On Leadership

Yesterday I had the pleasure of meeting with in person, listening to speak, and via VTC 4 different GOs from the Army, Navy, and Air Force -- all in some way in my deployed or stateside chain of command.  A lot of leadership for one day as I wrapped up my week in Kabul.  As I head back out for the last two months of my deployment, this was a good opportunity to get some command guidance, some perspective, and some motivation for my "sprint to the finish" as I have started calling my last 60 days.  Perhaps the most memorable thing said by one of my in theater commanders was that he doesn't believe in "experts."  With 30+ years in the Army he said he has had experiences and he has perspectives, but says he would never call himself an "expert" in anything and doesn't buy into people who do so.  The context is the civ/mil environment in which we work which is complex, always changing, and greatly varied based on where you work in the country and when you worked there.  Also very fitting for my week spent with colleagues covering 9 vastly different provinces with different challenges.  In 60 days when I reunite with the other three members of the "fearsome foursome" as I call the other JAG and two paralegals that I flew in with, I'm sure we will begin to reflect on our experiences spread across the country.  And when we go home, I hope we are able to put in perspective what we saw and what we did as our unique, individual experience without trying to speak for Afghanistan as a whole, the status of rule of law, and what hopes the country has for the future.  Because while we are all having tremendous experiences and learning a lot -- 6 months, or a year, or 5 deployments would still make it difficult for anyone to become an "expert" on the many challenges Afghan people face for the future of their country.

Sidebar:  David Brooks is always a favorite.  He's not talking about Afghanistan per se, but he is talking about my generation (the entitlement generation as I've been told on more than one occasion and sometimes nodded in agreement), but also filled with idealists.  His statement that "you can cram all the nongovernmental organizations you want into a country, but if there is no rule of law and if the ruling class is predatory then your achievements won’t add up to much" certainly applies to the work my command and other RoL actors are trying to do here. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/13/opinion/brooks-sam-spade-at-starbucks.html?src=me&ref=general 

Sidebar:  A SF guy bought me a coffee yesterday -- he just got a $150,000 bonus.  Not too shabby.  As he said "there are a lot of lawyers in the world...not too many SF guys.  True.  Very true.