Cheating at the Military Intelligence “School of Excellence”, Ft. Huachuca, AZ is not only tolerated but often facilitated by cadre. If it weren’t the student failure rate in most courses would be about 40%.
Inquisition #1.
I volunteered for mobilized retiree duty in 2006 and was assigned to teach at the Military Intelligence Captain’s Career Course. The course was within the 304th MI Bn commanded by LCOL Ed Riehle (see also blog 8 Feb 2015 111th MI Brigade: Peter Principle Personified). During a down period between iterations of captains’ classes, LCOL Riehle assigned me to conduct a 15-6 investigation. A 15-6 investigation is the military version of a grand jury investigation in which evidence is examined to determine if there is sufficient cause to bring formal charges against an offender. In this case a class leader in the Basic Officer Leadership Intelligence Course (BOLIC) was accused of cheating on his final exam. He also allegedly held “study halls” at his dorm where he provided copies to other students of the final exam he allegedly obtained from the student leader of the previous class.
Conducting this kind of investigation was right down my alley. I had a bachelor’s degree in Criminal Justice, a Master’s Degree in Public Administration with an emphasis in Criminal Justice. I had been a police officer and a sheriff deputy prior to entering the army. After branch transferring from Special Forces to military intelligence I tracked counterintelligence and was the CI Chief for 3d Special Forces Group (ABN). I had the best interrogation training in the world from the LSI and Reed Courses and training from the two of the three best interrogation agencies in the world. I had just spent eight years conducting over 5,000 criminal interrogations as an immigration inspector on the Mexican border. This 15-6 investigation was going to be a piece of cake….until command influence by LCOL Riehle made its presence painfully obvious.
“Command influence” is prohibited during investigations like this. The reason an officer is selected outside the unit in which the offense occurred is to ensure there is objectivity and impartiality avoiding any appearance of bias one way or the other by the chain of command. In this case, BOLIC was just one of three companies (committees) under the command of the 304th MI Battalion – commanded by LCOL Riehle. A cheating scandal was not something any commander wanted reflected on his officer efficiency report when fantasizing about donning the coveted eagle of a “full colonel” (like it did on the commandant of West Point).
First I visited the BOLIC company commander to introduce myself, explain my assignment and to get her assessment of the incident. She was a black, female captain, noticeably nervous. I attributed it to her fearing my findings could ruin her career. I assured her I would get to the truth of the matter. That did not assuage her trepidations.
I began at the top of the list of names of lieutenants who were in “Hollywood’s” squad. I began each interview emphasizing the potential UCMJ action for lying or not cooperating. This could include a general officer memorandum of reprimand (GOMER) and separation from the service. A few were holding back information and I earmarked their names as potential collaborators. It became obvious the class leader had held a study hall the evening prior to taking the final exam in which he distributed copies of the final exam taken by the previous class. “I guarantee you will pass if you attend the study hall” he promised the class.
[I heard the exact same thing for the final exam at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center (FLETC) at Glyncoe, Ga. The day prior to the final exam the instructor recited the test questions in order. The day after the final exam he asked each student individually to state in front of the class if he/she thought the “review” was cheating. I was the only one to say yes. The immigration academy director didn’t want to hear it.]
The most stunning statement was made by one of the more forthright lieutenants. “The company commander encouraged the previous class leader to “liaison” and “cooperate” with their class leader…wink, nod” he said. I asked if he had proof of this. He subsequently provided the policy letter signed by the commander stating just that. The “wink and a nod” would have to be obtained from “Hollywood” or a witness.
