THE HARDER RIGHT
OVER EASIER WRONG
By William A. Cohen, '59,
PhD, Major General, USAFR, Ret., Professor of
Marketing and Leadership,
California State University Los Angeles
I put the following story in my
latest book, The Stuff of Heroes: The Eight
Universal Laws of Leadership (Longstreet Press,
1998). I used an assumed name. However, the
reality is that "Lt. Herb" was actually
Lt. Bill Cohen. Moreover, when I say I worked
long and hard to get into "one of the
academies." I wasn't fooling. At the end of
plebe year, one of my professors told me that I
had succeeded in getting through mathematics
without having to take a "turnout" exam
with the lowest grade point average since 1817
when the "3.00 system" was established.
I was exactly one tenth proficient at the end of
the first semester, and was zero tenths
proficient (but none deficient) at the end of the
year. Trust me, I was not trying to set this
record. Here's the story:
As a young Air Force lieutenant
in 1960, Herb was a new navigator on a B-52 crew.
Among his responsibilities was the programming
and launch of the two air-to-ground
"cruise" missiles called "Hound
Dogs." The missiles were also new and there
were still many problems with them that hadn't
yet been solved. The few crews in Herb's squadron
that had flown with them got mixed results.
Sometimes they hit right on target. Sometimes
they weren't even close.
Actually, they really didn't
launch the missiles. That would have been too
expensive, as each missile cost millions dollars.
What they did was to program the missiles while
they were flying to the launch point. That took
several hours as Herb updated the missile
repeatedly and told its computers where it was.
When about fifteen minutes from the target the
crew would put the missile into a "simulated
launch" mode. Herb then instructed the
pilots to follow a special needle indicator on
their consoles. If the needle turned
right, the pilots turned the aircraft right. If
the needle turned left, they turned the aircraft
left. When they did this, the aircraft followed
the course to the target according to information
in the missile's inertial guidance system.
Two minutes from the target Herb turned on a tone signal.
On the ground, a
Ground Control Intercept or GCI site tracked Herb's aircraft on radar.
At the point where the missile would dive into its target, the missile would
automatically interrupt Herb's tone signal. The course the missile
would take to the ground once it started its final dive was based on
predetermined factors. This included the weight of the missile, its shape,
etc. This unpowered flight path from the air to the target on the ground is
known as the missile's ballistic path. So plotting the
aircraft's radar track and knowing the missile's ballistics,
when the tone signal stopped, it was easy for the GCI site to calculate
where the missile would impact if it had actually been launched. The
missile’s accuracy was generally dependent on the accuracy of the
information that Herb gave the missile's computers during programming.
This was the same way that the aircrews practiced making bomb runs without
actually dropping any bombs. The only difference was that the pilots
followed a similar needle that was wired to the bombardier's bombsight
and the bombing and navigational computers.
These practice runs had a major impact on the crews’ careers. Crews
that got good scores got promoted. Those that did not, were held back. And
it went that way all the way up the chain of command. Woe to a unit
commander, when one of his crews got a "bad bomb," or now, a "bad missile."
Herb’s crewmates were all far more experienced than he. His aircraft
commander was a lieutenant colonel. Before going to flying school during
World War II, he had been a first sergeant. At six foot two inches, he was
still tough, and looked the part. His co-pilot was a captain. The electronic
warfare officer was also a captain. The senior navigator, who was also the
bombardier, was another lieutenant colonel and veteran of World War II.
Finally, Herb's crew had one non-commissioned officer. That was the
gunner. He was a master sergeant and a Korean War veteran. Herb was a
lieutenant and fresh out of flying school.
Herb's crew had never flown with missiles previously. However, while
on seven day alert, their aircraft commander called the crew together. "We
have missiles for the first time," he said. "I don't want to discuss
it. We're going to cheat to make sure we get good scores. All I want
to know is how we're going to do it."
