By James McDonough

     T’was in the summer of 1970 that I, with my wife, Pat, and newborn baby Jim, traveled the long road from Fort Bragg, North Carolina to Northern Virginia seeking refuge for them.  I had been summoned by the rulers of the land to do my sworn duty on the fields of battle (Vietnam).  Thusly, I spent the few days remaining to us settling them into place with her nuclear family.  Whilst in the midst of the necessary preparations, I journeyed to Fort Belvoir to purchase from the market there (the PX) accoutrements to tend to our immediate future.  And, lo, there I espied a document (the Army Times) with the posted listing of the entire cohort of 2^nd Lieutenants newly promoted to the esteemed rank of 1^st Lieutenant.  Yea, verily, therein was the clearly legible name:  James Richard McDonough.

     I hastened back to tell Pat the exciting news but, on the way, realized that the day of promotion had already come and gone (the aforementioned document being a dated one of a week or so before) and since I had already departed my prior unit (which had itself since departed Fort Bragg for a long-duration military exercise) I was stuck — or so I believed–with not being promoted.  The more I thought about it, the greater became my consternation. With no one to promote me, would I now fall behind my year group, even if only by a few weeks?  And what of my pay?  Would the greater bonanza of a 1^st Lieutenant’s salary be denied to me?  To whom could I turn to get promoted properly?  Should I ask the cadre at Jungle Warfare School (my next stop on the way to Vietnam) if they could promote me?  Should I ask my company commander when I got to Vietnam?  And what insignia should I wear in the meantime – the gold bar I now wore or the silver one that signifies the higher rank?  These and several other troubling thoughts laid heavy on my mind.

     However, being properly prepared by my four years at West Point to face even the greatest of challenges, I steadied myself and by the time I arrived at Pat’s side had resolved to take the initiative to straighten things out. After sharing the good news of a promotion (only lightly indicating any concerns), I announced that the very next day we would travel to Fort McNair in nearby Washington to get some clarifying instructions.  Why Fort McNair? I had no idea (so work the minds of Lieutenants).  Although I detected a look of bewilderment in Pat’s eyes, she nevertheless trusted my vast knowledge of military matters and consented to accompanying me.

     The next morning, we arose early and arrived soon enough at McNair, where I showed my military acumen by asking the MP at the gate how I might find the “personnel office”. “Sorry, Lieutenant, I don’t know,” he answered, “perhaps you could ask someone on post.  Now could you please drive through so the cars behind you can get by.”  It was a reasonable answer, I thought, although I was surprised that he didn’t know.  Perhaps I should have been more specific.

      At any rate, once we parked, I followed his advice and asked a few uniformed officers and non-commissioned officers passing by where the appropriate office was, always being sure to render proper military courtesies when doing so.  Although all were polite, none were quite sure what I meant.  One, however, did suggest that at the far end of the nearby parade field was a large ‘administrative’ building that might hold the answer.  So, with our objective in sight, off we went.

     All such ‘administrative’ buildings, at least in those days, tended to be a maze in themselves.  Once we passed through the front doors, we saw only long hallways and unintelligible acronyms abutting each room. Bit by bit, however, we resolutely made our way, now and then asking directions and, for the most part, getting bemused looks back for our trouble.  Finally, one charitable soul thought about it a bit and gave us a floor and room number to head toward.  I sensed we were closing in on our quarry.

     Here, a nice lady took a moment to ask us why we were there and what help we might need.  She listened to my summarization of the issue at hand and then she asked that we wait for a moment while she went to yet another room nearby.  A short time later, she returned and asked us to accompany her to meet the official who ‘might’ be able to help.  Here we met an Army Major (whose name I am ashamed to admit I do not recall) who politely invited us to sit and explain to him what was going on.  So, I did, to which he listened both patiently and keenly before excusing himself, leaving Pat and me alone for what seemed like a long time.  When he returned, he resumed his seat and reopened the conversation by asking us many questions about our backgrounds, how we met, where I was headed, did we have children, and so on.  To say that he was engaging would be an understatement.  I enjoyed the discussion, but quietly wondered why he was so curious, why he was able to pass so much time with us, what he actually did on this post, and why he just didn’t tell me what I had to do to get the promotion matter settled and done with.

