Hertling’s Dedication to Planning

Review by Bill Doughty

Most career Sailors and military veterans know this phrase: “Proper prior planning prevents piss-poor performance.” The “seven Ps” is a distant cousin of “measure twice and cut once.”

And ongoing planning is more important than just having a plan.

That’s the perspective of Lt. General Mark Hertling, U.S. Army (Retired), author of “If I Don’t Return: A Father’s Wartime Journal” (Ballast Books, 2026).

In planning to deal with his own angst about heading into combat in 1990, Hertling started a journal to his sons, writings he hoped would help them know him even if he were no longer in their lives. In his journal he shares observations, beliefs, lessons, and hopes for his young sons.

“Like so many soldiers, I once hoped I was fighting so that my sons would never have to.”

 He expresses that sentiment in the journal several times.

“That hope, noble as it was back then, proved naive. My sons did go to war. Multiple times. Always in Iraq, save two of those tours for our oldest son, Todd. So did one of our daughters-in-law. And for all practical purposes, while they didn't deploy, my wife and the spouse of our other son went to war too. All of them did so with honor, courage, humility, selfless service, and empathy for both their own soldiers and their enemies. Even knowing that, I offer this same hope once again—this time so that our grandchildren, and others who read this book, find that same grace with this wish:

“May you never face combat. But if you do, or if life ever tests you — whether in war, in family, in leadership, or in moments when character, integrity, values, and personal courage matter most — I hope you'll find strength in these pages. Strength in values. In character. In purpose. In love. In the stories and thoughts of this old soldier who wrote some random thoughts down for his family –– now also for you.”

Throughout this memoir/journal he praises his family, friends, and selfless soldiers he’s known throughout an illustrious career. He has special praise for key senior leaders he worked for as well as command sergeants major who worked for him, SNCO leaders “whose wisdom, loyalty, and fierce dedication helped shape my view of true leadership. They weren't just senior enlisted advisors. They were battle buddies, they were partners in command –– they were friends I could count on, without question,” Hertling writes.

“Many of these military friendships were forged in combat. And that matters. War, in all its chaos and clarity, forces you to strip away the unimportant and rely on the person beside you. You see people not for their rank but for their soul. That crucible of shared danger and absolute dependence creates a bond that outlasts distance, time, and even silence. These are life-bonds-brotherhoods and sisterhoods born of trust under fire. They are evergreen. 

But most people, thankfully, won't need war to discover those kinds of relationships. They find true and trusted friends in the combat of daily life. The crucible doesn't have to be courage shown in combat. 

Sometimes it's just the courage to give of yourself to others-truthfully and with candor-trusting someone else with your thoughts, sharing the parts of your heart that you can only share with a friend.”

He offers gifts of advice throughout the book.

For example…

• It’s OK to cry. “Here’s the deal: Emotion is the full spectrum of what it means to be alive –– and to love others more than yourself.”
• “Self-awareness and empathy aren’t soft skills, they’re core skills.”
• “Be a friend to all by being yourself –– no false airs.”
• “Leadership, like war, is a cumulative endeavor. You don't arrive on the battlefield—or at any new job—with a blank slate. You bring everything with you—the training, the scars, the questions you asked and the ones you were too afraid to. And if you're lucky, you bring the wisdom earned through experience and some of the scar tissue you've endured.”
• Hertling asserts, “Leadership is love in public. It is the steady choice to put people and purpose ahead of ego. It is the discipline of humility and the courage of beliefs. It is the willingness to widen the circle of responsibility until it includes not only ‘your’ people but the ones you once called ‘other.’”
• On what it means to be a man, Hertling writes, “A real man proves his masculinity by being considerate, protective, concerned, and confident –– and by demonstrating it.” [Core values > Testosterone tests.]
• A military career usually affords many moves, including often to foreign cultures, which is a gift in itself: an opportunity to experience diversity in life. “Differences are not threats to be judged –– they are windows into the should of different and unique people.”
• Hertling observes, “Humans are astonishingly diverse yet fundamentally similar.” He notes that Shalom and Salaam mean the same thing: “Peace be unto you.”
• He quotes Mark Twain with this advice: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness.” Travel, Hertling says helps you “begin to appreciate, nuance, complexity, and the truth that your way is not the only way.”

