. How could we know Hillary would have been any better? I honestly doubt it would have been better. I was right there with the rest of you complaining about her ties to wall street. But that thought doesn't mean I can't complain about what is actually happening now rather than compare it to what would have theoretically happened. Hillary is gone. Unless the DNC is dumber than even I think, she won't be a contender for president again. We need to deal with what is really happening.

But on to the point of this post. General Mattis has some crazy quotes floating out there. We are already a warmongering country. One of the few bipartisan agreements is we need to stop being the world police. How can we be comfortable with a Secretary of Defense that has quotes about loving fighting and killing?

I served under Mattis when I was with 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines and he commanded I MEF. Of course, I was but a filthy Lance Corporal/Corporal, so it's not like him and I were drinking buddies. I managed to get a handshake in with him once. Sadly, he was already out of challenge coins since he was being swamped by Marines. I'm still a little salty about that. But I personally benefitted from working under Mattis. So I am not exactly an unbiased source, but I will do my best.

So why do military and especially Marines love him so much? There is a number of reasons. First, he was an intellectual in a branch that is not exactly known for intellectualism. General Mattis was well known for being an educated and intelligent man. He had a library of over 6000 books that he took with him from post to post from ancient Roman philosophies to modern military tactics. Reading and Marines go together like oil and water, so this is particularly amazing.

But what about those violent and antagonistic quotes?!? Talking about loving to kill people isn't exactly a hallmark of intellectualism. One of his quotes is:

“You go into Afghanistan, you got guys who slap women around for five years because they didn’t wear a veil. You know, guys like that ain’t got no manhood left anyway. So it’s a hell of a lot of fun to shoot them. Actually it’s quite fun to fight them, you know. It’s a hell of a hoot. It’s fun to shoot some people. I’ll be right up there with you. I like brawling.”

Not exactly politically correct. But there is a couple things you have to remember. First, one of the horrors of our deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan is seeing the horrible treatment of women and girls in those two countries. We've seen women getting the hell beat out of them in public. We've seen little girls rigged with bombs because they were already a burden on their family not being a boy. I've had to clean the remains of a 6 year old girl (guessing her age) off the side of my truck after her parents and Imam rigged her to blow up. She ran away from us, likely because she knew she was sent to kill us. They still detonated her as she ran.

So a General talking about these horrors isn't being callous. He is just speaking from experience that many Americans thankfully don't have. I personally never wanted to kill anyone. When I went to Iraq, it was to try and prevent killing, unless absolutely necessary. My fellow detainee guard and I actually got threatened with NJPs for not killing people, and instead physically restraining them at the risk of our own lives. I have no love of killing people. But I absolutely understand where General Mattis is coming from with that statement. It's not pretty. It's not PC. But it speaks to his men who have these experiences.

There are other quotes by Mattis that aren't getting much air time. But they are supremely important to understanding who this man is:

“You are part of the world’s most feared and trusted force. Engage your brain before you engage your weapon.”

Challenging Marines to think before they fight is a big part of General Mattis. He led the charge on nurturing Marine's minds as much as their bodies. You won't find many leaders in the military who harp on intelligence in their ranks. Mattis was one of the few, and we loved him for it.

“Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet.”

This is another quote to show how violent and antagonistic Mattis is. But that is only to people who weren't deployed. As Marines, we have been trained for literally centuries to never be complacent. Complacency kills is painted all around bases in Iraq. We don't know who is out to get us, especially in wars like these where the enemy isn't in uniform, working in ranks. So for us Marines, the "have a plan" part is just business. But the be polite and professional part is new, and different. Under Mattis, we were instructed to not be assholes to Iraqis. Treat these people with respect and politeness isn't how wars are normally fought, but it was the best advice we could have been given. Iraqis had been demoralized and beaten down for decades. Having the strength we did, while still being polite and respectful was a totally new idea. In Iraq and a lot of the world, people who had strength got to do whatever they wanted, and they took advantage of that. A force as strong as the USMC, and still being respectful was a new experience for them, and honestly how all wars should be fought. As Winston Churchill said "When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite". Stopping a fight before it happens is more important than winning after you caused it.

“I come in peace. I didn’t bring artillery. But I’m pleading with you, with tears in my eyes: If you fuck with me, I’ll kill you all.”

