Troop Leaders Quotes

Therefore the skillful leader subdues the enemy's troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field.

Trench fighting is the bloodiest, wildest, most brutal of all ... Of all the war's exciting moments none is so powerful as the meeting of two storm troop leaders between narrow trench walls. There's no mercy there, no going back, the blood speaks from a shrill cry of recognition that tears itself from one's breast like a nightmare.

any general who isn’t connected spiritually to his troops is not a combat leader.

The Dichotomy of Leadership A good leader must be: • confident but not cocky; • courageous but not foolhardy; • competitive but a gracious loser; • attentive to details but not obsessed by them; • strong but have endurance; • a leader and follower; • humble not passive; • aggressive not overbearing; • quiet not silent; • calm but not robotic, logical but not devoid of emotions; • close with the troops but not so close that one becomes more important than another or more important than the good of the team; not so close that they forget who is in charge. • able to execute Extreme Ownership, while exercising Decentralized Command. A good leader has nothing to prove, but everything to prove. APPLICATION

I wonder of what you must daily endure in America, having no government to protect you, no one to tell you what to do. Is it true you're given no ration card, that you must find food for yourself? Is it true that you labor for no higher purpose than paper money? What is California, this place you come from? I have never seen a picture. What plays over the American loudspeakers, when is your curfew, what is taught at your child-rearing collectives? Where does a woman go with her children on Sunday afternoons, and if a woman loses her husband, how does she know the government will assign her a good replacement? With whom would she curry favor to ensure her children got the best Youth Troop leader?

One of the great Confederate combat leaders, General John B. Gordon, had sat at his horse and spoken farewell to his men. Some he had seen weeping as they folded burnt and shot-pierced battle flags and laid them on the stacked arms of surrender. As he told his troops his own grief he tried to give them hope to rebuild out of the poverty and ashes to which many would return. Gordon would never forget a Kentucky father who lost two sons, one dying for the North, the other for the South. Over the two graves of his soldier boys the father set up a joint monument inscribed "God knows which was right.

The troop commander's name was Rich...[and] he was one of the best leaders I've ever known. His motto, which I've stolen from him, is, 'Nobody ever worked for me. They worked with me.

You are all soldiers of Christ," he said, "and now is an opportunity given to you to show that you are worthy soldiers. When the troops of a worldly monarch go into battle they do so with head erect, with proud and resolute bearing, with flashing eye, and with high courage, determined to bear aloft his banner and to crown it with victory, even though it cost them their lives. Such is the mien that soldiers of Christ should bear in the mortal strife now raging round us. Let them show the same fearlessness of death, the same high courage, the same unlimited confidence in their Leader. What matter if they die in His service? He has told them what their work should be. He has bidden them visit the sick and comfort the sorrowing. What if there be danger in the work? Did He shrink from the Cross which was to end His work of love, and is it for His followers to do so? 'Though you go down into the pit,' He has said, 'I am there also'; and with His companionship one must be craven indeed to tremble. This is a noble opportunity for holding high the banner of Christ. There is work to be done for all, and as the work is done, men should see by the calm courage, the cheerfulness, and the patience of those that do it, that they know that they are doing His work, and that they are content to leave the issue, whatever it be, in His hands.

The boy was in the Hitler Youth, he says, and he was reading a book one day, he was really enjoying it, until his troop leader found him reading it and gave him a severe warning because it was by a, a Jewish writer, it was a banned book. And the boy was so incensed that this really good book he’d been reading had been banned—was the wrong kind of book, the wrong kind of art, if you like, written by the wrong kind of writer—that he thought twice, he began to ask questions about what was happening, and then, it turns out, he went on with his sister, Sophie Scholl, their name was Scholl, to do this stellar work, to try to change things, make it possible for people to think, I mean differently. And they fought back, and they did change things. They did a lot of good before they were caught. And they were killed for it.

At the first ever Girl Scout training event Hesselbein attended, she heard another new troop leader complain that she was getting nothing from the session. Hesselbein mentioned it to a dress-factory worker who was also volunteering, and the woman told her, “You have to carry a big basket to bring something home.” She repeats that phrase today, to mean that a mind kept wide open will take something from every new experience. It is a natural philosophy for someone who was sixty when she attempted to turn down an interview for the job that became her calling. She had no long-term plan, only a plan to do what was interesting or needed at the moment. “I never envisioned” is her most popular preamble. Hesselbein’s professional career, which started in her midfifties, was extraordinary. The meandering path, however, was not.

I have often been criticized for being an 'emotional' leader, for not being macho enough, but even during this early stage in my career, I believed that the magic of command lies in openness, in being both sympathetic to the troops and at the same time being apart, in always projecting supreme confidence in my own ability and in theirs to accomplish whatever task is set for us.

The genes supply the motivation for warfare, [E. O.] Wilson is saying, in humans as they do in chimps, but people, blessed with the power of language, look for some objective cause of war. A society psychs itself up to go to war by agreeing that their neighbors have wronged them, whether by seizing property or failing to deliver on some promise. Religious leaders confirm that the local deity favors their cause and off go the troops.

You are the leader and the troops will reflect your emotions.

Guys who get their name splashed all over history and folklore don’t tend to be Boy Scout troop leaders.

A leader must care about the troops, but at the same time the leader must complete the mission, and in doing so there will be risk and sometimes unavoidable consequences to the troops.

And yet these Americans, with their helicopters and laser-guided weapons and shock-troop Rangers were going to somehow sort it out in a few weeks? Arrest Aidid and make it all better? They were trying to take down a clan, the most ancient and efficient social organization known to man. Didn’t the Americans realize that for every leader they arrested there were dozens of brothers, cousins, sons, and nephews to take his place? Setbacks just strengthened the clan’s resolve. Even if the Habr Gidr were somehow crippled or destroyed, wouldn’t that just elevate the next most powerful clan? Or did the Americans expect Somalia to suddenly sprout full-fledged Jeffersonian democracy?

Those who were called skillful leaders of old knew how to drive a wedge between the enemy's front and rear; [More literally, "cause the front and rear to lose touch with each other."] to prevent co-operation between his large and small divisions; to hinder the good troops from rescuing the bad, the officers from rallying their men. 16. When the enemy's men were united, they managed to keep them in disorder.

thought then that decent, intelligent, and experienced managers would automatically make rational business decisions. But I learned over time that isn’t so. Instead, rationality frequently wilts when the institutional imperative comes into play. For example: (1) As if governed by Newton’s First Law of Motion, an institution will resist any change in its current direction; (2) Just as work expands to fill available time, corporate projects or acquisitions will materialize to soak up available funds; (3) Any business craving of the leader, however foolish, will be quickly supported by detailed rate-of-return and strategic studies prepared by his troops; and (4) The behavior of peer companies, whether they are expanding, acquiring, setting executive compensation or whatever, will be mindlessly imitated.

Since both Eliza and Angelica were pregnant, sister Peggy crept downstairs to retrieve the endangered child. The leader of the raiding party barred her way with a musket. “Wench, wench! Where is your master?” he demanded. “Gone to alarm the town,” the coolheaded Peggy said. The intruder, fearing that Schuyler would return with troops, fled in alarm.

For over two weeks, the defenders of Wake Island held off a vastly superior force of Japanese ships and troops, inspiring the whole nation with their plucky spirit and sacrifice. Unfortunately, Navy leaders at Pearl Harbor, struggling to protect what was left of the shattered Pacific Fleet, canceled a relief mission, allowing the island and its defenders to fall without support. Wake damaged the long-standing trust between the Corps and the Navy, a memory that still rankles Marines and shames sailors.

If the only way you can inspire the troops is by a regimen of exhaustion, it’s time to look for some deeper substance. Because what trickles down is less likely to be admiration but dread and fear instead. A leader who sets an example of self-sacrifice can’t help but ask self-sacrifice of others.

These leaders cast no blame. They made no excuses. Instead of complaining about challenges or setbacks, they developed solutions and solved problems. They leveraged assets, relationships, and resources to get the job done. Their own egos took a back seat to the mission and their troops. These leaders truly led.

The skillful leader subdues the enemy's troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field. With his forces intact he will dispute the mastery of the Empire, and thus, without losing a man, his triumph will be complete.

Strive to do small things well. Be a doer and a self-starter—aggressiveness and initiative are two most admired qualities in a leader—but you must also put your feet up and think. Strive for self-improvement through constant self-evaluation. Never be satisfied. Ask of any project, How can it be done better? Don’t overinspect or oversupervise. Allow your leaders to make mistakes in training, so they can profit from the errors and not make them in combat. Keep the troops informed; telling them “what, how, and why” builds their confidence. The harder the training, the more troops will brag. Enthusiasm, fairness, and moral and physical courage—four of the most important aspects of leadership. Showmanship—a vital technique of leadership. The ability to speak and write well—two essential tools of leadership. There is a salient difference between profanity and obscenity; while a leader employs profanity (tempered with discretion), he never uses obscenities. Have consideration for others. Yelling detracts from your dignity; take men aside to counsel them. Understand and use judgment; know when to stop fighting for something you believe is right. Discuss and argue your point of view until a decision is made, and then support the decision wholeheartedly. Stay ahead of your boss.

I learned in WW II,” he said, “that the slightest bit of excitement in a leader is transmitted to the men. You might be afraid, but the fear gets magnified in the troops. Somebody has to keep his cool. If you’re a decent leader, you don’t dare lose it—for your own good. You’ve got to keep your unit up there doing its job.

Leaders have always found it useful to have an enemy at their gates in times of trouble, distracting the public from their difficulties. In using your enemies to rally your troops, polarize them as far as possible: they will fight the more fiercely when they feel a little hatred. So exaggerate the differences between you and the enemy—draw the lines clearly.

But troops properly inspired, and animated by a just confidence in their leader will often exceed expectation, or the limits of probability.

it is paramount that senior leaders explain to their junior leaders and troops executing the mission how their role contributes to big picture success.

A leader is most effective when people barely know he exists. When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, his troops will feel they did it themselves.

The conservatives had started bringing demagoguery to the table on the [Afghan] war issue the previous fall [fall 2006]. Whenever opposition members criticized the war policy, assorted Tories accused them of being disloyal and of failing to support the troops....[Harper] was gaining the reputation of a leader who couldn't see a belt without wanting to hit below it.

A few words in defense of military scientists. I agree that squad leaders are in the best position to know what and how much their men and women need to bring on a given mission. But you want those squad leaders to be armed with knowledge, and not all knowledge comes from experience. Sometimes it comes from a pogue at USUHS who’s been investigating the specific and potentially deadly consequences of a bodybuilding supplement. Or an army physiologist who puts men adrift in life rafts off the dock at a Florida air base and discovers that wetting your uniform cools you enough to conserve 74 percent more of your body fluids per hour. Or the Navy researcher who comes up with a way to speed the recovery time from travelers’ diarrhea. These things matter when it’s 115 degrees and you’re trying to keep your troops from dehydrating to the point of collapse. There’s no glory in the work. No one wins a medal. And maybe someone should.

Nothing breeds arrogance like success—a string of victories on the battlefield or business initiatives. Combat leaders must never forget just how much is at stake: the lives of their troops.

The skillful leader subdues the enemy's troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field.

It is I, indeed; and if ever true knight gave proof I am that man,’ replied the leader of the second troop; ‘for who would not rather face giants, sorcerers, or pagans, than this pinching cold?

Napoléon Bonaparte. The new leader had no immediate fight to pick with America; some thought he might actually bring peace to Europe. Hamilton’s endless demands for more funding and troops were beginning to look foolish.

Getting ahead of the next curve requires courage and communication: Courage to determine the next bold move, and communication to keep the troops committed to the value of moving forward. Rallying stakeholders to move together in a common course of action is all part of the innovation and survival process. Leaders at every level in an organization need to be skillful at creating resonance if that organization is to control its own destiny.

The State Department received detailed reports of the extent and nature of the Army operations as killings began in Java. A “Moslem Youth Leader” reported that “assistants” were accompanying troops on sweeps that led to killings.

Among the admirable achievements of Hannibal is included in this: that although he led a huge army, made up of countless different races, on foreign campaigns, there was never any dissension, either among the troops themselves or against their leader, whether things were going well or badly. For this, inhuman cruelty was wholly responsible. It was this, along with his countless other qualities, which made him feared and respected by his soldiers. If it had not been for his cruelty, his other qualities would not have been enough. The historians, having given little thought to this, on the one hand admire what Hannibal achieved, and on the other condemn what made his achievements possible.

The Dichotomy of Leadership A good leader must be: • confident but not cocky; • courageous but not foolhardy; • competitive but a gracious loser; • attentive to details but not obsessed by them; • strong but have endurance; • a leader and follower; • humble not passive; • aggressive not overbearing; • quiet not silent; • calm but not robotic, logical but not devoid of emotions; • close with the troops but not so close that one becomes more important than another or more important than the good of the team; not so close that they forget who is in charge. • able to execute Extreme Ownership, while exercising Decentralized Command. A good leader has nothing to prove, but everything to prove.

On November 29, 1947, the UN General Assembly approved the Partition Plan. On May 14, 1948, as the last British troops departed, Jewish leaders declared the creation of the State of Israel on the land apportioned to them by the UN plan.

In earlier history when groups of people declared war on each other the leaders always led their troops into battle. It is a great pity we do not have the same system today; perhaps our politicians would think twice before they gambled with the lives of their people.

What’s the mission? Planning begins with mission analysis. Leaders must identify clear directives for the team. Once they themselves understand the mission, they can impart this knowledge to their key leaders and frontline troops tasked with executing the mission. A broad and ambiguous mission results in lack of focus, ineffective execution, and mission creep. To prevent this, the mission must be carefully refined and simplified so that it is explicitly clear and specifically focused to achieve the greater strategic vision for which that mission is a part.

Who were these leaders? What was the strength of the storm troops they were throwing into the streets? And what exactly were they up to? I worked long hours those first weeks in Paris to try to find out. It was not easy. Even the government and the police, as the rioting grew day after day, seemed to be ignorant and confused about the forces opposing them. The origins of these forces went back much farther than I had suspected. As early as 1926, when the franc had fallen to new lows and the government was facing bankruptcy, Ernest Mercier, the electricity magnate, had founded an antiparliamentarian movement called Redressement Français (French Resurgence). Its message was that a parliament of politicians was incompetent to handle the affairs of state in the complicated postwar world, where the intricacies of national and international business and finance called for specialized knowledge. It wanted a parliament and government of “technicians” who knew how modern capitalist society functioned, and it assured the country that the great business and financial enterprises could furnish these trained men. In other words, it wanted its own men to control directly what up to now they controlled only indirectly. Mercier saw in Mussolini’s corporate state a form in which his aims could be realized. Gradually he built up a following among his fellow magnates. Together they dispensed millions propagating their ideas.

...the slightest bit of excitement in a leader is transmitted to the men. You might be afraid, but the fear gets magnified in the troops. Somebody has to keep his cool. If you’re a decent leader, you don’t dare lose it— for your own good. You’ve got to keep your unit up there doing its job.

The power-crazed leaders of the world would certainly be surprised to find that their military leaders and troops were only masquerading sodomites who were only too eager to meet the masquerading sodomite armies of other nations in order to have dances and balls and learn some foreign dance steps.

It’s natural for anyone in a leadership position to blame subordinate leaders and direct reports when something goes wrong. Our egos don’t like to take blame. But it’s on us as leaders to see where we failed to communicate effectively and help our troops clearly understand what their roles and responsibilities are and how their actions impact the bigger strategic picture. “Remember, it’s not about you,” I continued. “It’s not about the drilling superintendent. It’s about the mission and how best to accomplish it. With that attitude exemplified in you and your key leaders, your team will dominate.

Of the many exceptional leaders we served alongside throughout our military careers, the consistent attribute that made them great was that they took absolute ownership—Extreme Ownership—not just of those things for which they were responsible, but for everything that impacted their mission. These leaders cast no blame. They made no excuses. Instead of complaining about challenges or setbacks, they developed solutions and solved problems. They leveraged assets, relationships, and resources to get the job done. Their own egos took a back seat to the mission and their troops. These leaders truly led.

But the most ironic thing, in those bitter days of December 1950, was that the commentators who cried havoc the loudest were the very men who had done most to change and destroy the old 1945 Army. These were the men who had shouted for the boys to be brought home, who had urged the troops to exert civil rights. They were the ones who had hinted that leaders trying to delay the frenetic demobilization, or the reform of the Army, were no better than the Fascists. And these were the men who screamed most shrilly when some young Americans on the field of battle behaved more like citizens than like soldiers.

When General Pikalov, commander of the chemical warfare troops, gave his initial situation report on the thirty-kilometer zone to the visiting leaders of the Politburo Operations Group, he forecast that decontamination work would take up to seven years to complete.54 Upon hearing this, the hardline Politburo member Yegor Ligachev exploded in fury. He told Pikalov he could have seven months. “And if you haven’t done it by then, we’ll relieve you of your Party card!” “Esteemed Yegor Kuzmich,” the general replied, “if that is the situation, you needn’t wait seven months to take my Party card. You can have it now.

Osama bin-Laden, though reportedly very wealthy, lives in a cave. Yes, it is for security, but it is also leadership by example. It may make it harder to separate, both physically and psychologically, Fourth Generation war leaders from their troops. It also makes it harder to discredit those leaders with their followers.

