McChrystal: 'Leadership' Includes Self-Serving, Evil Leaders

"My Share of the Task: A Memoir," by General Stanley McChrystal, 2013, Portfolio/Penguin.

Review by Bill Doughty

Gen. Stan McChrystal, the cat who caught the rat Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, has a tale to tell. The chase after the "itinerant terrorist" Al Qaeda operative takes up a good part of this book, which focuses on service, sacrifice and the true meaning of leadership – a "crushing burden" that can be good or bad, depending on the leader.

McChrystal follows Gen. David Petraeus's footsteps in several positions. Adm. Mike Mullen, one of the most respected Chiefs of Naval Operations and Chairs of the Joint Chiefs, selected McChrystal as director of the Joint Staff (chief of staff to the JCS). In this memoir McChrystal takes readers from Fort Benning to Fort Bragg and from Iraq and Afghanistan to NATO and Washington D.C.

"At the heart of the story is Afghanistan itself, a complex swirl of ethnic and political rivalries, cultural intransigence, strains of religious fervor, and bitter memories overlaid on a beautiful, but harshly poor, landscape. Without internal struggles or outside interference, Afghanistan would be a difficult place to govern, and a challenge to develop. And there have always been struggles and interference. But it's not just that. In her beauty and coarseness, in her complexity and tragedy Afghanistan possesses a mystical quality, a magnetism. Few places have such accumulated layers of culture, religion, history, and lore that instill both fear and awe. Yet those who seek to even budge her trajectory are reminded that dreams often end up buried in the barren slopes of the Hindu Kush or in the muddy fields alongside the Helmand River."

Winter on the Parwan Plains and Hindu Kush mountains Jan. 2, 2010, viewed from Bagram Air Field, Afghanistan. Photo by Capt. Thomas Cieslak, DVIDS.

He shows how dealing with fatalism and pessimism and "a sense of insecurity" was key to the success and viability of the mission. First step, drive out fear and lead with honor and a sense of duty.

But throughout this important book, McChristal shows why we cannot oversimplify war, surrender to hostage-takers or create a "false drama" through fear and tyranny.

The killing of Zarqawi, after bringing down walls of his hideaway, reads like Tom Clancy:

"At 6:12 p.m., a laser-guided, five-hundred-pound GBU-12 bomb traveling nine hundred feet per second hit the house. The explosion flashed, turning our screens in the JOC white for a split second, as smoke and dust burst up and out laterally in three columns, like the prongs of a toy jack. The F-16 circled again, and a  minute and thirty-six seconds later, using GPS coordinates, a GBU-38 hit the same spot.Thick billows of smoke streamed diagonally up from the house and frontage road, thinning over the tops of the palm grove..."Our medic leaned over the Man in Black, who was alive, but barely. Under the medic's forefingers, Zarqawi's carotid artery was deflated. His breathing was shallow, and blood seeped out of his nose and ears. The pressure caused by the blast waves had cascaded through the concrete walls of the house and pulsed through his chest cavity, bursting vessels and air sacs in his lungs..."The medic continued to work on Zarqawi. When he cleared his airway, the Green team had descended, under an orange evening sun and the long shadows of palm trees extending across the crater, beneath the clenched faces of the operators standing over him, Zarqawi's lungs failed. At 7:04 p.m., our medic called it. Zarqawi was dead."

Wyeth's Navy hero John Paul Jones

We read McChrystal's thoughts about the capture of Saddam Hussein, decision-making of President Obama, the tragic death of Cpl. Pat Tillman, the relationship with generals Charlie and Mike Flynn, the fallout from the Rolling Stone interview and his leadership influences, including John Paul Jones, George Washington, Horatio Nelson, the Scot Robert Bruce and Ulysses S. Grant.

At the end of "My Share" McChrystal shares what he learned about being a leader. Leadership, he says, "is the single biggest reason organizations succeeded or failed." In hindsight, one need only see how the leadership of Gen. McChrystal and Adm. McRaven trumps that of Gen. Mike Flynn.

"Leadership is the art of influencing others," McChrystal writes, acknowledging "it is difficult to measure and often difficult to adequately describe."