      After about 30 minutes or more, the door opened a crack and a uniformed figure signaled to the Major.  Nodding to Pat and me, our host then arose, told us how much he had enjoyed our talk and asked that we join him as he led us towards yet another room where he stood back and gestured for us to open the door and go in.  We did.

     Therein stood a gathering of a dozen people or so, some in uniform, some without.  On a table in the corner stood several refreshments – a small cake, a tray of cookies, a pitcher of Kool Aid.  A flag stood at the head of the room, where the Major invited us to stand. 

He then directed a non-commissioned officer to “Publish the Orders”, after which he produced two silver bars, giving one to Pat to pin on my hat while he affixed the other to my collar.  I was promoted!  I was also stunned, even as the line of strangers came by to shake hands and offer their congratulations.

     In the hours, weeks, and ultimately years that followed I reflected on the lessons of that morning.  I was not to believe that anytime and anywhere in every headquarters on every post an officer and his team of supporters are standing by for a wayward lieutenant to saunter in to be promoted. The good Major surely had many pressing things to do, but he did not let it preclude him from looking after a naïve lieutenant and his wife.  He did not ask for reimbursement for the lieutenant bars or the refreshments, which he surely purchased himself.  He did not make me feel self-conscious about my foolish and needless concerns about ‘not being promoted on time.”  He did not bemoan the unexpected interruption to his day and the work-time loss of the people he gathered.  Instead, he honored both Pat and me without the slightest reference to himself and in so doing showed me what leadership is all about – taking care of people over whom you have the authority to act and the capacity to help.

      It was an example that I have never forgotten and have endeavored to emulate ever since whenever the opportunity arose.  And although I look back upon the occasion with a significant degree of embarrassment, I realize what a wonderful and priceless moment it was.

From Jim McDonough, THE WAR – 2023

Speech given at the Army-Navy Club, July 2023, in remembrance of 50^th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War

     How do you talk about a war that ran from the early 1960s to 1973 – or from a larger perspective from the defeat of the French at Dien Bin Phu 1954 to the fall of Saigon in 1975 — and do so in only a matter of minutes?

The answer is you can’t. 

     I can only summarize that it was both a long and hard war — one that not only cost the lives of 58,281 Americans but when we include military and civilian deaths throughout Indochina most tallies regardless of national source put the total for all at over 3 million dead.

     For America, it also cost us more than 300,000 wounded, 75,000 of whom were severely disabled and 23,000 of whom were 100 % disabled, a result of vastly improved medical care along with evacuation of the severely wounded by helicopter saving many who in past wars almost surely would have died.  Nonetheless, the broken bodies of those that did survive caused them to pay a price for the rest of their lives.

     At home, the consequences of the war tore the country apart.  Not at first, but from 1965 on as the months became years, the ever-continuing casualties at ever higher numbers led to political and social acrimony and left a divide among our citizenry that may yet take time to heal. 

     Over 9 million Americans served in uniform over the time officially defined as the Vietnam War.  Not quite 3 million of them served in Vietnam.  At its peak, more than a half million American troops were in country.  All were faced with a hostile environment: Anti-aircraft weapons, missiles, rockets, mortars, automatic weapons fire, mines, and so on. Added to the plate of dangers were ambushes, sappers, tunnels, jungles, mountains, rice-paddies, monsoons, heat, leeches, insects, jungle rot and for many the hell holes reserved for prisoners of war.    There were many ways to suffer and die.

      It was both a conventional war and an insurgency of the most violent proportions.  Hardened terrorists and assassins infiltrated the populated areas; Viet Cong treachery slew tens of thousands of their own countrymen and – when the opportunity arose – many of us as well.  Booby traps were everywhere, designed to kill and to maim.  Wherever you walked you knew your next step could be your last.  They caused over 17% of US casualties and 11% of our killed in action.  And the North Vietnamese Army was ever-present throughout, reinforcing the local Viet Cong in mass at regiment and division levels, ready to strike at isolated American and allied units whenever the opportunity presented itself.