Praise be to Allah, who revealed the Book, controls the clouds, defeats factionalism, and says in His Book: 'But when the forbidden months are past, then fight and slay the pagans wherever ye find them, seize them, beleaguer them, and lie in wait for them in every stratagem (of war)'; and peace be upon our Prophet, Muhammad Bin-'Abdallah, who said: I have been sent with the sword between my hands to ensure that no one but Allah is worshipped, Allah who put my livelihood under the shadow of my spear and who inflicts humiliation and scorn on those who disobey my orders. ...All these crimes and sins committed by the Americans are a clear declaration of war on Allah, his messenger, and Muslims. And ulema have throughout Islamic history unanimously agreed that the jihad is an individual duty if the enemy destroys the Muslim countries. This was revealed by Imam Bin-Qadamah in 'Al- Mughni,' Imam al-Kisa'i in 'Al-Bada'i,' al-Qurtubi in his interpretation, and the shaykh of al-Islam in his books, where he said: 'As for the fighting to repulse [an enemy], it is aimed at defending sanctity and religion, and it is a duty as agreed [by the ulema]. Nothing is more sacred than belief except repulsing an enemy who is attacking religion and life.' On that basis, and in compliance with Allah's order, we issue the following fatwa to all Muslims: The ruling to kill the Americans and their allies -- civilians and military -- is an individual duty for every Muslim who can do it in any country in which it is possible to do it, in order to liberate the al-Aqsa Mosque and the holy mosque [Mecca] from their grip, and in order for their armies to move out of all the lands of Islam, defeated and unable to threaten any Muslim. This is in accordance with the words of Almighty Allah, 'and fight the pagans all together as they fight you all together,' and 'fight them until there is no more tumult or oppression, and there prevail justice and faith in Allah.' ...We -- with Allah's help -- call on every Muslim who believes in Allah and wishes to be rewarded to comply with Allah's order to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they find it. We also call on Muslim ulema, leaders, youths, and soldiers to launch the raid on Satan's U.S. troops and the devil's supporters allying with them, and to displace those who are behind them so that they may learn a lesson. ...Almighty Allah also says: 'O ye who believe, what is the matter with you, that when ye are asked to go forth in the cause of Allah, ye cling so heavily to the earth! Do ye prefer the life of this world to the hereafter? But little is the comfort of this life, as compared with the hereafter. Unless ye go forth, He will punish you with a grievous penalty, and put others in your place; but Him ye would not harm in the least. For Allah hath power over all things.' Almighty Allah also says: 'So lose no heart, nor fall into despair. For ye must gain mastery if ye are true in faith.' [World Islamic Front Statement, 23 February 1998]

There have been ample opportunities since 1945 to show that material superiority in war is not enough if the will to fight is lacking. In Algeria, Vietnam and Afghanistan the balance of economic and military strength lay overwhelmingly on the side of France, the United States, and the Soviet Union, but the will to win was slowly eroded. Troops became demoralised and brutalised. Even a political solution was abandoned. In all three cases the greater power withdrew. The Second World War was an altogether different conflict, but the will to win was every bit as important - indeed it was more so. The contest was popularly perceived to be about issues of life and death of whole communities rather than for their fighting forces alone. They were issues, wrote one American observer in 1939, 'worth dying for'. If, he continued, 'the will-to-destruction triumphs, our resolution to preserve civilisation must become more implacable...our courage must mount'. Words like 'will' and 'courage' are difficult for historians to use as instruments of cold analysis. They cannot be quantified; they are elusive of definition; they are products of a moral language that is regarded sceptically today, even tainted by its association with fascist rhetoric. German and Japanese leaders believed that the spiritual strength of their soldiers and workers in some indefinable way compensate for their technical inferiority. When asked after the war why Japan lost, one senior naval officer replied that the Japanese 'were short on spirit, the military spirit was weak...' and put this explanation ahead of any material cause. Within Germany, belief that spiritual strength or willpower was worth more than generous supplies of weapons was not confined to Hitler by any means, though it was certainly a central element in the way he looked at the world. The irony was that Hitler's ambition to impose his will on others did perhaps more than anything to ensure that his enemies' will to win burned brighter still. The Allies were united by nothing so much as a fundamental desire to smash Hitlerism and Japanese militarism and to use any weapon to achieve it. The primal drive for victory at all costs nourished Allied fighting power and assuaged the thirst for vengeance. They fought not only because the sum of their resources added up to victory, but because they wanted to win and were certain that their cause was just. The Allies won the Second World War because they turned their economic strength into effective fighting power, and turned the moral energies of their people into an effective will to win. The mobilisation of national resources in this broad sense never worked perfectly, but worked well enough to prevail. Materially rich, but divided, demoralised, and poorly led, the Allied coalition would have lost the war, however exaggerated Axis ambitions, however flawed their moral outlook. The war made exceptional demands on the Allied peoples. Half a century later the level of cruelty, destruction and sacrifice that it engendered is hard to comprehend, let alone recapture. Fifty years of security and prosperity have opened up a gulf between our own age and the age of crisis and violence that propelled the world into war. Though from today's perspective Allied victory might seem somehow inevitable, the conflict was poised on a knife-edge in the middle years of the war. This period must surely rank as the most significant turning point in the history of the modern age.

Morale is the greatest single factor in successful war. Endurable comparisons with the enemy in other essential factors—leadership, discipline, technique, numbers, equipment, mobility, supply, and maintenance—are prerequisite to the existence of morale. It breeds most readily upon success; but under good leaders it will be maintained among troops even during extended periods of adversity.

It was on 7 March 1936 that Hitler comprehensivelyviolated the Versailles Treaty by sending troops intothe industrial region of the Rhineland, which under Article 180 had been specifically designated ademilitarized zone. Had the German Army beenopposed by the French and British forces stationednear by, it had orders to retire back to base and sucha reverse would almost certainly have cost Hitler thechancellorship. Yet the Western powers, riven withguilt about having imposed what was described as a‘Carthaginian peace’ on Germany in 1919, allowedthe Germans to enter the Rhineland unopposed. ‘After all,’ said the influential Liberal politician andnewspaper director the Marquis of Lothian, who hadbeen Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster in RamsayMacDonald’s National Government, ‘they are onlygoing into their own back garden.’ When Hitler assured the Western powers in March 1936 thatGermany wished only for peace, Arthur Greenwood,the deputy leader of the Labour Party, told the Houseof Commons: ‘Herr Hitler has made a statement…holding out the olive branch… which ought to be takenat face value… It is idle to say that those statementsare insincere.’ That August Germany adopted compulsory two-year military service

1. Question every requirement. Each should come with the name of the person who made it. You should never accept that a requirement came from a department, such as from “the legal department” or “the safety department.” You need to know the name of the real person who made that requirement. Then you should question it, no matter how smart that person is. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because people are less likely to question them. Always do so, even if the requirement came from me. Then make the requirements less dumb. 2. Delete any part or process you can. You may have to add them back later. In fact, if you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn’t delete enough. 3. Simplify and optimize. This should come after step two. A common mistake is to simplify and optimize a part or a process that should not exist. 4. Accelerate cycle time. Every process can be speeded up. But only do this after you have followed the first three steps. In the Tesla factory, I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. 5. Automate. That comes last. The big mistake in Nevada and at Fremont was that I began by trying to automate every step. We should have waited until all the requirements had been questioned, parts and processes deleted, and the bugs were shaken out. The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation

Commanders are not always leaders. Commanders are appointed. Leaders are unofficially “elected” by the troops in the unit. Likewise in other fields of endeavor. Every leader is put through an informal process in the first few weeks wherein his people judge him and decide whether or not he is worthy of their trust. He must earn that trust. How? A leader must prove himself by his actions, appearance, demeanor, attitude, and decisions.

The CIA found in Laos a country where it already had amassed influence, in the heart of a Cold War battlefield, and which had been largely ignored by the American military. These CIA leaders saw that an inexpensive—in American money and lives, at least—proxy war could be a template for fights in other places around the world, at a time when presidents were looking for ways to continue the Cold War without going through Congress or committing ground troops.

But the most ironic thing, in those bitter days of December 1950, was that the commentators who cried havoc the loudest were the very men who had done most to change and destroy the old 1945 Army. These were the men who had shouted for the boys to be brought home, who had urged the troops to exert civil rights. They were the ones who had hinted that leaders trying to delay the frenetic demobilization, or the reform of the Army, were no better than the Fascists.

There are, likewise, other senior leaders who are so far removed from the troops executing on the frontline that they become ineffective. These leaders might give the appearance of control, but they actually have no idea what their troops are doing and cannot effectively direct their teams. We call this trait “battlefield aloofness.” This attitude creates a significant disconnect between leadership and the troops, and such a leader’s team will struggle to effectively accomplish their mission.

13.  He wins his battles by making no mistakes. [Ch’en Hao says: “He plans no superfluous marches, he devises no futile attacks.” The connection of ideas is thus explained by Chang Yu: “One who seeks to conquer by sheer strength, clever though he may be at winning pitched battles, is also liable on occasion to be vanquished; whereas he who can look into the future and discern conditions that are not yet manifest, will never make a blunder and therefore invariably win.”] Making no mistakes is what establishes the certainty of victory, for it means conquering an enemy that is already defeated. 14.  Hence the skillful fighter puts himself into a position which makes defeat impossible, and does not miss the moment for defeating the enemy. [A “counsel of perfection” as Tu Mu truly observes. “Position” need not be confined to the actual ground occupied by the troops. It includes all the arrangements and preparations which a wise general will make to increase the safety of his army.] 15.  Thus it is that in war the victorious strategist only seeks battle after the victory has been won, whereas he who is destined to defeat first fights and afterwards looks for victory. [Ho Shih thus expounds the paradox: “In warfare, first lay plans which will ensure victory, and then lead your army to battle; if you will not begin with stratagem but rely on brute strength alone, victory will no longer be assured.”] 16.  The consummate leader cultivates the moral law, and strictly adheres to method and discipline; thus it is in his power to control success. 17.  In respect of military method, we have, firstly, Measurement; secondly, Estimation of quantity; thirdly, Calculation; fourthly, Balancing of chances; fifthly, Victory. 18.  Measurement owes its existence to Earth; Estimation of quantity to Measurement; Calculation to Estimation of quantity; Balancing of chances to Calculation; and Victory to Balancing of chances. [It is not easy to distinguish the four terms very clearly in the Chinese. The

As a leader, you must find the right balance between too much oversight and too little scrutiny. Left unattended, most organizations will get sloppy and undisciplined. It is human nature. Your employees must understand that their work will be judged, reviewed, inspected, and graded. It is the only way to ensure compliance with the high standards you set. While the troops will always complain about too much oversight and too many inspections, they will also appreciate knowing what’s expected of them.

For generations the official U.S. policy had been to support these regimes against any threat from their own citizens, who were branded automatically as Communists. When necessary, U.S. troops had been deployed in Latin America for decades to defend our military allies, many of whom were graduates of the U.S. Military Academy, spoke English, and sent their children to be educated in our country. They were often involved in lucrative trade agreements involving pineapples, bananas, bauxite, copper and iron ore, and other valuable commodities. When I became president, military juntas ruled in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay. I decided to support peaceful moves toward freedom and democracy throughout the hemisphere. In addition, our government used its influence through public statements and our votes in financial institutions to put special pressure on the regimes that were most abusive to their own people, including Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, Nicaragua, and El Salvador. On visits to the region Rosalynn and I met with religious and other leaders who were seeking political change through peaceful means, and we refused requests from dictators to defend their regimes from armed revolutionaries, most of whom were poor, indigenous Indians or descendants of former African slaves. Within ten years all the Latin American countries I named here had become democracies, and The Carter Center had observed early elections in Panama, Nicaragua, Peru, Haiti, and Paraguay.

Jill’s words reminded me of a concept I learned in the Army: the 80 percent solution. As Army leaders, we were trained to recognize that the 100 percent solution—absolute perfection—isn’t realistic, so the 80 percent solution was our goal: Get most things right, and get your butt moving to accomplish the mission. If you have 80 percent handled and a well-trained team, you’ll be able to deal with whatever contingencies arise. But if you spend all your time planning to create the 100 percent perfect solution, the troops won’t have time to prepare, train, and actually execute the mission.

Teaching leaders at all levels to live with friction. Friction is the inherent condition of war. It is caused by the enemy, by terrain and weather, and by the foul-ups that occur in your own force. The only way to learn how to deal with it is to train with it. Again, this means conducting aggressed, free-play exercises. And it means taking the whole unit to the field. CPXs have great value, but whenever troops are not involved, the level of friction is unrealistically low. Units must get plenty of time in the field as units if they are to learn how to accomplish their missions despite friction.

When [Ivan] Ilyin wrote that the art of politics was “identifying and neutralizing the enemy,” he did not mean that statesmen should ascertain which foreign power actually posed a threat. He meant that politics began with a leader’s decision about which foreign enmity will consolidate a dictatorship. Russia’s real geopolitical problem was China. But precisely because Chinese power was real and proximate, considering Russia’s actual geopolitics might lead to depressing conclusions. The West was chosen as an enemy precisely because it represented no threat to Russia. Unlike China, the EU had no army and no long border with Russia. The United States did have an army, but had withdrawn the vast majority of its troops from the European continent: from about 300,000 in 1991 to about 60,000 in 2012. NATO still existed and had admitted former communist countries of eastern Europe. But President Barack Obama had cancelled an American plan to build a missile defense system in eastern Europe in 2009, and in 2010 Russia was allowing American planes to fly through Russian airspace to supply American forces in Afghanistan. No Russian leader feared a NATO invasion in 2011 or 2012, or even pretended to.

During my time in Iraq and Afghanistan, I watched the great generals (and the colonels, majors, captains, lieutenants, and senior enlisted personnel) and how they interacted with their troops. The good ones spent time at the front lines, dodging bullets in Fallujah, riding in a Humvee on Route Irish, flying in a helo over the Hindu Kush, or just talking to the soldiers who manned the watchtowers. This engagement was not only important to understanding the troops, and thereby making better decisions; it was also vitally important for the troops to see their leaders getting sweaty and dirty right beside them.

The Dichotomy of Leadership A good leader must be: • confident but not cocky; • courageous but not foolhardy; • competitive but a gracious loser; • attentive to details but not obsessed by them; • strong but have endurance; • a leader and follower; • humble not passive; • aggressive not overbearing; • quiet not silent; • calm but not robotic, logical but not devoid of emotions; • close with the troops but not so close that one becomes more important than another or more important than the good of the team; not so close that they forget who is in charge. • able to execute Extreme Ownership, while exercising Decentralized Command.

but does it serve any useful purpose to know that Pompey was the first to exhibit the slaughter of eighteen elephants in the Circus, pitting criminals against them in a mimic battle? He, a leader of the state and one who, according to report, was conspicuous among the leaders28 of old for the kindness of his heart, thought it a notable kind of spectacle to kill human beings after a new fashion. Do they fight to the death? That is not enough! Are they torn to pieces? That is not enough! Let them be crushed by animals of monstrous bulk! Better would it be that these things pass into oblivion lest hereafter some all-powerful man should learn them and be jealous of an act that was nowise human.29 O, what blindness does great prosperity cast upon our minds! When he was casting so many troops of wretched human beings to wild beasts born under a different sky, when he was proclaiming war between creatures so ill matched, when he was shedding so much blood before the eyes of the Roman people, who itself was soon to be forced to shed more. he then believed that he was beyond the power of Nature. But later this same man, betrayed by Alexandrine treachery, offered himself to the dagger of the vilest slave, and then at last discovered what an empty boast his surname30 was.

The member of the Nazi hierarchy most gifted at solving problems of conscience was Himmler. He coined slogans, like the famous watchword of the S.S., taken from a Hitler speech before the S.S. in 1931, “My Honor is my Loyalty”—catch phrases which Eichmann called “winged words” and the judges “empty talk”—and issued them, as Eichmann recalled, “around the turn of the year,” presumably along with a Christmas bonus. Eichmann remembered only one of them and kept repeating it: “These are battles which future generations will not have to fight again,” alluding to the “battles” against women, children, old people, and other “useless mouths.” Other such phrases, taken from speeches Himmler made to the commanders of the Einsatzgruppen and the Higher S.S. and Police Leaders, were: “To have stuck it out and, apart from exceptions caused by human weakness, to have remained decent, that is what has made us hard. This is a page of glory in our history which has never been written and is never to be written.” Or: “The order to solve the Jewish question, this was the most frightening order an organization could ever receive.” Or: We realize that what we are expecting from you is “superhuman,” to be “superhumanly inhuman.” All one can say is that their expectations were not disappointed. It is noteworthy, however, that Himmler hardly ever attempted to justify in ideological terms, and if he did, it was apparently quickly forgotten. What stuck in the minds of these men who had become murderers was simply the notion of being involved in something historic, grandiose, unique (“a great task that occurs once in two thousand years”), which must therefore be difficult to bear. This was important, because the murderers were not sadists or killers by nature; on the contrary, a systematic effort was made to weed out all those who derived physical pleasure from what they did. The troops of the Einsatzgruppen had been drafted

And while the most desperate hours of the men within the Perimeter were passing, a second battle had been raging in their rear, back in the continental United States. When American soldiers went into action, it had become customary to provide them with a free issue of candy, cigarettes—and beer. In the places American troops fought, there were rarely any handy taverns or supermarkets. Reported to the home front, the “beer issue” rapidly became a national controversy. Temperance, church, and various civic groups bombarded the Pentagon and Congress with howls of protest against the corruption of American youth. One legislator, himself a man who took a brew now and then, tried a flanking attack against the complainers, saying on the floor of the House, “Water in Korea is more deadly than bullets!” But no one either polled the troops for their opinion or said openly that a man who was old enough to kill and be killed was also old enough to have a beer if he wanted it. Unable to shake the habit of acquiescence, the Army leaders bowed to the storm of public wrath. On 12 September the day the 3rd Battalion, 7th Cavalry, lost half its strength securing Hill 314, Far East Command cut off its beer ration. The troops could still buy beer, but only when and if the PX caught up with them.

Every great leader I served with understood the need to share the hardships with the men and women they led. Nothing gains the respect of the troops quicker than spending time on the factory floor, or in the trading room, the warehouse, the clinic, or the foxhole. The C-suite, the corner office, the front office, or the largest cubicle can trap you into believing that your place is above the people you serve. It is not. Wherever you sit as a leader, don’t sit for long. Get out of your office and spend time with the employees. This will give you an appreciation for the work they do, an understanding of the challenges they face, and insights into how to improve the business.

when someone is not leading you, then you lead them. You pick up the slack for their weakness. My leader doesn’t want to come up with a plan? That’s okay. I will. My leader doesn’t want to give a brief? That’s fine. I will. My leader doesn’t want to mentor the younger troops? That’s okay. I will do it. My leader doesn’t want to take the blame when something goes wrong? That’s fine with me. I’m going to take the blame. And you have to think about that one. That one can be tricky because you think to yourself, “If I take the blame, I’m going to look bad. I’m going to look bad in front of the team and in front of the more senior boss—my weak boss’s boss.” But think about it from a leader’s perspective. Let’s say the mission was a failure, and the boss comes in to find out what happened. Listen to the way this situation plays out: I’m the guy that was in charge of the mission and I say, “Sorry, boss, we failed. But it wasn’t my fault. It was his fault,” and I point the finger at someone else. Now imagine that the guy I pointed the finger at says, “Yes. It was my fault. Here’s what happened. Here are the mistakes I made. And here is what I am going to do to fix the situation next time.” Who does the senior boss respect more? The guy who blamed someone or the guy who took responsibility—the guy that took ownership? Of course, it is the guy that takes ownership of

[Tolstoy] denounced [many historians'] lamentable tendency to simplify. The experts stumble onto a battlefield, into a parliament or public square, and demand, "Where is he? Where is he?" "Where is who?" "The hero, of course! The leader, the creator, the great man!" And having found him, they promptly ignore all his peers and troops and advisors. They close their eyes and abstract their Napoleon from the mud and the smoke and the masses on either side, and marvel at how such a figure could possibly have prevailed in so many battles and commanded the destiny of an entire continent. "There was an eye to see in this man," wrote Thomas Carlyle about Napoleon in 1840, "a soul to dare and do. He rose naturally to be the King. All men saw that he was such." But Tolstoy saw differently. "Kings are the slaves of history," he declared. "The unconscious swarmlike life of mankind uses every moment of a king's life as an instrument for its purposes." Kings and commanders and presidents did not interest Tolstoy. History, his history, looks elsewhere: it is the study of infinitely incremental, imperceptible change from one state of being (peace) to another (war). The experts claimed that the decisions of exceptional men could explain all of history's great events. For the novelist, this belief was evidence of their failure to grasp the reality of an incremental change brought about by the multitude's infinitely small actions.