Another antagonistic quote. But again, and as usual, context is key. This was part of a talk with Iraqi military leaders. As I said above, Iraq had been run with system of "whoever has the strength, makes the rules". Mattis' quote is reminding them strongly that HE had the strength now. A big issue in Iraq is that Iraqis had been trained into being submissive, subversive, or being horrifically murdered. It had been an incredibly dangerous time in Iraq for decades. Saddam's regime had killed an estimated 10% of the Iraqi population. And Iraqis laughed at us for such a low estimate. For comparison's sake, the civil war was the US's highest casualty war, and we lost less than 2% of our population during it. You either hid and lied in Saddam's regime, or you died. Mattis (and all of us) had to deal with rightfully suspicious Iraqis, many who had spent the majority (or entirety) of their lives being beaten down. Mattis had to show strength, and had to be honest here. If those Iraqi commanders had turned on him, he would have had to kill them. It's the nature of doing business. He put it to them straight, not because he wanted to kill them, but because he didn't want to.

“You cannot allow any of your people to avoid the brutal facts. If they start living in a dream world, it’s going to be bad.”

This quote is important to me, because we are living in a country where information is getting more and more available, but facts are becoming less and less important to us. Our politicians don't even bother with being factual anymore. They know the people who support them won't care if they lied, and the people who don't won't care if they told the truth. Preach to the choir is how we do business now.

Mattis I believe would reject that as SecDef. He is very much a man who values the truth over what he wants to hear. And to be honest, he is the only one in the incoming administration that seems to value that. Being honest and being effective are big parts of who Mattis is. We've needed that for a long time, and it'll be especially valuable now.

Another big part of why you are seeing waves of military and exmilitary supporting him is because he supported us. Mattis put his troops first throughout his career. He even once pulled duty for a Marine so that young guy could spend Christmas with his family. His explanation by General Krulak: “So I said to him, ‘Jim, what are you standing the duty for?’ “And he said, ‘Sir, I looked at the duty roster for today and there was a young major who had it who is married and had a family; and so I’m a bachelor, I thought why should the major miss out on the fun of having Christmas with his family, and so I took the duty for him.’ ". Find me the time Trump or Hillary took over a job for one of their workers on a holiday. I'll wait.

That is why servicemen and servicewomen support him and would follow him into hell. He was a man who didn't demand respect, he earned it. We loved him because he was one of us, not above us. He worked his way up from infantry ranks all the way to General. He knew what life was like as one of us. We learned the hard way what it was like having a General who did not know what it was like as a front line troop when we got General Amos as Commandant. He was the antithesis of Mattis. A man who threw his troops under the bus to protect himself. In other words, a man who emulated US politicians. Few Marines would follow Amos to a Dairy Queen, even if he was buying.

One thing about General Mattis that should make my liberal readers more comfortable is that I don't think Trump understands exactly what he is getting with him. Trump was confident he could force the military to obey even blatantly unlawful orders. He wouldn't even be able to control his own SecDef if he tried it. Mattis would absolutely stand up against that garbage, and what is Trump going to do? Fire the one and only pick that the US is happy about? Can a man who commands far more respect that he ever could? I seriously doubt it. On veterans sites I am already seeing vets asking how many people have to go before Mattis would become president (the answer btw is Mattis would be 6th in line). You think Trump has the grapes to can Mattis for refusing to administer orders that break our laws and treaties? I highly doubt it.

What Marines Dream About

If you were worried about the ignorant things Trump said he'd do with the military, than I highly suggest you think about supporting General Mattis. Don't just trust me. Look into the man's life and talk to people who have served under him. Try as I might, I haven't found a single person who has served under him who don't wholeheartedly support him as SecDef. That should speak volumes about who he is.

In summary, if you want a strong military that is intimidating to forces that want to hurt us, Mattis is a great pick. If you want a military that acts justly and professionally, Mattis is a great pick. If you want someone who will stand up for American values when stupid orders come from above, Mattis is a great pick. He's not perfect. He's not an angel. But he is who can do the job, and likely do it the best. I know his quotes might bother some people, but as General Patton said:

“When I want my men to remember something important, to really make it stick, I give it to them double dirty. It may not sound nice to some bunch of little old ladies at an afternoon tea party, but it helps my soldiers to remember. You can't run an army without profanity; and it has to be eloquent profanity. An army without profanity couldn't fight its way out of a piss-soaked paper bag. … As for the types of comments I make, sometimes I just, By God, get carried away with my own eloquence.”

I leave you with a letter sent by Mattis to his Marines. Read this, and see if you can understand why he is so beloved.

P.S. That comic above was taken from www.TerminalLance.com. Max is an great artist, motivating person, and a filthy Marine veteran like yours truly. Please take the time to visit his site and appreciate his work.

You Have To Invite Them In

So this election huh? I have friends in other countries calling me like we just experienced a natural disaster.

"Are you OK?"

"Has anyone you know been hurt?"