       By 1967, as casualties climbed to several hundred killed a week with no end in sight, the support of the American public waned.  Domestic hostility toward the war — often fanned by both a sensationalized and critical press — rose to the breaking point.  Defeatism followed, punctuated by Tet of 1968 — a massive country-wide battle which we won in the field but was portrayed differently in the press at home.  The now open hostility against the war at home turned bit by bit toward America’s fighting forces as well.

THE SOLDIERS, SAILORS, AIRMEN, AND MARINES

     They were young, younger than any of our previous wars.  Sixty-one percent were less than 21 years old.  11,500 were less than 19.  The average age of those killed was 22.

     And contrary to myth, the majority – two-thirds in fact – were volunteers, not draftees.  Not surprising when you think about it.  These were the sons of the ‘greatest generation’ come of age.  Their fathers fought for the country in WW II; they would do the same in Vietnam.

     After the initial deployment of units at the outset of the war, America’s warriors arrived as individuals, without the benefit of familiar faces alongside them.  And they arrived suddenly, departing the United States one day and arriving the next.  The crucible – and the shock — of battle came quickly.

     They would serve for one year (13 months if you were a Marine, a virtual eternity if you were a prisoner of war).  But in that one year, they were likely to see a great deal of combat.  It has been estimated that the average infantryman in Vietnam would experience 240 days of combat; the average for the Pacific Theater in WWII was 40 days, over a stretch of four years. 

     Many in this room no doubt experienced one or more of the big battles:  Ia Drang, Dak To, Khe Sahn, Tet, Hue, Hamburger Hill, the Easter Offensive, Rolling Thunder, Lam Son 719 (the greatest helicopter meatgrinder of the entire war), Ripcord and many, many more.  But for most it was the grueling routine of patrols, ambushes, search and destroy missions, convoy runs, landing zone insertions, firebase defenses (such as the disaster at Mary Ann) and supporting our Vietnamese allies that took their toll of misery and death.  What were the chances of surviving unscathed in a line unit?  In my own opinion, very low.  Consider our NCO corps, particularly the line sergeants who served multiple tours.  By the end of the war, we had to rebuild it, so many were gone.

     But all who served, no matter the rank, did their job: stoically, endlessly, and with surprisingly good humor.  They loved their country, our country, but they fought to stay alive, and they fought for each other.  The objective was to make it home, for home was America, family, safety, and a future.

THE FAMILIES

    As in all wars, the families suffered along with their loved ones as they went off to serve in the combat zone.  The pain of separation, the fear of what might happen, and far too often the notification that something bad had happened – all of this was a difficult cross to bear. 

     The Army at first had neglected to prepare itself for mass casualties.  The costly 1965 Battle of the Ia Drang revealed a greatly lacking method of notifying the next of kin.  In the Columbus, Georgia area where most of the troops in that battle had departed from, the notifications of those killed in action came in to Western Union in the middle of the night.  Under a time deadline to deliver the sad news to family members, Western Union used the local taxi company to go to individual houses and notify the families.  Many of the latter lived in the same neighborhoods as doorbells were rung by cab drivers burdened with carrying the fateful message.  The shock of the delivery soon reverberated throughout the area and the sight of a yellow cab coming up the street evoked sheer terror.

     This was eventually fixed, but nothing could stop the continual drumbeat of bad news.  At its peak, the war in Vietnam took over 500 hundred American lives in a single week.  In the week I graduated from West Point in 1969, in a war that I assumed in 1965 would be over by then, over 250 were killed.  Long since, servicemen’s families no longer resided in one place; each had become an individual island of worry awaiting the return of a son, a father, or a husband.  Family structured support systems to carry the wives, children, and parents through the ordeal hardly existed and where they did were only shallowly structured.