Herb was shocked and speechless. The bombardier spoke up. "That's
easy. Don't follow the missile needle. I'll figure out an
adjustment for the ballistics, and I'll "bomb" the target using my
bombsight. All you have to do is follow the bombsight's needle as we
normally do. The GCI site will not know that we're actually bombing
the target. It will be easy, and no one will know."
The aircraft commander dismissed the crew immediately afterwards and they
were released from their duties on alert. They had three days of crew rest
before getting together to plan the mission which would involve the twelve
hour flight with the missiles. It would include the simulated missile
launch, some regular bomb runs, some navigation and bomb runs at low level,
an aerial refueling, and a celestial navigation leg.
The three days were absolute hell for Herb. He was new to the crew and the
squadron, but he had heard that this type of cheating was not unusual. Now
he was being ordered to do it with the very missiles to which he was
entrusted. He talked it over with several friends. They told him not to rock
the boat. They told Herb that this sort of thing was routine and that
everybody did it. If he didn't cheat, they said, it would be the end
of his career.
Herb had worked long and hard for his career. He had worked long and hard to
enter one of the academies, and with difficulty managed to make it through
his four years there. He had spent a year in navigation school, six months
in bombardier school, attended Air Force survival training, and more weeks
of B-52 ground and air training. It had been six years altogether, not
counting three years he had been in the Reserve Officers Training Corps
(ROTC) before that. How could Herb let it all slip away for this one little
lie that apparently nobody cared about anyway?
"But, I had been taught integrity," said Herb. "I was taught "integrity
first," that this was the essential of being an officer. I was taught to do
the harder right rather than the easier wrong. This lie was contrary to
everything I had been taught and believed in."
When Herb's crew met to plan the mission, he asked to speak to his
aircraft commander privately. As soon as they were alone Herb told him: "If
you want to cheat on these missiles, that's up to you. But get
yourself a new navigator, because I'm not going to do it."
Herb's commander was furious and berated him for quite a long time.
Then, he slammed the door to the room and left. Said Herb, "I was plenty
scarred, and I thought it was the end of my career."
An hour or so later, Herb’s commander was still angry when he said he
wanted to see Herb alone. Once alone he said, "Okay. We'll do it your
way. And, this won't affect your performance report. But those
missiles better be reliable." "I'll do everything possible to make
them so, but I won't cheat," answered Herb.
Herb heard later that this commander told someone, "I don't know
whether Herb's a good navigator or not, but I trust him. He’s
honest and he's got guts."
The missiles were reliable. To this day Herb told me that he didn't
know if he was skilled, lucky, or whether the two lieutenant colonels had
figured out a way to fool their inexperienced young navigator. But
here's something Herb did know. He knew how far he would go for what
he believed to be right. And the answer was: all the way. Said Herb, who
later became a general: "I believe that knowledge has helped me immensely
over the years and I believe that I owe whatever success I have achieved in
part to it. In fact, it still affects my thinking today. Had it ended my
career then and there, it still would have been worth it for this priceless
piece of knowledge about myself."'
Lead, Follow, or Get out of the Way,
As a cadet, I never really understood that phrase. Its meaning became
painfully obvious at the midpoint of a twenty-year career. The lieutenant
years were spent learning the profession of arms, doing it well and loving
every minute of it. I had a very successful company command in Germany. The
days were long and I was dog-tired at the end of them but so was everyone
else. I never thought much of it. I learned later the fatigue was the
beginning of something much worse. I was so successful that Engineer Branch
assigned me to Recruiting Command where I was a company commander.
I spent a lot of time on the road with my recruiters. I frequently fumbled
pens and bumped into desks. I kept telling myself I needed more sleep. I
mentioned a lack of feeling in my hands a few months later at a routine
physical examination. I soon embarked upon two years as an outpatient at
Walter Reed. The doctors weren't sure what I had so they made sure that they
knew what I didn't have. I had seen every doctor on the neurological ward
and had every available diagnostic test before my doctor finally made a
diagnosis of mitochondrial myopathy.