"What are things like over there???"

This election has been a tough one. First, because there is a short list of pros, and a seemingly constantly growing list of cons for each candidate. Neither side had to worry about running out of ammunition. If it came close we just had to wait a couple hours and a new Hillary email would surface, or a new Trump recording would be published, and we were all back into the mudpit.

But this happens every four years right? This might make my naiveness show, but I think this election has been unique when you're looking at what was going on in society. We've always had divides in this country. We fought an entire war over it. Now that we have President-elect Trump, of course close to 50% people are going to be angry for awhile. That's just the nature of the beast. Right?

I wouldn't call myself a history buff, but I do enjoy it. Oftentimes I'll see people complaining about how horrible the world is becoming and laugh to myself because those people are forgetting what the world used to be. Even with all the conflicts in the world, the rate of violence has been falling dramatically. I am a OIF veteran. I have seen conflict and some of my friends didn't come back from there. Total deaths of US military between Iraq and Afghanistan come in right under 7,000. That is a terrible loss of life, but let us not forget that in the World Wars, there was tens of thousands of men dying in just a single battle. Even Napoleon had a famous quote "You cannot stop me. I can spend 30,000 men a month". That is terrifying.

Now if you look at our election this month with a more historical perspective, should this be an election that causes this much friction? I'm not pretending that there isn't anything going on. Trump will have to make some serious and divisive decisions while president. But we've held elections during World Wars. We held elections during The Cold War when we were all sitting on the button, waiting to see who called who's bluff first and kill us all. Those were far more important elections, and obviously before my time, but from what I see and read, it still didn't feel as personal for your average American as this election did.

Why is that? While there is a lot of stress in the world, for us Americans it's relatively calm. Economy is doing decent. The wars we are in have lost a lot of their steam. The refugee issue is more of a theoretical problem than a real issue with The US. I don't even know anyone who knows anyone that has met a Syrian refugee. Not exactly life changing. We have so little going on here we argue about Starbucks holiday cups. Or the Kardashians.

The biggest culprit is the media, and both sides are sure that the media is against them. It's the media's fault Trump ever had a chance. It's the media's fault they make Trump look bad. It's always the media's fault. They have a conspiracy one way or another, and they breed in controversy to make themselves money! Or so screams Americans.

I have worked in the military, in government jobs, and for large corporations, and something I have come to realize is there is a lot less thought and planning than everyone assumes. The military and government is almost always like a dog chasing a ball. Little thought, even less planning. Everyone is flying by the seat of their pants. Corporations aren't much different. Every big company I have worked for reminded me very much of a quote that I can't remember well enough to attribute correctly, but it's essence was "It is so disorganized if you kicked it's ass the head won't realize it for a week". Imagining these organizations having these carefully crafted, secretive plans is hilarious to me.

Here is my completely unsubstantiated idea about the media. Are they digging their claws into our lives, making public things personal and causes way more animosity than it should? I believe so. But I don't think it was done intentionally, or even willingly. I think we demanded it, and the media provided the service.

Imagine you are a media executive. You are giving important and relevant news for years, but now you have to be providing fresh material 24 hours a day. So you resort to throwing in some filler crap. Let's toss in something about the candidate's personal life that might intrigue some people, but is barely relevant to the election. But then, holy crap! The public LOVED that filler material. Your ratings jumped, which put more money in your pocket and more stability in your career. You know that the material was junk that held no relevance to important thought, but what are you going to do? Turn down extra money and acclaim?

I would love to believe that I have the constitution to do what is right in that situation, ignore the money and only display important material. But even if I did do you think those shareholders didn't notice? You think they are going to let me go with my morals, or fire me and put someone in who pulls in the ratings and the money?

What I am saying is I really doubt there is some big global conspiracy against us. It's just that we as consumers are demanding this junk news, and all the media is doing is chasing those dollars we are throwing at them to show it. Americans love to be outraged, and we will pay top dollar for it. It reminds me of the Kardashians. You can't go a day in the US without hearing people say how much they hate the Kardashians and how bad they are for America. But we keep throwing money at them don't we? The Kardashians aren't the problem, us buying what they are selling is the problem. If someone would pay me millions to act like an idiot on TV, you better get ready for the Simmons Show. I doubt you would turn down that money either.

We aren't victims people. We are consumers who are demanding this stuff and not liking what we are demanding. We've demanded the media come into our homes, sit at our dinner table, and outrage us all. We've demanded an election convert from "I think this would be the best way, and my opponent thinks this will be the best way" to "If my opponent wins the USA is doomed and if I win it'll be a angelic utopia!!!". If we want the media to change, we need to stop rewarding them for doing us wrong. All they are doing is what we are incentivising them to do, and expecting them to have better morals than we do.

