I sent an email to Matt at Black Five to make some personal observations about a story about John Kerry riding in a military aircraft. By telling a story of my Navy experience, I wanted to bring out differences in leadership. I could do this because of a man who was the first person I actually had working for me, once I was assigned my first leadership tasks at my first command, the USS MILWAUKEE (AOR-2).

I have decided to repost it here, as it is a tribute to Operations Specialist Chief Petty Officer Michael P. MacCaffery, USN, a man whom I owe much to for taking me aside and teaching me things that are the foundation of leadership. If he ever manages to read this, he’ll be upset that I didn’t refer to him as “RDC,” the Radarman rating that had been replaced with “Operations Specialist” just before I came into the service. He was proud of the old moniker, and had a certain passion about him as he chomped on his half smoked stub of a cigar and snarled “RDC MacCaffery!” to make sure everyone one knew who he really was, after being addressed or introduced as “OSC Mac.”

Here’s my posting:

Once more, it’s the “when you think no one is looking” stories that tell your heart…

Before I begin, let me say something I learned about leadership. My twenty years in the Navy began aboard a replenishment oiler out of Norfolk. As an Ensign, I was a Division Officer, fresh out of several professional schools and college, but with no hands on experience in leadership of any significance beyond Boy Scouts and “playing Army” at The Citadel. OSC Michael P. MacCaffrey, USN, began the age old duty of making something out of the know nothing that just became his “boss.” For at least the next six months (and I didn’t realize what this was until about 4 years later), the Chief would ask me if I’d like a cup of coffee. I’d say “yes,” and we’d head off to the “Goat Locker” (what a Chief’s Mess is called). Chief Mac would regal me with all sorts of stories, interspersed with questions, as we drank coffee, surrounded by the Backbone of the Fleet, the senior enlisted men. These stories were in the best fashion of parables. He slowly injected principles of leadership learned over centuries of human interaction, yet rasied to a fine art in modern western society, into my consciousneess, and sub-consciousness. That’s the ground work, for the
point of one of these coffee induced meetings (read “disguised lectures”).

The discussion went something like this:

Chief Mac: “Sir, if were at GQ (General Quarters) and we have to do Battle Messing (boxed meals delivered to yout combat stations, since you can’t leave during heavy fighting), if we come up one ration short, who doesn’t eat?”

Me: (Sort of knowing there was a key lesson here, and pondering the answer) “Me.” (I really had to think to come up with this answer, so I noticably hesitated before answering)

CM: “Right! What if we’re short two rations?

Me: (I answered quicker now, as I was finally catching up mentally) “You and I!”

CM: “You got it! What if we’re short three?”

Me: “You, I and the Leading Petty Officer!”

CM: “Right again. Sir, the other thing is before you open yours, you make the rounds of every man in the watch station area and make sure he has a proper meal and don’t you dare open yours up and start to eat, until they are ALL taken care of. Do this and these men will follow you anywhere.”

Over the next 19 years from that tour of duty, that simple leadership principle served me well, and the great leaders I worked for and with all had that as a part of their core beliefs. I was blessed by compentent people believing in me and together my units routinely stood out at the top of the heap, whether a Division, Department, Section, or a Ship, or Inspection or Training Team. It was more than about Battle Messing, it’s all about the highest duty of a leader is to make sure his people are cared for before him or herself. Think about that for a moment, and consider those you have worked with whom you hold in highest esteem, and know they demonstrated that over and over to you.

John Kerry grabbing the pizza in the story below is a statement not on his hunger, but his character. Thank God I had many Michael P. MacCafferys in my life as a leader. I’m saddened that John Kerry did not.

I found a blog a few weeks ago written by an active duty Navy Captain, and posted a comment to one of his remarks about refueling at sea. He posted it out for the general readership!

My first ship was a fleet replenishment oiler and our job was to drive along, all 40,000 tons of steel, 6 million gallons of diesel fuel and 600 tons of ammunition and spare parts, at about 12 kts on a steady course and have ships from aircraft carriers to small combatants to come up beside us, at about 120 to 160 feet (yes, feet!), at which point, we’d send over fueling hoses and hydraulically tensioned span wires for passing cargo. A short “alongside time” was about 20 minutes, which was more to keep proficient at maneuvering alongside, but we had some ships alongside for hours. For the ship coming alongside, they had to match our course and speed precisely for the entire time. It is a real exercise in relative motion.