     Families could and did follow the nightly news on Vietnam with grave anticipation.  And they could see the growing unrest at home, the demonstrations and then the riots in the streets, the rebellion of our young, their chants, their mocking, and their hateful commentary, amplified by the press and sometimes reinforced by the same. 

     Worst of all, they began to see shows of support for our enemies and with it the purposeful and hateful denigration of those Americans who were engaged in direct combat and even those held in brutal captivity.  All of this made for great theater, except for the families already gripped with concerns who now not only felt abandoned but even betrayed by many of their countrymen.

      It was a crushing, and bitter time.  Yes, most of our warriors did come home, thank God.  But the ordeal for both veteran and family was not over.  

THE ROAD BACK

     The early years were difficult.  Vietnam was hard but in some ways the rejections and the slights received from fellow citizens were harder.  Many myths developed about the instability of the Vietnam veteran:  He drank too much, had become addicted to drugs, secretly harbored memories of war crimes, was a maddened time bomb ready to explode.   He was now a crazed killer who never should have gone off to fight in the first place.  A general characterization was that he must either have been driven by a lust for war or an outright fool for not finding one of the many ways to beat the system and avoid serving in “that” war.  In short, he was not to be trusted as a worthy member of civilized society.

     Most of this was balderdash.  97% of Vietnam veterans were honorably discharged from the military.  85% successfully transitioned to civilian life.  They were less likely to be incarcerated and more likely to be employed than their counterparts who had not served; over time their mean income was 20% higher.  In virtually every area they showed their merit.

     Not that the road back wasn’t bumpy.  During the first five years after discharge, suicide rates among veterans were almost twice that of those that did not serve, perhaps due in part to the sense of isolation from society.  I am reminded of the poem by Rudyard Kipling about the British soldier, represented universally as Tommy Atkins, at the turn of the 19^th century:

For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Chuck him out, the brute!”
But it’s “Saviour of ‘is country” when the guns begin to shoot;
An’ it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ anything you please;
An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool — you bet that Tommy sees!

     Our veterans saw and felt the pain as well.  But they, and their families, fought through it all and made a proud place for themselves.  Over time their suicide rate overall has fallen significantly below that of their contemporaries.  Today, 91% of Vietnam vets report they are glad that they served.  American society has changed its opinion as well, appearing, most remarkably, in the guise of ‘stolen valor’.  I said earlier that about 3 million of us served in Vietnam.           

     Yet according to the census taken in 2000, by which time many Vietnam vets had passed from this earth, approximately 13 million Americans claimed to be Vietnam veterans.  What was once looked down upon had now become a sought-after status symbol.  Imitation, however false, remains the greatest source of flattery.

      The Vietnam veteran and his family sought no special status.  If they sought anything, it was the simple recognition that they had served their country, each as valiantly as the other.  For the years that recognition did not come their way, they yet found quiet solace in one another and in their own knowledge that they had done their duty.  Today, their sacrifice is fully noted.  So, I say to them and to all of you, “Thank you for your Service.”

     In keeping with this site’s call for reflective articles on the meaning of West Point’s motto to us over the years, I offer this impression on the third, and perhaps most profound, word of the three, ‘Country’.  Previously I wrote one on ‘Duty’ and then one on ‘Honor’, citing the unexpected (at least when we were cadets) complexities and dilemmas that duty might demand by citing the 1994 Rwandan genocide in the first case, and offering in the second essay the example of the absence of honor to emphasize its critical importance by describing a corrupted prison system in Florida.  The bottom line on both words — duty and honor — is that they are key, even noble, concepts that are worthy and necessary characteristics in addressing any event or challenge.  Therefore, West Point was right to impress upon us their importance and helped prepare us to take on the challenges that came before us over the year in one way or another.