JFK asked his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, to break up organized crime. Nobody high-up in government has tangled the Mafia. J. E. Hoover, the hired hands of FBI and CIA, ran the assassination teams. They have been used since World War II. JFK was attempting to end the oil-tax depletion rip-offs, to get tax money from oil companies. JFK instituted the nuclear test ban treaty, often called “the kiss of death,” to oppose the Pentagon. JFK called off the Invasion of Cuba. He allowed Castro to live, antagonized narcotics and gambling, oil and sugar interests, formerly in Cuba. JFK asked his brother, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, to break up the CIA, the “hidden government behind my back.” Allen Dulles was fired. Dulles, the attorney for international multinationals, was angry. JFK planned to withdraw troops from Vietnam after the 1964 elections. Nov. 24, 1963, two days after JFK’s burial, the Pentagon escalated the Vietnam war … with no known provocations, after JFK was gone. There was no chance Kennedy could survive antagonizing the CIA, oil companies, Pentagon, organized crime. He was not their man. The assassination of JFK employed people from the Texas-Southwest. It was not a Southern plot. Upstarts could not have controlled the northern CIA, FBI, Kennedy family connections. This was a more detailed, sophisticated conspiracy that was to set the pattern for future murders to take place. The murder was funded by Permindex, with headquarters in Montreal and Switzerland. Their stated purpose was to encourage trade between nations in the Western world. Their actual purpose was fourfold: 1) To fund and direct assassinations of European, Mid-East and world leaders considered threats to the western world, and to Petroleum Interests of their backers. 2) Provide couriers, agents for transporting and depositing funds through Swiss Banks for Vegas, Miami and the international gambling syndicate. 3) Coordinate the espionage activities of White Russian Solidarists and Division V of the FBI, headed by William Sullivan. 4) Build, acquire and operate hotels and gambling casinos. See: Nomenclature of an Assassination Cabal, by William Torbitt.

By 2003, I found myself in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now that I was a one-star admiral leading troops in a war zone, every decision I made had its consequences. Over the next several years, I stumbled often. But, for every failure, for every mistake, there were hundreds of successes: hostages rescued, suicide bombers stopped, pirates captured, terrorists killed, and countless lives saved. I realized that the past failures had strengthened me, taught me that no one is immune from mistakes. True leaders must learn from their failures, use the lessons to motivate themselves, and not be afraid to try again or make the next tough decision. You can’t avoid The Circus. At some point we all make the list. Don’t be afraid of The Circus.

His first decision was to return to Rome without knowing who was in charge or how he’d be received. The stakes skyrocketed when he learned, after landing near Brundisium, that Caesar’s will had made him an heir and—by adoption—a son. He reached the capital as Caius Julius Caesar Octavianus, 9 and out of respect for their martyred leader the legions he encountered took his new status seriously. Octavian could have blown the opportunity by coming across as a twerp. But he saw the difference, even then, between inheriting a title and mastering the art of command. The first can happen overnight. The second can take a lifetime. Octavian never explained how he learned this, but with the privilege of closely observing the greatest of all commanders, he’d had to have been a blockhead not to pick up something. Sun Tzu, untranslated in Europe for another eighteen centuries, suggests what it might have been: If wise, a commander is able to recognize changing circumstances and to act expediently. If sincere, his men will have no doubt of the certainty of rewards and punishments. If humane, he loves mankind, sympathizes with others, and appreciates their industry and toil. If courageous, he gains victory by seizing opportunity without hesitation. If strict, his troops are disciplined because they are in awe of him and are afraid of punishment. 10 Caesar, in turn, appears never to have explained to Octavian why he was being taught. 11 That spared him the hang-ups of knowing he’d be son, heir, and commander. Rome’s Chiron tethered a student who had little sense of being tethered. The constraint conveyed instruction and liberation.

The privilege of command is command,” Mattis once told a lieutenant he’d caught shirking. “You don’t get a bigger tent.” In fact, the best commanders take the smaller tent. They pass their extra provisions on to their troops. They don’t go easier on themselves, they go harder. Because they know that it’s not just about them anymore. “We are not on the level,” a foot soldier once complained to Xenophon as he led the Ten Thousand Greeks out of Persia. “You are riding on horseback while I am wearing myself out with a shield to carry.” Hearing this, Xenophon jumped down and carried the man’s shield the rest of the way. Being the “boss” is a job. Being a “leader” is something you earn. You get elevated to that plane by your self-discipline. By moments of sacrifice like this, when you take the hit or the responsibility on behalf of someone else.

Patton had been a reflective man, an extraordinarily well-read student of wars and military leaders, ancient and modern, with a curiosity about his war to match his energy. No detail had been too minor or too dull for him, nor any task too humble. Everything from infantry squad tactics to tank armor plate and chassis and engines had interested him. To keep his mind occupied while he was driving through a countryside, he would study the terrain and imagine how he might attack this hill or defend that ridge. He would stop at an infantry position and look down the barrel of a machine gun to see whether the weapon was properly sited to kill counterattacking Germans. If it was not, he would give the officers and men a lesson in how to emplace the gun. He had been a military tailor’s delight of creased cloth and shined leather, and he had worn an ivory-handled pistol too because he thought he was a cavalier who needed these trappings for panache. But if he came upon a truck stuck in the mud with soldiers shirking in the back, he would jump from his jeep, berate the men for their laziness, and then help them push their truck free and move them forward again to battle. By dint of such lesson and example, Patton had formed his Third Army into his ideal of a fighting force. In the process he had come to understand the capabilities of his troops and he had become more knowledgeable about the German enemy than any other Allied general on the Western Front. Patton had been able to command with certainty, overcoming the mistakes that are inevitable in the practice of the deadly art as well as personal eccentricities and public gaffes that would have ruined a lesser general, because he had always stayed in touch with the realities of his war.

Nazi aggression, one might think, should have lent support to Winston’s candidacy. At this, of all times, it seems inconceivable that Baldwin would pick a weak man to supervise the defense of England. Nevertheless, that was what he did. Baldwin said outright: “If I pick Winston, Hitler will be cross.” In his biography of Chamberlain, Keith Feiling writes that the Rhineland was “decisive against Winston’s appointment”; it was “obvious that Hitler would not like it.” As the prime minister’s heir apparent, Chamberlain encouraged Baldwin to think along these lines. He suggested that Baldwin choose a man “who would excite no enthusiasm” and “create no jealousies.” The prime minister agreed. On Saturday, March 14—exactly a week since German troops had crossed the Rhine—he announced that he was establishing, not a ministry of defense, but a ministry for coordination of defense. Its leader, the new cabinet member, would be Sir Thomas Inskip.

With extraordinary bravery, civil rights leaders, activists, and progressive clergy launched boycotts, marches, and sit-ins protesting the Jim Crow system. They endured fire hoses, police dogs, bombings, and beatings by white mobs, as well as by the police. Once again, federal troops were sent to the South to provide protection for blacks attempting to exercise their civil rights, and the violent reaction of white racists was met with horror in the North. The dramatic high point of the Civil Rights Movement occurred in 1963. The Southern struggle had grown from a modest group of black students demonstrating peacefully at one lunch counter to the largest mass movement for racial reform and civil rights in the twentieth century. Between autumn 1961 and the spring of 1963, twenty thousand men, women, and children had been arrested. In 1963 alone, another fifteen thousand were imprisoned, and one thousand desegregation protests occurred across the region, in more than one hundred cities.32

All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation.

My family is a classic American-dream story. My great-grandparents fled Russia to avoid being murdered for their religion. Just two generations later, my parents fled New York City weekends for their country house. I never felt guilty about this. I was raised to believe America rewards hard work. But I was also raised to understand that luck plays a role in even the bootstrappiest success story. The cost of living the dream, I was taught, is the responsibility to expand it for others. It’s a more than fair price. Yet the people running the country didn’t see it that way. With George W. Bush in the White House, millionaires and billionaires were showered with tax cuts. Meanwhile, schools went underfunded. Roads and bridges deteriorated. Household incomes languished. Deficits ballooned. And America went to war. President Bush invaded Iraq to destroy weapons of mass destruction, a campaign which hit a snag when it turned out those weapons didn’t exist. But by then it was too late. We had broken a country and owned the resulting mess. Colin Powell called this “the Pottery Barn rule,” which, admittedly, was cute. Still, it’s hard to imagine a visit to Pottery Barn that costs trillions of dollars and thousands of American lives. Our leaders, in other words, had made bad choices. They would therefore be replaced with better ones. That’s how AP Government told me the system worked. In the real world, however, the invasion of Iraq became an excuse for a dark and antidemocratic turn. Those who questioned the war, the torture of prisoners—or even just the tax cuts—found themselves accused of something barely short of treason. No longer was a distinction made between supporting the president’s policies and America’s troops. As an electoral strategy, this was dangerous and cynical. Also, it worked. So no, I didn’t grow up with a high opinion of politicians. But I did grow up in the kind of environment where people constantly told me I could change the world. In 2004, eager to prove them right, I volunteered for John Kerry’s presidential campaign.

The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation. On the assembly line

Treaty and the reparations Germany was obliged to pay were ‘malignant and silly to an extent that made them obviously futile’. This was the theme of the young economist Maynard Keynes in his philippic The Economic Consequences of the Peace, which began a myth which has never died. In reality, the real disaster wasn’t the way the war had begun or who was responsible, but how it had ended; not the claim that Germany had started the war, but the Germans’ belief that they hadn’t lost it, a belief encouraged by both German generals and politicians. When returning troops marched through Berlin in December, they were told, by Ebert of all people, the Social Democratic leader, ‘No army has overcome you.’ With that belief implanted, when the Treaty was published it was easy for demagogues to offer an answer. If the army had been ‘im Feld unbesiegt’, undefeated in battle, it must have been betrayed by the ‘November criminals’, the treacherous politicians who had taken over, and then betrayed Germany, and then ‘stabbed in the back’ by civilians, and Jews. Thus was the seed planted that would bring forth a frightful blossom.

Question every requirement. Each should come with the name of the person who made it. You should never accept that a requirement came from a department, such as from “the legal department” or “the safety department.” You need to know the name of the real person who made that requirement. Then you should question it, no matter how smart that person is. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because people are less likely to question them. Always do so, even if the requirement came from me. Then make the requirements less dumb. 2. Delete any part or process you can. You may have to add them back later. In fact, if you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn’t delete enough. 3. Simplify and optimize. This should come after step two. A common mistake is to simplify and optimize a part or a process that should not exist. 4. Accelerate cycle time. Every process can be speeded up. But only do this after you have followed the first three steps. In the Tesla factory, I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. 5. Automate. That comes last. The big mistake in Nevada and at Fremont was that I began by trying to automate every step. We should have waited until all the requirements had been questioned, parts and processes deleted, and the bugs were shaken out. The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics.

Close to forty thousand Germans gathered in front of Berlin’s opera house on May 10, 1933, as a parade of swastika-wearing students and beer-hall thugs carrying torches tossed books into a huge bonfire. Ordinary citizens poured forth carrying volumes looted from libraries and private homes. “Jewish intellectualism is dead,” propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, his face fiery, yelled from the podium. “The German soul can again express itself.” What happened in Germany in 1933 was not just a brutality perpetrated by thuggish leaders and abetted by ignorant mobs. It was also, as Einstein described, “the utter failure of the so-called intellectual aristocracy.” Einstein and other Jews were ousted from what had been among the world’s greatest citadels of open-minded inquiry, and those who remained did little to resist. It represented the triumph of the ilk of Philipp Lenard, Einstein’s longtime anti-Semitic baiter, who was named by Hitler to be the new chief of Aryan science. “We must recognize that it is unworthy of a German to be the intellectual follower of a Jew,” Lenard exulted that May. “Heil Hitler!” It would be a dozen years before Allied troops would fight their way in and oust him from that role.41 Le

By 1949, both the United States and the Soviet Union had withdrawn their troops and turned the peninsula over to the new puppet leaders. It did not go well. Kim Il Sung was a Stalinist and an ultranationalist dictator who decided to reunify the country in the summer of 1950 by invading the South with Russian tanks and thousands of troops. In North Korea, we were taught that the Yankee imperialists started the war, and our soldiers gallantly fought off their evil invasion. In fact, the United States military returned to Korea for the express purpose of defending the South—bolstered by an official United Nations force—and quickly drove Kim Il Sung’s army all the way to the Yalu River, nearly taking over the country. They were stopped only when Chinese soldiers surged across the border and fought the Americans back to the 38th parallel. By the end of this senseless war, at least three million Koreans had been killed or wounded, millions were refugees, and most of the country was in ruins. In 1953, both sides agreed to end the fighting, but they never signed a peace treaty. To this day we are still officially at war, and both the governments of the North and South believe that they are the legitimate representatives of all Koreans.

4. The general who thoroughly understands the advantages that accompany variation of tactics knows how to handle his troops. 5. The general who does not understand these, may be well acquainted with the configuration of the country, yet he will not be able to turn his knowledge to practical account. 6. So, the student of war who is unversed in the art of war of varying his plans, even though he be acquainted with the Five Advantages, will fail to make the best use of his men. 7. Hence in the wise leader’s plans, considerations of advantage and of disadvantage will be blended together. 8. If our expectation of advantage be tempered in this way, we may succeed in accomplishing the essential part of our schemes. 9. If, on the other hand, in the midst of difficulties we are always ready to seize an advantage, we may extricate ourselves from misfortune. 10. Reduce the hostile chiefs by inflicting damage on them; and make trouble for them, and keep them constantly engaged; hold out specious allurements, and make them rush to any given point. 11. The art of war teaches us to rely not on the likelihood of the enemy’s not coming, but on our own readiness to receive him; not on the chance of his not attacking, but rather on the fact that we have made our position unassailable.

Firstly, the Azerbaijanian struggle for a measure of autonomy and self-government is genuine and is locally inspired. The facts of history and existing conditions show that Azerbaijan has always been struggling to overthrow the feudal conditions imposed upon it (and upon the rest of Iran) by corrupt Iranian Governments. Secondly, the extent of Russian interference appeared to be negligible. In our travels we saw few Russian troops, and in Kurdistan we saw none at all. The leaders of the Azerbaijanian Government are not Russians but Azerbaijanians, and with few exceptions their sole aim seems to be the recovery and improvement and economic reform of Azerbaijan. There may be some Russian influence by indirect means, but I would suggest that it is less than our own influence in Iran which we exercise by direct control of ministers, political parties, state financiers, and by petty bribery. As for Kurdish Independence. The Kurds ask for an independence of their own making, not an independence sponsored by the British Government. Like the Azerbaijanians the Kurds are seeking real autonomy, and more than that, self-determination. Our present scheme to take them over and use them as a balancing factor in the political affairs of the Middle East is a reflection upon the honest of our intentions, and a direct blow at the spirit of all good men.

During Bill Clinton’s presidency, the Palestinian terrorist Yasser Arafat was invited to spend more time in the White House than any other foreign leader—thirteen invitations.303 Clinton was dead set on helping the Israelis and Palestinians achieve a lasting peace. He pushed the Israelis to grant ever-greater concessions until the Israelis were willing to grant the Palestinians up to 98 percent of all the territory they requested. And what was the Palestinian response? They walked away from the bargaining table and launched the wave of suicide bombings and other terrorist attacks known as the Second Intifada. And what of Osama bin Laden? Even while America was granting concessions to Palestinians—and thereby theoretically easing the conditions that provided much of the pretext for Muslim terror—bin Laden was bombing U.S. embassies in Africa, almost sank the USS Cole in Yemen, and was well into the planning stages of the catastrophic attacks of September 11, 2001. After President George W. Bush ordered U.S. forces to invade Afghanistan and Iraq in 2001 and 2003, respectively, bringing American troops into direct ground combat with jihadists half a world away, many Americans quickly forgot the recent past and blamed American acts of self-defense for “inflaming” jihad. One of those Americans was Barack Obama. Soon after his election, Obama traveled to Cairo, Egypt, where he delivered a now-infamous speech that signaled America’s massive policy shifts. The United States pulled entirely out of Iraq despite the pleas of “all the major Iraqi parties.”304 In Egypt, the United States actually backed the Muslim Brotherhood government, going so far as agreeing to give it advanced F-16 fighters and M1 Abrams main battle tanks, even as the Muslim Brotherhood government was violating its peace treaty with Israel and persecuting Egypt’s ancient Coptic Christian community. The Obama administration continued supporting the Brotherhood, even when it stood aside and allowed jihadists to storm the American embassy, raising the black flag of jihad over an American diplomatic facility. In Libya, the United States persuaded its allies to come to the aid of a motley group of rebels, including jihadists. Then many of these same jihadists promptly turned their anger on the United States, attacking our diplomatic compound in Benghazi the afternoon and evening of September 11, 2012—killing the American ambassador and three more brave Americans. Compounding this disaster, the administration had steadfastly refused to reinforce the American security presence in spite of a deteriorating security situation, afraid that it would anger the local population. This naïve and foolish administration decision cost American lives.

