The following is the first chapter of Changing Commands: The Betrayal of America’s Military, written by John F. McManus and published by The John Birch Society in 1995. In observance of Veterans Day 2015, we offer this as an opportunity to reflect back 20 years on the observations of Mr. McManus to see the progress made on such an insidious agenda of changing the role of America’s armed forces. The book is available at ShopJBS.org.
Changing the Role of America’s Armed Forces
“The Clinton Administration appears dedicated to sending the U.S. military into dangerous seas of multinational peacekeeping in an effort to elevate the status of the United Nations into a guardian arbiter of the new world order … [with] a new world army whose singular purpose is to enforce the whims of the arcane United Nations Security Council.”
— Senator Trent Lott (R-MS), October 5, 1993
Any person who joins the armed forces of this nation swears an oath to the U.S. Constitution. Traditionally, virtually all who put on the uniform of this nation’s military have served with singular honor, in keeping with the understanding that their total mission was to protect the lives and property of the people of this nation. Maintaining the sovereignty of the United States of America has always been a fundamental part of that mission.
Except for the War Between the States, for more than two centuries, our military forces have operated from the belief that America’s only enemies are outside our borders. It is difficult for a military professional, even more so than the average civilian, to conclude that an enemy lurks within, and especially within the military itself. Yet, this is the reality in America today.
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Our fighting men went off to the Pacific after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. More men went off to Europe when Germany declared war on our nation a few days later. Why? Because our nation and its people — the families of these men included — were threatened by a foreign enemy. There was a need to fight to insure that our nation would remain free and independent.
Lately, however, the military’s role has been significantly altered to include a new category of national responsibility, that of protecting the undefined “vital interests of the United States.” That phrase is broad enough to cover just about anything a President might want. And recent Presidents have employed this very phrase to justify dispatching troops to the far corners of the earth and to use them to enforce resolutions of the United Nations. This is dangerously wrong.
America’s Chief Executives have in recent years told the people that our “vital interests” call for injecting U.S. military might — under UN auspices — into an attempted takeover of one Arab nation by another, a civil war in faraway Somalia, a centuries-old territorial struggle in the former Yugoslavia, and a totally domestic fight for leadership in Haiti. Practically everything on earth has become a U.S. concern — but always under UN jurisdiction.
No matter what the President says, however, such missions are not constitutionally authorized. Any American who feels compelled to defend one side or another in any of these conflicts is free to volunteer his or her own services, but not free to force others to participate or to pay with tax dollars for such ventures.
The U.S. military was not created to be a mercenary force for sale to the highest bidder. It is not supposed to act as a worldwide service club performing good deeds around the globe. And no President has the legitimate authority to make our armed forces available to a world government. The U.S. military is a taxpayer-supported force whose role is limited by the Constitution of the United States to the defense of the lives and property of our people and the independence of our nation.
Over the years, Congress has allowed some fundamental and frightening changes regarding the military. Resistance to this steady transformation — both in and out of the services — has been slight, or at least not reported. So the changes have been accepted and various steps along this suicidal route have become U.S. policy. Unless such dangerous policies are reversed, they will result in the conversion of our nation’s armed forces into a full-fledged UN military force. And the American people will see an end to their freedom.
Softening up the Troops
After the text of the May 10th survey at the Twentynine Palms Marine Corps base had been confirmed by one of the Marines who was forced to participate, information about it appeared in The New American magazine. Military officials who were questioned about it quickly insisted that the project was the sole work of its creator, Navy Lieutenant Commander Guy Cunningham, a master’s degree student at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in Monterey, California. They said his project had no official status, and that they were simply helping him so he could write his thesis.
But an official press release issued by NPS stated: “The student’s idea for the thesis originated from the Department of Defense’s Bottom Up Review, which included a section on peacekeeping, disaster relief, humanitarian assistance, and peace enforcement operations, and from Presidential Review Directives 13 and 25, which directed DOD to create a U.S. military force structure whose command and control would include the United Nations.”
So, the Department of Defense (DOD) has indeed been directed by presidential decrees to create the kind of force structure the survey discussed. According to the NPS release, DOD has also been given presidential directives to alter the military’s “command and control structure” to include a role for the United Nations. All of this, as we demonstrate in chapter 3, is leading our nation to a condition of having no military force except that which serves the UN.
A reporter for the California-based publication F&H News interviewed Lieutenant Commander Cunningham, who maintained that the idea for his survey came from “a magazine article dealing with President Clinton’s apparent willingness to place U.S. military combat troops under United Nations command.” Cunningham did not name the magazine, but his assessment of Mr. Clinton’s “willingness” was deadly accurate.
Cunningham emphatically insisted that he merely intended to discover how Marines felt about being assigned “non-traditional” roles. He had obviously become aware of the revolutionary changes being foisted on our military. Even if his claims about his motivations are completely honest, Marine Corps senior officers should never have allowed him to proceed with such a survey. It couldn’t help but undermine morale, patriotism, and the ultimate effectiveness of the troops.
