Quotable
05.04.2011 at 06:59pm
Tom Ricks quotes “the likely next chairman of the JCS” on operational risk and career cowardice – excerpted from the May issue of the Marine Corps Gazette:
“The enormous irony of the military profession is that we are huge risk takers in what we do operationally — flying airplanes on and off a carrier, driving a ship through a sea state five typhoon, walking point with your platoon in southern Afghanistan — but publishing an article, posting a blog, or speaking to the media can scare us badly. We are happy to take personal risk or operational risk, but too many of us won’t take career risk.”
The author is Admiral James Stavridis, Commander, U.S. European Command.