Hertling says self-reflection is the key to personal development. He reflects further on life lessons and the importance of military families’ dedication:

“Looking back across the arc of my tours, as well as the continuous wars we fought at the beginning of the twenty-first century, I'm struck by how much changed—in me, in our army, and in our families. And how much good leadership and caring for each other mattered. Desert Storm taught me how to fight. The time in Baghdad taught me how much I didn't know. The surge taught me how to lead through complexity—how to integrate force with purpose, how to trust partners, how to adapt daily to the terrain of war and the human terrain of recovery. Those conflicts also taught military families a lot. It was the most challenging thing in my life and in the lives of most of the soldiers and family members I know. And it remains the most defining for all of us. All this taught me something about trust about purpose and about the quiet burden of leadership. But I also learned a lot about resilience and the power of families.”

Good leaders never dismiss the concerns of military families for their service members.

Hertling riffs briefly on President George Washington’s “Rules of Civility and Decent Behavior in Company and Conversation,” seeing the same humor along with some still-timely truths in George’s advice just as we saw in an earlier Navy Reads post.

Included in his sometimes random thoughts are extended discourses on MREs (Meals Ready to Eat) and music appreciation: He loves the Eagles but New Kids on the Block … not so much.

On the serious side, he reflects on the importance of ongoing planning instead of relying just on a plan [some advice that seems very pertinent to whatever “planning” went into the Iran War.]

“What I've learned, and what I hope shows in this reflection, is something even more profound: Sometimes the plans don't matter— but the planning always does. 

There's a story I like that captures this lesson. In the early 1960s, President John F. Kennedy suspected the Soviets were preparing some type of provocation in Berlin. Concerned but unsure of what was coming, he asked the Pentagon to develop a series of potential responses, what the military calls an action-reaction-counteraction series of drills. 

When those potential action-reaction-counteraction plans were complete and briefed to the President, Kennedy—aware of his own limitations as a junior naval officer during WWII –– asked the planners to brief someone with deeper experience in strategic decision-making: former President Dwight D. Eisenhower. 

So, the planners went to Gettysburg. 

In Ike's quiet farmhouse near a battlefield where another kind of crisis had once played out during the Civil War, these senior officers briefed Eisenhower on their assumptions and options. They laid out potential Soviet scenarios: an armored push through the Fulda Gap, economic pressure, nuclear signaling, political propaganda campaigns. 

At the end of the briefing, one of the officers asked, ‘Mr. President, based on what we've told you, what do you think the Soviets are going to do?’ Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander who’d planned D-Day and led Allied forces in WWII, and who had been the president for eight years, paused. Then, he reportedly replied succinctly, ‘I don't really know what they're going to do. But remember—your plans mean nothing, but your planning means everything.’ 

One of the plans the Pentagon officers hadn't considered was that the Soviets would build a wall around Berlin.”

EiOn the need for planning instead of reliance on intelligence and plans, Hertling writes, “(Clausewitz) said that the smart Soldier does not put any faith in the intelligence by staff officers about the progress of the battle because most times it’s just flat wrong!”

Yesterday, Hertling wrote for the Bulwark in response to President Trump’s threat expressed to a FOX News reporter, “If Oman gets in the way, we'll bomb the shit out of them,” Trump said. 

Hertling’s essay of August 18, 2026 is titled, “Who Would Want to Be Friends with America Now,” written in the wake of Trump’s threat to Oman, his directive to cancel Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises with South Korea, his embrace of North Korea’s dictator, and his tariffs against key allies (not to mention his threats to invade Greenland, take over Canada and make the Strait of Hormuz "new American territory").

In part, Hertling writes this about Trump’s vulgar threat to Oman: "The president is threatening to bomb a country that for nearly half a century has quietly provided the United States with military access, logistical support, diplomatic assistance, and something increasingly rare in the Middle East: the ability to communicate with friends as well as enemies. For decades, Oman hasn’t been in the way, it has often been the way.

Hertling warns about a president’s power to destroy alliances. “That destruction rarely occurs with a formal announcement. More often, trust corrodes incrementally. An exercise is canceled. An ally is publicly berated. An adversary is praised. A partner wonders whether Washington will respond to help during a crisis. Another begins looking elsewhere for security or diplomatic support. And America loses a partner, an ally, or a friend.”

