I see almost no way of concluding that there hasn't at least been a cover-up of accidental deaths. But three of those in one day is hard to believe. I agree with the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (first link) that a special prosecutor is badly needed to investigate this case.
Posts: 4600 | Registered: Mar 2000
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Having never been to Cuba I can only weigh in on the "denial" piece.
I believe O-6s are the lowest paygrade allowed to sign off on ArCOMs, and since they're traditionally awarded to anyone from a high-speed E-5 to a low-speed E-7 it's more likely than not he didn't even read the name on the package. Further, they don't have to.
For enlisted the routing generally goes from Company-equivalent "management" (who writes the actual citation), to a senior battalion 1SG or the SGM who kicks it back once for corrections, it gets fixed, it gets approved, and it moves up to the Brigade-equivalent SGM who kicks it back twice for corrections, it gets approved, and MAYBE the Col reads it before he signs it.
The NCO of the Quarter thing is a relatively big deal for NCOs, but it isn't huge. I'm about 97% sure the Col in charge of the building where I worked had no idea who the NCOs of the Quarter were. I'm 96% sure he didn't know who the NCOs of the Year were. And that guy was only in charge of a building.
So, in what I like to consider my expert opinion, the last link is full of crap.
Posts: 1156 | Registered: Jan 2004
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The part about Bumgarner knowing Hickman seemed a bit unlikely to me too. Any colonel is going to have legions of non-commissioned personnel under them, and decorations do flow like water (as you point out).
But that doesn't undermine the part of the reply that indicates Bumgarner must be lying about having been in the camp at the time of the "suicides." He did make a statement to NCIS that he didn't arrive until after midnight.
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That's true. But I have a tendency to zone people out once I observe them playing around with "gotchas" that I can rip apart from off the top of my head.
I'm also willing to give the Col the benefit of the doubt. I don't remember everything I do, and even space out occasionally when working late at night. Just because his statement to NCIS has a hole in it doesn't mean that the Col is willfully misleading anyone.
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Jack Shafer takes the Harper's piece to task for publishing unsubstantiated rumor and hearsay without recognizing the weight of evidence that contradicts it. In the Slate article he hat tips a series of blog posts by Joe Carter. The third one in the series I felt pretty effectively eviscerated Horton's article (the other three, particularly the first one, are pretty good as well, although Carter engages in a bit of tit-for-tat name-calling with Andrew Sullivan).
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The Shafer piece is pretty compelling, I agree. Horton certainly played up the redaction of the NCIS report, but Shafer doesn't make it sound as bad. Thanks for posting that.
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