Pentagon chief used personal email account until December. Do the rules only apply to the minions?

CSM Michael J. Uhlig
You actually asked a lot of questions here. No, the rules apply to everyone, and compliance SHOULD start at the top. Who is running place and holding them accountable...see should above...maybe the buck stops at the man who went to the baseball game while our allies were still pulling victims out their bombed out airport? So who is the first in a long list of people needing to be fired? Well, they will all be fired this time next year and hopefully replaced with someone with character and standards?

My reaction at this point -- with all these personal email accounts -- is that this is an indictment on the processes in place. I think these people were using their personal email accounts in many cases because they couldn't connect to their secure email in an efficient way when they weren't in the office. Whose fault is that? Now, I agree it's on them if they decide to just use a personal account -- that's bad. But did they have an equally effective secure way of conducting their email? Knowing how shoddy and unreliable some of the IT systems are in the DoD, my bet is that some of these systems just downright suck in other govt agencies, so for the user it's a decision of: (a) don't have access to email at all outside of the office, or (b) have access but only through personal means. It's a dilemma.

Lack of holding senior leadership to standards is why we have many problems. If I am a trial defense for a soldier, I will keep showing how different the UCMJ is applied. There is a comms team dedicated to ensure the SECDEF has government comms. Sad to see the excuses.