NOTE: While attending the 111th M.I Brigade’s M.I. Officers’ Advanced Course in 1990 I witnessed an obvious case of cheating. The most difficult part of the course was creating overlays of Soviet Order of Battle in both the offense and defense. We displayed how the Russians would deploy in the Fulda Gap on clear plastic overlays with red marker. At the end of the day the room smelled like everyone’s spit – the easiest way to erase mistakes. The “school solutions” were rolled up and stowed behind the platform. At day’s end the instructor told us remaining students “You can stay as long as you need to complete your work. When you leave lock the door behind you. DO NOT GO BEHIND THE PLATFORM.” [Of course, I never thought his leaving the room was designed exactly for that opportunity.] No sooner had the instructor cleared the door at the back of the classroom than a goggle-eyed fuck jumped up and ran toward the platform. He stopped before going into the projector room to ask me “Do you want a peek?” to which I declined. He brought the “school solutions” onto the platform and laid them out. While he was memorizing them I left. He followed me out to my car and asked if I “had a problem.” I told him he was cheating and had until the next morning to turn himself in or I was going to report him to the instructor. He told the instructor the next morning I was spreading lies about him. When I approached the instructor that afternoon in the hallway he got this dreaded “I don’t want to hear this!” look on his face. He told me what the cheater said and I told him what really happened. He started to say “The thing is….” When I interrupted him and said “let me guess. You’ve already been through this type of thing and the chain of command didn’t support you in kicking the cheater out of the army, right?” He just nodded. I said “Never mind.”
The “nobody fails” climate apparently persists because that apparently was the same attitude the black, female captain in charge of the lieutenants’ course in encouraging “full cooperation” between iterations of classes.
I concluded my investigation stating “Hollywood” and several other lieutenants had knowingly cheated but that the company commander bore some responsibility for creating the cheating climate by her signed written policy and innuendo. LCOL Riehle was not happy. As reflected in such movies as A Few Good Men, Breaker Morant and more egregiously exemplified by the My Lai Massacre and the Nuremburg Trials, subordinates’ culpability is diminished if directed by superior officers.
Disappointed at not being able to slam “Hollywood”, LCOL Riehle appointed a more compliant captain to conduct another 15-6 investigation. That is “command influence.”
Inquisition #2.
Army Regulation 600-20 covers the Equal Opportunity Program. Its professed goal is to “maximize human potential and to ensure fair treatment for all persons based solely on merit, fitness, and capability in support of readiness.” The policy also states NO retribution may be taken against anyone for making a complaint
In response to my EO complaint, LCOL Riehle ordered every instructor in the Captain’s Career Course to assemble in the large classroom on Friday at 1700hrs. When all were seated LCOL Riehle barged in the room yelling “Someone on this committee (stopping to glare at me) feels North Star is discriminatory!” LCOL Riehle began asking each instructor seat by seat, row by row if he thought North Star was discriminatory!
First, most instructors were not involved in teaching or conducting North Star and had only a vague concept of its’ scenario (Dusty Miller demanding blood oath absolute secrecy). Second, LCOL Riehle storming into the classroom yelling angrily about someone’s complaint hardly sets the atmosphere for a frank expression of opinion. Third, LCOL Riehle –in conducting what several of my fellow instructors told me was a “solicitation for a crucifixion” and a “public castration and lynching” – was violating both my right to complain without fear of retribution and my right to privately do so. His real agenda was to ostracize me from my peers.
What a small man.
LCOL Riehle thought he would humiliate me asking me in front of my peers if I thought North Star was discriminatory. I told him I did. He interrupted my explanation before I had three words out of my mouth. He wasn’t interested in my reasons nor in justifying myself to my peers. I was not humiliated. I was angry. If LCOL Riehle was the exceptional leader COL Monnard praised him as during his change of command, LCOL Riehle would have been the one humiliated. What we instructors saw was a vindictive, out of control battalion commander – Captain Queeg in the Caine Mutiny. He fits perfectly the profile of so many bad leaders discussed in Norman F. Dixon’s On the Psychology of Military Incompetence. In my opinion LCOL Riehle is incompetence personified and suffers severely from cognitive dissonance.
Some of LCOL Riehle’s fans may aver to his decorations as proof of leadership. Any enlisted man knows Bronze Stars are (a) administrative (even Petraeus’ boss lied on ol’ Dave’s citation in order to get him the coveted “V” device); and, (b) are distributed by commanders based on rank – not actual performance- to their favorite sycophants. In the military, troops who tell truth to power don’t get Bronze Stars…or DSMs….or MSMs. In my opinion, the only thing Riehle’s awards tell me is he has a double jointed jaw.