Questions:

• Will Congress or the 25th Amendment stop Trump from losing allies and friends?
• Why did Donald Trump say recently that families are not concerned about their Sailors welfare?
• Why did he say the USS Lincoln’s Carrier Strike Group 3 (CSG-3) deployment was “not nearly long enough”?
• Why does Secretary Pete Hegseth say the Navy can remain near the Hormuz Strait “indefinitely”?
• Did Trump and Hegseth plan for destruction of logistics basing in the region?
• Why is Trump praising North Korea’s leader –– a dictator who is helping Russia against Ukraine, who supports Iran, and who once called Trump a “dotard”?

Most importantly, What trust is there in the quality of Trump’s “proper prior planning”?

Black-and-white photo above: Former President Dwight Eisenhower (right) meets with Republican leaders at his farm at Gettysburg. Future president Gerald Ford (a Navy World War II Veteran), who was then the Minority Leader in the House of Representatives, sits far left. (Eisenhower National Historic Site)

An Imperial Presidency’s ‘Prerogative’

Review by Bill Doughty

Some of America’s greatest presidents have assumed emergency powers during crises. Jefferson took the law into his own hands when he ordered the arrest of Aaron Burr for treason. Lincoln blockaded ships of the Confederacy and employed exceptional powers in the Civil War. FDR assumed extraordinary powers as Commander in Chief Immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Jefferson, Lincoln, Roosevelt

They acted on “presidential prerogative,” a right to act temporarily outside of the Constitution as justified in times of emergency or extraordinary imminent threat to the nation.

But, like George Washington before them, they worked with Congress and followed constraints of the courts. In his farewell address, Washington rejected “change by usurpation; for through this, in one instance, may the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed.” Washington famously turned down calls to serve as president beyond his two terms.

Historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. examines the history of the tension between the executive and the other co-equal branches of government in “The Imperial Presidency” (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1973). Despite being written more than half a century ago, this remarkable book is relevant in 2026 in the era of “No Kings” protests. In fact, as we show, Schlesinger predicted what the United States is now experiencing –– 50 years after his book was published.

President John F. Kennedy and historian/advisor Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr.

Schlesinger, an advisor to JFK, was an advocate for a strong forward-thinking executive as essential to a healthy democracy. But in The Imperial Presidency –– published near the end of the Vietnam War, the Nixon presidency, and Watergate scandal –– he warns of the expansion of presidential power leading to dangerous abuse of the office.

His book and conclusions especially resonate in a topsy-turvy week –– as the current president and his administration go after a former FBI director for posting a picture of seashells, attack a comedian for telling a joke, justify tearing down part of the White House to build a ballroom, and try to manage a war of choice that is causing massive damage to the world's economy..

Years later Schlesinger also criticized George Bush’s ill-conceived “needless war” in Iraq, calling Bush an “imperial president.”

Marines marching prisoners in Iraq in 2003.

Commitment to the Constitution

Key to the success of American democracy, Schlesinger contends, is respect for and commitment to separation of powers as outlined in the U.S. Constitution.

“The American Constitution was established, for better or worse, on an idea new to the world in the eighteenth century and still uncommon in the twentieth century –– the idea of the separation of powers. This forbidding phrase represented a distinctive American contribution to the art of government. There had been no such doctrine in medieval times. Before the eighteenth century, everyone assumed that government required the unification of authority. But the Founding Fathers, who saw conflict as the guarantee of freedom, grandly defied the inherited wisdom. Instead of concentrating authority in a single institution, they chose to disperse authority among three independent branches of government, equipping the leaders of each, in the words of the 51st Federalist Paper, with the ‘necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others.’ These branches, as every schoolchild used to know, were the executive, the legislative, and the judiciary. The Constitution thus institutionalized conflict in the very heart of the American polity.

The question has always remained –– and has provided a central theme of American political history –– how a government based on the separation of powers could be made to work.”

Using events in American history, Schlesinger examines how a balance of power without checks on that power can create “inertia” that allows a president to become a corrupt autocrat. He shows how the executive branch can then manipulate fear, hate, religion, and emergencies such as war to breach the Constitution.