Mitochondrial myopathy is a metabolic disease covered by the Muscular
Dystrophy Association. The prognosis was for a gradual worsening of my
ability to walk. Running was out of the question. One of the symptoms is
exercise intolerance. I could exercise for a short period but the cost was
spending the next couple of days exhausted. All of a sudden I had a medical
profile and no chance to lead the troops I loved.
Complicating my decision were the facts that I was on the promotion list for
major, was coming into the zone for CGSC selection, and that it would take
another year to complete my masters degree at a local college.
The only way I had ever been taught to lead was from the front. There was a
slim chance I could lose myself in a staff or district job with the Corps of
Engineers until retirement. I had always wanted to get back to a battalion
but I realized it wasn't going to happen.
Suddenly, the wisdom of "Lead, follow, or get out of the way" was clear. The
phrase wasn't always an indictment of abilities but another statement of
unselfish service to the nation. I had seen the recruits entering the Army
over the previous two years. They needed better leadership than I could give
them. It had come time for this member of the "Long, Gray Line" to get out
of the way.
A month later, a classmate and I were at a Society of American Military
Engineers luncheon. We discussed civilian employment. He told me his company
was looking for someone with my qualifications. I applied and got the job.
Once again, the "Long, Gray Line" was intertwined with my life.
Harder Right, Easier Wrong!
Military leadership is a complicated business but I always felt I understood
it like the back of my hand. The military works like a big machine with the
parts made of soldiers of various shapes, sizes, backgrounds, and abilities.
I had made many tough decisions in my career concerning the welfare of my
soldiers and my unit. All of those decisions prepared me for what was to be
the toughest decision of my career.
I had the singular good fortune to be appointed a recruiting company
commander after amassing what the branch assignment officer had said was an
excellent file. In order to give you a feel for the climate of the
recruiting battalion, the first sergeant and I were on my orientation tour
of our recruiting stations. My battalion commander reached me by telephone,
told me to get a secure line, and informed me that my company was to get a
"probable cause" urinalysis test for drugs the next day. Things went
downhill after that.
USAREC had seen fit to place our battalion in the "special interest"
category for being ranked in the bottom five of the approximately 50
recruiting battalions for the last few months. The pressure to make "mission
box" (potential enlistees in the appropriate mental and physical categories)
was intense.
There was a practice used by some recruiting companies and battalions to
stack the deck. The recruiters would be going full bore to put potential
enlistees in the Army until the "mission box" was out of reach for that
recruiting month. Once the mission was out of reach, potential enlistees
that the recruiters had scheduled to put in the Army that month would
suddenly have a minor disqualification that would take until the next day to
resolve. The applicant was then enlisted into the Army the next recruiting
month. This manipulation of applicants was against USAREC regulations as
well as being unethical.
I was searching company records looking for problems on the last day of the
recruiting month when I noted several potential enlistees in the battalion
who had been mysteriously disqualified for minor reasons. I searched further
and found several in this group who were enlisted the next month. I had a
lengthy discussion about this problem with company commander Y who had
disqualified enlistees X. He agreed there was a problem but wasn't sure if
there was enough evidence to take to the battalion commander.
I was sure there was sufficient evidence of a battalion wide problem. I saw
the battalion commander the next day. I explained the problem as I saw it.
In his haste to explain the problem away, he called company commander Y whom
I had talked to the day before. The battalion commander's door was closed
and the speakerphone was on. As soon as he started discussing enlistee X,
the phone was taken off the speaker. I was not prepared for what happened
next. After my battalion commander hung up, he was telling me a story
opposite that of my earlier discussion with company commander Y.
I had the regulation. I trusted the veracity of company commander Y. I had
both written and oral evidence. I had a battalion commander who denied there
was a problem in the battalion and acted strange when I continued to pursue
the problem. Most importantly, I had the honor code that was not black and
white but seemed awfully gray at the moment.
