Posted on Aug 17, 2018
'Really An Amazing Moment': Former Army Officer On Trump And Security Clearances
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Retired Navy Adm. William McRaven, who oversaw the raid that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden, is asking President Trump to revoke his security clearance. In an opinion piece for The Washington Post, he expressed solidarity with former CIA Director John Brennan after Trump revoked Brennan's security clearance earlier this week.
'Really An Amazing Moment': Former Army Officer On Trump And Security Clearances
Posted from wbur.org
Security Clearance
American History
Donald Trump
Navy SEALs
Edited 6 y ago
Posted 6 y ago
Responses: 10
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To see the value of the current set of senior leaders having the ability to bring in and discuss classified things with former senior leaders, consider this example. When you are a company commander planning something, you have the the experience of your battalion commander and S3 and XO, all who have been company commanders before, to draw on. They can warn you of pitfalls they may have learned the hard way. This goes all the way up the Army chain of command.
However, when you reach the top, as a three or 4 star cimbatant commander or senior planner, who is the pool of experienced people you can bounce ideas off of, or get feedback from? It is that small group of people who have done your job already. People like former JSOC or SOCOM Commanders, former combatant commanders, etc. And it not only relates to knowledge of tactics, etc. often these leaders cultivated and maintain relationships with key foreign civilian and military leaders, which can be extremely valuable to the country.
But if you take away their clearances because they exercised their first amendment right to disagree with the current administration in a non classified way, we as a nation lose all of that valuable expertise. The country deserves to have access to the expertise of these senior people who dedicated decades of their lives to the service of our country, and the American people deserve to be able to hear their uncensored thoughts about current decisions and actions by the administration. By tying access to expertise to only those who agree with and praise the president, we are losing a valuable asset.
However, when you reach the top, as a three or 4 star cimbatant commander or senior planner, who is the pool of experienced people you can bounce ideas off of, or get feedback from? It is that small group of people who have done your job already. People like former JSOC or SOCOM Commanders, former combatant commanders, etc. And it not only relates to knowledge of tactics, etc. often these leaders cultivated and maintain relationships with key foreign civilian and military leaders, which can be extremely valuable to the country.
But if you take away their clearances because they exercised their first amendment right to disagree with the current administration in a non classified way, we as a nation lose all of that valuable expertise. The country deserves to have access to the expertise of these senior people who dedicated decades of their lives to the service of our country, and the American people deserve to be able to hear their uncensored thoughts about current decisions and actions by the administration. By tying access to expertise to only those who agree with and praise the president, we are losing a valuable asset.
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MAJ Byron Oyler
While I agree with you Sir, does Loretta Lynch and Eric Holder really need theirs now? There are people out there saying some pretty questionable shit bordering on treason.
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My position is that if you are no longer in a particular job, your security access should be reassessed. It doesn't really belong to you. And for the idiots: This in no way infringes on your free speech.
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LTC (Join to see)
The access is reassessed. And for the vast majority of people, like us, the clearances are withdrawn. That's because the Army is full of higher ranking people who served as LTC already. So there is no need to bring in retired LTCs to get that insight. But there are very few people who have served as combatant commanders, JSOC Commanders,head of the CIA, Secretary of State, etc. so they represent a valuable pool of knowledge and experience that those in those high positions now can get feedback from. That is why those senior officials retain their clearances. Not for their benefit, but for the benefit of those currently holding those positions, and ultimately the country.
And since these senior leaders dedicated most of their lives to the service of the nation, if you force them to make a choice between continuing to provide a service to the nation by providing input to the current leaders OR being able to honestly give their opinion of current events based upon unclassified events, you may very well limit their free speech. Because if they know they will lose their clearance if they say anything critical about the current policies, they may well choose not to speak out, as they believe they can still help the country by contributing to classified discussions.
So yes, there will be a very chilling effect on those ex senior leaders, and the result is that the American people will not hear voices of dissent, perhaps at times when it is most needed.
And since these senior leaders dedicated most of their lives to the service of the nation, if you force them to make a choice between continuing to provide a service to the nation by providing input to the current leaders OR being able to honestly give their opinion of current events based upon unclassified events, you may very well limit their free speech. Because if they know they will lose their clearance if they say anything critical about the current policies, they may well choose not to speak out, as they believe they can still help the country by contributing to classified discussions.
So yes, there will be a very chilling effect on those ex senior leaders, and the result is that the American people will not hear voices of dissent, perhaps at times when it is most needed.
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