Reporting Adverse Information about Senior Military Officers.

摘要

The American public demands impeccable conduct from senior military officers. Thus, in 1988, when a recently disciplined lieutenant general retired at that rank with no mention being made of the disciplinary action, members of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) voiced concern and asked to be told of any adverse information regarding flag and general officers as part of any confirmation process. Accordingly, the Secretary of Defense directed the military departments to review all investigative files before forwarding any general or flag officer nomination for approval. He tasked them to forward any adverse information or to certify that the files had no such information. However, recent cases suggest that the processes for collecting and reporting this information differ across the services and are neither well-documented nor well-understood. The Department of Defense (DoD) asked researchers from the RAND National Defense Research Institute (NDRI) to review DoD procedures and those of the military services to ensure that consistent and reliable information supports the management of general and flag officers. Key findings are as follows: (1) By law, the DoD must report adverse information about general or flag officers nominated for promotion, assignment, or retirement; (2) RAND reviewed DoD and service procedures and identified areas where practice differs from what is required and where current practice or supporting data may be inadequate; and (3) RAND recommended corrective actions, including a dialog between Congress and DoD to recognize differences in perspective.