Schlesinger writes this:

“This book consequently devotes special attention to the history of the war-making power. The assumption of that power by the Presidency was gradual and usually under the demand or pretext of emergency. It was as much a matter of congressional abdication as of presidential usurpation. As it took place, there dwindled away checks, both written and unwritten, that had long held the Presidency under control. The written checks were in the Constitution. The unwritten checks were in the forces and institutions a President once had to take into practical account before he made decisions of war and peace –– the cabinet and the executive branch itself, the Congress, the judiciary, the press, public opinion at home and the opinion of the world. By the early 1970s the American President had become on issues of war and peace the most absolute monarch (with the possible exception of Mao Tse-tung of China) among the great powers of the world.

The Indochina War placed this problem high on the national consciousness. But the end of American military involvement in Southeast Asia would not extinguish the problem. The assertions of sweeping and unilateral presidential authority remained official doctrine in foreign affairs. And, if the President were conceded these life-and-death decisions abroad, how could he be restrained from gathering unto himself the less fateful powers of the national polity? For the claims of unilateral authority in foreign policy soon began to pervade and embolden the domestic Presidency. ‘Perhaps it is a universal truth,’ Madison had written Jefferson, ‘that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad.’ The all-purpose invocation of 'national security,' the insistence on executive secrecy, the withholding of information from Congress, the refusal to spend funds appropriated by congress, the attempted intimidation of the press, the use of the White House itself as a base for espionage and sabotage directed against the political opposition –– all signified the extension of the imperial Presidency from foreign to domestic affairs. Underneath such developments there could be discerned a revolutionary challenge to the separation of powers itself.”

Schlesinger continues:

“This book is written out of a double concern. The first concern is that the pivotal institution of the American government, the Presidency, has got out of control and badly needs new definition and restraint. The second concern is that revulsion against inordinate theories of presidential power may produce an inordinate swing against the Presidency and thereby do essential damage to our national capacity to handle the problems of the future. The answer to the runaway Presidency is not the messenger-boy Presidency. The American democracy must discover a middle ground between making the President a czar and making him a puppet. The problem is to devise means of reconciling a strong and purposeful Presidency with equally strong and purposeful forms of democratic control. Or, to put it succinctly, we need a strong Presidency — but a strong Presidency within the Constitution.”

The solution is to find a balance between a strong executive and strong guardrails of, by, and for the people. Schlesinger examines the yin-yang relationship between the executive and legislative branches within the context of the War Powers Act and how the military is used or abused.

[Of note, England’s King Charles spoke to a joint session of Congress yesterday in this “No Kings” era and 250th commemoration of the birth of the United States. Charles praised the prowess of the American military. And he gently rebuked those who are against NATO, who oppose support for Ukraine, who only look "inward," who refuse to recognize climate change, and who want an imbalance of power without checks and balances. He did not mention directly the hundreds of women who were victims of Epstein, Maxwell and friends (including Charles’s brother Andrew).]

Corruption and Tyranny

Near the end of The Imperial Presidency, Schlesinger makes the provocative statement that “Watergate was potentially the best thing to have happened to the Presidency in a long time.”

Facing certain impeachment, Nixon was forced to resign the presidency. His associates were jailed and humiliated. But accountability and lessons-learned sometimes do not last forever.

Here’s Schlesinger's astounding prediction from 50 years ago:

“We have noted that corruption appears to visit the White House in fifty-year cycles. This suggests that exposure and retribution inoculate the Presidency against its latent criminal impulses for about half a century. Around the year 2023 the American people would be well advised to go on the alert and start nailing down everything in sight.

A constitutional Presidency, as the great Presidents had shown, could be a very strong Presidency indeed. But what kept a strong President constitutional, in addition to checks and balances incorporated within his own breast, was the vigilance of the nation. Neither impeachment nor repentance would make much difference if the people themselves had come to an unconscious acceptance of the imperial Presidency. The Constitution could not hold the nation to ideals it was determined to betray. The reinvigoration of the written checks in the American Constitution depended on the reinvigoration of the unwritten checks in American society. The great institutions — Congress, the courts, the executive establishment, the press, the universities, public opinion — had to reclaim their own dignity and meet their own responsibilities. As Madison said long ago, the country could not trust to "parchment barriers" to halt the encroaching spirit of power. In the end, the Constitution would live only if it embodied the spirit of the American people.”

