Tom Ricks has recently been fielding input in regard to the aversion or willingness of the branches of our armed forces to relieve commanders and in regard to the general trends by which we promote or discard poor performers. For example, this piece and a few similar ones. I hope that he finds some good answers. Our personnel system (at least in the Army) has some serious flaws. That said, I am more upbeat as of late. The reason is that I have seen great examples of where we have gotten things right.

In the past two weeks, I have spoken with two of my former Battalion Commanders, the former Battalion XO whom I worked with most closely as a Company XO, a former Battalion S-3, a former Company Commander, and a couple peers. In the same order as the preceding sentence, those individuals are now: commanding a Brigade, immersed in a second career in a lucrative civilian management position (not related to the defense industry), commanding a Battalion, commanding a Battalion, attending SAMS, commanding a Battery, and leading an ODA. For all of the system’s flaws, these guys are where they belong.

At least we got a handful of important things right.