John T. Reed’s blog about military matters

I started these military Web pages in part because I felt that no one was saying things that needed to be said about the military. Now that I have read General Rupert Smith’s Utility of Force, I must admit that at least one other person is saying them: General Smith. He is a retired British army general. If I were president of the U.S., I would be inclined to offer him the job of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff—the top military officer in the U.S. I am not sure that’s legal, but I am damned fed up with...

Copyright John T. Reed I have been trying to get this story out to the public for 37 years. I’ve offered it to 60 Minutes, 20/20 and other investigative journalists. (I was interviewed on 60 Minutes by Morley Safer in 1986 and later worked with 20/20 producers on a similar show they did.) They were not interested. One—I don’t remember which—told me in the early nineties that although the story was important and valid, that his editors were not interested because it made the U.S. military look bad and the public wanted to love their military after Desert Storm because...

Copyright John T. Reed One of the things that has bugged me about the way the military is depicted in Hollywood is the sounds the weapons fire and explosions make. When I entered West Point in 1964 and during subsequent weapons training, I was surprised at the way weapons fire and explosions really sounded. It was often not at all like it sounded in war movies and TV shows depicting combat. M-79 grenade launcher The biggest discrepancy was the M-79 grenade launcher. It looks like a sawed-off shotgun with a huge diameter barrel. It shoots very big, fat bullet-looking ammunition....

Copyright by John T. Reed On Sunday morning, June 29, 2008, Wes Clark appeared on the CBS News program Face the Nation. During that broadcast, he commented, in response to questions, about whether John McCain’s military service qualified him to be president. A firestorm of criticism has arisen against Clark. Some have said, perhaps accurately, that Clark’s political career is over as a result of the comments. Does he deserve that? No. The reaction to his comments is an interesting example of the current state of dishonesty and spin in politics. Indeed, in my local paper, the San Francisco Chronicle,...

Copyright 2014 John T. Reed Today, our West Point class scribe Dave Gerard sent me and my classmates whose email addresses he has a link to a YouTube video which is a recruiting film for West Point made when I was there. It’s called “West Point: The Army Challenge” and has a date of 1968 on it. That is the year my class graduated. Finally, a way to convey to people what West Point was like back then both at West Point and the public’s view of West Point then! Unlike the West Point TV series of the 1950s which...