Lt. Cmdr. Swift on c-span at 9:30 EDT.

[trof]

The Navy lawyer who led a successful Supreme Court challenge of the Bush administration's military tribunals for detainees at Guantanamo Bay has been passed over for promotion and will have to leave the military, The Miami Herald reported Sunday.

Lt. Cmdr. Charles Swift, 44, will retire in March or April under the military's "up or out" promotion system. Swift said last week he was notified he would not be promoted to commander.

He said the notification came about two weeks after the Supreme Court sided with him and against the White House in the case involving Salim Ahmed Hamdan, a Yemeni who was Osama bin Laden's driver.

[Hugin]

1. Silly me... I thought the Military wanted to encourage the best.

Isn't a favorable ruling a 'win' for an attorney?

In a totally objective system it would be... But, We're in a totalitarian society
now. The only people who get ahead have brown noses.

I'm seeing it all over the place.

[trof]

2. What a well spoken, self-effacing guy.

The Navy's loss will be some megafirm's gain.

[Hugin]

6. He's always come across as sincere.

He would have to be to represent a client against the machine.

[MADem]

4. The way the system works, it's the juniors who do defense, and

the mid to senior grade who do prosecution and judge work.

Don't cry for this guy--this was a good thing for him. He would never have an opportunity like this again, it was a one-shot deal. His career path would put him in some schmucky boring job on the prosecution side, working for an 0-6, and doing dull work.

The odds are that his boss KNEW he was toast (it's a small community) because he'd already been given the thumbs down once before when he was assigned the task, and his boss gave it to him because he'd be able to work WITHOUT FEAR. It's very rare for someone to get picked up on a second look. It happens occasionally, but it is the exception, not the rule.

He was given lemons, and was smart enough to make some spiked lemonade. He's got nowhere to go but up. His life in the legal world is just beginning.

[Hugin]

7. That's encouraging...

and maybe the reality based world has one more resident.

[MADem]

9. Believe me, he'll do fine....he will transition gracefully, he'll be

happy as hell, and he will go with good memories. On the first of the month, he'll get a nice direct deposit that will improve his quality of life. He'll get a great job with a fine firm full of influential silverbacks who will teach him a few good tricks.

As an example of how "tough" it is at the senior levels for Navy lawyers, there's only ONE Admiral.

And he's not even a senior Admiral, he's a JUNIOR admiral. They 'frock' a second one (wear the suit, but ya don't get the pay) to step in when they kick the first one out after he's been top dog for a few years.

It's a small group, like chaplains, public affairs officers or civil engineers. They all pretty much know one another, and the odds to promote get more brutal as one goes up the ladder. It's also totally political in those small staff communities, even more so than it is with line officers (and it is plenty political with that bunch as well).

[MADem]

3. He's on the list of 100 Most Influential Lawyers in America

But Greta and Nancy aren't!

Don't feel sorry for this guy--this is actually the BEST thing that could have happened to him. The Navy is where he cut his teeth, they gave him an opportunity to play at the SUPREMES level, and if he stayed in, he'd NEVER get that kind of shot again. He'd be shoved in some HQ slot and be bored to tears.

As it stands, he gets a nice check every month, and he can go on and make a king's ransom without having to watch his waistline, pass a PT test every six months, wear a uniform, or worry about haircuts.

[Doctor_J]

5. Hmm... A bright, honest, modest, military attorney

I wonder if he'd be interested in trying to unseat John Warner in 08? Another Fighting Dem.

[trof]

8. Wish I could call in. I'd say:

Are those submariner dolphins I see on your chest?
Impressive.

I don't know what your politics are, but I'd sure like for you to consider running for office.
You are a true patriot and we badly need people like you, especially now.
You bring a lump to my throat.

You say you've been in the Navy a little over 19 years and you're leaving next July.
Will your have your 20 years in for retirement beneftis byt then or have they screwed you out of that too?

[MADem]

10. He gets his retirement.

There's a rule they have for 0-4s who hit 18 years....they submit what's called a 'continuation letter' and they're kept onboard until they hit 20.

See my other comments elsewhere in this thread about the USN promotion system, especially as regards staff corps officers. I doubt he was surprised that he FOS'd (failed of selection).

[trof]

11. You put out some good info. Thanks.

Sounds like you've had inside experience.

[MADem]

12. Yep, I played the game myself for decades

Sat on a few promotion boards as well.

It's a shitty, political system to a great extent after you hit the middle grades, and it's totally political at the senior officer level. With the small communities, they pretty much know it's a crap shoot after 0-4--a combination of punching the right tickets, kissing the right ass, and shooting the shit with the right bigwigs. If you can play golf well enough to give the flag officer who writes your fitrep a real run for his money, but lose by (damn the bad luck!) one stroke, you're ahead of the curve.

Fair? Hell no. Reality? Hell yes....

[Jai4WKC08]

13. Oh c'mon, it ain't that bad

I played a couple of decades myself -- mid-70s to late-90's -- the political component of promotions was never all that big of a deal until you hit the very top-most flag rank. By that point, pretty much everyone under consideration had demonstrated a high level of real competence, and not just by losing to the boss on the golf course.

