Thursday, August 11, 2016
A General Officer and indeed all of the higher military ranks, are not only military, but political and strongly “organizational.” The sacrifice it takes to reach those ranks is amazingly difficult. It is often commonly said that in the Army a general is next to God, and while I wouldn’t go that far, they are pretty powerful people. All the more reason that they are held to the highest standard of ethical behavior.
Yet like the CEO or the COO of a civilian organization, a general can fall from grace with a rapid thud; make that, a big huge thud. It is usually not incompetence of the military kind that destroys a general’s career but completely screwed up ethical decisions. Such is the case with Maj. Gen. David Haight. His ethical behavior created quite the consequence.
According to Tom Vanden Brook writing for USA Today (July 27, 2016), the general was relieved because: “He had misused government resources while having an extramarital affair…
Army Maj. Gen. David Haight had been in charge of operations for U.S. European Command, the Pentagon’s principal command for confronting a resurgent Russia with the 28-nation NATO alliance.”
Think about that. The man is a two-star general and is in charge of the European Command, and somehow he managed to throw it all away. The military prohibits extramarital affairs, and a general above all else should know that. He has four children. We can only guess that he used his influence and power to spend money on his extracurricular activities.
Someone dropped the dime on his unethical behavior
Perhaps it was his wife, or the woman he had been seeing or, most probably and ambitious underling who didn’t appreciate the general wining and dining a mistress. We have to understand that the general was not in charge of the commissary or paper clips, but in safeguarding Europe from Russian threats, spying and mayhem (such as computer hacking). His job entailed a tremendous amount of responsibility.
The other woman
Lest we think the Army is “Old School” or a bunch of straight-laced prudes, there is a very important reason for their intransigence on the topic of affairs: security. Affairs involve the heart, and often the heart is blind. The heart can “let in” just about anyone it loves. The heart does not believe in vetting, only in making itself happy. There is no telling who the heart wants to meet – and the general should have also known this too. In fact, his heart was so smitten, he may have spent taxpayer money on keeping the affair happy. Keeping one’s home life straight is part of expected military ethical behavior.
Sooner or later, he should have realized his dumb choices would have led to several consequences. In this case, the general’s consequences include demotion, shame, and loss of pay and many of the perks he enjoyed. Obviously, it also affected his home life and his relationship with his family and friends. Ethical behavior or lack thereof in this case is most certainly going to bring unexpected and unintended consequences.
The “other woman” did not care about consequences either, but that’s not our worry. “Our” worry is who this person may be and what secrets were told. We will never know that of course, and she may be “just another fling,” but it calls into mind the question of what other poor choices the general made for himself.
Could ethical training have helped the general? Possibly. Generals sometimes, really do believe they are gods. Why? Everybody tells them so. However, they are no different than high-ranking executives or association CEO’s and directors. Though a fraction of leaders may believe in their invincibility, they should not forget their responsibility is to those they serve and those who serve them. In this case, the general is responsible to the most basic of Army privates as well as to those they report to in the highest chains of command. “An affair” could potentially cost major secrets and many lives. Ethical behavior is critical and often taken for granted. That’s why effective – I repeat – effective ethical training is so important.
Ethical training could have reinforced what the general already knew. Ethical training might have led to the general stopping something before it had a chance to start. Now it is too late and Army Maj. Gen. David Haight must live with his indiscretion and shame.
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Military Ethics: Who Trains Generals on Ethical Behavior? appeared first on
Chuck Gallagher.