The historian Michael Walzer has argued that modern revolution was a task for the kind of ascetic, single-minded, self-denying personality that Calvinism sought to inculcate, and certainly some of the successful revolutionaries of the West would seem to fill the bill. As we have seen, the English revolutionary leader Oliver Cromwell, a Calvinist himself, railed perpetually against the festive inclinations of his troops. The Jacobin leader Robespierre despised disorderly gatherings, including “any group in which there is a tumult”—a hard thing to avoid during the French Revolution, one might think.73 His fellow revolutionary Louis de Saint-Just described the ideal “revolutionary man” in terms that would have been acceptable to any Puritan: “inflexible, but sensible; he is frugal; he is simple … honorable, he is sober, but not mawkish.”74 Lenin inveighed against “slovenliness … carelessness, untidiness, unpunctuality” as well as “dissoluteness in sexual life,”75 seeing himself as a “manager” and “controller” as well as a leader.76 For men like Robespierre and Lenin, the central revolutionary rite was the meeting—experienced in a sitting position, requiring no form of participation other than an occasional speech, and conducted according to strict rules of procedure. Dancing, singing, trances—these could only be distractions from the weighty business at hand.

In the earliest strand of the conquest narratives, Joshua's violence was associated with an ancient Canaanite custom called the "ban" (herem). Before a battle, a military leader would strike a deal with his god: if this deity undertook to give him the city, the commander promised to "devote" (HRM) all valuable loot to his temple and offer the conquered people to him in a human sacrifice. Joshua had made such a pact with Yahweh before attacking Jericho, and Yahweh responded by delivering the town to Israel in a specular miracle, causing its famous walls to collapse when the priests blew their rams' horns. Before allowing his troops to storm the city, Joshua explained the terms of the ban and stipulated that no one in the city should be spared, since everybody and everything in the town had been "devoted" to Yahweh. Accordingly, the Israelites "enforced the ban on everything in the town, men, and women, young and old, even the oxen and sheep and donkeys, massacring them all." But the ban had been violated when one of the soldiers kept booty for himself, and consequently the Israelites failed to take the town of Ai the following day. After the culprit had been found and executed, the Israelites attached Ai again, this time successfully, setting fire to the city so that it became a sacrificial pyre and slaughtering anybody who tried to escape: "The number of those who fell that day, men and women together, were twelve thousand all (the) people of Ai." Finally Joshua hanged the king from a tree, built a monumental cairn over his body, and reduced the city to "a ruin for ever more, a desolate place, even today.

[T]hat afternoon, Sergei Lavrov called me for the second time during the crisis. [...] “We have three demands,” he said. “What are they?” I asked. “The first two are that the Georgians sign the no-use-of-force pledge and that their troops return to barracks,” he told me. “Done,” I answered. [...] But then Sergei said, “The other demand is just between us. Misha Saakashvili has to go.” I couldn’t believe my ears and I reacted out of instinct, not analysis. “Sergei, the secretary of state of the United States does not have a conversation with the Russian foreign minister about overthrowing a democratically elected president,” I said. “The third condition has just become public because I’m going to call everyone I can and tell them that Russia is demanding the overthrow of the Georgian president.” “I said it was between us,” he repeated. “No, it’s not between us. Everyone is going to know.” The conversation ended. I called Steve Hadley to tell him about the Russian demand. Then I called the British, the French, and several others. That afternoon the UN Security Council was meeting. I asked our representative to inform the Council as well. Lavrov was furious, saying that he’d never had a colleague divulge the contents of a diplomatic conversation. I felt I had no choice. If the Georgians wanted to punish Saakashvili for the war, they would have a chance to do it through their own constitutional processes. But the Russians had no right to insist on his removal. The whole thing had an air of the Soviet period, when Moscow had controlled the fate of leaders throughout Eastern Europe. I was certainly not going to be party to a return to those days [688].

He made a costly error in judgement and sent an entire regiment into a virtual slaughterhouse. It happens frequently. Officers risk their troops' lives for the sake of a promotion. Not my father. He valued the life of every man under his command, from his officers to the humblest fresh recruit. When he realized what had happened, he was devastated. He couldn't ever forget that his error had cost the lives of so many men, created so many widows and orphans..." "But, Lyon, measured against his valor, one mistake is forgivable." "To us, yes. Not to him. He was sickened that the battle was hailed as one of the turning points of the war. He was decorated for it. It was considered a great victory, but it defeated him as a soldier, as a man. When he came home and was hailed a hero, he couldn't stand the conflict within himself. He didn't feel like a hero. He felt like a traitor." "That can't be!" "Not a traitor to his country, but to the men who had trusted his judgement and leadership. It was a conflict he never could reconcile, so he retired from the Army and came here and shut out the world and all reminders of the lie he was living." They were quiet for a moment before she said,"No one would have thrown stones at him, Lyon. he was a respected man, a hero, a leader at a time in history when America needed heroes and leaders. It was a battleground that spread out for miles. Admist all the chaos he may have thought he made a mistake when he actually didn't." "I know that, Andy, and you know that, but since the time I was old enough to understand his reclusiveness, I was never able to convince him of it. He died still regretting that one day in his life as though he had live no other. It didn't matter what the public would have thought if they had known. He judged himself more severely than anyone else could have." "How tragic for him. He was such a lovely man, Lyon. Such a lovely man.

These include: 1.Do the Right Thing—the principle of integrity. We see in George Marshall the endless determination to tell the truth and never to curry favor by thought, word, or deed. Every one of General Marshall’s actions was grounded in the highest sense of integrity, honesty, and fair play. 2.Master the Situation—the principle of action. Here we see the classic “know your stuff and take appropriate action” principle of leadership coupled with a determination to drive events and not be driven by them. Marshall knew that given the enormous challenges of World War II followed by the turbulent postwar era, action would be the heart of his remit. And he was right. 3.Serve the Greater Good—the principle of selflessness. In George Marshall we see a leader who always asked himself, “What is the morally correct course of action that does the greatest good for the greatest number?” as opposed to the careerist leader who asks “What’s in it for me?” and shades recommendations in a way that creates self-benefit. 4.Speak Your Mind—the principle of candor. Always happiest when speaking simple truth to power, General and Secretary Marshall never sugarcoated the message to the global leaders he served so well. 5.Lay the Groundwork—the principle of preparation. As is often said at the nation’s service academies, know the six Ps: Prior Preparation Prevents Particularly Poor Performance. 6.Share Knowledge—the principle of learning and teaching. Like Larry Bird on a basketball court, George Marshall made everyone on his team look better by collaborating and sharing information. 7.Choose and Reward the Right People—the principle of fairness. Unbiased, color- and religion-blind, George Marshall simply picked the very best people. 8.Focus on the Big Picture—the principle of vision. Marshall always kept himself at the strategic level, content to delegate to subordinates when necessary. 9.Support the Troops—the principle of caring. Deeply involved in ensuring that the men and women under his command prospered, General and Secretary Marshall taught that if we are loyal down the chain of command, that loyalty will be repaid not only in kind but in operational outcomes as well.

five commandments: 1. Question every requirement. Each should come with the name of the person who made it. You should never accept that a requirement came from a department, such as from “the legal department” or “the safety department.” You need to know the name of the real person who made that requirement. Then you should question it, no matter how smart that person is. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because people are less likely to question them. Always do so, even if the requirement came from me. Then make the requirements less dumb. 2. Delete any part or process you can. You may have to add them back later. In fact, if you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn’t delete enough. 3. Simplify and optimize. This should come after step two. A common mistake is to simplify and optimize a part or a process that should not exist. 4. Accelerate cycle time. Every process can be speeded up. But only do this after you have followed the first three steps. In the Tesla factory, I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. 5. Automate. That comes last. The big mistake in Nevada and at Fremont was that I began by trying to automate every step. We should have waited until all the requirements had been questioned, parts and processes deleted, and the bugs were shaken out. The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle.

Question every requirement. Each should come with the name of the person who made it. You should never accept that a requirement came from a department, such as from “the legal department” or “the safety department.” You need to know the name of the real person who made that requirement. Then you should question it, no matter how smart that person is. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because people are less likely to question them. Always do so, even if the requirement came from me. Then make the requirements less dumb. 2. Delete any part or process you can. You may have to add them back later. In fact, if you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn’t delete enough. 3. Simplify and optimize. This should come after step two. A common mistake is to simplify and optimize a part or a process that should not exist. 4. Accelerate cycle time. Every process can be speeded up. But only do this after you have followed the first three steps. In the Tesla factory, I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. 5. Automate. That comes last. The big mistake in Nevada and at Fremont was that I began by trying to automate every step. We should have waited until all the requirements had been questioned, parts and processes deleted, and the bugs were shaken out. The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation.

I became a broken record on the algorithm,” Musk says. “But I think it’s helpful to say it to an annoying degree.” It had five commandments: 1. Question every requirement. Each should come with the name of the person who made it. You should never accept that a requirement came from a department, such as from “the legal department” or “the safety department.” You need to know the name of the real person who made that requirement. Then you should question it, no matter how smart that person is. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because people are less likely to question them. Always do so, even if the requirement came from me. Then make the requirements less dumb. 2. Delete any part or process you can. You may have to add them back later. In fact, if you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn’t delete enough. 3. Simplify and optimize. This should come after step two. A common mistake is to simplify and optimize a part or a process that should not exist. 4. Accelerate cycle time. Every process can be speeded up. But only do this after you have followed the first three steps. In the Tesla factory, I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. 5. Automate. That comes last. The big mistake in Nevada and at Fremont was that I began by trying to automate every step. We should have waited until all the requirements had been questioned, parts and processes deleted, and the bugs were shaken out. The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation.

Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta Verse 1 Damn it feels good to be a gangsta A real gangsta-ass nigga plays his cards right A real gangsta-ass nigga never runs his f**kin mouth Cuz real gangsta-ass niggas don't start fights And niggas always gotta high cap Showin' all his boys how he shot em But real gangsta-ass niggas don't flex nuts Cuz real gangsta-ass niggas know they got em And everythings cool in the mind of a gangsta Cuz gangsta-ass niggas think deep Up three-sixty-five a year 24/7 Cuz real gangsta ass niggas don't sleep And all I gotta say to you Wannabe, gonnabe, cocksuckin', pussy-eatin' prankstas 'Cause when the fire dies down what the f**k you gonna do Damn it feels good to be a gangsta Verse 2 Damn it feels good to be a gangsta Feedin' the poor and helpin out with their bills Although I was born in Jamaica Now I'm in the US makin' deals Damn it feels good to be a gangsta I mean one that you don't really know Ridin' around town in a drop-top Benz Hittin' switches in my black six-fo' Now gangsta-ass niggas come in all shapes and colors Some got killed in the past But this gangtsa here is a smart one Started living for the lord and I last Now all I gotta say to you Wannabe, gonnabe, pussy-eatin' cocksuckin' prankstas When the sh*t jumps off what the f**k you gonna do Damn it feels good to be a gangsta Verse 3 Damn it feels good to be a gangsta A real gangta-ass nigga knows the play Real gangsta-ass niggas get the flyest of the b**ches Ask that gangsta-ass nigga Little Jake Now b**ches look at gangsta-ass niggas like a stop sign And play the role of Little Miss Sweet But catch the b**ch all alone get the digit take her out and then dump-hittin' the ass with the meat Cuz gangsta-ass niggas be the gang playas And everythings quiet in the clique A gangsta-ass nigga pulls the trigger And his partners in the posse ain't tellin' off sh*t Real gangsta-ass niggas don't talk much All ya hear is the black from the gun blast And real gangsta-ass niggas don't run for sh*t Cuz real gangsta-ass niggas can't run fast Now when you in the free world talkin' sh*t do the sh*t Hit the pen and let the mothaf**kas shank ya But niggas like myself kick back and peep game Cuz damn it feels good to be a gangsta Verse 4 And now, a word from the President! Damn it feels good to be a gangsta Gettin voted into the White House Everything lookin good to the people of the world But the Mafia family is my boss So every now and then I owe a favor gettin' down like lettin' a big drug shipment through And send 'em to the poor community So we can bust you know who So voters of the world keep supportin' me And I promise to take you very far Other leaders better not upset me Or I'll send a million troops to die at war To all you Republicans, that helped me win I sincerely like to thank you Cuz now I got the world swingin' from my nuts And damn it feels good to be a gangsta

Here is my six step process for how we will first start with ISIS and then build an international force that will fight terrorism and corruption wherever it appears. “First, in dedication to Lieutenant Commander McKay, Operation Crapshoot commenced at six o’clock this morning. I’ve directed a handpicked team currently deployed in Iraq to coordinate a tenfold increase in aerial bombing and close air support. In addition to aerial support, fifteen civilian security companies, including delegations from our international allies, are flying special operations veterans into Iraq. Those forces will be tasked with finding and annihilating ISIS, wherever they walk, eat or sleep. I’ve been told that they can’t wait to get started. “Second, going forward, our military will be a major component in our battle against evil. Militaries need training. I’ve been assured by General McMillan and his staff that there is no better final training test than live combat. So without much more expenditure, we will do two things, train our troops of the future, and wipe out international threats. “Third, I have a message for our allies. If you need us, we will be there. If evil raises its ugly head, we will be with you, arm in arm, fighting for what is right. But that aid comes with a caveat. Our allies must be dedicated to the common global ideals of personal and religious freedom. Any supposed ally who ignores these terms will find themselves without impunity. A criminal is a criminal. A thief is a thief. Decide which side you’re on, because our side carries a big stick. “Fourth, to the religious leaders of the world, especially those of Islam, though we live with differing traditions, we are still one people on this Earth. What one person does always has the possibility of affecting others. If you want to be part of our community, it is time to do your part. Denounce the criminals who besmirch your faith. Tell your followers the true meaning of the Koran. Do not let the money and influence of hypocrites taint your religion or your people. We request that you do this now, respectfully, or face the scrutiny of America and our allies. “Fifth, starting today, an unprecedented coalition of three former American presidents, my predecessor included, will travel around the globe to strengthen our alliances. Much like our brave military leaders, we will lead from the front, go where we are needed. We will go toe to toe with any who would seek to undermine our good intentions, and who trample the freedoms of our citizens. In the coming days you will find out how great our resolve truly is. “Sixth, my staff is in the process of drafting a proposal for the members of the United Nations. The proposal will outline our recommendations for the formation of an international terrorism strike force along with an international tax that will fund ongoing anti-terrorism operations. Only the countries that contribute to this fund will be supported by the strike force. You pay to play.

Donald Trump’s foreign policy was framed by his hostility to Western democratic leaders and a bizarre attraction to former KGB agent and current Russian president Vladimir Putin. Trump let pass no opportunity to undermine NATO, a bulwark against Russian aggression since its founding. Trump also, in effect, ceded Syria to Putin, giving Russia its first beachhead in the Middle East since 1973. And his constant attacks on America’s most faithful ally during the Cold War, Germany, led to the American president playing into Russia’s hands again by withdrawing troops from the country. While Trump’s “America First” theme initially struck a nerve with voters, his ignorance of history and lack of diplomatic skill prevented

Hamilton elite, most of whom deplored incendiary speech. They’d seen the damage it could do not only in the Atlanta riot (where the judge’s son-in-law commandeered state militia troops) but in Wilmington, North Carolina, in 1898, where distant Williams cousin Colonel Alfred Waddell had riled crowds of white men to a frenzy, resulting in wide-scale death and destruction aimed at ridding the city of black leaders and officeholders. Even though the ends in that case were to their liking, they preferred more legalistic means.

But—” “There are lots of things I can’t tell you. It’s only fair you have some of your own.” She zipped out the door before I could say another word. I considered going after her, but between her and the Spartan, I didn’t see how that could go well. I turned back to Jun. “It appears you now have my undivided attention.” “I’ll try to be brief.” Jun resettled himself to face me. “You’re familiar with the Spartans.” “I’ve encountered my fair share.” He gave me a nod of acknowledgment. “You served with the 11th Shock Troops Battalion on Reach.” “That I did. Spartan-B312 helped me out of a pinch in New Alexandria.” Jun bowed his head. “Noble Six was a good man.” I gave him a moment to collect himself. He still had eyes as dry as a glassed desert. “You have an exemplary combat record, Sergeant Buck. You’re a fantastic leader. One of the finest soldiers in the ODST.” “You’re making me blush.” “Just because the Covenant War is over doesn’t mean there aren’t battles to be fought.” “Is this some kind of recruiting drive? Because I still have a good while left on my current tour.” “Recruiting? In a way.” He sized me up. “How would you like to become a Spartan?” That caught me so off guard I actually laughed out loud. “It’s not a joke,” Jun said.

What did not happen in Florida, in either the Second or Third Seminole War, was the provision of enough forces and transportation to affect the object of these wars, the final removal of all Native Americans from the peninsula. Prior to the war’s end, rewards were offered by the United States government for the capture of Seminoles. This policy failed to bring in any significant number of Native Americans; however, by early 1858, the war was winding down. White flags and other signs were hung out on known paths used by the Seminoles, and military operations were ordered stopped by Colonel Loomis. Elias Rector, the superintendent for Indian Affairs in the southern superintendency, came to Florida in January 1858 to assist in the negotiations for peace. After a conference was held 35 miles from Fort Myers with Assinwah’s band and others, the terms were offered and monetary inducements guaranteed. On May 4, 1858, Billy Bowlegs and most of his band boarded the Grey Cloud and sailed to Egmont Key, at the mouth of Tampa Bay. Here this group was joined by 41 prisoners and made ready for the trip west. By May 8, the war was declared officially over. The army believed that there were only about 100 Seminoles and Miccosukees left in Florida. This number included the aged leader Sam Jones. There is a debate on just when this ancient and respected leader died; however, it is known that he was gone before the end of Civil War. Where his remains were deposited is a secret to this day. It is from this small number of Seminoles and Miccosukees that today’s recognized tribes have descended as a continuing tribute to the tenacity of their ancestors’ will to survive. As historian Patsy West has aptly called them, they are “The Enduring Seminoles.” BIBLIOGRAPHY DOCUMENTS A number of collections of documents exist from which the above was drawn, including the Letters Received by the Secretary of War, Registered Series, 1801–1860; Letters Sent by the Secretary of War Relating to Military Affairs, 1800–1889; Letters Received by the Office of the Adjutant General (Main Series) 1822–1860; and Letters Sent, Registers of Letters Received, and Letters Received by Headquarters, Troops in Florida, and Headquarters Department of Florida, 1850–1858. The collections are all on microfilm from the National Archives. Numerous Congressional documents were also consulted

Promise?” He pulls the light toward his face. “Scout’s honor.” I roll my eyes. “You were never a Scout.” He chuckles. “What makes you say that?” “Maybe because of your issue with authority. I can see you arguing with your troop leader about rules and principles you refuse to abide by because they were created by self-righteous assholes.