The presidency has some prerogatives in times of crisis. But in the American democracy, Congress has the prerogative to impeach the president, fund the government, and declare war. Under the Constitution, the media (and comedians) have the prerogative and right to free expression. And the people have the ultimate prerogative through their voice and vote –– as long as voting is not corrupted by an imperial presidency.

“Unless the American democracy figures out how to control the Presidency in war and peace without enfeebling the Presidency across the board, then our system of government will face grave troubles,” Schlesinger warns.

The Imperial Presidency concludes with a quote from Walt Whitman:

“"There is no week nor day nor hour when tyranny may not enter upon this country, if the people lose their supreme confidence in themselves, –– and lose their roughness and spirit of defiance –– Tyranny may always enter –– there is no charm, no bar against it –– the only bar against it is a large resolute breed of men [and women].”

Civility ‘By George’

Review by Bill Doughty

In his first Easter address today Pope Leo XIV said this, in part: “Let those who have weapons lay them down! Let those who have the power to unleash wars choose peace! Not a peace imposed by force, but through dialogue! Not with the desire to dominate others, but to encounter them!”

In one of President Trump's messages issued on Easter Sunday, after threatening to bomb Iran “back to the Stone Age,” Trump said: “Tuesday will be Power Plant Day, and Bridge Day, all wrapped up in one, in Iran. There will be nothing like it!!! Open the Fuckin’ Strait, you crazy bastards, or you’ll be living in Hell – JUST WATCH! Praise be to Allah.”*

George Washington would not have approved of Trump’s message.

First Commander in Chief George Washington lived by a code of manners, habits, and values. His 110 rules may seem quaint by today’s standards, but many of his words of wisdom –– which originally came from a French Jesuit book of etiquette –– resonate powerfully hundreds of years later, especially when we compare his code of conduct with that of the current CINC.

Washington’s rules are examined in “By George!: Mr. Washington’s Guide to Civility Today” by Steven Michael Selzer (Andrews McMeer Publishing 2000).

Selzer wrote this small book more than 20 years before Trump dared to compare himself as a better president than Abraham Lincoln or George Washington.

Selzer observed cracks in society at the turn of the millennium with plenty of symptoms of incivility, hate speech, and meanness. He writes:

“Rudeness. Crudeness. Thoughtlessness. Uncivilized behavior is everywhere. From the boss who publicly chews out her assistant, to the driver who barrels dangerously down the highway, to the sports fan who yells obscenities at the ball game, there is little doubt that we live in an increasingly barbaric world. And it's just as clear that many of us would like to see things change.

Polls indicate that a great many Americans long for greater civility because the way we treat one another has a powerful impact on our daily life. Civility in this context goes beyond good manners. It means behaving honorably and ethically in all aspects of our lives.

The problem is we just don't know how to behave anymore. On the one hand we're taught to be forthright and assertive in our interactions, while on the other hand there is an expectation that we will be extremely polite — even passive –– when faced with a problem or conflict. The mixed messages are confusing and misleading. What Americans need is a model of civility, one we can look to for insight and inspiration.”

Washington copied the 110 rules down at age fourteen and kept them as his model for good and honorable behavior.

Many of the rules apply to a different time in history –– an 18th century era of castes, chauvinism, and codes for dress, table manners, and body language. For example, Rule 2 says, basically, “watch where you scratch;” Rule 9 admonishes, loosely, “don’t spit in the fire;” Rule 13 advises, literally, “Kill no vermin, as fleas, lice, ticks, etc., in the sight of others;” and Rule 100 tells diners, “Cleanse not your teeth with the tablecloth, napkin, fork, or knife.”

Washington's wording sometimes comes across as old-fashioned and stilted, but Selzer helps translate and contextualize the insights along the way.

Many of the 110 rules stand out as golden rule common sense advice, which is especially relevant 250 years after the birth of the United States. There is some redundancy and a scolding tone, but there are also some gems that reach across the years:

Rule 1: “Every action done in company ought to be done with some sign of respect to those that are present.” Show some respect, including to the legislature, judiciary, and media!

