“Sinclair, 51, still faces five charges including sexual assault in his trial before a jury of five two-star generals. The former deputy commander of the 82nd Airborne could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted on the most serious charges.
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By pleading guilty to possessing a horde of porn on his laptop, for example, Sinclair’s defense hopes to limit the ability of prosecutors to use those graphic images to shock the jury. By admitting to improper relationships with the two other women, whom Sinclair asked to send nude photos of themselves, the defense lessens the relevance of the messages they exchanged in relation to the remaining charges.”
Statement from Brig. Gen. Sinclair: “Now, as you can tell, I’m all for taking full advantage of the privileges and allowances allowed to me by virtue of the motherin’ star on my motherin’ chest.
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Oh and one more thing about Peaches (Gen. Petraeus), he wrote the book on COIN, huh? I got my own book on COIN, it’s called 'Ck Out, Inserted Nightly.’ Call my assistant, she’ll send you a copy with my mushroom stamp on it.
Alright, you cats keep your feet on the ground and reach for the anal lube. Uncle Jeffy is fkin’ out.”
My previous Battalion Commander was, without a doubt, the best CDR I’ve ever had and he had no problem digging in on an OP with the Joes. 10 months in Afghanistan under his command and I still believe that my time there was the best I’ve had in the Army so far.
As for Generals…I’m just an NCO and am thankfully still serving on the line and haven’t been sucked away into an S Shop or Staff job yet. Very little experience with them, but I’ve never particularly enjoyed talking with the ones I have.
Good stuff, I like commanders that don’t exhibit the “I’m above doing that type of work” mentality. They, by definition, are of course. But they don’t need to secrete it.
I was specifically speaking of full birds though. Like regimental COs (brigade in the army?) and other colonels in staff jobs. (Think Major Powers in Heartbreak Ridge promoted twice)
I think the context was he had porn in Afg, violating GO 1B.
Pretty much everyone has porn and alcohol in Afg though.
My current Wg/CC (O-6) has gone out of his way to spend 2-4 hrs doing the same job that E-2s do all over base, as long as that work doesn’t require certification first. He earned a lot of respect for that. He also stays out of his flight suit as much as possible, which also earns respect from the non-flyers on base, which make up the vast majority of the base of course.
I hold him to a higher standard. They absolutely need to take the star away. Screwing your female subordinates (even if they BEG you to) crosses the line, and it looks like he jumped over it with both feet. As a former dog robber, I’ve seen good GO’s that I’d follow thru hell and back, and bad, self-centered conceited egotistical SOB’s - and most soldier’s can spot them too.
I’ll always remember what one told me: “The higher you go in rank, the MORE of a servant you are to those who you lead”…soldiers like a boss with a little ‘panache’ but its the ego that you have to watch out for…
But I find it hilarious that some of the people that are so “shocked” and disappointed I hear talking about it (senior citizens)
are guys that were officers and senior officers when they could run around smoking filterless cigarettes everywhere, drink during duty hours, DUI home from the O-club, bang their secretaries without anyone batting an eyebrow, have offices and locker rooms with porn posters everywhere, and give their wives a light little smack when they got out of hand.
I sent terabyte harddrives FULL of porn to deployed friends. I did not do it for my enlisted friends as I was afraid of getting them in trouble, but I sent bottles of bourbon to a Dr. I know that was deployed there as well. Just poured out the gross brown Listerine bottles, washed them out, and filled them with bourbon and scotch. But when you’re in charge of the whole enchilada, you should jerk off to a lifetime of memories, drink water or get a Dr. to prescribe you something good, and deal with what you’ve ordered all of your subordinates to deal with.
And yes, it matters not one iota if she begged for it or not and he resisted as long as he could. He’s the one in the position of authority, and therefore it’s wrong. Same with Monica and Willy. She wasn’t really taken advantage of…but nonetheless he was in the wrong.
I couldn’t care less about adultery etc…that’s between these guys and their wives. It’s about a professional environment.
I have some personal ties to this story as Sinclair was the battalion commander for 1-18 in 2008, and later when he was the 172nd Infantry Brigade commander that same year until I left the Army. As a battalion commander I found him very respectable and thought he was an upstanding gentleman, and never had anything bad to say about his policies. He was a no-nonsense Infantry officer that knew his stuff. Later as brigade commander I thought about the same, until we deployed to Iraq in November of 2008 and I noticed that all the battalion commanders and Col. Sinclair received two very beautiful Arabic speaking women as interpreters. Myself and the other soldiers in my unit suspected that the battalion commanders were sleeping with their terps.
The 172nd Infantry was notorious. The battalion commander of the unit my company was attached to from what I remember was an awful a cheating son of a bitch when we were deployed.