To explain how we got to this seemingly intractable place, a little history is required—never a simple proposition in a part of the world where rivaling versions of the past are a dense thicket. The 1930s saw a series of Arab revolts against the influx of Jewish migrants to Palestine, which was then under British control. This wave of Jewish immigration was regarded by many Palestinians as a colonial imposition, a perception that was further cemented when British troops and local police put down the Arab uprising with tremendous force, fueling further resentment. When Palestine was partitioned in 1947, a move with overwhelming Arab opposition, and Israel declared statehood the next year, the first Arab-Israeli war was locked in. These were the years that Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe: roughly 750,000 Palestinians were expelled, hundreds of Palestinian villages were destroyed, and thousands were killed, with many of the horrifying truths about these atrocities finally escaping Israel’s own Shadow Lands in recent years. Of course Palestinians would resist such ethnic cleaning with violence of their own. Yet rather than seeing Arab resistance for what it was—a nationalist, anti-colonial battle over land and self-determination (with some anti-Semitic elements, to be sure)—many influential Zionist leaders portrayed the entire Palestinian cause as nothing but more irrational Jew-hatred, a seamless continuation of the very same anti-Semitism that had resulted in the Holocaust, and that therefore needed to be crushed with the kind of militarized force that Jews had not been able to marshal in Nazi-controlled Europe. Within this imaginary, the Palestinian, as the Jew’s new eternal enemy, was treated as so illegitimate, so irrational, so other, that Israelis believed themselves to be justified in reenacting many of the forms of violence, dehumanizing propaganda, and forced displacement that had targeted and uprooted the Jewish people throughout Europe for centuries, a process that continues to this day with ongoing home demolitions, Israeli settlement expansions, targeted assassinations, settler rampages through Palestinian communities, openly discriminatory laws, and walled ghettos into which Palestinians are corralled.

The relief of a combat leader is something that is not to be lightly done in war. Its first effect is to indicate to troops dissatisfaction with their performance; otherwise the commander would be commended, not relieved. This probable effect must always be weighed against the hoped-for advantage of assigning to the post another, and possibly untried, commander. On the other hand, really inept leadership must be quickly detected and instantly removed. Lives of thousands are involved—the question is not one of academic justice for the leader, it is that of concern for the many and the objective of victory.

This plan would be the fulfillment of the words of Henry Kissinger recorded in Chapter 1, that are worth repeating here. “Today, Americans would be outraged if UN troops entered Los Angeles to restore order; tomorrow, they will be grateful. This is especially true if they were told there was an outside threat from beyond, whether real or promulgated, that threatened our very existence. It is then that all people of the world will plead with world leaders to deliver them from this evil. The one thing that every man fears is the unknown. When presented with this scenario, individual rights will be willingly relinquished for the guarantee of their well-being granted to them by their world government.

Every leader understands that nothing is more important to the success of a mission than the morale of the troops. But leaders often misunderstand the nature of morale. Morale is not just about the employees feeling good, it is about the employees feeling valued. It is about the rank and file having the resources they need to do their job. It is about the troops believing that their leader is listening to their concerns.

In all primate groups, members direct attention up the hierarchy rather than down. We humans are a lot like baboons and chimpanzees, who check every twenty or thirty seconds to see what the alpha male in their troop is doing. This lopsided attention is adaptive because more powerful creatures dispense rewards and punishments. Human bosses often don’t realize how closely underlings monitor their every word and deed—and are oblivious of the gyrations that subordinates go through to protect themselves from and please those at the top of the pecking order.

M. Romains had taken many journeys in his country’s interest and at his own expense. He had talked with the statesmen of fourteen European lands. Three years ago he had traveled to Berlin and delivered a lecture under government auspices. Brownshirted leaders had been summoned from all over the land to hear him, and one of the top-flight Nazis had said to him: “You know, no private individual has ever been received like this in Berlin.” The philosopher-novelist had also been welcomed by the King of the Belgians, who had discussed frankly that country’s attitude to the gravely threatened war. As M. Romains told about these matters, you couldn’t doubt that he was patriotically in earnest, but also you couldn’t help feeling that he was intensely impressed by his own importance. His plan was the one known as le couple France-Allemagne, and it meant reconcilation with Germany, by the simple method of giving the Nazis whatever they demanded. For example, he had had the idea that the Allies should have got out of the Saar without the formality of a plebiscite. Lanny happened to know that Briand had been trying to work out some compromise on this question as far back as ten years ago; but apparently M. Romains didn’t know that, and certainly it wasn’t up to Lanny to correct him on his facts. The philosopher-novelist seemed to have the idea that the Saar settlement had been a matter between France and Germany, and that the plebiscite had taken place under French military control, whereas the fact was it had been a League matter, and French troops had been withdrawn nine years before the plebiscite was held. Among the members of that attentive audience was Kurt Meissner, who had met the Frenchman many years ago in Emily’s drawing-room. Evidently he had put his opportunity to good use, for it was just as if M. Romains had sat in a seminar conducted by the Wehrmacht’s agent, had absorbed the entire doctrine, and was now giving an oral dissertation to demonstrate what he had learned and get his degree. His discourse embraced the complete Nazi program for the undermining of the French republic: warm protestations of friendship; unlimited promises of peace; the sowing of distrust of all politicians and of the entire democratic procedure; and, above all else, fear of the Red specter. The Reds kept faith with nobody, their country was a colossus with feet of clay, their army a broken reed upon which France persisted in trying to lean. The republic had to choose between Stalin and Hitler; between an illusory military alliance and a secure and enduring peace. The words burned Lanny’s tongue: “M. Romains, have you ever read Mein Kampf?” Of course, Lanny couldn’t say them; but he wondered, how would this somewhat self-conscious idol of the bourgeois world have replied? Lanny recalled the Max Beerbohm cartoon in which a drawing-room fop is asked if he has read a certain book, and replies: “I do not read books; I write them.

This wicked woman trapped Huotu Clan in such a situation.” Shi Ying was cold, the voice was not high, but every word he pronounced was clear and spread to every soldier’s ear: “I have come here at the behest of the Emperor, to punish the evil leader, who dare to threaten and rule recklessly! The Red King has come with his troops, and the valiant cavalry of the Imperial Capital is about to arrive. Do you people still want to help do evil and fight against the Heavenly Army?” “…” On the Wasteland, three thousand iron armored soldiers were silent for a while.

In any chain of command, the leadership must always present a united front to the troops. A public display of discontent or disagreement with the chain of command undermines the authority of leaders at all levels. This is catastrophic to the performance of any organization. As a leader, if you don’t understand why decisions are being made, requests denied, or support allocated elsewhere, you must ask those questions up the chain. Then, once understood, you can pass that understanding down to your team. Leaders in any chain of command will not always agree. But at the end of the day, once the debate on a particular course of action is over and the boss has made a decision—even if that decision is one you argued against—you must execute the plan as if it were your own. When leading up the chain of command, use caution and respect. But remember, if your leader is not giving the support you need, don’t blame him or her. Instead, reexamine what you can do to better clarify, educate, influence, or convince that person to give you what you need in order to win. The major factors to be aware of when leading up and down the chain of command are these: • Take responsibility for leading everyone in your world, subordinates and superiors alike. • If someone isn’t doing what you want or need them to do, look in the mirror first and determine what you can do to better enable this. • Don’t ask your leader what you should do, tell them what you are going to do.

In any chain of command, the leadership must always present a united front to the troops. A public display of discontent or disagreement with the chain of command undermines the authority of leaders at all levels. This is catastrophic to the performance of any organization. As a leader, if you don’t understand why decisions are being made, requests denied, or support allocated elsewhere, you must ask those questions up the chain. Then, once understood, you can pass that understanding down to your team. Leaders in any chain of command will not always agree. But at the end of the day, once the debate on a particular course of action is over and the boss has made a decision—even if that decision is one you argued against—you must execute the plan as if it were your own. When leading up the chain of command, use caution and respect. But remember, if your leader is not giving the support you need, don’t blame him or her. Instead, reexamine what you can do to better clarify, educate, influence, or convince that person to give you what you need in order to win. The major factors to be aware of when leading up and down the chain of command are these: • Take responsibility for leading everyone in your world, subordinates and superiors alike. • If someone isn’t doing what you want or need them to do, look in the mirror first and determine what you can do to better enable this. • Don’t ask your leader what you should do, tell them what you are going to do. APPLICATION TO BUSINESS “Corporate doesn’t understand what’s going on out here,” said the field manager. “Whatever experience those guys had in the field from years ago, they have long forgotten. They just don’t get what we are dealing with, and their questions and second-guessing prevents me and my team from getting the job done.” The infamous they. I was on a visit to a client company’s field leadership team, the frontline troops that executed the company’s mission. This was where the rubber met the road: all the corporate capital initiatives, strategic planning sessions, and allocated resources were geared to support this team here on the ground. How the frontline troops executed the mission would ultimately mean success or failure for the entire company. The field manager’s team was geographically separated from their corporate headquarters located hundreds of miles away. He was clearly frustrated. The field manager had a job to do, and he was angry at the questions and scrutiny from afar. For every task his team undertook he was required to submit substantial paperwork. In his mind, it made for a lot more work than necessary and detracted from his team’s focus and ability to execute. I listened and allowed him to vent for several minutes. “I’ve been in your shoes,” I said. “I used to get frustrated as hell at my chain of command when we were in Iraq. They

The object remaining a secret in the hands of the managers, the rest simply put a ring in their own noses, by which they may be led about at pleasure; and still panting after the secret, they are the better pleased the less they see of their way. A mystical object enables the leader to shift his ground as he pleases, and to accommodate himself to every current fashion or prejudice. This again gives him almost unlimited power; for he can make use of these prejudices to lead men by troops. He finds them already associated by their prejudices, and waiting for a leader to concentrate their strength and set them in motion.

In 2008 an official website commemorating Sharon’s life and achievements was established, in which, rather than hiding his role in Gaza in those days, it proudly lauded it: Sharon participates in these searches himself. He orders the soldiers to perform a full body search on all males and sometimes imposes curfews on refugee camps in order to conduct a search. The clear goal of the mission is finding terrorists and killing them. The soldiers have orders not to try and capture the terrorists alive. Sharon instructs them to be rough with the local population, to perform searches in the streets and even to strip suspects naked if necessary; to shoot to kill any Arab who holds a gun; to shoot to kill any Arab who does not obey a Stop! call; and to diminish the risk to their lives by employing a big volume of fire, by uprooting trees from orchards which makes it difficult to capture terrorists, by demolishing houses and driving out their owners to other houses in order to pave secure roads. Haider Abd al-Shafi, Senior Palestinian leader, says: ‘Sharon took a decision to open roads in Al Shateya camp and in Rafah for security. That led to removing houses, the houses of refugees, which is an action not to be taken lightly, but there was no objection neither from Dayan nor from the Israeli government. They let Sharon realize his aim and he really destroyed a lot of refugees’ houses.’ Eli Landau, political ally and a friend of Ariel Sharon, says: ‘He was a very senior officer going with the troops from house to house, from bunker to bunker, from orange grove to orange grove, to explain what he meant. Three months later, Gaza was quiet. The terror was crushed with an iron fist, with a vicious hand. He cast fear in Gaza, he was feared.’9 The manner and detail of the retaliation were based on British military counter-insurgency methods employed against the Palestinians during the Arab revolt in the 1930s; it seems that the new rulers of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip were highly impressed by this ruthless methodology. In the case of the British this pattern of inhumanity was in place for three years; in the case of the Palestinians it has lasted for more than fifty years.

In 1952, a year after becoming Chabad’s leader, the Rebbe undertook to send a newly married couple to serve as shluchim in Brazil. Unlike the Lipskers, in this case the bride and her parents, all three Lubavitchers, were very unhappy with the Rebbe’s request. The father, who held a key position for the movement in Israel, couldn’t comprehend the idea of his daughter and son-in-law moving to a country with little Jewish infrastructure in place, and he wrote to the Rebbe to express his unhappiness. We possess no copy of the father’s letter, but the basic content of what he said is clear from the Rebbe’s response (when the letter was published, the Rebbe, as was his custom, omitted all names). The father, clearly pleased about the marriage, wrote that the family’s “happy event was [now] disturbed” by the news that the couple were to be sent abroad. It seems apparent from the Rebbe’s response that the father made no effort to disguise his displeasure at what the Rebbe had done. The Rebbe was in no way apologetic. He wrote in his capacity as a leader, in a sense as a military general who understood the need to deploy his troops where they were most needed, to “a place where your son-in-law and your daughter can fully utilize their potential.” The Rebbe acknowledged that moving to a foreign and largely nonobservant Jewish community requires a certain measure of self-sacrifice (mesirut nefesh), but he then posed a rhetorical question intended to overwhelm any further opposition. To paraphrase: “If one can’t expect such self-sacrifice from a graduate of our yeshiva, one who is a child as well of such a graduate and who is married to the daughter of such a graduate, if even from such people one can’t ask for a measure of self-sacrifice, then upon whom can one rely?” The Rebbe proceeded to offer both a carrot and a stick. Thus, he assured the father—knowing that the letter would be read by his daughter as well—that the couple would flourish in every meaningful manner by undertaking such a mission: “The vastness of the good fortune that will result if they accept this offer, including good fortune in a physical sense, is obvious to me.” On the other hand—and the Rebbe stated this as a fact, not a threat—refusing such a mission would cut the couple off from the work of the Previous Rebbe (who had died just two years earlier), and, by implication, from the Rebbe himself. Although he expressed “shock” that an offer to spread “the light of Torah and Chasidus” to unknowledgeable Jews could lead to the parents feeling that their happiness had been “disturbed,” he also set down, near the letter’s end, his trademark conclusion: “As stated above, I am not giving an order, Heaven forbid. This is only a suggestion.

All the 14 parishes of the West Province accepted the terms, and on the 24th of October the great ceremony of reconciliation took place in Port-au-Prince. The leaders of the whites and the leaders of the Mulattoes marched into Port-au-Prince arm in arm, with their troops marching behind, greeted by salvoes of artillery and mutual shouts of “Unity and Fidelity.

The most virulent expression of narco religion is by La Familia Cartel in Michoacán. La Familia indoctrinates its followers in its own version of evangelical Christianity mixed with some peasant rebel politics. The gang’s spiritual leader, Nazario Moreno, “El Mas Loco,” or the Maddest One, actually wrote his own bible, which is compulsory reading for the troops. This sounds so nuts I thought it was another drug war myth. Until I got my hands on a copy of his “good” book. It is not an easy bedtime read. But La Familia is only the most defined voice in a chorus of narco religion that has been rising in volume for decades. Other tones of the choir include some morphed rituals of Caribbean Santeria, the folk saint Jesús Malverde, and the wildly popular Santa Muerte, or Holy Death. Many who follow these faiths are not drug traffickers or gun-toting assassins. The beliefs all have an appeal to poor Mexicans who feel the staid Catholic Church is not speaking to them and their problems. But gangsters definitely feel at home in these new sects and exert a powerful influence on them, giving a spiritual and semi-ideological backbone to narco clans. Such a backbone strengthens El Narco as an insurgent movement that is challenging the old order. Kingpins now fight for souls as well as turfs.

My body craved the pressure of sitting in a curled up, “gargoyle” posture (many Autistic people enjoy sitting this way), but the group leader found it so irritating she couldn’t help but berate me for it in front of the whole troop every single time it happened.

The goal of all leaders should be to work themselves out of a job. You never quite get there, but by putting junior leaders and frontline troops in charge, our SEAL platoon and task unit were far more effective. It created a culture of leaders at every level of the team.

The stationing of American and European troops in Saudi-Arabia and the following military fight against the Iraqi army brought the Arab world into their closest contact with the ominous "West" since colonial times. The broad public in most Arab countries sided with Iraq, thus contrasting in the most obvious way with their governments’ positions. For the Islamists in all Arab states, especially those in Palestine, the Gulf-War was a great moment because it seemed to confirm their world view in an impressive manner; and those views were shared in an unprecedented way by the majority of the Arab population. In fact, the reaction of the population often pushed the Islamists to a more open position of support for Saddam Hussein than they had wished to take with regards to their main financiers, the Gulf-states and Saudi-Arabia. Nevertheless, the Western military intervention gave the Islamists the chance to become—for a short time—the leaders of the masses against their "corrupt" governments to an extent which they only had dreamt about until then.