"All leaders are human. They get tired, angry, and jealous and carry the same range of emotions and frailties common to mankind. Most leaders periodically display them. The leaders I most admired were totally human but constantly strove to be the best humans they could be..."Leaders make mistakes, and they are often costly. The first reflex is normally to deny the failure to themselves; the second is to hide it from others, because most leaders covet a reputation for infallibility. But it's a fool's dream and is inherently dishonest... "There are few secrets to leadership. It is mostly just heard work. More than anything else it requires self-discipline. Colorful, charismatic characters often fascinate people, even soldiers. But over time, effectiveness is what counts. Those who lead most successfully do so while looking out for their followers' welfare... "In the end, leadership is a choice. Rank, authority, and even responsibility can be inherited or assigned, whether or not an individual desires or deserves them. Even the mantle of leadership occasionally falls to people who haven't sought it. But actually leading is different. A leader decides to accept responsibility for others in a way that assumes stewardship of their hopes, their dreams, and sometimes their very lives. It can be a crushing burden, but I found it an indescribable honor."

McChrystal is agnostic about whether leaders can be good or evil.

He uses Adolf Hitler and Zarqawi as examples of effective leaders who had a sway over believers. Bad leaders can be elected to lead nations or closed-minded minions at least for a time. "Self-serving or evil intent motivates some of the most effective leaders I saw," he said.

More recently, McChrystal – writing with former Navy SEAL and Special Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs Jeff Eggers and former United States Marine Jason Mangone – published "Leaders: Myth and Reality," a book in our Navy Reads reading queue.

Gates presents McChrystal with Distinguished Service Medal in 2010.

He and his co-authors examine both tyrannical leaders and leaders of principle, with some eclectic choices: Walt Disney, Harriet Tubman, Zheng He, Robespierre, Robert E. Lee and, yes, rat-leader Zarqawi, among others.

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates calls "Leaders: Myth and Reality" "a superb, thought-provoking challenge to conventional understandings of the nature of leadership. An enlightening, entertaining must-read about why we revere so many leaders who are often deeply flawed and even unsuccessful, and the lessons for thinking about and teaching leadership in the future."

In "My Share of the Task" McChrystal reveals: Evil or incompetent leaders can be shut down by honorable and ethical free-thinking leader-followers who realize that strong leadership is not the same as being a "good" leader.

Ladies and Gentlemen, We are Experiencing 'Turbulence'

Review by Bill Doughty

People who say Americans have never been more divided must not be aware of the history of the United States. We were more divided many times in our history, including in my lifetime during the late 1960s and early 70s.

Obviously, we were more split apart during the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln, arguably our greatest president, brought a divided nation together, arguing against a wall between North and South. 

Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin.

In "Leadership in Turbulent Times" (Simon & Schuster, 2018) Pulitzer Prize winner Doris Kearns Goodwin shows how Lincoln was the bridge from George Washington to Theodore Roosevelt and into the 20th century and key presidents Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Lyndon Baines Johnson.

"From childhood, Theodore Roosevelt's great hero was Abraham Lincoln, whose patient resolve sought to follow all his life. And for Abraham Lincoln, the closest he fond to an ideal leader was George Washington, whom he invoked when he bade farewell to his home in 1861, drawing strength from the first president as he left Illinois to assume a task 'greater than that which rested upon Washington.' If George Washington was the father of his country, then by affiliation and affinity, Abraham Lincoln was his prodigious son. These four men form a family tree, a lineage of leadership that spans the entirety of our country's history."

In the case of the Roosevelts, Navy readers will see TR's and FDR's roles as part of the Navy's lineage.

FDR as Assistant Secretary of the Navy.

Working as assistant secretary of the Navy under Secretary Josephus Daniels proved challenging at first for the young Franklin Delano Roosevelt, "who, despite his unfolding leadership skills, remained deficient in one essential quality – humility."

Yet he learned to harness his ego and focus his energies in collaborative and constructive efforts to strengthen the Navy.