I knew if I said nothing, the matter would be dropped. I also knew if I
wrongfully accused my battalion commander of lying and disobeying a
regulation, my career was over. I knew I would be walking out onto the plank
by myself. I couldn't count on company commander Y to back me up. The
written evidence could be explained away as an administrative foul-up. The
risk was great. The only reward was in doing the right thing.
I had a restless weekend. What if I was wrong? Who was I to accuse my
battalion commander? In the end, the tenets of the honor code and my own
sense of ethics won out.
Monday, I dialed the telephone to the USAREC Inspector General.
When I was a young 1st Lt. in Germany, I was given command of a battery in a
105mm SP Howitzer battalion. There was a big push on then to get every man
qualified on the M1 rifle. We had conducted extensive preliminary rifle
instruction and had taken the battery to the known-distance range several
times. All of my men had qualified except two young men that grew up in the
city and were afraid of all weapons. One day as I returned from the range,
the battalion S3 asked me if all of my men were qualified. I told him about
our efforts and about the two men that had not qualified. He reminded me
that the battalion goal was 100% qualification. I told him that I would do
all I could to help those two men to qualify, but I would not shoot the
rifle for them. The S3 (a large, burly major) told me to "remember that a
pencil makes a 30 calibre hole." I had absolutely no doubt what he wanted
me to do so that he could send a 100% qualification report on to VII Corps
and I realized that he could do harm to my career if I did not comply. I
just told him that I would continue my efforts to help the men qualify, and
if they did not, I would explain it to the battalion commander and I would
like for him (the S3) to be present. I just decided that I could not attest
to scores that I knew to be false. Those two men did not qualify and the
battalion commander did not punish me.
One other story is more on the humorous side. A few weeks after I
joined my first Artillery unit at Fort Sill, OK, I got a call from the
battalion adjutant and asked me to play golf the next Wednesday at 1:00
p.m. with the battalion commander, executive officer and the adjutant. I
told him that I really liked to play golf, but that I would be working as
usual. The adjutant informed me that playing golf with the battalion
commander took precedence over work. I joined them for the game and all
was going well until about the sixth hole when the adjutant called me to
the side. He told me that the "old man" did not like to loose and that I
had better start making some "bad" shots because I was up by several
strokes. I told the adjutant that I always play to the best of my
ability and I hoped that everybody else did too. I went on to beat the
battalion commander by a fair margin, and to the adjutant's surprise, the
"old man" was not upset - in fact he was very good to me while I served
under his command.
My choice of the harder right was severely tested during my 2d class year
when I had serious concerns that my roommate may have committed an honor
violation. After careful soul-searching I discussed the incident with my
classmate who was our honor representative. After talking with him, I
confronted the roommate with my concerns. He was of course very upset. It
turned out not to lead any further, but he and I never were close friends
after this incident. I still believe that choosing the harder right was the
right course of action to uphold the honor system, which is an important
aspect of life at West Point.
What I remember most is that the West Point experience built my
self-confidence by forcing me to overcome fears and challenges. For example,
I was a terrible boxer. Being forced to go for 20 boxing lessons when my
best block was with my nose and bleeding 12 out of 20 lessons as I fought a
much taller opponent taught me to persevere. I learned about being a Team
Player from the Plebe Obstacle Course. I'll never forget the difficulty of
surmounting obstacles like the 8 foot wall or high shelf. I learned
techniques for beating each obstacle from a firstie who spent many hours
with me in the Gym. Passing such tests and training like the Recondo Slide
at Camp Buckner have helped me gain confidence to pass later challenges. For
example, they have helped me get through 8 major surgeries on my brain and
kidneys and persevere in the face of cancer and the need to take dialysis
treatments three times a week. It means a great deal to me to be part of the
Long Gray Line that has always been there for our country when needed.
Although I was never called on to fight in a war zone, West Point made me
ready to face such battles.
John P. Rainier, '72
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