NEWS: Four-Star Army General Relieved of Duty

General Kevin P Byrnes was relieved of duty Monday after a Pentagon investigation into what Bryan Whitman, a spokesman for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, said involved "matters of personal conduct". Byrnes was commander of U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command. There, he oversaw development guidelines and all Army training schools. He also was in command of recruiting and recruit training.



Among the rumor of a draft and the low recruiting numbers being reported over the past few years, this seems a bit fishy to me. I think we may see a character assassination of Gen. Byrnes in the coming weeks. I just hope whatever it was he did was truly worth this, and this isn't an attempt to blame their recruiting woes on a "bad apple".

[edit on 9-8-2005 by RockerDom]

Officers are held to a very high standard of conduct, especially General Officers. The General was dismissed over a sexual conduct issue.

The Army cited no specific allegation against Byrnes, but a senior official said it involved unspecified sexual misconduct. The official spoke only on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the allegation.

startribune.com

[edit on 2005/8/9 by GradyPhilpott]

Good find, I couldn't find anything that related to a specific charge.

Other news sites are suggesting it may have been a issue of sexual misconduct.

Army sacks senior general for misconduct

WASHINGTON - In an extraordinary move, the Army sacked a four-star general who was the subject of a Defense Department investigation into alleged sexual misconduct, officials said Tuesday.

Gen. Kevin P. Byrnes, commander of Army Training and Doctrine Command, was approaching retirement when the decision to relieve him of duty was made by the Army chief of staff, Gen. Peter Schoomaker.

The Army announced no specific allegation against Byrnes, but a senior official said it involved unspecified sexual misconduct. The official spoke only on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the allegation.

EDIT: Grady beat me to it while I was looking for a non-subscription site to link to.

[edit on 9-8-2005 by AceOfBase]

Or how to discredit someone ready to discredit the Bush administration for lying.

If the General had anything to "expose the lie" on Bush, a petty charge of sexual misconduct isn't going to stop him from disclosing anything.

Some people..

Is it me, or is sacking a 4 star general, who until now had an unblemished record, a bit extreme for sexual misconduct? I just have to wonder why go to such extremes on this guy (you'd think that someone with that kind of power could get away with alot more). There are no recent records of a 4 star general being stripped down like this. He is 4 months away from retirement. There has to me much more to this that just some kind of sexual harrassment kind of deal.

Interestingly, the Army is offering no details and no one else has come forward with accusations. Also, he is stationed at Ft. Monroe, VA where the terrorist nuclear attack drill is currently underway. Hmmmmm....

Originally posted by mpeake
Is it me, or is sacking a 4 star general, who until now had an unblemished record, a bit extreme for sexual misconduct? I just have to wonder why go to such extremes on this guy (you'd think that someone with that kind of power could get away with alot more). There are no recent records of a 4 star general being stripped down like this. He is 4 months away from retirement. There has to me much more to this that just some kind of sexual harrassment kind of deal.

That's what struck me. They have stated what the investigation is about, but there's nothing else. I guess we will have to see how it plays out, but generally (no pun intended) unless something is done publically, an officer at that high of a level would simply be cut loose. Not only because they are such high rank, but because it's bad publicity for the Department of Defense.

I just hope these charges turn out to be legit.

ok... So he is being "retired"... maybe he wasn't friend with everybody in pentagon...

It's not uncommon. I have known of officers of all levels sacked for sexual misconduct. One case was a Chaplain who was sleeping with an underage girl in Australia.

Keep in mind that if they are married and have a known affair, that is a big no-no.

Adultery is a court-martial offense in the military and according to UCMJ: Article 134-2
Because of his rank and tenure, he is being offered the honorable way of dealing with this other than by a court-martial.

Military takes this offense very seriously.




seekerof

[edit on 10-8-2005 by Seekerof]

If anything Kay Riggs says is true, and she has her former husband's direct diary on these matters, all of those people full bird Colonel and above in the military are placed in compromised positions as a routine fact of life. It is a rite of passage, so we might beg the inquiry that if it is so then what is the deal with the nuclear terrorism simulations and exercises set to begin very soon? Is the general being sacked because he was alarmed by another "exercise," as happened during 911, and had an outbreak of conscience at his briefings?