Not only did we do it with one ship, but we had the manpower to have a ship on each side at one time. Oh, throw in that we carried two cargo helicopters, which would take off, then hover over the deck (while we went thru the ocean) to pick up pallet loads of cargo or ammunition/bombs on a hook under the “bird.” So, rigs “flying” to ships port and starboard, plus helos swooping in over the fight deck aft was just another day at the office for the 450 of us aboard the USS MILWAUKEE (AOR-2). You wouldn’t have know it be how smoothly the operation is executed, but death lurked all around. Between the incredible power of nature, and the frail nature of human engineering, mixed with moments of inattention, and it’s a recipe for disaster, but I never saw a serious accident on either side of that eveolution in 9 years of sea assignments, only two of which I was on the ship that just sat in the middle, with everyone else having the hard ship handling work. For 7 years of sea assignments, I was on the other side.

If you’re mildly curious about what I told Chap, then it’s at My post on Chapomatic. I’ll warn you, it’s sort of full of Navy language, but it should be understandable. If you need it clarified, just ask…..

Black Five continues to ferret out stories that rejuvenate the soul. Check out this link to a story of a 7 year old with luekemia that became a Command Sargent Major for a day in The Corps.

CSM Phillip Shriver, USMC

On the ride home the night of 9/20/2004, the local talk fill in host talked about how he was for George Bush, but he didn’t think he was being aggressive enough prosecuting the war in Iraq. Most of his callers agreed.

Here’s the skinny: Step back and look at the proper long term strategy. If President Bush had gone full tilt boogie on the bad guys, it’s still like trying to get rid of the cockroaches in your southeast low country home. You can go after them and beat them back, while you consider your options, or just burn the house down. Option two helps you make it through the day, with only sometimes seeing the bugs at night when you turn on the light. You keep them from overrunning the place, and it’s pretty livable, given other more aggressive options. If you burn the house down, you’ll probably have the cockroaches around, and you’ll get really, really wet when it rains. So here George is, standing at the threshold of getting rid of many of the cockroaches, while his “family” pleads with him to quit gassing the house and spreading chemicals all over, because it hurts the environment. He’s within striking distance, but the gate he must pass through to do more is the one labeled “Re-Election.”

If George leaves office now, we will slip in our resolve, and many of the hard fought gains will be lost. Because the “family” of the American public is teetering on the fence right now, it’s good that he takes a generally moderate, strategic holding battle into the war. It will cost some lives, but here’s the advantage: It will keep the squeamish conservatives on his side that may sway the vote. Since the President has a term limit, once he’s back in, then he can roll up his figurative sleeves, take off his gloves and stand and fight hard for us. It will repel some, yet in the long run, think what four more years of fighting terrorists would do for World peace? If we have come this far since 9/11/2001, and we have had a military that has been transmogrified into a flexible, well trained organization, capable of fighting in asymmetric environments, and conducting joint operations, augmented by OGAs as well as drawing on the significant expertise of the citizen-soldiers of this modern time. In Vietnam, the book On Strategy argued we took a European heavy armor mentality to the triple canopy jungle. The author was right, it didn’t fit the battle field strategically.

Since Vietnam, we have evolved somewhat in our war fighting orientations, but it was still focused on building a better self-contained military. We have been pretty successful at that. What we didn’t seem to learn very well, until we somewhat got it in GWI, is that war is a multi-faceted thing, to include the press, economics, and many other things, and not all of those arenas have people in camouflage in them. We did better this time. Anyhow, back to may main thesis: George Bush needs to grit his teeth until he is re-elected, before he goes to the “and I’m not joking” bare knuckles approach needed to get rid of the terrorists. Once in office for the four more years, then he can get busy prosecuting war as he should, for the betterment of the entire human race. Short of impeachment, and it has been demonstrated how hard that is, he will be able to run it well, provided he has a Republican Congress in his bag of tricks. So, for those who are frustrated with George Bush, help put him back in and see where this goes. Don’t put him in and see what happens in our back yard.