Look Pretty For The Camera

There is ongoing research showing that the way we experience something is at least as important as what we experience. Reading a book rather than seeing a video of something has markedly different ways you process that information. Being at an event affects you differently than seeing it on TV. To what extent it changes, we're not sure yet.

Which makes me wonder how much the way we as people experience things has changed rapidly in the present day. Think about it. How many years of humanity was it the only way I could relay a message to anyone was by speaking it directly to them? The best guess was about 100,000 years and that is constantly in argument. Then how many centuries was it it was solely the written word to relay information to one another? About another 3300 years until the telegraph was invented, and for many decades after the written word stayed king. Now it's cell phones, TVs, radio, internet and many growing new ways. Our bodies have not changed much over the last couple hundred years, but what we do with them has changed drastically.

Now think about experiences we all assume we share. Like being a child and how your parents handled and interacted with you. What being a kid and a teenager is like. We all assume it's by and large the same. But is it anymore, and how will we be impacted by those changes?

A friend of mine posted a video of a little girl having an intimate moment with her mother and little sister. Very cute and heartwarming video that a good amount of us can relate to having with our parents or having with our children. But think of how that little girl saw it. She was having a bonding moment with her family, and she is having a cell phone camera put in her face. She isn't just having a moment anymore, she was performing for the camera, and likely could hardly see her mother.

Don't think I am saying that lady did anything wrong. I have family across the world who want videos and pictures of our kids regularly. I don't want those families left out of important moments with my kids. If I had caught a close moment like that with my kids I would have been ecstatic that I got so lucky and posted it everywhere.

Look at my kids damn it!

But am I fundamentally changing how my kids are having experiences by shoving a camera into the equation? You go to a kids' school event these days and look at the parents, it's just a wall of the backs of their phones. Maybe an actual real camera or two for those folks who really went all out. The amount of parents' faces those kids can see can be counted on one hand. I remember having school events when I was a kid. I was a kid in the early nineties, not that long ago. There were cell phones, but few people had them and you were lucky if they actually could make a call, little on take 4K video and high definition pictures. When I would look out from those events I was doing what every other kid was doing. Seeking out my family. Can my kid do that with me? Only if they can recognize my cell phone case. They certainly can't see if I am looking enthusiastic, or happy, or proud.

Beyond even lack of facial recognition, how does putting an audience in the room change how kids interact? Now my kids aren't just adjusting how they are acting because of me, but also because of people viewing it on Facebook. My six year old knows how Facebook works and that videos of her get posted there. She has asked me to video her doing something and post it. How does her interaction with me change when she knows she is performing for the camera? I really doubt it has no effect. Think about those times you whipped out your camera to take a picture of something that the front facing camera was on. Not being prepared to be photographed makes you look ridiculous. 

It's not exactly unknown that we adjust how we pose, act, and talk when a camera is on. Run up to a table full of people with a camera and watch the conversation stop and everyone adjust and straighten out for the camera. Take the picture and put it away and you can literally hear the sighs of relief from everyone as they relax again, stop sucking in their gut and pushing out their chest, and continue being human beings. That's with grown adults, many of whom grew up without a camera waiting around every corner. How is this affecting our impressionable kids getting cameras shoved in their faces from the time they are in diapers until the time they can own their own camera phones.

Lastly, what about the person holding the camera? Are they getting to be a part of the experience too? When I watch my favorite shows or events, whoever is holding the camera is not even part of the equation in my mind. You can probably think up a couple famous news anchors, how many of you can think of the name of a famous cameraman? I sure can't. Am I removing myself or my wife from important experiences with our children because we have been regulated to camera duty? Will my kids remember the person interacting with them, or the person whose head has been replaced by a camera phone?

Please don't take this as me chastising you or anyone else about how you raise your children. I don't know if it's a current issue, but it seems lately that parents can't talk to one another about possible issues without coming across as pretentious or stuck up. This article (and practically all the articles that I write) is based around me questioning myself, and how I am parenting. I have no evidence that putting a camera in family events makes things better or worse. I certainly understand why parents do it. Not only to be able to let family be a part of their kids' lives, but also to be able to go back to these videos and reminiscence as my wife and I do on occasion. My worry is that I definitely am seeing a change, and I am wondering what the long term consequences of these changes are. Are they really worth the trade off, or should I toss the damn phone and just enjoy the moment with the people who are most important to me?