     But what of ‘country’?  Why do I say it may be the most profound of the three and therefore by implication the most binding and compelling?  The simple answer is that the first two are concepts, essentially intangibles.  We speak of ‘doing’ our duty and of doing it ‘with’ honor.  Country, on the other hand, is tangible, an entity that exists in form and construct.  It is a place as well as an idea, an entity that is defined by geographic boundaries and a system of laws and precedents with both the reality and the idea simultaneously empowered and constrained by a document known as the Constitution.  We speak of and act in service to our country, as we pledged on that first day on the Plain in the summer of 1965 and again on the day we were commissioned in the summer of 1969.

     It was important that we understood from the very beginning that we were to be subordinate to a higher entity and its lawful civilian leadership.  After all, we were to be ‘soldiers of the state’, commissioned officers in fact, given authority over the armed elements the country would need to defend itself and to ‘uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States’.  These were not mere words, but a solemn undertaking.  They would put us in difficult places under challenging circumstances.  For some of us, it would cost them their lives.  We knew it was a solemn oath when we took it, but few – if any – knew how solemn. 

     As the years passed, some of the Class of 1969 put military duty behind them.  Eventually, all of us did.  But hardly any of us left the concepts of duty, honor, and country behind.  In many walks of life, we ‘soldiered’ on, subordinating ourselves and our egos to those values.  Together, they mark a trinity of loyalty and faith, of pride and destiny.  We had come to fully realize their value, their meaning, their worth — not only to us but for the greater good. 

      Therefore, they do not and cannot stand alone.  Each is important in its own right, but their power is greatly multiplied when joined together as one.  But consider this.  What has penetrated most deeply of all into our psyches is the image of country – our country, the United States of America.  It is a great country, an exceptional country, which each and every citizen is privileged to be a part of.  Paul Johnson, the prolific and renowned British historian who only recently passed from this earth, cited it as a ‘marvelous’ country.  Having lived abroad for 17 plus years and visited dozens of other countries (to include Russia and China), for the most part in the line of duty, and having read extensively of other places and times, I would have to agree with him.  There has never been another country like it.

     Johnson also wrote in his award-winning book, ‘The History of the American People’ that he would hear no more of hyphenated Americans.  “They are all Americans,” he stated, “… [a] black, white, red, brown, yellow swirling maelstrom of history which has produced the most remarkable people the world has ever seen.”  My mother would agree with him.  The daughter of immigrants (likewise her husband, my father) she replied with understandable umbrage, in 1942, to a questioner who, noting her Italian ethnicity, asked what country her recently drafted brother would be fighting for in the war (she was in Alabama at the time to catch a last few days with my father before he deployed to Europe): “America, of course.  We are Americans.”

     All along, the graduates of the West Point Class of 1969 have known intrinsically the wisdom of our West Point motto, but above all we have come to realize the beauty, value, and uniqueness of our country.  We are proud of having done our duty (“…May it be said, ‘Well done’…) and we have strived to serve and live with honor (“…To keep thine honor bright…”), but we say and mean, without any self-consciousness, that we love our country.  What greater emotion can one feel than love for someone or something cherished.  Aside from our relationship with our Creator, what greater allegiance can there be?  Duty, Honor, Country.

*Drafted early in 1942 and shipped shortly thereafter to England. Retired as a Master Sergeant in 1965.

                        The call from Governor Jeb Bush’s Chief of Staff came at 9 o’clock at night.  “Can you take over the Florida Correction’s Department at 6 am in the morning?”

            “What?” I said.  “Let me think about that.”

            “No time.  Give me an answer.  The Governor wants to know. Yes or no.”

            A few more words, than this from me.  “Well, at least let me talk with my wife, Pat, about it.  She’s right here.  I’ll call you back in five minutes.”

            “You can’t talk about it.  Not with her, not with anybody.  Yes or no.  What is it?”

            “Okay.  I’ll do it.”

