Generally Speaking (27 page)

The bonds linking a junior to a senior soldier are based on mutual trust and respect, which require that each know the other. The junior soldier counts on being able to confide sensitive information to the leader without fear of the leader's overreaction and in full confidence that there will be an appropriate level of reaction. But too often an inexperienced leader reacts to information on sexual harassment in a rigid, formulaic manner. The problem is compounded when leaders are uncertain about the issue and too focused on avoiding accountability for an unconventional response.

Equally troubling, many leaders, because they had not experienced sexual harassment, tended to deny it even existed. But the panel found that a leader must be sensitive to the possibility that enlisted soldiers' experiences may be outside the realm of the leader's personal experience.

Distrust of leaders was particularly evident in the survey responses from women soldiers. Only one third would go for help with personal problems to their chain of command. Army women in focus groups repeatedly asserted that they needed a system through which they could report inappropriate behavior and other complaints without fear of reprisal. They felt that existing agencies, such as the Equal Opportunity Advisor, the Inspector General, or the chaplain, worked more for the chain of command than for the soldiers.

The Review Panel was disturbed by the perception of many soldiers that their officers were more concerned with their own careers than with caring for their soldiers' welfare. This perception was shared by 37 percent of men and 40 percent of women. In the junior enlisted ranks, the perception was especially prevalent.

As we examined these problems, a pattern became evident: Army leaders from junior NCOs to senior officers were feeling the stress of expanding missions and diminishing resources. Further, downsizing increased competition for advancement. One leader complained in a focus group that “there is simply not enough time, money, equipment, or people to get the mission done and to concentrate on maintaining a positive human relations environment.” But other leaders
did
find the time to work on human relations problems with their junior officers and NCOs. Creating a more positive human relations environment was certainly more a matter of attitude and consistency than of increasing the number of regulations or trying to find money to throw at the problem.

Among the more troubling issues emerging from the Review Panel's work was the concern that many leaders and soldiers said that the Army was becoming more like a civilian job than a profession. This attitude apparently stemmed from the mistaken belief that heightened concerns for soldiers' privacy prevented their leaders from any involvement in their private lives. But experienced leaders recognized that the Army certainly was not a nine-to-five job. A large number of the units we surveyed were deployable worldwide; they were in effect mobile communities that were never truly off duty. Soldiers depended on mutual trust and respect, and ideally this bond included their leaders.

When I was commanding soldiers at the company and battalion level, I made it a point to visit their barracks and homes, to understand their living conditions. And the most effective leaders the panel interviewed had never relinquished this concern and responsibility.

Another serious and widespread problem the Review Panel encountered was that many women perceived that the Army was not committed to accepting them as equal members of the force. Although the Army as an institution had officially accepted women as an essential element, it had not taken the practical steps necessary to inculcate this commitment into its culture. (Training the Army for the integration of women in the 1970s did not take place as it had earlier for racial integration.) Many women soldiers told the Review Panel that they routinely heard that their selections for promotion, schooling, command, or other highly visible assignments had “taken slots and opportunities” away from their men peers. Further, women said they were often excluded from competing for positions for which men soldiers of the same rank and qualifications were considered. And some women were still fighting the same struggle for operational or line assignments as opposed to the administrative and staff positions which were deemed “more appropriate for a woman” that I had known as a young lieutenant at Fort Devens.

At the end of its exhaustive work, the Review Panel concluded that the human relations environment in the Army did not engender dignity and respect among soldiers. We found that leadership was the fundamental issue, noting, “Passive leadership has allowed sexual harassment to persist; active leadership can bring about change to eradicate it.”

We made a number of specific recommendations, which can be found in
The Secretary of the Army's Senior Review Panel Report on Sexual Harassment, Volume One, July 1997
. Among the key recommendations was to intensify human relations training during all soldiers' critical initial months in the Army, so that a relationship of mutual respect and dignity would be fostered from the onset of service. Also, we recommended a top-to-bottom reengineering of the Equal Opportunity program to make it more responsive to leaders and soldiers, to protect those who used it, and to ensure that those working in it were not stigmatized. Further, we recommended establishing a mechanism to hold commanders accountable for their unit's command climate.

One of the criticisms of the Review Panel's recommendations was that they would result in the “feminization” of the Army. The implication of this charge is that the Army's identity as a masculine organization is diluted by the presence of women. But the Army is neither masculine nor feminine; it is gender-neutral. And those who are so anxious about this matter ignore the record of the last two decades during which the Army has demonstrated both remarkable operational success and unprecedented diversity.

But all of us on the Review Panel recognized that the Army had cultural problems that needed fixing. Our summary statement epitomized this view:

The Panel very strongly believes that we must ensure that we maintain a positive human relations environment in the Army. Personnel readiness relies on a positive human relations environment. It is the vital base upon which we build our army, and the combat effectiveness of our most important weapon system—the soldier.

In May 1997, I was confirmed for appointment to the grade of lieutenant general and for assignment as Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, United States Army.

This was the pinnacle of my career. My responsibilities, which involved overseeing policy and resources for scores of units and installations and 45,000 Military Intelligence soldiers and civilians serving worldwide, were engrossing. With the assignment and appointment to three-star rank, I also assumed a significantly higher level of official social obligations, sometimes attending more than one function a night. And there was the inevitable official travel, which took me from the Far East to the Balkans.