Rule 6: “Sleep not when others speak, sit not when others stand, speak not when you should hold your peace.” Wake up even if you’re not “woke.”

Rule 21: “Reproach none for the infirmities of nature, not delight them that have have them in mind.” Don’t make fun of disabilities.

Rule 22: “Shew not yourself glad at the misfortune of another, though he were your enemy.” Speak only good things about those who pass away –– or say nothing at all.

Rule 25: “Superfluous compliments and all affectation of ceremony are to be avoided.” Be careful about commenting on the appearance of others or in wrapping yourself in the flag.

Rule 26: “Remove your hat to persons of distinction … make a reverence…” Especially during dignified transfers of the remains of service members who die in wars you start. It’s common sense.

In a speech to the citizens of Baltimore on April 17, 1789, Washington said, “It appears to me that little more than common sense and common honesty, in the transaction of the community at large, would be necessary to make us a great and happy nation.”

Rule 35: “Let your discourse with men of business be short and comprehensive.” Selzer expounds: “Be short and comprehensive in speech. It is inconsiderate to waste the time of others.” Ramble not.

Rule 36: (Translates to) Remain humble and treat everyone equally. “…Treat them with affability and courtesy, without arrogancy.”

Rule 47: “Mock not nor jest at anything of importance, break no jests that are sharp and biting..” Imagine George’s and the other founders’ horror at some of the AI generated memes and vitriolic social media texts by the current White House.

Rule 49: “Use no reproachful language against anyone, neither curse nor revile.” [*For example, Trump’s Easter post to Iran.]

Selzer notes, “Profanity demeans us, not those against whom we use it. And it usually backfires.”

Rule 50: “Be not hasty to believe flying reports to the disparagement of any.” Ignore gossip and rumors –– and conspiracies such as Big Lies and distorted statistics.

Rule 56: “Associate yourself with men of good quality …” Consider Trump’s second administration, which included Kristi Noem and Pam Bondi and still includes (for now) Kash Patel, Tulsi Gabbard, and Pete Hegseth. His first choice for Attorney General was Matt Gaetz.

Rule 58: “Let your conversation be without malice or envy as a sign of a commendable nature.”

Rule 59: “Never express anything unbecoming nor act against the moral rules…”

Rule 61: “Utter not base and frivolous things among grave and learned men…”

Rule 63: “A man ought not to value himself of his achievements or rare qualities of wit, much less of his riches, virtue, or kindred.” How many presidents railed publicly about not receiving the Nobel Peace Prize or bragged about their wealth and self-proclaimed virtues?

Rule 76: “While you are talking, point not with your finger at him of whom you discourse, nor approach too near to him to whom you talk, especially to his face.” Including members of the press.

Rule 82: “Undertake not what you cannot perform but be careful to keep your promise.” If you promise to lower prices, release all the Epstein files, and not start a war it’s important to keep your promises.

Selzer adds, “A promise is to keep. Trust is based on performing on your promises. You should always be there when it counts. People rely on you, and you should be willing to make a personal sacrifice to meet your commitments.”

Public office should not be a means for self-enrichment and profiteering. Selzer notes that during the eight years General Washington fought the Revolutionary War, he spent only three days of respite at his Mount Vernon home. “To keep a promise, George Washington believed in sacrifice –– he lost half his net worth during the Revolutionary War.”

Rule 88: “Be not tedious in discourse, make not many digressions, nor repeat often the same manner of discourse.” Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Rule 89: “Speak not evil of the absent, for it is unjust.” Selzer adds, “Fairness is basic to our entire social system.” And, “If ever there was a golden opportunity to exercise the golden rule, this is it.”

Rule 110: “Labor to keep alive in your breast that little spark of celestial fire called conscience.” If you have a conscience.

Washington’s final rule focuses on conscience as the ultimate guide toward civility. He frowned on hubris, self-importance, and dishonest behavior. Instead, he sought to follow his conscience toward humility, kindness, respect, tolerance, restraint and empathy. Civility

George Washington lived core values of Honor, Courage, and Commitment.

One of his namesakes, USS George Washington (CVN 73), is part of the Forward-Deployed Naval Forces and calls Yokosuka, Japan, its current home.