But senior officers did allow the survey. At some higher levels in the Marine Corps, it is now considered acceptable to have Marine Corps personnel think about all kinds of “non-traditional” roles, including assignments in which they would fire on U.S. citizens. In other words, Marines are being programmed to accept assignments that no one wearing an American military uniform should ever be forced to accept. They are even being led to transfer their loyalty to the United Nations.
Non-Traditional Roles
As the following list shows, new roles mentioned in the notorious Twentynine Palms survey are already being introduced in all of the services:
–In June 1993, the U.S. Army issued FM-105 Operations, a document outlining a new emphasis on “conducting operations other than war.” An entire chapter of this new set of guidelines dwells on peacekeeping missions, humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, riot control, and relations with nations in need of democratic assistance. The document’s declaration that “the Army will not operate alone” indicates that the other services will participate in the new assignments.
–During the summer of 1993, President Clinton issued Presidential Decision Directive 13 (PDD-13), which called for rapid expansion of “the United Nation’s … peace enforcement operations around the world.” Even the pro-UN New York Times commented that PDD-13’s intention to place American forces under foreign commanders in UN operations amounted to a significant departure from “long-standing tradition.”
–On September 23, 1993, Representative William Goodling (R-PA), the appointed congressional delegate to the United Nations, sent a strongly worded letter to President Clinton, hurriedly signed by 32 House colleagues, expressing “serious reservations” about the Clinton plans contained in PDD-13. Goodling and his fellow representatives stated:
This proposal appears to coincide with the apparent effort on the part of the U.N. to redefine itself and expand its mission to include not simply peacekeeping, also on a more expanded scope, but also peacemaking and the nexus of “nation building.”…
By issuing a blank check committing U.S. troops to the U.N. under foreign command, you would in effect be making U.N. initiatives U.S. commitments, and U.N. conflicts U.S. conflicts, while forfeiting the leadership of the troops on the ground.
The planned transfer of control of our own military had begun to become obvious to some members of Congress.
–On October 5, 1993, Senator Trent Lott (R-MS) saw a larger and more sinister motive in the President’s directives. He stated: “The Clinton Administration appears dedicated to sending the U.S. military into dangerous seas of multinational peacekeeping in an effort to elevate the status of the United Nations into a guardian arbiter of the new world order … [with] a new world army whose singular purpose is to enforce the whims of the arcane United Nations Security Council. The Administration’s effort to create a new vision for the U.S. military is embodied in … PDD-13.” Senator Lott hit the nail right on the head. His side-by-side use of the phrases “new world order” and “new world army” indicates that he fully grasps the all-encompassing seriousness of the President’s plans.
–On May 3, 1994, President Clinton signed Presidential Decision Directive 25 (PDD-25) and immediately classified it “secret.” Simultaneously, National Security Adviser Anthony Lake (CFR) released an official “summary” of the document. It states that U.S. military forces can be placed under foreign command in UN operations “on a case by case basis.” If the “summary” admits this much, it seems clear that the document itself must contain even worse plans and directives for the misuse of the military. Why else keep it hidden from the public and even from Congress?
–On June 9, 1994, then-House Minority Leader Robert Michel (R-IL) sought to amend the 1995 Defense Authorization Act. His amendment called merely for placing “prudent limits” on the President’s power to place U.S. forces under foreign command in UN operations. It should have emphatically forbidden the placement of troops in such a position. Opponents of the Michel measure read a letter signed by Secretary of Defense William J. Perry and Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General John Shalikashvili which stated, “In sum, we believe this proposed legislation is ill-advised and potentially harmful to the execution of military operations. We urge that the House of Representatives not approve this legislation.”
Thanks in part to this betrayal from the top civilian and military leaders of our armed forces, the measure was defeated in the House by a vote of 237 to 185. Which means that most members of the 1994 Congress, along with the nation’s highest military officer, see nothing wrong with having foreign commanders in UN operations issuing orders to American forces.
–A July 18, 1994 press release from Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base reported that a detachment of Marines and Navy personnel from Southern California would undergo “urban training” near Sacramento, California. The July 23rd-August 3rd TRUE (TRaining in an Urban Environment) program would prepare a military unit to become “America’s quick reaction force to safeguard this country’s citizens, property, and interests” overseas. As shown in our next chapter, there are ample reasons to speculate that this “quick reaction force” could eventually be used to “fire upon U.S. citizens who refuse or resist confiscation of firearms banned by the U.S. government,” as the Twentynine Palms survey suggested.
–The Washington Post reported on August 15, 1994 about a new type of “peace maneuvers” for Army regulars at Fort Polk, Louisiana. Part of the training called for Army units to “disarm the militia” while being observed by British and French officers playing the role of UN observers.
–In November 1994, Secretary of Defense William Perry approved a plan to employ military reservists to carry out the growing number of non-traditional missions assigned to our armed forces. According to a report in the New York Times, the plan would have “many of the one million members of the National Guard and Reserves of the various armed services spend their annual training time performing real operations, including peacekeeping missions overseas….” Army Chief of Staff General Gordon R. Sullivan (CFR) said he was “very supportive” of the idea. Missions involving peacekeeping are, of course, UN missions.
