“I fear that in perhaps 50 years America will pay a dear price and become a land of corruption and degenerate morals”

One of the best characterizations I’ve heard of America’s Generals was distinguishing between those who came during WW II and before, and those that came after. It goes along with what Victor Davis Hanson has said many times. VDH has said that civilizations have long recognized the need at times for a complete bastard to get a particularly dirty job done.

Once that deed is done and the threat has passed, they spurned their savior and threw him to the curb. Which goes along with the previous thought that generals in earlier times took bold moves and either succeeded in a grand way or failed spectacularly.

What happened post WW II was that the “bean counter” or MBA general became the vogue. “Don’t take chances”. Colonels found the road to promotion better served by doing nothing bad, then risking failure to do something good. They put it in the context that America “hasn’t won a war since”.