To Pledge or Not To Pledge

Colin Kaepernick is making headlines by refusing to stand up for the national anthem recently. Not going to lie. When I heard something an NFL player did was making waves, I was bracing myself for something terrible. Did he beat his wife? Did he rape a woman? Did he torture and abuse animals? Did he beat his son in the testicles with a switch? Did he kill some people and get away with it? I shudder to think what could have the nation more embroiled than all of the above incidents did.

Well, it turns out this is seriously the bigger issue than the formers. How dare he? Doesn't he know that the country made him a millionaire? If it wasn't for people fighting for his freedoms, he'd be speaking German! Or is it Chinese now? Russian? Hard to keep up with who is the threat lurking right outside of the US anymore.

But this Kaepernick debate has been going on for longer than him. It has been recurring in our classrooms too. Should students be forced to stand for the pledge? Are the children who don't awful? Are their parents awful? What's the most creative way we should punish or intimidate children into doing the pledge? Does it count if they don't say "under god"? How can I use the image of wounded veterans to make my point?!?!

Nailed it!

One of the most underrated benefits of being a veteran is getting used as cannon fodder (again) for other people's debates. It's seriously the best thing ever, please everyone keep it up. 

Now, for me, I absolutely do stand for the national anthem, and intend to do so for the rest of my days. But do I do it because I feel obligated to, or because I think I owe my country? I don't make millions like Kaepernick, but whatever money I do have is thanks to my country right? It has nothing to do with the work I put in personally.

The weird thing is when Obama made his infamous "You didn't build that" quote, the same people who said he was taking away from hard working business owners are the same ones implying that Kaepernick owes his fortune to the country. He didn't make that money due to his talent and hard work, but every business owner owes practically nothing to the country? How do these two thoughts coexist?

Now, I think there is an element of truth to both Obama's quote and the people saying the same about Kaepernick. He is making millions because we are a country that made his talents valuable, and gave him the opportunity to work his way up. If he was born in North Korea, he'd be the fastest running laborer a task master ever had. But he'd be far from a millionaire.

But something that is important to me is that these symbols have their own meaning for people. What "country" means can mean something totally different to me than it does to you. To me, the flag is a representation to the hard work of Americans past and present. A representation to the mythology of the US. That we support democracy. We support the downtrodden and the weak. That every person is equal and should have equal opportunities. But do we live up to those myths as a country? Whenever the CIA knocks over another democracy, When we ally with totalitarian governments like Saudi Arabia and enable them to torture their citizens? When our own citizens get treated unfairly and abused by the system?

But if I am unhappy about these issues, why do I still stand for the flag? Because for me, the flag doesn't represent our government, it represents you and I. Personally, I think those ideals were very separate not too long ago. When we talked about the flag and the US it didn't represent the government or politicians. It represented us as citizens. Our ideals, our visions, our beliefs. I believe that during the Cold War the government did it's best to tie itself to the flag, to use it as a shield. Any complaints about the government means you are complaining about America and thus you are a traitor. That didn't just end with the Cold War. Who remembers just after 9/11 and anyone calling out Bush Jr. for being the crap we all know he is now were called unAmerican or traitors? "If you don't respect the man at least respect the position".

That's why even though I am not ignorant to the many issues plaguing the US, I still will rise for the flag and salute it. I am proud of Americans, not of our government for the most part. I do believe we have lost a lot of control of our government, and we need to correct that. But giving them the flag isn't my way to fix it. That flag is ours, not theirs.

So does that mean I hate Kaepernick for not standing? No. His idea of what the flag represents can be different from mine. He could have bought into that Cold War rhetoric that government = America, and his opinion is just as valid as mine. While I disagree with him singling out the flag rather than directing his protest more accurately, I do respect any man for taking a strong stand like that. Even if it isn't something I totally agree with, our country was born from strong Americans making difficult and controversial stands. Often to quite a bit of disagreement from other Americans. They estimate that 20% of Americans were loyalists during our revolution. Another large percentage didn't want Britain, but weren't willing to fight a war over it. Where would we be without those Americans who made a stand?

Beyond Kaepernick, I see the battleground over our schools and the Pledge of Allegiance. Again, I intend to talk to my kids about what my idea is of the symbols of America. I hope they will stand for the pledge as I did as a child, and as I do now as an adult. But if any school tries to force it, or harass the children that don't stand, I would be furious. What good is it to recite some empty words to a piece of cloth if when we are tested, we are so excited about taking away rights from other Americans? Save your breath, it means nothing.

Us Americans have gotten too divided. We're getting too involved with how other Americans decide to live their lives. Our business should not be to make cookie cutters out of everyone, but defend their rights to live as they want to, and hopefully they'll defend our rights to live as we want to.