Well how convenient, they already have all the dirt they want Skull and Bones style on all these upper level guys, and all they have to do is hint at it, to remove anyone who repents and wants to have a conscience.

I hope none of this is true, but on the other hand the implications of this are stunning, with Bush at his lowest level of trust in the polls ever, and the hand on the nuclear button facing Iran "even if they have nothing to do with any terrorist nuclear attack."

Yes I want to be wrong about worst case projections, but people at the Hudson Institute and Rand designed such as preventative scenarios.

[edit on 10-8-2005 by SkipShipman]

I find this extreme suspicious, considering:

"The spokesman said it was an Army policy not to release information about specific allegations in an investigation of an Army officer."

So "anyone" can "allegate" you did something and you get the sack

I thought they would at least find out if the allegations were true before they actually sacked him.

I'd like to know the *real* reason for his sacking...but I guess that's wishful thinking eh?

Cheers

JS

This is the sort of statement that tends to rankle the Army and alienate one's superiors. The Army hates the Marine Corps:

General Byrnes said in a 2003 interview that he wanted the Army to borrow a lesson from the Marine Corps, whose credo is that every marine is first and foremost a rifleman. "We've become too specialized," General Byrnes said, adding that he was tired of hearing young enlisted people say things like "I'm a mechanic" rather than "I'm a soldier."

Beside that Byrnes had already incurred the wrath of the Secretary of Defense after which many of his colleagues came to his defense:

Retired officers, who asked not to be named, said Gen. Byrnes had been under investigation for some time and had been in the throes of a divorce.

They expressed dismay at Gen. Byrnes, for whom a number of officers went to bat in 2002 when Mr. Rumsfeld threatened to end his career at lieutenant general.

Mr. Rumsfeld was upset at Gen. Byrnes for fighting proposed troop cuts being outlined by the defense secretary's aide, Stephen Cambone.

Then-Army Secretary Thomas White and top generals interceded and convinced Mr. Rumsfeld to keep him. Shortly thereafter, Gen. Byrnes won nomination to a fourth star and the TRADOC command.

"I'm damn mad," said a retired general who supported Gen. Byrnes. "People went to the mat to get him promoted. ... Now Rumsfeld can say, 'I told you so. I saw something you didn't.'?"

It seems that the General had been "cruisin' for a bruisin'" for some time and I doubt that many will come to his defense again. For whatever reason, his judgement seems impaired and such is not good for those who sport four stars.

Personally, I think he will be allowed to retire without penalty. The harm to his reputation should be punishment enough. If he marries the woman in question, he might even take on the aura of a King Edward VIII.


[edit on 2005/8/10 by GradyPhilpott]

well it says here it's all part of a coup and counter coup

Link

plus it's on prison planet too...

this summer just gets weirder and weirder


[edit on 10-8-2005 by asala]

hey dude, please shorten your link!

Originally posted by nexus6
well it says here it's all part of a coup and counter coup

If something like this were true, the General would have been found dead in bed with young boy. This is utterly preposterous.

[edit on 2005/8/10 by GradyPhilpott]

www.parapolitics.info...

More at the parapolitics link above regarding the "coup" happening in America today, according to a russian reporter.

Russian Intelligence Analysts are reporting this evening that an apparent coup is taking place in the United States and that both Russian and Chinese Forces have been ordered to their highest non-nuclear defense status.

Take with chunk of salt.



[edit on 10-8-2005 by smallpeeps]

One of the Coup Leaders in the United States, General Kevin P. Byrnes, and who is also one of their top Military Generals, has been arrested and taken prisoner by US Counter-Coup Forces, and as we can read as reported by the Newsday News Service in their article titled “Senior general is relieved of duties at commander of key Army training organization" www.newsday.com... and which says....

source

This just illustrates how ludicrous this all is. There has been no indication that the General is under arrest or that he should be.


[edit on 2005/8/10 by GradyPhilpott]