Do you agree with potential charges against GEN Petraeus?

I never worked for the man, and never served under him as far as any major units go... however, we lost 3 guys in my Platoon due to a deep buried I.E.D and they kept pushing back the memorial ceremony at Camp Taji and I was trying to figure out why. Later when we saw a couple of Expeditions pull up "I was on the honor guard team", we realized that he and the CSM had flown in to partake in the wake for those falling hero's. Once we rendered honors we came back in and saw him and the CSM go up first to pay there respects and render there hand salute and they walked out the room, and got into the Expedition, drove to the flight line and got on a Blackhawk and headed to go knows where in Iraq.

To think that the man would come down during the high points of the war for us it was "THE SURGE" and render those honors to my Sapper/Engineer Brothers meant a lot to me. At that time in the war we were losing over 100 Soldiers a month. I don't care who he banged or what was claimed he did.. as a Soldier I will never forget that or him. He is good to go as far as I am concerned!

CW5 Jim Steddum. Are you kidding me? NO!!! Absolutely & Positively NO!!! Warmest Regards, Sandy

I have personally interacted and been led by General Petraeus......He was my 1st BDE Commander when I was assigned to HHC 2/504 PIR and then he was my Division Commander when I was in the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault). He led us into Iraq in OIF I and I will always remember him driving by our convoy after an attack for which we successfully repelled. He drove by in an unarmored HMMWV and threw all of us a thumbs up and a smile. General Petraeus was the mastermind of the few successes we had in Iraq and Afghanistan. I would follow him anywhere. He knew how to inspire Soldiers and tactically win wars. He was not perfect and I understand that he had flaws, but it sickens me that our DOJ is dragging out a witch hunt to find fault in this man. It screams politically driven intent to destroy this man. He was not a fan of pulling out of Iraq and look what happened. What he said would happen, did. He was not a fan of pulling out of Afghanistan and there is a possibility that he will be right about that as well. But all of that goes against the Presidents agenda and intent. Therefore, this is all now coming to light 2 years after the investigation started. There is some eye brow raising coincidences to this situation and it really doesn't sit well with me. This has political assassination written all over it.

On the one hand, it sounds extremely political to me. On the other hand, even as a 4-star General, he is not above the law (or the UCMJ), so the investigators should look at the situation fairly. Unfortunately, because GEN Petraeus is such a personality and potential political foe, there's probably no such thing as fair when it comes to an investigation into his alleged wrongdoing.

Let's break this down into bite size pieces.
- Charge. Boils down to allegedly sharing classified information.
- Shared with whom. His mistress. A USMA graduate, LTC in the reserves with a security clearance, who was writing a book on him.
- Negative impact to the nation. To be determined but my guess is negligible in terms of did the mistress share the information with adversaries of the United States (doubtful).
- Guilt/Innocence. TBD but likely happened.
- Extenuation/Mitigation. See above negative impact to the nation.
- Behind the scenes. Appears to be a case of pole vaulting over a mouse turd. Therefore begs the questions of why, why now, and what is end state for DOJ (and POTUS). Call me crazy but last six years of DOJ actions do not fill me with confidence that national laws are uniformly and equally applied to all and enforced. The examples are too numerous to list all but a few include: Illegal immigrant executive order, police shootings, Islamic terrorist attacks (sorry work place violence incidents), and voting irregularities.

I think Gen Petraeus is a great leader, however, if they have evidence and prove that the classified information he shared was in violation of his non disclosure agreement and caused harm to our nation, then he must be held accountable.

Team,

I have nothing but respect for P4. He was my Division CG in Iraq and ran PT with my Company (I was the 1SG) once around the Mosul Airfield... just jumped in formation with his aide and ran with us. He was then my CG @ CAC. He really made a difference in that assignment and shook up the typical TRADOCians to be more innovative. Hell, during a brief (I was a civilian then) he looked at me and remembered me 5 years later saying, "Cam... where do I know you from..." I explained and he immediately went into the story in 03 at Mosul. To this day I think he was one of the better, no best, senior leaders in the Army over the past score years and the fittest GO I have ever seen.

Now I drop the other boot

He is not above the law and the charges he faces need to be addressed. Period. If they are found not to be true, or unfounded, and he is vindicated... which I hope is the case (though "Hope is Not a Method" by GRS) then there can not be an accusation of cover up... should he elect to run for any office in the future... though he has stated he doesn't plan to.

Now you may say that even if proven innocent people will still whisper that he was guilty and it was a shame... to that I say simply... there will always be those that believe in the "conspiracy theories". Got it and let them. Why? You won't convince those folks otherwise...no matter what proof.

I would place a wager of a bottle Jamesons that he would say the same thing. Regardless of the affair, he was a very stand up man and leader.

My 2 cents

Question really becomes: why now? why not when they first fired him/forced retirement?

No, He Should NOT be charged. Especially given that the person who WOULD possibly bring the charges against him is himself under Contempt of Congress charges. Besides if an American War Hero is allowed to be Charged, yet Terrorist's are traded for Traitors, and Voter Intimidation against the American Voting Public at Polling Places is Overlooked & Summarily Dismissed. Then We as a Nation have Misplaced Our Priorities & have Allowed Elected Leaders to Usurp Our Moral Fabric for Political Expediency & Unmitigated, Corrupt Power. THIS Must Change, Immediately.

looks like the ugliest politics on the highest level