            When I showed up at my new office in the morning, I couldn’t go in.  It was blocked with “Crime Scene” tape.  Later, I got the explanation for the cryptic phone call.  The former-Secretary of Corrections at the time of the call to me was talking to his corrupt deputy, who had flipped under duress from the FBI.  Wearing a wire under his shirt, he was trying to get the Secretary to say the words that would reduce his own later sentence (he got 3 years).  But the FBI was getting anxious that the Secretary was onto the treachery (but not the wire) and was about to whack him (he had invited him to go out on a rowboat with him on a remote prison-grounds lake).  They then gave the Governor the courtesy of a quick call (before they moved in) to line up a replacement – under the condition he would not share what was going on.  The Secretary didn’t whack anybody that night, but he did get eight years.

            So began my introduction to a large organization (28,000 cadre, 95,000 inmates, 155,000 probationers and parolees, 60+ prisons, and another 70 or so work camps, road camps, half-way houses, etc., and a budget of $3.5 billion.) that was corrupted from the head down.  Up until that morning I had been Florida’s top drug official (colorfully labeled ‘Drug Czar”) but had recently informed the governor of my intention to retire.  Apparently, that didn’t faze him in offering me this new ‘opportunity’. 

He did give me the courtesy of holding my initial meeting with senior staff in his conference room (it was a Saturday morning, so no one was there).  The meeting with the top 12 department officials that morning was tense; before it ended a phone call came in to the number three honcho in the department hierarchy announcing there had been a prison break in the Panhandle.  “How often does that happen?”, I asked.  “First time since I’ve been in the department” she answered.  It hadn’t taken long for the gauntlet to be thrown down.  (It was a fake, a message to the ‘new guy’ – me — that he couldn’t handle the department; we found the two ‘escapees’ four days later hiding in the attic of a warehouse inside the prison, where they had been secreted.)  A ‘resistance movement’ had already begun.

            The department had been corrupted, but by my estimate at the end of my time there was that only 10 percent or so were so involved.  Yet that was enough to make the climate toxic for everyone, not just inmates and offenders, but also for the cadre who were bullied, cajoled, or otherwise threatened to ‘play ball’ (violence by rogue cadre against rival cadre was common, as was inmate abuse).  Also corrupted (or dysfunctional) as a result were the many systems that make a corrections system run properly (medical care was poor, food service was abysmal, contracts were chaotic, maintenance was broken, and so on).  With this recognition early on, prioritizing became easy.  Figure out who the corrupt are and get rid of them, replace them with good people (and there were lots of good people in the department) and fix the operating systems.

            Week two began with a meeting called by me of the 400 ranking members of the department (all with nametags) at a central Florida town.  At 40 tables of ten apiece (which I scrambled every hour), all were introduced to me as I queried the regional leaders about their agendas and priorities, after which I talked to them from the front of the room about ethics, discipline, and behavior, liberally sprinkled with quotes right out of Bugle Notes (‘an officer on duty knows no one’; ‘…discipline is not to be gained by harsh or tyrannical treatment…’).  Some were entertained by such ideas (so much so they failed to recognize that among them were strangers who were noting their defiant under-the-breath comments at the tables — and their nametags) which helped me isolate on where to go first.  By the end of week five, the first tranche of leader departures (wardens, IG, general counsel, others for a total of 12) ensued, usually on the heels of an early morning visit by me to their presumed fiefdoms. 

            Some of this was not easy, as rural counties in Florida are bastions of Corrections Department employment, are heavily intermarried or otherwise connected with local law enforcement (Sheriff and Warden brothers-in-law is not uncommon), and not shy about contacting their political benefactors in the Florida legislature.  One of the chief goons (think of the movie “On the Waterfront”) was related to a top Florida law enforcement official and the strongest union in Florida represented the prison guards.  But bit by bit progress was made, although it took a while to uncover all the rot.

            And the rot was extensive if zany at times.  For example, inter-prison softball competition (by rival guard teams) had become an obsession.  Professional ball players were recruited as ‘officers’ but never pulled a shift.  Steroids were smuggled into the prison system.  It produced better long-ball hitters and made the dealers some money as well.  Monies for the lavish weekend ‘tournaments’ were raised by compelling guards to sell T-shirts with the team logo for $20 apiece (the guards, whose average salary was $32,000 a year, were made to pay for the shirts up front to the supplier – often the warden or another ranking official; he or she then, hopefully, could find family and neighbors to buy them in turn). Thereby, well-funded post-game celebrations, usually at pricey hotels, became wild events, not uncommonly erupting into drunken brawls between teams.

