Dempsey: Military policy faces challenges in an era without secrets

The chasm between the U.S. military and the country’s civilian population has grown so wide as to appear unbridgeable. But in the realm of cable news and social media, where decisions on national security are parsed without pause, the gap has vanished — at least from the vantage point of the nation’s top military official.

“Almost nothing today — whether it’s policy or strategy — is conducted in private, in secrecy, without some rather significant degree of public scrutiny,” said Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Dempsey spoke Thursday at a conference hosted by the Center for a New American Security that examined the military-civilian divide and the country’s all-volunteer armed forces. The general, while insisting that as “Citizen Dempsey” he favors openness on policy, admitted that offering “strategy in public” poses problems in his advisory role to the president.

 Read the full article at Stars and Stripes.