I will agree with you that promotion has always been tougher in the smaller specialties, probably more so in the Navy than in the Army where I did my time, simply because of the number of people competing for relatively small number of poisitons. And I'll further agree that this guy won't suffer much -- I suspect he will be gobbled up by some big-name civilian firm, with a paycheck that will make his retirements seem like chump change. But I also believe that if he had won his case for the govt, instead of defending Hamdan, he'd probably have been selected below the zone and had a real shot at that one O7 job in a few years.

This is the first administration I have ever seen where the civilians insert themselves into promotion decisions at such an incredibly low level.

[MADem]

14. It's not horrible at all if you're in the line--you can cruise to 0-6

with the right assignments, the right bosses, and a reasonable degree of poise, judgment, leadership skills, intelligence and fitness--but you really have to have the right assignments. You do have to be political above 0-5, because at that point the odds are good that either one of your old bosses, or a friend of one of your old bosses, is the selection board president. I've sat on a bunch of them, I'm pretty familiar with the drill, and the chit-chat would surprise people who think it's a totally fair system--it isn't.

But I wasn't talking about the line--I was talking about the staff corps specifically. Those guys and gals are completely at the mercy of politics above 0-4. If their community managers have a bad opinion of them (and they DO know them, either personally or by reputation), or a good opinion of someone else that is in competition with them, they can fall by the wayside through no fault of their own. It has nothing to do with skill--it has to do with incredible competition for very limited slots. I know a 'government official's' kid (don't want to get any more specific than that) who is staff corps, and keeps getting promoted--he's not the best, he's sure as hell not the brightest, but his daddy is wired into the defense procurement process. Because of this, someone better has to get shoved aside. It's unfair. It happens. More than most people realize.

This lawyer was already well above zone--he'd FOS'd the second time, at least (he may have asked for/gotten a third look, I don't know who sat on his board). He didn't have a prayer to get picked up below zone or in zone, otherwise it would have happened. I suspect he had a line skipper in the ADM Johnson (a former CNO, two back) mode -- a frigging fitness fanatic. And the good LCDR Swift looked like he didn't miss too many meals, which can be the kiss of death for those types when the skipper is handing out the military bearing grades--sometimes, that can be all it takes when the competition is crazy and that particular characteristic is the 'important thing' of the era (I sat on one board once where the board president decreed that anyone without an up-to-date picture in their fiche got dumped out of the first look; and most of those who didn't make it were in that pile when we finished). I sat on another board eons back where the President decreed that those selected for command had to have decent retention statistics -- those were the bug up his ass, and that quality alone provided way too much weight in deciding fates.

I've seen civilians in Congress and throughout the cabinet cherrypick their acolytes over the years. The board president gets the word, and that particular person gets selected on the first look. No one argues, they know the score. Look at Colin Powell--he sealed his fate with all the right words for the My Lai incident and mitigation of other atrocities during Vietnam, and it was smooth sailing ever-after--he went on to OMB, and thence to fame and fortune--once he got that White House fellowship, he was pretty untouchable. They short toured his ass all the way to General, because that's where they wanted him. I do see the GOP as fiddling with the system a bit more than the Democrats, by and large, but there's influence happening from all ends of the spectrum all the time. And I suspect the Navy's methodology isn't much different from the other branches.

Funny, though, there are different requirements in war and peace. In wartime, the Services tend to want people who can execute, who are proactive, who damn the torpedoes--in peacetime, they seem to prefer bureaucrats and functionaries. The ultimately successful officer is one who can switch between those roles without tearing their hair out. The ones who have trouble are those who can't make that switch when it's called for.

[Jai4WKC08]

15. I have a feeling

It's almost completely different in the Navy than it is in the Army, where almost everybody is "line" and the total numbers are so much larger.

That said, I've suspect you may be right about the commander's weight. We in the Army have long lived with the need to toe that line, and have our photos look perfect, such that many went to professional photographers who know just where to tape, what lighting and angles to use, and so forth.

I think you're wrong about Powell tho. I don't think My Lai had anything to do with it. The man really was heads and shoulders above his peers in many ways, he had the right jobs and right bosses (that sort of goes without saying) and he was exactly what tptb needed at the time he was coming up.

[MADem]

16. I've worked in joint commands, and never envied the Army lads (or lasses)

USA was probably the WORST in terms of appearance, followed by fitness, requirements, save USMC, who were steroidal. USN was slightly more professional about both than USAF, which for the longest time was a joke, but they eventually toughened up their standards a little bit. I remember an early joint tour where the USAF guy took his PT test walking around a track smoking cigarettes...he had something like 40 minutes to walk five miles or something like that--this was back in the early 80s!

We're gonna have to disagree, though, about Saint Colin; he whitewashed My Lai, he whitewashed other Vietnam atrocities, and he was rewarded for it. He was fasttracked and short-toured like crazy. He never had any time to screw up in a job, because he was there just long enough to punch an operational ticket, and nothing more, to quickly get back to the rarified GOP/Political air of DC. Check his career--he had more time in DC as a Colonel than any Commandant/CNO/Military Service Chief of Staff. The guy was a GOP pet. He sold his soul early on.

Not a real General. A useful show horse.