            A convicted murderer and inmate, a former doctor who killed for the ‘mob’ and who retained substantial wealth in his outside accounts, was caught (by a tapped phone line) paying a former head of the department to ‘engineer’ a prison transfer to be with his lover.  The former Secretary in this case saw no problem with that.  He was merely working for a client, in his opinion.  The transfer didn’t go through.  And it became more difficult for him to consult with inmates after I played the tape for him in my office.

            It also was dangerous from time to time.  On one occasion, we penetrated and broke a drug-smuggling enterprise in a prison in the Florida Panhandle.  Prison staff, up to highest level, in cahoots with inmates were trafficking drugs into the prison.  We caught on and broke it and on the morning after doing so, I showed up with a new warden I had selected to take over.  Although I generally was armed, guns could not be brought into the prison, where I had to go to restore order.  The SOP called for me to wear a signal alarm that with the push of a button would bring a response squad of guards on the run and the armed tower guard (with M16) to take a ready-to-fire stance and await my command.  As I moved with the new warden through the grounds, a group of about 12 inmates came out of a weight-lifting cage in the exercise yard and came toward us with seeming hostile intent.  I hit the button and the new warden hit his. No response.  The reaction squad did not appear; a glance at the tower showed me the guard there had abandoned his post.  We were on our own.  Thanks in large part to the experienced warden who immediately began to berate and threaten with severe sanctions the dozen now face-to-face with us, they hesitated.  So, I reinforced the threats and the warden one-upped me.  It was enough to give the inmates pause and they backed away.  The upshot was we had to fire a bunch more of the staff, something I had planned to do anyway, I removed all heavy weights from the prisons, replacing them with pull up bars and parallel bars and had guards lead what you would recognize as the ‘daily dozen’.

Eighteen months into the effort of reform and de-corruption, a final confrontation was a prison riot in the Everglades, where the rioters were the guards who had gotten drunk, started a bonfire, and moved with weapons to threaten the life of an uncorrupted guard who was about to come off duty; he had reported to me a horrific act by cadre.  They failed as we countered with strength, protecting the guard and vectoring about 20 trusted and capable leaders to the prison, even as I called local law enforcement in on the problem.  When I reached the threatened guard (with whom I had placed two armed IG agents during the night) I asked what he needed.  He asked that I let him go off prison grounds as he had elderly parents that he stopped by to look in every day after shift.  And then he wanted to go home, as he was sure it was past time to let his dog out. Both requests were granted, and he was promoted as well.

            So, what had happened to cause this particular department to become so dysfunctional?  Honor had been abandoned.  Employment and especially leadership in the department had come to be seen as opportunity, not duty.  Certainly not by all, but by the more ruthless who for a while had their way.  Once countered, it was not hard to find the good people, very much in the majority.  Many of them had in fact stood up to the oppression during the worst of it.  By and by, I reminded all of the guards (who prefer to be called ‘officers’) of their oath of office and had each and every one of them recite it again; I also wrote and printed a wallet-sized card that echoed the tone and commitment to duty of in a manner similar to a soldier’s ‘Code of Conduct’.  It was to be memorized and held on the officer’s person at all times. 

It is my observation that there are always good people that only want to do their duty and to do it well.  All they need is a chance to do so, along with the reinforcing signals and support that it is proper to do.   Once able to do that within the Florida Corrections Department, decency and functional systems returned.  Whether or not such things last rests in the hands of continued honorable leadership.  But the key is honor.  Leaders and institutions need to hold honor high and never let it erode. 

            As for me, I retired (my original plan before the Governor’s call), although two years later than expected.  But the good news is that somewhere during that time, Pat forgave me for taking the job without talking to her first.  I might add, she could write her own story on this, as we did have to make adjustments in our daily routines.