{"id":33468,"date":"2013-01-04T11:54:47","date_gmt":"2013-01-04T15:54:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=33468"},"modified":"2013-01-04T12:02:23","modified_gmt":"2013-01-04T16:02:23","slug":"about-that-former-mda-director","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=33468","title":{"rendered":"About That Former MDA Director . . . ."},"content":{"rendered":"

LTG Patrick O\u2019Reilly, former director of the Missile Defense Agency, received a Christmas present this holiday season.\u00a0 The SECDEF determined that O\u2019Reilly \u00a0had \u201cserved successfully\u201d as a Lieutenant General<\/a> \u2013 thus allowing O\u2019Reilly to retire at that grade.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve previously written that O\u2019Reilly was not exactly the best \u201cboss\u201d in the world<\/a>.\u00a0 He was allegedly abusive, and yelled at subordinates in public and private settings.\u00a0 The DoD IG investigated O\u2019Reilly and substantiated these facts.\u00a0 Yet there appears to have been no clearly criminal behavior on O\u2019Reilly\u2019s part.\u00a0 The DoD IG Report of Investigation (ROI) on O\u2019Reilly can be found here<\/a>; read it yourself if you like.\u00a0 It\u2019s fairly short, and very little is redacted.<\/p>\n

When I wrote my earlier article linked above, I was convinced LTG O\u2019Reilly was an abusive jerk who fully deserved to be relieved of duty.\u00a0 After locating and reading the DoD IG ROI, I\u2019m still convinced of that \u2013 but it\u2019s also not exactly the \u201cslam-dunk\u201d case I expected.<\/p>\n

Effectively all the DoD IG ROI says is that O\u2019Reilly\u2019s leadership style was very poor – e.g., that he chewed ass in public (sometimes profanely) , he sometimes was overly critical of subordinates; and he didn\u2019t take bad news well. \u00a0That\u2019s about it.\u00a0 No other misconduct is alleged or substantiated.\u00a0 Its conclusions, quoted verbatim, are:\u00a0 \u201cLTG O’Reilly engaged in a leadership style that was inconsistent with the JER and AR 600-100.\u201d\u00a0 I also see nothing in the DoD IG ROI I haven\u2019t seen \u2013 though admittedly on a much smaller scale \u2013 in numerous otherwise excellent leaders.<\/p>\n

Leadership styles vary; what\u2019s appropriate in one environment may not be appropriate in another.\u00a0 The same criticisms levied against O\u2019Reilly in the DoD IG ROI can also be accurately applied to an individual named George S. Patton, Jr., between 1942 and 1945.\u00a0 Or to a guy named Curtis LeMay pretty much anytime between 1945 and 1965.<\/p>\n

In short:\u00a0 I think the SECDEF got this one right.\u00a0 O\u2019Reilly apparently was the wrong choice to lead MDA and needed to go; the SECDEF was IMO correct in replacing him.\u00a0 I don\u2019t really \u201cget\u201d how O\u2019Reilly ended up with 1 star, much less 3.\u00a0 He appears to have been the proverbial \u201cboss from hell\u201d; in my experience, such behavior doesn\u2019t develop overnight.\u00a0 He simply doesn\u2019t seem to have the leadership ability one would expect in a General\/Flag Officer.<\/p>\n

But being pleasant or even a good leader isn\u2019t the regulatory criteria for determining retired grade; serving successfully at a particular grade is.\u00a0 And it does appear that LTG O\u2019Reilly served successfully \u2013 though not pleasantly or with distinction – for the requisite amount of time before being removed as MDA Director.\u00a0 So based on what\u2019s contained in the DoD IG ROI I don\u2019t see how the SECDEF had much choice but to allow O\u2019Reilly to retire at his final grade.\u00a0 There simply doesn’t seem to be evidence of anything but an inappropriate leadership style.<\/p>\n

YMMV, though.\u00a0 And I’d be interested in hearing what others have to say on the matter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LTG Patrick O\u2019Reilly, former director of the Missile Defense Agency, received a Christmas present this holiday … About That Former MDA Director . . . .<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":623,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[84],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33468","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-military-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33468","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/623"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=33468"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33468\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=33468"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=33468"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=33468"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}