People outside the Army have often commented how much “fun” it must have been to serve as a three-star general in the Pentagon. In reality, I derived the most fulfillment and day-to-day satisfaction working with soldiers as a battalion and brigade commander. But I was proud to be the DCSINT, in part because serving in that position showed that the Army's glass ceiling was beginning to crack. This was no small consideration, given the troubling public perception of the role of Army women after the recent scandals.

Later in 1997 Larry Smith, now a major general, became the commander of the U.S. Army Security Assistance Command with its headquarters in nearby Alexandria. There were a lot of generals in the Pentagon, and we did not move on the same official or social circuit. So he was not present to remind me of the unfortunate encounter in October 1996.

But coming back from a break during a large conference in September 1999, I happened to overhear one general say to another that Smith was being nominated as the Deputy Inspector General, United States Army. I was surprised and made a note to myself to check whether this information was accurate.

Among other responsibilities, the Deputy IG investigates allegations of sexual misconduct by general officers. Further, the position involves evaluation of programs designed to eliminate sexual harassment.

It concerned me that the Army would nominate Larry Smith for this assignment and that he might assume the same position that former Major General David Hale had filled. Hale had retired in 1998 after serving a short stint as Deputy Inspector General. But when allegations that Hale had had a series of improper relationships with the wives of subordinates during assignments in Turkey, Hawaii, and Washington, D.C., he was recalled to active duty and court-martialed. He pled guilty to seven counts of conduct unbecoming an officer and one count of making a false official statement. Hale was reprimanded and fined. The new Secretary of the Army, Louis Caldera, convened a board to review whether Hale should continue to receive pay as a major general. It was determined his retirement rank should be reduced to brigadier general, the last grade he held when there was no evidence of impropriety against him. Clearly, the Army had made a mistake in appointing an officer like David Hale to be Deputy IG.

Now it seemed to me they were about to make a similar mistake in nominating Larry Smith for the job. I doubted that Smith's actions in the 1996 incident had been an isolated event. If he had done that to me, there might have been other women he had assaulted and who also had not come forward. Certainly Smith had made no effort to apologize to me or to excuse his behavior as an aberration. And, in view of all the disturbing revelations of sexual misconduct I had seen while on the Review Panel, I knew the integrity of the Inspector General's office was especially important. If a person like Smith held the number two position in that office, the Army would be in trouble.

For a short time, I tried to put the matter out of my mind. Then, early one morning as I prepared to leave for my office, I decided to face this situation and discover whether what I had heard at the conference was correct. After a few unofficial inquiries, I learned that Smith was indeed slated to be the new Deputy IG. I continued to weigh my options for several more days, retaining the fading hope that his assignment would be changed when some other woman presented negative information about him. However, there appeared to be no sign of anyone coming forward with an objection.

Finally, I decided that it would be up to me to present the information I had about Larry Smith. Although I have been praised for courage in this matter, I had a very strong wish not to be in this position. On one level, I felt the same apprehension I had experienced at Command and General Staff College when I had decided to report the officer who had broken the honor code. Again I would be stepping out of line, putting into play unpredictable dynamics. I couldn't dictate the Army's reaction. The leaders would handle the matter as they saw fit, and I couldn't control the outcome.

This situation, however, was far more serious than a question of a plagiarized research paper involving myself and another obscure young officer at a service school. I would be making my revelation in the Pentagon, notorious for leaks to the news media within the politically charged Washington atmosphere. I knew that whatever the outcome, once I presented my information, privacy would disappear. The case would inevitably become public, regardless of any assurances I would receive about anonymity.

But I also wanted to do all that I could to protect the Army from further embarrassment. I considered a number of options: I could contact Larry Smith directly and advise him to withdraw his name from consideration for the Deputy IG job; I could make an anonymous report, but that did not seem a fair way to present negative information about a fellow officer; or I could report the Smith incident to the Inspector General or to the Vice Chief of Staff.

I needed advice, so I consulted a senior civilian lawyer in the Department of the Army, describing to him what had happened in my office in October 1996.

“That's sexual assault and battery,” he said without hesitation. His further response was supportive. “Claudia, I sure am sorry this happened to you. You don't deserve this, and you should not have had to experience that sort of thing.”

I was enormously relieved that he believed me and had first responded to the legal substance of the event before addressing the emotional issues involved. He treated me as a professional officer first and a woman second. Then we turned to how to deal with the problem.

When he asked me exactly what I planned to do, I said, “I had thought I could call Larry Smith and tell him he needed to withdraw his name from the Deputy IG assignment or I was prepared to go to the Army leadership with my account of the incident.”

The lawyer frowned and shook his head. “No, Claudia, that would be extortion, even if you were to leave out the threat about going to the leadership.”

“Well,” I said, “it would be terrible for the Army if Smith gets that job, so I think I'll go to the Vice Chief and tell him what happened.”

The next day, the lawyer called me at my quarters. “I've been thinking about this matter. Rather than reporting the incident to the Vice Chief, you should go to the IG himself.” The lawyer had two reasons for this suggestion: One, the Inspector General was the correct channel for reporting general officer misconduct, and two, the matter ought to be investigated officially, not just dealt with informally without giving Smith the chance to clear his name.

This made sense. One lesson I had learned in an earlier case involving another officer was that making an official report might not result in a finding on one's own incident, but might bring forward evidence about more serious incidents that were disclosed as a result of that investigation, as it had during the earlier Fort McPherson Article 15 investigation.

So I understood the value of having the Smith matter investigated. And since I knew it would be hard to have my complaint substantiated due to lack of witnesses, I thought it was worth the exposure of a public investigation to pursue the question of Smith treating other women in a similar way.