Note: Whether Kamala Harris or Donald Trump becomes president of the USA, there will be changes; nothing nor the world will be able to enjoy peace and human rights. However, one change will be definite if Kamala takes the black presidential oath in the White House atmosphere. A man of accusations, Trump should enjoy the retirement of life with beauties. An open letter, which Ehsan Sehgal wrote to him, is republished in Medium to realize his political character and role.  Dear President of the USA, Donald Trump  Your Excellency,  Equality, justice, harmony, and love, within the concept and context of security and respect, are for the entire humanity, not only for the USA and its people. Global peace lies in a step that pulls out your troops from the Muslim States and stops interfering with its systems and way of life; all terrorists will disappear, and peace shall prevail.  One should realize the atrocities of Israel against Palestinians’ determination and India against Kashmiris that the United Nations and its Security Council failed to resolve and solve those disputes under the umbrella of the USA. Consequently, each one of us faces the consequences.  You, as a leader of a great nation, ought to be great and noble. It is possible if you change your distinctive thoughts and policies, you may change human history, becoming the historical leader of the entire humanity that suffers from injustice, hunger, and death.  As far as I know, the Pakistan Armed Forces have devotedly and significantly sacrificed along with the Armed Forces of the USA for global peace, so never degrade your national pride by ignoring, denying, and forgetting the sacrifice of Pakistani men and women, which they are still paying. You should cooperate instead of becoming influenced by the opposing third party to accuse Pakistan. They are a peaceful nation and are determined to stand along with the US forces to eliminate all sorts of terrorists for world peace. God bless you.  Ehsan Sehgal

Even before the first Soviet tanks crossed into Afghanistan in 1979, a movement of Islamists had sprung up nationwide in opposition to the Communist state. They were, at first, city-bound intellectuals, university students and professors with limited countryside appeal. But under unrelenting Soviet brutality they began to forge alliances with rural tribal leaders and clerics. The resulting Islamist insurgents—the mujahedeen—became proxies in a Cold War battle, with the Soviet Union on one side and the United States, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia on the other. As the Soviets propped up the Afghan government, the CIA and other intelligence agencies funneled millions of dollars in aid to the mujahedeen, along with crate after crate of weaponry. In the process, traditional hierarchies came radically undone. When the Communists killed hundreds of tribal leaders and landlords, young men of more humble backgrounds used CIA money and arms to form a new warrior elite in their place. In the West, we would call such men “warlords.” In Afghanistan they are usually labeled “commanders.” Whatever the term, they represented a phenomenon previously unknown in Afghan history. Now, each valley and district had its own mujahedeen commanders, all fighting to free the country from Soviet rule but ultimately subservient to the CIA’s guns and money. The war revolutionized the very core of rural culture. With Afghan schools destroyed, millions of boys were instead educated across the border in Pakistani madrassas, or religious seminaries, where they were fed an extreme, violence-laden version of Islam. Looking to keep the war fueled, Washington—where the prevailing ethos was to bleed the Russians until the last Afghan—financed textbooks for schoolchildren in refugee camps festooned with illustrations of Kalashnikovs, swords, and overturned tanks. One edition declared: Jihad is a kind of war that Muslims fight in the name of God to free Muslims.… If infidels invade, jihad is the obligation of every Muslim. An American text designed to teach children Farsi: Tey [is for] Tofang (rifle); Javed obtains rifles for the mujahedeen Jeem [is for] Jihad; Jihad is an obligation. My mom went to the jihad. The cult of martyrdom, the veneration of jihad, the casting of music and cinema as sinful—once heard only from the pulpits of a few zealots—now became the common vocabulary of resistance nationwide. The US-backed mujahedeen branded those supporting the Communist government, or even simply refusing to pick sides, as “infidels,” and justified the killing of civilians by labeling them apostates. They waged assassination campaigns against professors and civil servants, bombed movie theaters, and kidnapped humanitarian workers. They sabotaged basic infrastructure and even razed schools and clinics. With foreign backing, the Afghan resistance eventually proved too much for the Russians. The last Soviet troops withdrew in 1989, leaving a battered nation, a tottering government that was Communist in name only, and a countryside in the sway of the commanders. For three long years following the withdrawal, the CIA kept the weapons and money flowing to the mujahedeen, while working to block any peace deal between them and the Soviet-funded government. The CIA and Pakistan’s spy agency pushed the rebels to shell Afghan cities still under government control, including a major assault on the eastern city of Jalalabad that flattened whole neighborhoods. As long as Soviet patronage continued though, the government withstood the onslaught. With the collapse of the Soviet Union in late 1991, however, Moscow and Washington agreed to cease all aid to their respective proxies. Within months, the Afghan government crumbled. The question of who would fill the vacuum, who would build a new state, has not been fully resolved to this day.

As Sir Eric Williams wrote in From Columbus to Castro: The situation was more discouraging in Cuba, which was in every sense of the term an American colony. The Americans openly supported, in the interest of stability, the dictator Machado who raised no awkward questions of Cuban independence and who was concerned merely with the exile or assassination of hostile labour leaders and the reckless and enormous increase of the public debt, both public and private. America dominated the scene. One American writer has stated that no one could become President of Cuba without the endorsement of the United States. According to another, the American Ambassador in Havana was the most important man in Cuba. A third analyses United States policy as "putting a veto on revolution whatever the cause". The Platt Amendment dominated the relations between the United States and Cuba. On the occasion of a threatened rebellion by a Negro political party, the Independent Party of Colour, the United States sent troops to Cuba. In reply to Cuba's protests Secretary of State Knox stated: "The United States does not undertake first to consult the Cuban Government if a crisis arises requiring a temporary landing somewhere." In 1933 Ambassador Sumner Welles identified six desirable characteristics which a Cuban president should possess. These read in part: "First, his thorough acquaintance with the desires of this Government… Sixth, his amenability to suggestions or advice which might be made to him by the American Legation.

The Lixingshe movement set up by dedicated supporters from Whampoa in 1932 to ensure authoritarian allegiance to the leader grew to number half a million members, with offshoots such as the political shock troops known as the Blue Shirts. But the notion of a continuous mass movement remained deeply suspect to the militarised bureaucracy in Nanking - a major difference between Chiang's regime and Mussolini's Italy or Hitler's Germany. It presented an authoritarian view of Chinese tradition as a historic justification for dictatorship with a conservative cultural policy to buttress the supremacy' of the state and its chief. Intellectuals were told to sacrifice their individual liberty for the sake of the nation. If the regime had fascist tendencies, it was `Confucian Fascism', as the historian Frederic Wakeman has dubbed it.

For reasons of electoral calculation—to preserve his Democratic majorities in a congressional midterm election—Roosevelt wanted American troops fighting Germans before the end of the year. “We failed to see,” Marshall would write, “that the leader in a democracy has to keep the people entertained. The people demand action.

What is the life of one person worth? Although the Supreme leader Kim Jong-un is not suicidal, life to him is relatively cheap, after all he had his half-brother murdered. The countries population of almost 25 million people is harshly subjugated and the military consists of 5,200,000 men and women both active and in the reserves. Although his military ranks as 25th of the worlds military powers, it is the development of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems that makes Kim Jong-un so dangerous. It is estimated that they have about a dozen nuclear devices that could most likely be delivered as far as Japan. Of course their future targets, including the United States are more ambitious. In contrast to their troop strength, the United States has 1,400,000 personnel under arms, South Korea has only 624,465 and China has 2,333,000 personnel. Our advantage is primarily technical, however regardless of our superiority in battlefield technology, oil which they get from China, remains the lifeblood of their supporting economy and army. North Korea has threatened to fire missiles at the U. S. military bases in Okinawa and Guam. The reality of a war is that we would most likely win such a conflict but at a very high cost. The biggest losers of a war on the Korean Peninsula would be South Korea, North Korea and the United States in that order. If there were to be a winner it would be Russia. What are we thinking? Perhaps we should come up with a better strategy.

As a graduate of the Citadel, the military college of South Carolina, I am astonished by Tolstoy’s absolute mastery at describing battles and military tactics. If I were teaching military history in any country in the world, I would make War and Peace required reading for anyone who held any ambition for advancement into the officer corps. It should be on the night table of the leader of every country who wishes to send troops into war. No writer has ever described the horror and anarchy of battle with more authority. It is one of the timeless lessons of War and Peace that no one, not Napoleon, nor the Tsar, nor the Russian general Katuzov, has any idea how a war is going to turn out once it is unleashed. Napoleon

Ramesses had personal details inscribed that claimed, "No officer was with me, no charioteer, no soldier of the army, no shield-bearer..." and “I was before them like Seth in his monument. I found the mass of chariots in whose midst I was, scattering them before my horses..." In Luxor, it was written, “His majesty slaughtered the armed forces of the Hittites in their entirety, their great rulers and all their brothers ... their infantry and chariot troops fell prostrate, one on top of the other. His majesty killed them ... and they lay stretched out in front of their horses. But his majesty was alone, nobody accompanied him...” If the inscriptions were to be believed, the great warrior had singlehandedly ensured his own survival, even with all the odds stacked against him. Ramesses II successfully used propaganda inscribed onto the monuments and in the public places of Egypt to ensure that the people he ruled would deem him a victorious leader, even when he himself was faced with defeat. The

Intelligence is the decisive factor in planning guerrilla operations. Where is the enemy? In what strength? What does he propose to do? What is the state of his equipment, his supply, his morale? Are his leaders intelligent, bold, and imaginative or stupid and impetuous? Are his troops tough, efficient, and well disciplined, or poorly trained and soft? Guerrillas expect the members of their intelligence service to provide the answers to these and dozens more detailed questions. “Guerrilla intelligence nets are tightly organized and pervasive. In a guerrilla area, every person without exception must be considered an agent — old men and women, boys driving ox carts, girls tending goats, farm laborers, storekeepers, schoolteachers, priests, boatmen, scavengers. The local cadres “put the heat” on everyone, without regard to age or sex, to produce all conceivable information. And produce it they do.

Guerrillas fight only when the chances of victory are weighted heavily in their favor; if the tide of battle unexpectedly flows against them, they withdraw. They rely on imaginative leadership, distraction, sunrise, and mobility to create a victorious situation before battle is joined. The enemy is deceived and again deceived. Attacks are sudden, sharp, vicious, and of short duration. Many are harassing in nature; others designed to dislocate the enemy’s plans and to agitate and confuse his commanders. The mind of the enemy and the will of his leaders is a target of far more importance than the bodies of his troops.

By the beginning of 1946, there were plenty of indications that Stalin was not going to cooperate with the Anglo-Americans, however, and not just with regard to Germany. Russia was refusing, for instance, to carry out its part of the post-war agreement when it came to Iran. The country had been occupied by British, American and Russian troops during the war years, with an agreement that all would withdraw as soon as peace came. The British and American forces duly complied within the time agreed, but the Soviets did not, and, moreover, showed signs of trying to expand their area of occupation. Two ethnically based ‘soviet republics’ were set up by Soviet agents on Iranian territory during early 1946. These were liquidated by the Iranian army, with American encouragement, and their leaders either executed or put to flight, but the crisis atmosphere lingered on for months before Stalin quietly withdrew. The Iran crisis was a key factor in the deteriorating relationship between the Anglo-American axis and its former Soviet allies. While it was still simmering, President Truman reinforced his case by sending the US battleship Missouri to the Mediterranean. The Missouri came to form the core of the Sixth Fleet, which is still there.2 At

The Obama administration and major US media portray Syria as a quagmire of religious groups fighting centuries-old battles. The reality is quite different. For many years, Syrians lived peacefully with one another. Syria was a secular dictatorship where dissidents faced torture and jail for criticizing Assad, but people largely ignored religious differences. Once the fighting began, however, leaders on both sides used religion to rally their troops. Rebels relied on the Sunni Muslim majority. Assad appealed to minority groups such as Alawites, Christians, and Shia Muslims.

The name Camp Columbia came from a historic and rather poetic name for the United States. It was founded in 1898, for the purpose of housing U.S. Army troops during the provisional American protectorate over Cuba. It was also considered “the First American occupation of Cuba,” established in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War. After the withdrawal of American troops, the military establishment was turned over to the Cuban government and became the largest Cuban army base on the island. On September 4, 1933, at Camp Columbia, an army base in Havana, Batista with his inner circle of conspirators took over power as he forced a military coup. Labor leaders who had opposed Machado’s re-election, along with “The Student Directory” comprised of teachers as well as students, joined the sergeants in assuming control of the government. In this way, Batista turned the revolt within the military into the full-blown “Revolution of 1933.

age COG—except for one minor problem. There was no clear communication system that would ensure the nation’s leaders didn’t end up living through a nuclear attack, only to be stuck 3,500 feet below in the world’s best-engineered tomb, cut off from the world above as supplies dwindled. That flaw made it unlikely a president would ever utilize the DUCC. Joint Chiefs chairman Maxwell Taylor wrote, “Escape and survivable communications from a DUCC would be problematical in case of a direct attack on Washington with large-yield nuclear weapons.” In the end, the DUCC never made it far off the drawing board. While the initial appropriation to begin digging was included in the FY1965 military budget, the House Armed Services Committee didn’t approve the full funding. Even as the Pentagon began to study specific sites, the project died a slow death—a casualty of its own shortcomings, of shifting national priorities, and a military budget increasingly focused on ground troops, Huey helicopters, and the other costs of the Vietnam War. In

It seemed to him the highest principle, loyalty. He preferred it to honor. He had never been exactly sure what men meant when they spoke of their honor, though it had been a popular word during the time of the War. He was sure, though, what he meant when he spoke of loyalty. A man didn’t desert his comrades, his troop, his leader. If he did he was, in Call’s book, worthless.

Forrest had about 4,000 cavalry with him, composed of thoroughly well-disciplined men, who under so able a leader were very effective. Smith’s command was nearly double that of Forrest, but not equal, man to man, for the lack of a successful experience such as Forrest’s men had had. The fact is, troops who have fought a few battles and won, and followed up their victories, improve upon what they were before to an extent that can hardly be counted by percentage. The difference in result is often decisive victory instead of inglorious defeat. This same difference, too, is often due to the way troops are officered, and for the particular kind of warfare which Forrest had carried on neither army could present a more effective officer than he was.

O’Neill and his army marched south from Ulster to meet the enemy while his ally Red Hugh O’Donnell marched in from the west. But once the Irish armies were in place, O’Neill and O’Donnell began arguing as to which of them should begin the attack. This delay proved fatal as the agreed upon hour of rendezvous with the Spaniards passed, and the window of opportunity for an Irish victory slammed shut. The Battle of Kinsale lasted three months, and in the end O’Neill was unable to defeat Mountjoy’s siege lines. Finally the Spanish troops surrendered to the English and sailed home. Thousands of Irish rebels died in the fighting or, taken prisoner, were hung. Hugh O’Neill was forced to submit to the English conquerors in a series of humiliating ceremonies, first on his knees to Mountjoy, then to the Lord Deputy and the Irish Privy Council. It was only after he’d put his submission in writing, renouncing his title of “The O’Neill and his allegiance to Spain, as well as protesting loyalty to the Crown, was he told that Elizabeth had died six days before. Mountjoy had tricked him. It was said that O’Neill wept openly and copiously for both his personal defeat and the ruination of the “Irish cause.” The rebel leader retreated to Ulster, and by the good graces of the new king of England, was pardoned once again, and his lands restored to him. He took up residency in his luxurious home, but spurred by a series of dangerous events and the realization that no hope was left for a free Ireland, O’Neill and a handful of Irish overlords and their families sailed from their homeland in 1607. The tragic “Flight of the Earls” ended the most tumultuous century in Ireland’s history. Tyrone,

Tomás Estrada Palma was a Cuban-born American citizen, who was a moderate and had worked with José Martí in New York. He became the leader of the Cuban Revolutionary Party after Marti’s death. On December 31, 1901, Tomás Estrada Palma was duly elected to become the first President of Cuba. Estrada Palma and the Cuban Congress assumed governance on May 20, 1902, which then became the official birthdate of the Cuban Republic. In 1906, Estrada Palma appealed to the United States to intervene in the revolt that threatened his second term. As Secretary of War during the Roosevelt administration, William Howard Taft was sent to Cuba, after having been the first civilian Governor-General of the Philippines. For the short period of time from September 29, 1906, until October 13, 1906, Taft was the Provisional Governor of Cuba. During this time, 5,600 U.S. Army troops were sent to Cuba to reassert American authority, giving Taft the muscle to set up another provisional government. Later, on March 4, 1909, Taft was elected the 27th President of the United States.

If I ran the world--and God knows I could do a better job of it than the yahoos doing it now--any leader who sent troops off to fight would have to march at the head of the ranks. That would bring about world peace in four weeks.

At every significant point in the four centuries since English settlers laid the foundations for the nation we know—at every significant point—American leaders and the great majority of the American people have explicitly said or acted as though they understood history in terms of this public religion. As King George III’s British troops moved toward New York City in the summer of 1776, Gershom Seixas, leader of the first Jewish synagogue in America, Shearith Israel, led his people into what they called their “exile.” Armed with the Torah scrolls, the congregation linked the ancient story of its forbears with the young country’s, referring to the Revolution as “the sacred cause of America.” Once victory was won, the congregation prayed in thanksgiving: “We cried unto the Lord from our straits and from our troubles He brought us forth.” The Lord delivered Israel; now he had delivered the United States.

However I was out of touch with Titch because of the distance, although at one point in the afternoon I heard him call for all echelons to return. I kept this news to myself, as I decided that it didn’t apply to us. The regiment would certainly need to be refuelled and as we were the only echelon in the area I stayed where I was.

Later that month, my tank driver, Chamberlain, was badly burned when, having primed the stove with petrol, he took the half empty jerrycan and laid it down behind him. Unbeknownst to him, a trail of petrol led from the stove to the jerrican, and when he threw a match on to the stove, the jerrycan blew up. His resultant injuries were so severe that he had to be evacuated and didn’t return to the crew until September.

I often found during the war that I was able to stand back and look at the scene around me as if I was not actually a participant but that it was all a dream. This was one of those occasions, when a sense of unreality pervaded and I felt out of touch with self, a sort of ‘sugary’ feeling came over me as if I was being manipulated gently into doing something which I wanted to do, but over which I had no control.

Rather than calling for the white citizens of Little Rock to show Christian love toward the black students, Rice mocked “the wholly selfish and political attitude of the NAACP radical leaders, by socialists and communists, by modernist ‘do-gooders’ who have no other gospel but questions of race and pacifism and labor unions.” He continued:   The nine Negro children were selected by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and on their instructions and to make a public issue.. wholly for political and propaganda purposes…and not for the good of the students themselves, attempted to transfer to Central High School…The Negroes already had a high school equally as good, newer and less crowded…To force integration, President Eisenhower called out units of the 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock, who took over somewhat as “occupation troops.” Citizens were barred from certain streets. Some [whites] were clubbed in the head by soldiers. The nine Negro students went to Central High School.[176]

Talk to virtually any American or Israeli veteran of a combat unit and he can tell you several stories that are remarkably similar. And they usually do not have happy endings. Soldiers ambushed from mosques have to return fire. Terrorist leaders surround themselves with civilians so often that troops face the terrible choice of either allowing terrorists to roam free and execute deadly attacks, or having to kill them and face the reality of civilian deaths. A terrible and hidden reality of both America’s and Israel’s wars is that hundreds of soldiers have fallen, killed by terrorists, because they were being cautious with civilian lives. This is an impulse that is utterly alien to jihadists, but is a core value for Americans and Israelis. Terrorists take a life for the purpose of taking a life. American and Israeli soldiers take a life in the effort to save civilians.

A leader’s job is to provide air cover for the troops, and the first form of air cover is a bulletproof strategy.

My Grandfather always said,'Rian,if you were a leader of a nation and your nation was in war with other nation,before you deliver a troops,you better know what you fighting for,okay?