"Those who witnessed young Roosevelt in the Navy Department, however, clearly understood that they were in the presence of a striking intelligence. 'A man with a flashing mind,' was how one rear admiral described him. 'It took my breath away,' he said, 'to see how rapidly he grasped the essentials of a situation,' how thoroughly he absorbed 'the details of the most complicated subjects.'To gain a dynamic up-to-date picture of the size and capacity of the current fleet and the disposition of the 65,000 military and civilian personnel, Franklin had fixed to his office wall a large map of the world. Colored pins denoted the position of every ship in the fleet. Whenever a ship moved, the pins were moved. Other pins indicated the numbers of people employed at various navy yards, docks and supply centers, allowing him to see what was transpiring. From the start, he formed a mental image of the Navy as a living organism rather than a moribund bureaucracy filled with 'dead wood'; he envisioned a vast organization comprised of people working in places and working in jobs that could be grown into a Navy 'second to none.'With a glance at his wall map, Roosevelt noted dozens of useless navy yards, originally designed for the maintenance of sailing vessels presently operating at great loss due to patronage and political pressure. Rather than closing these obsolete yards, he conceived of a new plan. He would convert each one into a specialized industrial plant for the manufacture of vessels and equipment needed for an expanded modern manufacture of vessels and equipment needed for an expanded modern navy. The old Brooklyn Navy Yard would specialize in radios to outfit the fleet. Ropes and anchors and chains for battleships would become the province of the Boston yard, Cruisers would be built in Philadelphia, submarines and destroyers in Norfolk. This new mode of reorganization gave Roosevelt a reputation as an 'economizer.' More importantly, such consolidation was a necessary step to ready a peacetime navy for a potential war."

When that war came, Kearns notes – two years after the German navy sank the Lusitania in 1915 – President Wilson was grateful for the "visionary" FDR, who "was certain that his insistence on preparedness would ultimately save his countrymen's lives."

FDR's commitment to readiness mirrored that of his cousin Theodore Roosevelt, who prior to becoming the 26th president, also served as assistant secretary of the Navy.

Kearns reminds readers of TR's remarks at the Naval War College in which "he drew from the wisdom of the country's first president. 'A century has passed since Washington wrote, 'To be prepared for war is the most effectual means to promote peace,''' he began. 'In all our history there has never been a time when preparedness for war was any menace to peace.' The speech garnered widespread praise, making Roosevelt a leading proponent of preparedness and war-readiness.'"

Kearns evaluates the leadership qualities and ties of both Roosevelts as well as those of Abraham Lincoln and Lyndon Baines Johnson, observing them "through the exclusive lens of leadership." She notes that Lincoln, TR and FDR "rank among our greatest presidents," despite their flaws. "The case of Lyndon Johnson is more problematic."

Young DKG with President LBJ.

She writes, "While Johnson's conduct during the (Vietnam) war will continue to tarnish his legacy, the passing years have made clear that his leadership in civil rights and his domestic vision in the Great Society will stand the test of time."

Kearns begins and ends her examination of leadership in turbulent times with the importance of leaders who learn humility and the importance of support of a majority of the people they were elected to lead. "'With public sentiment, nothing can fail,' Abraham Lincoln said, 'without it, nothing can succeed.' Such a leader is inseparably linked to the people. Such leadership is a mirror in which people see their collective reflection."

Kearns masterfully uses history to bring out key qualities found in good leaders. These include, among others:

• Lead by example.
• Keep temper in check.
• Keep your word.
• Forge a team aligned with action and change.
• Shield colleagues from blame.
• Set forth a compelling picture of the future.
• Use history to provide perspective.
• Refuse to let past resentments fester; transcend personal vendettas.
• Set a standard of mutual respect and dignity; control anger.
• Identify the key to success. Put ego aside.
• Be open to experiment. Design flexible agencies to deal with new problems.
• Address systemic problems. Launch lasting reforms.
• Tell the story simply, directly to the people.
• Be accessible, easy to approach.
• Bring all stakeholders aboard.
• Infuse a sense of shared purpose and direction.
• Restore confidence to the spirit and morale of the people.
• Strike the right balance of realism and optimism.
• Honor commitments.
• Master the power of narrative.
• Share credit for the successful resolution.
• Leave a record behind for the future.
• The readiness is all.

Although we may not be as divided as we've been in the past, history shows divisions can grow. Yet in a real national emergency, even in the most turbulent times – including the Civil War, World Wars I and II, and Vietnam – Americans can come together in the aftermath under the right leadership. We can thank the founders and the Constitution for creating a system of government with checks and balances as a protection from tyranny.



(Kearns dedicates her book in part to her late husband Richard Goodwin, who we featured last year on Navy Reads.)