Military Men Are Dumb, Stupid Animals
author: doubleplusgood
many people have asked about the origin of a quote from Henry Kissinger
regarding military men, which came from Woodward and Bernstein's "The
Final Days" (1976). Here is the complete paragraph--and for context, the
one following--excerpted from pages 194-195 of the second Touchstone
paperback edition (1994).
Alexander Haig, newly appointed White House chief of staff, greets
newsmen in H. R. Haldeman's former office on May 4, 1973. (UPI /
Bettmann)
====================


In their December 1975 Foreword to "The Final Days", Bob Woodward and
Carl Bernstein state that the book is based on interviews and
re-interviews with 394 people, concentrating on the last 100 days of
Nixon's administration. None of the quotes or information in the book is
individually footnoted or referenced--they do mention that "we did not
accord equal weight to all sources," and that "nothing in this book has
been reconstructed without accounts from at least two people."

Authors Woodward and Bernstein also note that "The Final Days" is "the
work of four people. Scott Armstrong, a former Senate Watergate
Committee investigator, and Al Kamen, a free-lance writer/researcher,
assisted us full time in the reporting, research and some of the
writing."

Kissinger's quote regarding military men comes from Chapter 14, which
extensively discusses Al Haig, Kissinger and other Nixon staff advisors'
negotiations and differences over national security issues during the
1969-1974 period.

The exact, direct quote marks begin with the word 'dumb' and terminate
after the word 'used'.

Here is the FULL KISSINGER QUOTE verbatim from the bottom two lines of
page 194 to line 14 of page 195:


====================
[paragraph]
In Haig's presence, Kissinger referred pointedly to military men as
"dumb, stupid animals to be used" as pawns for foreign policy. Kissinger
often took up a post outside the doorway to Haig's office and dressed
him down in front of the secretaries for alleged acts of incompetence
with which Haig was not even remotely involved. Once when the Air Force
was authorized to resume bombing of North Vietnam, the planes did not
fly on certain days because of bad weather. Kissinger assailed Haig. He
complained bitterly that the generals had been screamin for the limits
to be taken off but that now their pilots were afraid to go up in a
little fog. The country needed generals who could win battles, Kissinger
said, not good briefers like Haig.

[paragraph]
On another occasion, when Haig was leaving for a trip to Cambodia to
meet with Premier Lon Nol, Kissinger escorted him to a staff car, where
reporters and a retinue of aides waited. As Haig bent to get into the
automobile, Kissinger stopped him and began polishing the single star on
his shoulder. "Al, if you're a good boy, I'll get you another one," he
said.
====================

My words:
Kissinger, this evil bloated toad, has been a foreign policy advisor for
all administrations since the 60's..most recently the Bush
administration tried to put this reptile in charge of the 911
investigation...I think this is an example of the real attitude of the
PTB behind closed doors in Washington..

yep....and it gets worse......but it's better for people to fall over it
and break their necks than to warn them and hope they will make a better
choice in where they place their next step....


i don't know why we all seem to wait till the end of our Latin, when all
possibility of reconcilliation is destroyed then and only then are we
fed up enough to move, to take action.


but now i am actually astonished...the "mothers instinct to protect"
seems damaged as well...

what of our nests women!!!!!!


your children are dying! for naught

s of stone.

bl8ant...total agreement here...

we have become the most brainwashed society in history...
television, newsgroups, talk radio...the drumbeat of fear
is constant...and the voices of reason are only dim murmurs
in the background...and you are right..the instinct to protect
the children is a casualty as well...so sad..all of this...

when i read these sorta things i think those idiots missed their mark
when they crashed those planes.

I dont believe a word of it...
If it were true G. Bush would have told us so..........

Tighten up the blinders, close your eyes, walk backwards, and BAa, BAa..
We are on the right path, the path to truth....Just
believe........

We should outlaw every political Party except the right party, and elect
Bush cronies for the rest of our existance.

naww fanta...just get rid of both democrats & republicans..
every one of them..take them right from DC to yankee stadium...
and fill the seats with people ..like the colloseum...

Can I get a seat on the 50 yard line??

I dont think Yankee stadium would be big enough!!

Hey that's 30 years ago. Its a little unfair to make assumptions about
the administrations feelings about the military based on one guy
(Kissinger), 30 some years ago. Kissinger was an odd bird anyway. Nobody
understood him. Nobody could. He was also an elitist. No holding back
there at all. He was a historian and had written some magnificent works,
quite well developed stuff. I do not personally agree with a lot of his
opinions about how to negotiate. I also think his negotiation technique
likely created a lot more trouble I should have been negotiating most
likely. Things would have worked out a lot better I'm sure. But he did
have a good understanding of the problems. Still does.

But to say the current administration is any reflection of Kissinger, I
think that is a stretch.

phil-

your insights and understanding along with an honest approach of the
issues today are refreshing even if we dont always agree. repect has
been spawned, and is growing.

you are right on about kiss being an odd bird, who although he may
undestand the happenings around him was never quite as smart as he
thought he was when it came to action.
i also agree that to say because some kook said something 31 years ago
about the fodderness of troops does not make it applicable for today,
maybe thats why there was 58,000 men who died during the veitnam war
from the americans side, as opposed to the 4000 from the afgan and iraq
wars. in my way of thinking this goes a long way to prove that the
current administration actually 'cares' more than the fruitballs 30 some
odd years ago.

politicians suck, do doubt about that- the world over.

