As another Lame Cherry exclusive in matter anti matter.
What preceded the following quote was a little boy had written a letter to the only American general fighting in Europe in World War II before Normandy, General Mark Clark. The boy had written asking for an autographed photo and for a letter to be delivered to Marshal Tito of Yugoslavia.
Vernon Walters was ordered to get the letter to Tito. Walters had no idea who Tito was or where he was, but he delivered the letter to an Air Force supply plane and they dropped it. Clark would ask months later about the letter and Walters made the mistake of saying, "He thought it was delivered". Clark ordered him to find out.
The 5th Air Force had moved to France, so he had to fly there, and have the woman in charge dig through the files to see if the letter had been dropped. It had, but when Walters was about to report to General Clark about it being dropped, he was horrified as the thought crossed his mind that he was going to be ordered to go to Yugoslavia to make sure.
Meet you on the other side.
General Clark was very assiduous in his efforts to make me improve my sloppy habits, my forgetfulness, my carelessness and, in general, my efficiency. Sometimes this had a rather wearying and discouraging effect. I had never been as modest as I should be, but during this period of my life, I often lay in my sleeping bag at night reading by flashlight my letters of com¬ mendation and citations solely to reassure myself that I was not a complete damn fool and that some people in the world thought I did a fairly good job.
During one particularly frustrating period, I decided to resign as General Clark’s aide. I had always heard that this was the one job you could get out of in the Army by asking. It took me some time to work up enough courage to go in to General Clark to tell him that I felt he ought to get another aide. Finally, I did screw up enough gall to do it. I went into his van and said, “General, it's quite obvious to me that I cannot give you the type of service you want [I did not say that I could not do the job because I honestly thought I could and did do it well], and so I think in all fairness to you and to me, it would be better if you got an aide who could.” There was a long silence as he looked me up and down from head to toe, and finally, speaking sharply out of the corner of his mouth, he said, “Walters, let’s get one thing straight—you don’t quit when you feel like it—I fire you when I am ready, and I am not ready.” Feeling about three inches high, I backed out of his presence. It wasn’t until the following day that I realized he had said something rela¬ tively pleasant to me. If I really had not been performing to his satisfaction, he would have gotten rid of me long before this. It was a demanding job. I had no leave, no time to myself. I was with General Clark all day long, but fortunately, he used to go to bed quite early.
One problem was that I had to know at all times where every division and corps headquarters was. And this was not “know” in the sense of know on the map; this was “know” in the sense of being able to describe to General Clark what the road was like, where you turned off, how you got into the headquarters. After all, I had inherited the job as his aide because my prede¬ cessor had gotten lost while driving into Rome on the day of its liberation while trying to find the Hotel Excelsior. His confusion had cost him his job.
Vernon Walters is someone I admire. Yet when I read of his early years, he was not Saxon precise nor detailed. It is never enough to get something done. It is the responsibility of every person to be Inspired to know what could go wrong before, during and after, and to make plans for those possible events. You can not lie your way out of situations by being shiftless. You must do things right and do them complete and right the first time.
Does anyone not think that the underlings who are sucking the life out of America are competent at anything but destroying America, being immoral or being shiftless.
non rhetorical
Nuff Said
agtG