Suddenly, in the far distance, a bugle was heard, heralding the troops from Fort McKinney. The fighting at the T. A. did not stop immediately, though. Van Horn later reported that both of the hostile parties discovered his presence, and from that time the besiegers “kept up an almost continuous fire upon the buildings.” Shortly, the troops pulled up near the ranch, and about 6:45 A.M., Colonel Van Horn asked Sheriff Angus to order the posse to stop firing, which, in Van Horn’s words, “was soon effected.”13 The invaders watched the approach of the troops with intense interest. In a dramatic passage, David wrote that Major Wolcott, seeing the troops, “threw his hand in a gesture of stunned groping to the table and whispered: ‘Gentlemen, it is the troops. We are to live.’”14 Sam Clover interviewed a stockman he called Bertram, who told him, “We were up against it hard, and knew our case was hopeless unless the soldiers were ordered out. When that bugle sounded I could have wept; as it was, I howled for joy.”15 On the other hand, some of the invaders continued to show disdain for the sheriff’s posse, refusing to admit that they were ever in peril. Frank Canton wrote much later that the invaders could have broken out anytime they wanted. They only bothered to stay, Canton said, because they had gone to the trouble of making fortifications.16 Canton’s bravado notwithstanding, most of the invaders were deeply relieved. Surrounded and outnumbered almost ten to one, they faced determined men with ample ammunition and food. The four hundred besiegers, according to a Cheyenne Daily Leader correspondent on the scene, “were invariably small ranchmen, distinct from the rustlers, who believed that their lives and homes were in danger from the invasion.”17 Clover described the invaders, on the other hand, as presenting a “desperate appearance. . .  hollow-eyed, begrimed and half-frozen.”18 Still, they made

During China’s War of the Three Kingdoms (A.D. 207-265), the great general Chuko Liang, leading the forces of the Shu Kingdom, dispatched his vast army to a distant camp while he rested in a small town with a handful of soldiers. Suddenly sentinels hurried in with the alarming news that an enemy force of over 150,000 troops under Sima Yi was approaching. With only a hundred men to defend him, Chuko Liang’s situation was hopeless. The enemy would finally capture this renowned leader. Without lamenting his fate, or wasting time trying to figure out how he had been caught, Liang ordered his troops to take down their flags, throw open the city gates, and hide. He himself then took a seat on the most visible part of the city’s wall, wearing a Taoist robe. He lit some incense, strummed his lute, and began to chant. Minutes later he could see the vast enemy army approaching, an endless phalanx of soldiers. Pretending not to notice them, he continued to sing and play the lute. Soon the army stood at the town gates. At its head was Sima Yi, who instantly recognized the man on the wall. Even so, as his soldiers itched to enter the unguarded town through its open gates, Sima Yi hesitated, held them back, and studied Liang on the wall. Then, he ordered an immediate and speedy retreat.

after challenging France by arming and bankrolling the Algerian revolutionaries, he had the courage to send thousands of his troops to Yemen, on the Saudi borders, to support the revolutionaries in their coup against the country's antiquated royal regime. Nasser's project appeared to be a true revolutionary avalanche. Syria begged to unite with Egypt under his leadership. The Syrian leadership accepted union terms with Egypt that in effect dissolved the Syrian state. Several Iraqi leaders invited him to Baghdad to announce Iraq's inclusion in the ‘United Arab Republic’. Lebanon's Muslims and Druze hailed him as their leader.

The Indonesians had been told that the Malaysian masses would welcome their Indonesian brothers with open arms and that it was only their leaders and the British who believed in Malaysia. What followed was a debacle. Four planeloads of troops were involved in the “liberation.” One plane failed to get off the ground in Indonesia. A second plane crashed in the Straits of Melaka. A third dropped its troops in the wrong place. Stragglers from this plane flagged down a passing vehicle, and the Malaysian driver took his “liberators” to the nearest police station. The only commandos who were dropped on target were quickly rounded up by Commonwealth troops.

Hitler flaunted his evil intentions and deeds to the world. The Vatican had no excuse for its Nazi partnership or for its continued commendation of Hitler on the one hand and its thunderous silence regarding the Jewish question on the other hand. As the evil mounted, the Roman Catholic Church continued to work with the Fuehrer and even to praise him. Even after Hitler's troops, in spite of promises to the contrary, marched in and took over the demilitarized Rhineland, Catholic leaders all over Germany lauded him, among them Cardinal Schulte in Cologne's cathedral.18 The concordat with Hitler was nothing new. The popes had been partners with evil rulers for centuries. Would Jesus make a deal with Pilate or the apostle Peter with Nero? Yet those who claimed to be Peter's successors had been in unholy alliances with pagan emperors from Constantine onward, and continued in the alliance with Hitler until the end of the war, reaping hundreds of millions of dollars in payments from the Nazi government to the Vatican.

TDGs are common to a wide array of specialties, nationally and internationally. Teachers should introduce students to TDGs with problems they are not familiar with, such as combat troops doing non-combat TDGs, and just the opposite for support personnel. Particular courses or units may develop different operating procedures, but it is inadvisable to argue about specific procedural points. There will be plenty of time for that during the student debrief.182 TDGs do not have to be tactical. Other types of games exist: for example, the Los Angeles, California Fire Department has developed tactical decision games. Even the U.S. Army Chaplain Corps has developed its own games to deal with different scenarios that chaplains may experience.183 Instructors of other Army leader programs have also developed very good games as tools to teach adaptability.

She’s probably going to be chair of our department in a couple years. She’s the editor of the journal Cognitive, Affective, and Behavioral Neuroscience. She’s involved with basically every committee possible at the university. She’s the kind of person who wakes at four in the morning and writes a couple manuscripts before the kids wake up at seven. And she’s the leader of our daughter’s Girl Scout troop. She’s just the kind of person who makes everybody feel like: What am I doing wrong? And she’s an incredibly nice person, too. She’s not arrogant or egotistical. And she picked me. That’s the one thing that stops me from feeling insecure. She must have seen something.

in this society there is no one else you can count on,” said Chandler, the historian. “They don’t think a society really exists.” That tendency proved useful for most of Cambodia’s history, as the nation lived through successive wars with its neighbors. Most Cambodians focused only on family and village life. These were their only havens as foreign troops ranged over the nation and government leaders schemed and connived for their own accounts. Egoism was of undeniable value during the Khmer Rouge era. To survive Cambodians had to behave as Kok Chuum, the Dang Run village chief, did. “I ate wild potatoes I found in the woods,” he said. “I did it secretly. I told no one.” Presumably, back then, others near him were starving to death, as workers did all over the nation. But in the twenty-first century individualism, this shared personality trait, ensured that Cambodians would remain hungry and illiterate. By and large they could not, would not, stand up and advocate for themselves.   Imagine

Later in the fatwa, Osama Bin Laden said: ‘We – with Allah’s help – call on every Muslim who believes in Allah and wishes to be rewarded to comply with Allah’s order to kill the Americans and plunder their money wherever and whenever they can find it. We also call on Muslim ulema, leaders, youths, and soldiers to launch the raid on Satan’s U.S. troops and the devil’s supporters allying with them, and to displace those who are behind them so that they may learn a lesson.

But just as my assistant platoon commander had to be ready to lead, in this situation I had to be ready to follow. The goal of all leaders should be to work themselves out of a job. You never quite get there, but by putting junior leaders and frontline troops in charge, our SEAL platoon and task unit were far more effective. It created a culture of leaders at every level of the team. Trying to navigate between leadership and followership was an example of the Dichotomy of Leadership, the balance that every leader must find between two opposing forces in leadership. Ready to lead, but also knowing when to follow.

Dear Mr. President of the USA, Donald Trump Your Excellency, Equality, justice, harmony, and love, within the concept and context of security, and respect, are for the entire humanity, not only for the USA and its people. Global peace lies in a step that; pull out your troops from the Muslim States and stop interfering with its systems and way of life; all terrorists will disappear, and peace shall prevail. One should realize the atrocities of the Isreal, against Palestinians’ determination and India, against Kashmiris that the United Nations and its Security Council fail to resolve and solve those disputes under the umbrella of the USA. Consequently, each one of us faces the consequences. You, as a leader of the great nation, ought to be great and noble; it is possible if you change your distinctive thoughts and policies; you may change human history, becoming the historical leader of the entire humanity that suffers from injustice and hunger and death. As I know that Pakistan Armed forces have devotedly and significantly sacrificed along with the Armed Forces of the USA for global peace, so never degrade your national pride, ignoring, denying, and forgetting that the sacrifice of our men and women, which we are still paying. You should cooperate, instead of becoming influenced by the opposing third party, to accuse Pakistan. We are a peaceful nation and determined to stand along with the USA forces, to eliminate all sorts of terrorists, for world peace. God bless you. - Ehsan Sehgal

The store on the hill was encased in a rainbow, closer and brighter than any Hazel had ever seen. The light was anchored at the store, shooting up into the heavens, bathing the countryside in a weird kaleidoscopic glow. The lady Cyclops hefted her club and charged at the store. As she hit the rainbow, her whole body began to steam. She wailed in agony and dropped her club, retreating with multicolored blisters all over her arms and face. “Horrible goddess!” she bellowed at the store. “Give us snacks!” The other monsters went crazy, charging the convenience store, then running away as the rainbow light burned them. Some threw rocks, spears, swords, and even pieces of their armor, all of which burned up in flames of pretty colors. Finally the giant leader seemed to realize that his troops were throwing away perfectly good equipment.

A good leader must be: • confident but not cocky; • courageous but not foolhardy; • competitive but a gracious loser; • attentive to details but not obsessed by them; • strong but have endurance; • a leader and follower; • humble not passive; • aggressive not overbearing; • quiet not silent; • calm but not robotic, logical but not devoid of emotions; • close with the troops but not so close that one becomes more important than another or more important than the good of the team; not so close that they forget who is in charge. • able to execute Extreme Ownership, while exercising Decentralized Command. A good leader has nothing to prove, but everything to prove.

The Dichotomy of Leadership A good leader must be: • confident but not cocky; • courageous but not foolhardy; • competitive but a gracious loser; • attentive to details but not obsessed by them; • strong but have endurance; • a leader and follower; • humble not passive; • aggressive not overbearing; • quiet not silent; • calm but not robotic, logical but not devoid of emotions; • close with the troops but not so close that one becomes more important than another or more important than the good of the team; not so close that they forget who is in charge.

Vietnam was originally a matriarchy and, in 111 B.C. China tried to integrate it into the Han Empire, the first resistance leaders were women. A female military commander who managed, for a time, to successfully oppose the Chinese occupation of Vietnam, famously exhorted her troops: 'I'd like to ride storms, kill sharks in the open sea, drive out the aggressors, reconquer the country, undo the ties of serfdom, and never bend my back to be the concubine of whatever man.' Such heroines became iconic symbols of Vietnamese patriotism. The Chinese ruled Vietnam for one thousand five hundred years, imposing Confucian principles of male superiority. This provoked a deep divide between the north of the country, strongly influenced by China, and the south which kept alive the more relaxed culture of feminine sensuality. The nation's struggle for independence, finally won in 1428, was shaped by women's struggles for liberation from (Chinese) patriarchy. The whore was a distinct image of South Vietnam during two decades of the Vietnam War until the communist North's victory in 1975. Saigon — now Ho Chi Minh City — the 'Paris of the East' was dominated by corrupt politicians, army officers and gangsters who enjoyed and profited from prostitution rackets. After Communists seized power, a decade of severe repression followed, then an increasingly flagrant resurrection from prostitution in the late 1980s in reaction to poverty and austerity and austerity under communism.

leaders cast no blame. They made no excuses. Instead of complaining about challenges or setbacks, they developed solutions and solved problems. They leveraged assets, relationships, and resources to get the job done. Their own egos took a back seat to the mission and their troops. These leaders truly led.

From the day I was sworn in,” I continued, “I’ve gone out of my way to create an environment where everyone’s views are heard. And I think I’ve shown myself willing to make unpopular decisions when I thought it was necessary for our national security. Would you agree with that, Bob?” “I would, Mr. President,” Gates said. “So, when I set up a process that’s going to decide whether I send tens of thousands more troops into a deadly war zone at the cost of hundreds of billions of dollars, and I see my top military leaders short-circuiting that process to argue their position in public, I have to wonder. Is it because they figure they know better and don’t want to be bothered answering my questions? Is it because I’m young and didn’t serve in the military? Is it because they don’t like my politics…?” I paused, letting the question linger. Mullen cleared his throat.

You will perhaps have heard something of a disreputable Brawl occurring in Boston in March of three Years past, which I have often seen in Newspaper and Broadside called a “Massacre,” most irresponsibly—and most inaccurately, to one who has been privy to the actual Occurrence. I was not present myself, but have spoken to numerous of the Officers and Soldiers who were. If they speak truly, and I believe they do, such a View as is given by the Boston Press of the Matter has been monstrous. Boston is by all Accounts a perfect Hellhole of republican Sentiment, with so-called “Marching Societies” at large in the Streets in every Weather, these being no more than an Excuse for the Assembly of Mobs, whose chief Sport is the tormenting of the Troops quartered there. Higgins tells me that no Man would dare go out alone in Uniform, for fear of these Mobs, and that even when in greater Numbers, harassment from the public soon drove them back to their Quarters, save when compelled by Duty to persist. A Patrol of five Soldiers was so beset one Evening, pursued not only by insults of the grossest Nature, but by hurled Stones, Clods of Earth and Dung, and other such Rubbish. Such was the Press of the Mob around them that the Men feared for their Safety, and thus presented their Weapons, in hopes of discouraging the raucous Attentions rained upon them. So far from accomplishing this Aim, the Action provoked still greater Outrages from the Crowd, and at some Point, a Gun was fired. No one can say for sure whether the Shot was discharged from the Crowd, or from one of the Soldier’s Weapons, let alone whether it were by Accident or in Deliberation, but the Effect of it … well, you will have sufficient Knowledge of such Matters to imagine the Confusion of subsequent Events. In the End, five of the Mob were killed, and while the Soldiers were buffeted and badly handled, they escaped alive, only to be made Scapegoats by the malicious Rantings of the mob’s Leaders in the Press, these so styled as to make it seem a wanton and unprovoked Slaughter of Innocents, rather than a Matter of Self-defense against a Mob inflamed by Drink and Sloganeering. I confess that my Sympathies must lie altogether with the Soldiers; I am sure so much is obvious to you. They were brought to Trial, where the Judge discovered Three to be Innocent, but no Doubt felt it would be Dangerous to his own Situation to free them all.

What about Cuba? What was its vision of freedom in southern Africa? In Angola it supported the government of Agostinho Neto, who was authoritarian, eager to improve the lot of the people, and who lent courageous support to the liberation fighters of South Africa and Namibia. Neto died in 1979, and the government of President dos Santos grew increasingly corrupt and indifferent to the plight of the common people. It had, however, two important pluses: it continued to support the liberation movements in Namibia and South Africa and, for all its faults, it was far better than the alternative, Jonas Savimbi. The Cuban troops did not stay in Angola for more than a decade, however, to keep dos Santos in power. They stayed to defend Angola from South Africa. They stayed to help the ANC and SWAPO. They stayed because the Cuban leaders were convinced that their departure would provide an opportunity for South Africa to impose Savimbi on Angola and a puppet regime on Namibia. They stayed, in other words, to hold the line against apartheid.

if the planning process gets bogged down or different members of the team can’t agree on a course of action, it might be necessary for the leader to step in and provide guidance or even make a decision on which course of action to use. But it is almost always preferred for the leader to lead from the rear, to allow the troops to take the lead on the plan and to take ownership of it. The best ideas often come from the people on the team who are closest to the problem; those are the folks on the front line. Don’t inhibit them; instead, allow them the freedom and authority to create and execute new plans and ideas. They have the knowledge. Give them the power. Don’t feel the need to always

There has to be a balance of danger and safety as a leader. To risk oneself foolishly endangers everyone you lead, but to lead from complete safety undermines your command’s authority and troop morale.” Shane Van Aulen - Star Wolves 2023

PRINCIPLE: LEADING UP THE CHAIN If your boss isn’t making a decision in a timely manner or providing necessary support for you and your team, don’t blame the boss. First, blame yourself. Examine what you can do to better convey the critical information for decisions to be made and support allocated. Leading up the chain of command requires tactful engagement with the immediate boss (or in military terms, higher headquarters) to obtain the decisions and support necessary to enable your team to accomplish its mission and ultimately win. To do this, a leader must push situational awareness up the chain of command. Leading up the chain takes much more savvy and skill than leading down the chain. Leading up, the leader cannot fall back on his or her positional authority. Instead, the subordinate leader must use influence, experience, knowledge, communication, and maintain the highest professionalism. While pushing to make your superior understand what you need, you must also realize that your boss must allocate limited assets and make decisions with the bigger picture in mind. You and your team may not represent the priority effort at that particular time. Or perhaps the senior leadership has chosen a different direction. Have the humility to understand and accept this. One of the most important jobs of any leader is to support your own boss—your immediate leadership. In any chain of command, the leadership must always present a united front to the troops. A public display of discontent or disagreement with the chain of command undermines the authority of leaders at all levels. This is catastrophic to the performance of any organization. As a leader, if you don’t understand why decisions are being made, requests denied, or support allocated elsewhere, you must ask those questions up the chain. Then, once understood, you can pass that understanding down to your team. Leaders in any chain of command will not always agree. But at the end of the day, once the debate on a particular course of action is over and the boss has made a decision—even if that decision is one you argued against—you must execute the plan as if it were your own. When leading up the chain of command, use caution and respect. But remember, if your leader is not giving the support you need, don’t blame him or her. Instead, reexamine what you can do to better clarify, educate, influence, or convince that person to give you what you need in order to win. The major factors to be aware of when leading up and down the chain of command are these:

The true father of free India was Subhas Chandra Bose, not Gandhi. Imagine Commander Washington asking his troops to never fire back a single musket ball no matter how many british guns are fired at them. And that's exactly what Gandhi asked of his people. Bose eventually raised the Indian National Army to fight against the British in India. Subhas Chandra Bose is to India what George Washington is to the United States of America. Unfortunately, Bose lost his life in a plane crash in 1945, but had he lived, he would've been the rightful prime minister of India, not Jawaharlal Nehru, who was more of a scholar, than a leader. However, the death of Bose and the struggles of the Indian National Army lighted the fire of revolution in the heart of the entire nation empowering them to revolt against the mighty British Empire, which compelled the British to leave all imperialist authority over India in the year 1947.

President Dwight Eisenhower was more concerned with America’s strategic interests in the Cold War than with political point scoring. Dhahran was the only US Air Force base in the region capable of supporting strategic B-29 bombers, and had thus become an important Cold War asset on the southern flank of the Soviet Union. In 1957, Dhahran was every bit as important to American security as the sprawling Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar is today. So, instead of shunning King Saud, President Eisenhower met him on the tarmac at National Airport, something he had never before done for any foreign leader. Eisenhower then arranged for the king’s route from the airport to be lined with military troops and bands. In return for a large American loan and additional military training, King Saud renewed the Dhahran basing rights free of charge.

