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If you're at all interested in civil-military relations, read this @golby commentary on James Mattis as Secretary of Defense. Golby is fair, noting how it could have been a lot worse but faulting Mattis for shorting the "civil" part. 2 omissions warontherocks.com/2019/02/in-the…
2. Any Secretary of Defense plays a role in designing and implementing US foreign policy. This role can be problematic when the Secretary of State is a weak figure -- as both Rex Tillerson, foolishly at war with his own department, and the courtier Mike Pompeo have been.
3. Mattis. commendably, spoke often in public of his support for a strong Department of State. But the rest of the Trump administration gave little support to this cause, leaving key posts unfilled for many months and making clear the Secretary did not speak for the President.
4. In some respects, Mattis seemed to be running his own foreign policy from the Pentagon, an appearance that was not entirely his fault but which cannot have been helpful to a healthy civil-military relationship. His autonomy also helped produce one major disaster.
5. This was Yemen, where the American military has enabled a reckless Saudi/Emirati war on civilians since the latter months of the Obama administration. Al Qaeda has used Yemen as one of its bases, a valid reason for American interest in the country.
6. Iran also became a major patron of Yemen's Houthi rebels after Saudi Arabia invaded the country. Over two years later, Al Qaeda is still there, and so are the Iranians. Mattis' foreign policy autonomy did not produce success as far as American interests are concerned.
7. The blank check support for Saudi war policy that Mattis oversaw produced instead a stalemated war and a major famine affecting millions of Yemenis with whom America had no quarrel. This is a shameful thing. Mattis as Secretary never faced up to it.
8. One thing that's ordinarily pretty good for civil-military relations is winning the wars the military is involved with. Americans in and out of uniform know how to deal with success. But today the deference of civilians to the military of which Golby writes...
9... is a product of permanent war, which exalts commanders without holding them accountable for success. The extravagant regard in which Mattis was held by so many when he joined Trump's Cabinet was a symptom of this; his tenure as Secretary of Defense did not alter it. [end]