DaVinci -- trying to get caught up here in the Current threads.
Unfortunately, Kissinger's attitude has been held by others since him.
To my personal knowledge, Doug Feith and Paul Wolfowitz have a similar
attitude toward those in uniform: they are dumb and are simply there to
take orders. This is one of the reasons that they isolated General
Collin Powell when he was Sec. of State.

Of course, with these attitudes they cut themselves off from the wisdom
and experience that senior officers have. Those on the JCS and Service
staff who counselled against what the neocons wanted were all replaced
by yes-men -- like Generals Pace and Miller.

There is great bitterness now between the military leadership that feels
it was ignored when it counselled a more thoguhtful approach to the 'war
on terror', Afghanistan and Iraq, and is now being blamed for everything
that is going wrong. Most recently, of course, the senior brass
counselled against the latest troop escalation ("surge") and were told
to shut up. Retired generals then spoke out publicly, last Fall and
Winter, but were ignored by the President, Cheney and Rumsfeld, and the
still-powerful neocons who remain in the administration.

These are honorable officers, entirely dedicated to the interests of the
country, many of them VERY intelligent, and still serving they are
respecting the chain of command. But as they retire the story will
continue to become public.

oceans- your words;

These are honorable officers, entirely dedicated to the interests of
the country, many of them VERY intelligent, and still serving they are
respecting the chain of command. But as they retire the story will
continue to become public.


VERY intelligent,

but the Generals who are on the JCS are yes men? does that mean theyre
not very intelligent?

or in your mind is it the only one who are smart around here are the
ones who have an opposing view than that of the administration?

anyway, it doesnt really matter, neocons, socialist, communist,
fodder... youve got the bases all covered for us, think i'll sleep
better tonight knowing that you are on the intelligence front heading
off any craziness, what a relief!

i will say that you are very articulate and passionate about your views.

hmmmmm...

50 Yard Line, I cheer,
Hip, Hip, hooray....
Throw in another one....

Throw in a Republican this time!!!!

Sorry Oceans, There is no honor in taking the easy road out. If these
Generals had done the honorable thing they would have taken more
aggressive steps to address these problems while on active duty where
they could have done some good. Whispering in the shadows until one can
retire and then conspiring with a journalist to write a book does not
denote honor it denotes the desire to make a buck.

Those people are made Generals because they are supposed to have the
stones to stand up and tell the truth even when the truth isn't what one
wants to hear and even at the risk of their careers. The only thing
most of these people have shown me is their complete lack of support for
the men and women they are supposed to be leading and the country they
are supposed to be supporting. If their convictions are/were so strong
they would have stuck around and tried to make a difference. Even if
they had been told to retire SO WHAT. They would still get their
retirement pay and would at least have some credibility.

For the sake of arguement, let's assume the assertions about the current
admin are right. Can you imagine what the public would think had the
current administration publically and continually fired its top Generals
that stood up against everything they are currently complaining about
from the civilian sector. I think we would be looking at a completely
different scenario in both the foreign and domestic arenas.

sparky,

well said.

Hi, Jerry,

Thanks for the challenge.... Essentially, I agree with you and also
would have liked to see these senior officers be much more open and
insistent than they were. BUT, the way the governance of this country at
the Federal level is set up puts them in a very difficult position, and
I hope you will grant at least this point.

For your consideration: The Chain of Command concept posits that
ultimately a soldier must follow his (lawful) orders, and his training
is that in the end everyone rallies around the decision/command taken by
one's superior. One becomes a 'good soldier'. One's duty to provide
one's best advice is met when one respectfully advises one's commanding
officer, and then one salutes the decision he makes. Continuing dissent
is viewed as insurdination, and public dissent is viewed the act of a
renegade, not a team player.

In a 'normal' situation, this awkward balancing act works, more or less.
But when the Commander-in-Chief is bent on an insane course AND won't
stand for opposing views, the balancing act falls apart. I think this is
what happened. Powell is a good example of this; he was neutered by Bush
and the neocons. But does that mean he was a dishonorable man?

Of course, they weren't the only ones who rolled over for the President,
Cheney, and his team. Senators from both parties, George Tenet over at
the Agency, and some people in the media also rolled over.

'The government' is made up of a lot of different pieces, all in a
pretty wobbly states of balance. If we can learn anything it is that
when one part runs amok, and especially the part with the extraordinary
powers of the President, and in a situation of national panic, the
balance can simply fall apart and dig a big hole for the country.

OK, so here is my personal concern: you may be right in your
well-expressed criticism. Perhaps I am too close to too many of these
people, or too sensitive to the fact that with only a couple of
different career choices I might have ended up in their shoes.

I've laid out for you my reasons for calling them (or at least some of
them!) honorable. And I hear you when you say that they let the troops
down. I would say that it was the President and his key appointees who
let them down, first and foremost, and put them in impossible
situations.

I am anxious to hear your further thinking on this.

Oceans