–One week after the 1994 Republican election-day sweep, incoming House Armed Services Chairman Floyd Spence (R-SC) revealed that “wholesale categories of combat units are in a reduced state of readiness.” Secretary of Defense Perry reluctantly agreed with Spence’s charges and added that the U.S. military’s participation in overseas UN missions had forced defense officials to divert funds originally earmarked for training of stateside units. But Army Chief of Staff General Sullivan told the Boston Globe during a November 28th visit to Harvard University that he wasn’t concerned about the readiness of the troops under his command. Two days later, however, President Clinton was forced to address this serious decline as he proposed a $25 billion increase in the Pentagon’s budget. General Sullivan seems to care only about the readiness of troops serving the UN’s interests. The country might be better served if he retired.
A New Type of Commander in Chief
Americans have ample reason to be proud of our country’s military history. Numerous uniformed giants have served the nation well, especially when allowed by the President to do their jobs properly. Also, many Presidents themselves proudly wore the uniform of our nation before ascending to the highest office in the land. But like so many other changes in America, the White House is occupied today by a remarkably different kind of Commander in Chief.
When Bill Clinton became eligible for the draft while attending the University of Arkansas in 1969, he did everything fair or foul to avoid serving. In a December 1969 letter to Colonel Eugene Holmes, the university’s ROTC commander at the time, the future President expressed his “loathing for the military.”
That letter, along with a 1992 affidavit submitted by Holmes and additional evidence unearthed during the 1992 campaign, show that Mr. Clinton: a) used dishonorable means on several occasions to evade the draft; b) likely committed a felony in the process; and c) repeatedly lied about what he had done. But because he later became a committed CFR member, his disgraceful conduct was swept aside after it had been discovered, and he became the President of our nation.
After he entered the White House, Bill Clinton filled his Administration with individuals having a similar “loathing” for the military. In late January 1993, only days after the new Administration took office, Lieutenant General Barry McCaffrey, an assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, offered a pleasant “Good morning” to a young female Clinton aide on the White House grounds. She promptly rebuked him and told him that her personal policy was not to talk to anyone in a military uniform. What an outrage!
With Bill Clinton in the White House, morale in the military has sunk to such depths that an active duty senior officer sacrificed his career by publicly offering an attitude about the President shared by most others in the services. During a formal speech before a military audience in Germany four months after the Clinton inauguration, Air Force Major General Harold N. Campbell labeled the President a “pot-smoking … gay-loving … draft-dodging … and womanizing Commander in Chief.”
General Campbell was fined, demoted, and forced to retire. But nothing he stated could be denied. Having a man like Bill Clinton in the White House has taken a significant toll on the morale of those who serve.
In May 1994, President Clinton awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor posthumously to two American soldiers killed during the ill-advised military action in Somalia. Mr. Herbert Shugart, the father of an Army sergeant who perished trying to rescue a downed helicopter pilot, refused to shake the President’s hand when presented with his dead son’s award. He told the President: “You are not fit to be President of the United States. The blame for my son’s death rests with the White House and you. You are not fit to command.”
Nor is the office of Vice President in better hands. As a student at Harvard, Al Gore wrote to his father, then a senator from Tennessee, to express the view that the national aversion to communism was “paranoia,” “a psychological ailment,” and “national madness.” He characterized the U.S. Army as an example of “fascist, totalitarian regimes.” He later served in the Army on the way to a political career.
Now as Vice President, he has become far more approving of the U.S. military as long as it serves the United Nations. When 15 Americans perished on April 14, 1994 as a result of an attack by friendly fire while they were performing a patrol mission over Iraq, Gore extended official “condolences to the families of those who died in the service of the United Nations.”
In his report about this incredible statement, columnist Robert Novak stressed that these remarks by the Vice President were “prepared, not impromptu.” He noted that this was only one indication that Clinton Administration leaders, “distrustful and resentful of this country acting on its own in the past, truly want a new world order.”
The new world order is precisely where our nation is being taken — a redesigned world where the United Nations will reign supreme. Wherever they can, the President and his team will assign our military to the United Nations. They are serving a conspiracy the ultimate goal of which is to create a UN-led world government led by a powerful few. The rest of mankind is slated for slavery — or extinction.
But keeping our nation independent and retaining full U.S. control of our own armed forces isn’t just a nice idea, but an absolute necessity. Many more committed Americans are needed in the fight to block the sinister plans unfolding right before our eyes.
The first goal of anyone who wants to “take our country back” must be sharing sufficient information with fellow Americans to have them bring about a change in Congress. The nation sorely needs an influx of elected officials who are uncompromising Americans fully committed to their oath to the U.S. Constitution. A majority of truly informed and determined Americans in the House of Representatives alone can put a stop to the betrayal of the military, and of the nation itself.
This book has been written in hopes that many more Americans will be energized to accomplish such a goal. There is no alternative to rescuing our nation from the clutches of the Conspiracy that has, for too long, been advancing steadily toward its malevolent objectives.
Please read on as we supply the details about the plot to sacrifice American sovereignty on the altar of the United Nations.
John F. McManus is president of The John Birch Society and publisher of The New American. This column appeared originally at the insideJBS blog and is reprinted here with permission.