Perhaps because they were so convinced that traitors rather than the arrival of American troops had cost them victory in 1918, few Nazi leaders ever understood that the real problem for their long-term plans was the United States, not Britain. Nothing else can explain why, just days after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, Hitler declared war on the Americans rather than hoping that the war in the Pacific would distract them from Europe. “What does the USA amount to anyway?” asked Hermann Göring, the head of the German air force. Churchill, however, saw exactly what it amounted to. “Now at this very moment I knew the United States was in the war, up to the neck and in to the death,” he said of hearing the news about Pearl Harbor. “So we had won after all!

Biden reminded Blinken that six years ago, in 2015, when Biden was vice president, they were in the Situation Room debating whether to extend the U.S. troop commitment. Military leaders had made the case they needed to extend for another year. They said the last remaining piece to make the Afghanistan military self-sufficient and stand on its own feet was putting in place their ability to build supply lines and conduct aircraft maintenance. And that was supposed to take one year more. “That was six years ago,” Biden reminded Blinken and it still had not happened. “Six years ago!

Then he asked that everyone, including his own sentinels, hand over their arms to the men appointed by the tribal chieftains. “Those are the rules of war,” the leader explained. “The oases may not shelter armies or troops.” To the boy’s surprise, the Englishman took a chrome-plated revolver out of his bag and gave it to the men who were collecting the arms. “Why a revolver?” he asked. “It helped me to trust in people,” the Englishman answered.

If you, as the overall commander of your forces, can tell a story that your troops, the enemy troops and commander, and the wider world population can understand, then you will be a successful military leader.

So what are we to make of all this evidence for stone temples, princely burials, mammoth monuments and bustling centres of trade and craft production, stretching back far into the Ice Age? What are they doing there, in a Palaeolithic world where – at least on some accounts – nothing much is ever supposed to have happened, and human societies can best be understood by analogy with troops of chimps or bonobos? Unsurprisingly, perhaps, some have responded by completely abandoning the idea of an egalitarian Golden Age, concluding instead that this must have been a society dominated by powerful leaders, even dynasties – and, therefore, that self-aggrandizement and coercive power have always been the enduring forces behind human social evolution. But this doesn’t really work either. Evidence of institutional inequality in Ice Age societies, whether grand burials or monumental buildings, is sporadic.

It had five commandments: 1. Question every requirement. Each should come with the name of the person who made it. You should never accept that a requirement came from a department, such as from “the legal department” or “the safety department.” You need to know the name of the real person who made that requirement. Then you should question it, no matter how smart that person is. Requirements from smart people are the most dangerous, because people are less likely to question them. Always do so, even if the requirement came from me. Then make the requirements less dumb. 2. Delete any part or process you can. You may have to add them back later. In fact, if you do not end up adding back at least 10% of them, then you didn’t delete enough. 3. Simplify and optimize. This should come after step two. A common mistake is to simplify and optimize a part or a process that should not exist. 4. Accelerate cycle time. Every process can be speeded up. But only do this after you have followed the first three steps. In the Tesla factory, I mistakenly spent a lot of time accelerating processes that I later realized should have been deleted. 5. Automate. That comes last. The big mistake in Nevada and at Fremont was that I began by trying to automate every step. We should have waited until all the requirements had been questioned, parts and processes deleted, and the bugs were shaken out. The algorithm was sometimes accompanied by a few corollaries, among them: All technical managers must have hands-on experience. For example, managers of software teams must spend at least 20% of their time coding. Solar roof managers must spend time on the roofs doing installations. Otherwise, they are like a cavalry leader who can’t ride a horse or a general who can’t use a sword. Comradery is dangerous. It makes it hard for people to challenge each other’s work. There is a tendency to not want to throw a colleague under the bus. That needs to be avoided. It’s OK to be wrong. Just don’t be confident and wrong. Never ask your troops to do something you’re not willing to do. Whenever there are problems to solve, don’t just meet with your managers. Do a skip level, where you meet with the level right below your managers. When hiring, look for people with the right attitude. Skills can be taught. Attitude changes require a brain transplant. A maniacal sense of urgency is our operating principle. The only rules are the ones dictated by the laws of physics. Everything else is a recommendation.

knew that judges had no idea what they were deciding upon. They had not actually spent any time in the tenement housing looking the poor in the eye, smelling the stench of rotting tobacco and foul bedding. Almost a century later, in the 1970s, the business leadership saying “management by wandering around” became popular, a style of managing whereby executives walked through the workforce in an unstructured manner, just listening and interpreting. Several historians believe that it was Abraham Lincoln who first implemented the informal management style when he visited Union Army camps to inspect the troops in the early part of the Civil War. For Roosevelt, the Cigar Bill incident was a learning experience: leaders learn best by interpreting a situation firsthand.

I listened to you,” she vehemently said at last. “I loved you, and I trusted you, and I fought not to lose you after my brother’s death.” “You never trusted me,” Narian contradicted, interrupting whatever else she had intended to say. “And with good reason. You believe the only way to repay a betrayal if with a betrayal. You betrayed me in the worst way imaginable. You lied to me my entire life, trained me and used me as a weapon, never telling me the real reason I was of value to you.” His blue eyes flashed, their sapphire brilliance rivaling the ever-changing emerald sparks in hers. “But I will no longer be manipulated for your causes, and I will not become another warlord. You can consider yourself repaid.” The High Priestess’s rage built to a frightening level, her body almost shaking with the effort to retain control. Her shield maidens watched in fear from where they stood near her throne, while I locked my knees to force myself to stay in place. Then she backhanded Narian across the face, forcefully enough that he stumbled. “You will regret what you have done, Narian,” she swore as he brought a hand to his cheek. “The Hytanicans will not succeed. You will pay for protecting their leaders from execution and for your willingness to step aside.” “They may very well succeed. Don’t pretend otherwise. This is no longer a game of tug of war, Your Highness. It is a game of chess. And as you well know, Cannan and London have always been masterful strategists.” “London?” “Yes, he is alive and well. I suspect he is responsible for the chaos that surrounds us.” At the mention of London, my eyes snapped to Narian, and my heart ached to hear more. But something in Nantilam’s visage changed, and she turned away to take up her throne. “So you have lent no assistance to the Hytanicans--you have not armed them, have not repositioned our troops to aid their strike, have not left our soldiers without strong leadership?” “No, I have not. Our forces are in place, and I took all the usual precautions before traveling here as you ordered.” “Then it may indeed be interesting to see what the Hytanicans can do. Cannan as a commander long rivaled my brother, and London…well, a man such as London is rare. If he and I had not been enemies, I would have chosen him to father my own child.” My heart lurched at this revelation, but Narian showed no reaction, continuing to stand stiffly before her. The High Priestess met his eyes, evaluating him for another long moment.

The second Arab-Israeli war, known in Israel as the Sinai Campaign, and among the Arabs as the Tripartite Aggression, began in the afternoon of October 29th. Israeli paratroopers landed in the Mitla Pass, twenty-four miles east of the Canal. With the pretext established, the Powers issued their ultimatum which the Egyptians, as expected, rebuffed. Dayan’s armored columns, meanwhile, broke through the Egyptian lines in central and southern Sinai and rolled through Egyptian-occupied Gaza. General Muhammad ‘Abd al-Hakim ‘Amer, the Egyptian commander-in-chief, panicked and ordered his troops to retreat. Israel’s victory was swift—too swift, in fact, for Britain and France. The Anglo-French armada dallied at sea, while French and British leaders wavered under international pressure. Not until November 4 did the invasion commence, by which time the Egyptians could claim they had never been driven from Sinai but had rather retreated tactically in order to defend their homes.

Roman armies could move faster than the Gauls, especially over long distances, because of two advantages: superior engineering and better discipline. The Romans were not stopped by natural obstacles, because their engineers could quickly improvise a bridge across a river. The Gauls were taken by surprise because they regarded high mountain passes as impassable during winter, but Caesar’s soldiers, who were more like construction workers than soldiers, worked in teams to clear away deep snow. Gauls liked fighting but they thought the dirty work of building roads and fortifications was beneath their dignity as warriors. Romans did everything they were asked because their troops were highly disciplined. Roman soldiers knew that the faster they did these routine tasks, the more surely they would win, even against armies much bigger than themselves.

Self-discipline. Self-discipline may be the most important quality in light infantrymen. Without self-discipline, individuals will be unable to cope with the privations and stresses that are an inherent part of being light infantry. Troops that do not demonstrate self-discipline are a positive danger to the mission and to their comrades and have no place in the light infantry. Therefore, one of the most important goals of training light infantry is to substitute self-discipline for imposed discipline. Senseless or unnecessary rules should be done away with. As maneuver warfare doctrine requires, orders should normally specify only the result to be obtained, not methods. Leaders should expect and encourage their troops to maintain a high level of discipline, not through fear of reprisal, but because of a desire to demonstrate their professional qualities.

From the First Philippic of Demosthenes, he plucked a passage that summed up his conception of a leader as someone who would not pander to popular whims. “As a general marches at the head of his troops,” so should wise politicians “march at the head of affairs, insomuch that they ought not to wait the event to know what measures to take, but the measures which they have taken ought to produce the event.

We have something they don't', said Oliver, raising voice loud enough that everyone in the irregulars could hear. 'We fight as free citizens of Jackals, not slaves of a king or a first committee or a caliph.' He pulled one of his belt pistols out and the lion of Jackals on the handle seemed to suck in the light of the afternoon, drawing down rays of sunlight that rotated, blinding the troops with a brilliance they had never known before. 'We will not suffer the heel of tyranny, we will not bend our knee to unworthy gods, we will not see an evil without striking it down, and we will not pass meekly into the long face of darkness that is endangering our land. Because we are Jackelians - and our soul of freedom can never, never be conquered. Not as long as one free Jackelian has the heart to say, "No! I think my own thoughts I choose my own leader. I select my own book of worship and my law shall be the law of the people, not the whimsy of any bully with a sabre sharp enough to slice a crown off the previous brute's head.

You are like a town without a mayor, Like a troop without a leader, Like a ship without a captain, A company without a chief. You are a sheriff who steals, A mayor who pockets, A district prosecutor of crime Who is the model for the (evil)-doer!

The Huns won't be the last of China's problems. The Emperor will always face new threats, new invaders. He needs to have strong, brave men at his side. Men like you, Ping." "Shang," Mulan said, trying again, "stop talking like this." "Now that it's all over, now that my time on this earth is done, do you know what comforts me the most?" He waited, so Mulan gave in. "What?" she asked quietly. Shang lowered his voice. "That I've made a friend like you, Ping. Someone I can trust completely." Tears pricked the edges of Mulan's eyes. This time, she didn't try to hold them back. She knew she couldn't. She swallowed, choking on her words. "Stop talking like this. It's my fault you're wounded." "I would never have thought of firing that last cannon at the mountain," Shang confessed. "I went after you to get the cannon back, but you- you saved us. It was an honor to protect you." How strange, then, that Mulan's tongue grew heavy. There was so much she wanted to tell him. That it was her fault he was hurt; that if only she'd been more alert, she would have anticipated Shan-Yu's attack. She wanted to tell him he was the best leader their troops could have hoped for; a lesser man would have left her to die at Shan-Yu's hands, but Shang was not only courageous- he believed in his soldiers, and treated them as part of his team. She remembered how proud he'd been during their training when she'd defeated him in one-on-one combat. The satisfied smile that'd lit up his face as he wiped his jaw after her kick- she would never forget it. She wanted to tell him that she admired him and had always wanted his friendship.

In order to convince and inspire others to follow and accomplish a mission, a leader must be a true believer in the mission. Even when others doubt and question the amount of risk, asking, “Is it worth it?” the leader must believe in the greater cause. If a leader does not believe, he or she will not take the risks required to overcome the inevitable challenges necessary to win. And they will not be able to convince others—especially the frontline troops who must execute the mission—to do so.

Every leader must be able to detach from the immediate tactical mission and understand how it fits into strategic goals. When leaders receive an order that they themselves question and do not understand, they must ask the question: why? Why are we being asked to do this? Those leaders must take a step back, deconstruct the situation, analyze the strategic picture, and then come to a conclusion. If they cannot determine a satisfactory answer themselves, they must ask questions up the chain of command until they understand why. If frontline leaders and troops understand why, they can move forward, fully believing in what they are doing.

It is critical, as well, that the operating relationship facilitate the ability of the frontline troops to ask questions that clarify when they do not understand the mission or key tasks to be performed. Leaders must encourage this communication and take the time to explain so that every member of the team understands.

Your plan violates one of the most important principles we adhered to in combat: simplicity. When young SEAL leaders in training look at targets for training missions, they often try to develop a course of action that accounts for every single possibility they can think of. That results in a plan that is extraordinarily complex and very difficult to follow. While the troops might understand their individual pieces of the plan, they have a hard time following all the intricacies of the grand scheme. Perhaps they can even get away with that a few times if everything goes smoothly, but remember: the enemy gets a vote.

It’s counterintuitive,” I said. “It’s natural for anyone in a leadership position to blame subordinate leaders and direct reports when something goes wrong. Our egos don’t like to take blame. But it’s on us as leaders to see where we failed to communicate effectively and help our troops clearly understand what their roles and responsibilities are and how their actions impact the bigger strategic picture. “Remember, it’s not about you,” I continued. “It’s not about the drilling superintendent. It’s about the mission and how best to accomplish it. With that attitude exemplified in you and your key leaders, your team will dominate.

Any good leader is immersed in the planning and execution of tasks, projects, and operations to move the team toward a strategic goal. Such leaders possess insight into the bigger picture and why specific tasks need to be accomplished. This information does not automatically translate to subordinate leaders and the frontline troops. Junior members of the team—the tactical level operators—are rightly focused on their specific jobs. They must be in order to accomplish the tactical mission. They do not need the full knowledge and insight of their senior leaders, nor do the senior leaders need the intricate understanding of the tactical level operators’ jobs. Still, it is critical that each have an understanding of the other’s role. And it is paramount that senior leaders explain to their junior leaders and troops executing the mission how their role contributes to big picture success.

Leaders must routinely communicate with their team members to help them understand their role in the overall mission. Frontline leaders and troops can then connect the dots between what they do every day—the day-today operations—and how that impacts the company’s strategic goals. This understanding helps the team members prioritize their efforts in a rapidly changing, dynamic environment. That is leading down the chain of command. It requires regularly stepping out of the office and personally engaging in face-to-face conversations with direct reports and observing the frontline troops in action to understand their particular challenges and read them into the Commander’s Intent. This enables the team to understand why they are doing what they are doing, which facilitates Decentralized Command

While increased discipline most often results in more freedom, there are some teams that become so restricted by imposed discipline that they inhibit their leaders’ and teams’ ability to make decisions and think freely. If frontline leaders and troops executing the mission lack the ability to adapt, this becomes detrimental to the team’s performance. So the balance between discipline and freedom must be found and carefully maintained. In that, lies the dichotomy: discipline—strict order, regimen, and control—might appear to be the opposite of total freedom—the power to act, speak, or think without any restrictions. But, in fact, discipline is the pathway to freedom.

Motherhood By Christianna Maas My willingness to carry life is the revenge, the antidote, the great rebuttal of every murder, every abortion, and every genocide. I sustain humanity. Deep inside of me, life grows. I am death’s opposition. I have pushed back the hand of darkness today. I have caused there to be a weakening tremor among the ranks of those set on earth’s destruction. Today a vibration that calls angels to attention echoed throughout time. Our laughter threatened hell today. I dined with the greats of God’s army. I made their meals, and tied their shoes. Today, I walked with greatness, and when they were tired I carried them. I have poured myself out for the cause today. It is finally quiet, but life stirs inside of me. Gaining strength, the pulse of life sends a constant reminder to both good and evil that I have yielded myself to Heaven and now carry its dream. No angel has ever had such a privilege, nor any man. I am humbled by the honor. I am great with destiny. I birth the freedom fighters. In the great war, I am a leader of the underground resistance. I smile at the disguise of my troops, surrounded by a host of warriors, destiny swirling, invisible yet tangible, and the anointing to alter history. Our footsteps marking land for conquest, we move undetected through the common places. Today I was the barrier between evil and innocence. I was the gatekeeper, watching over the hope of mankind, and no intruder trespassed. There is not an hour of day or night when I turn from my post. The fierceness of my love is unmatched on earth. And because I smiled instead of frowned the world will know the power of grace. Hope has feet, and it will run to the corners of earth, because I stood up against destruction. I am a woman. I am a mother. I am the keeper and sustainer of life here on earth. Heaven stands in honor of my mission. No one else can carry my call. I am the daughter of Eve. Eve has been redeemed. I am the opposition of death. I am a woman.

Why is this bird following me?” Nek Muhammad Wazir sat inside a mud building in South Waziristan, surrounded by his followers and talking on his satellite phone to a BBC reporter. Looking out the window, the young commander with long, jet-black hair noticed something hovering above, glinting in the sun. He asked one of his lieutenants about the coruscating metal object in the sky. Nek Muhammad had just humbled Pakistani troops, and the CIA was following him. He had emerged as the undisputed rock star of Pakistan’s tribal areas, a brash member of the Wazir tribe who had raised an army to fight government forces in the spring of 2004 and brought Islamabad to the negotiating table. His rise had taken Pakistan’s leaders by surprise, and now they wanted him dead.

When Sauk leader Black Hawk led his people back from a winter stay in Iowa to their homeland in Illinois in 1832 to plant corn, the squatter settlers there claimed they were being invaded, bringing in both Illinois militia and federal troops. The "Black Hawk War" that is narrated in history texts was no more than a slaughter of Sauk farmers. The Sauks tried to defend themselves but were starving when Black Hawk surrendered under a white flag.

The cave goes back for a long way. With low narrow tunnels. You could get lost back there easy.” “There’s some kind of vertical passageway.” “They could have gotten out that way.” The speaker was Trainer. “Preston, you climb up there and see.” “And if he’s up there?” “Shoot him.” “He’s in a better position to shoot me than I am to shoot him,” the troop protested. The militia leader’s voice turned dangerous. “Are you refusing a direct order?” “No, sir.” The kid was right, of course. Well, not about getting shot. The minute he got to the top, Jack was going to kick him in the face and send him tumbling back down the shaft, hopefully onto Trainer’s head.