BOOK REVIEW--"WITHOUT HESITATION" by General (Ret.) Hugh Shelton

Reviewed by Bill Breakstone, November 20, 2010


One bright, beautiful spring day in 1991, I left my office in Manhattan and took the subway three stops downtown to Chambers Street to view the homecoming parade of our troops returning from Desert Storm. Out in front of one of the brigades of the 101st Airborne Division was a tall, gangly, bespectacled Brig. General leading his troops past the reviewing stand. He was so tall he stood out like a sore thumb, and couldn’t help from being a center of attention. That General was Hugh Shelton.

Henry Hugh Shelton served as fourteenth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the United States from 1997 to 2001. “Without Hesitation” is his autobiography, and it is a dandy. At 530-odd pages, it is a big book, and is filled with voluminous details, tales of personal adventures, and stories of heroism and dedication to the Service and the Country.

Shelton was born on January 2, 1942 in the town of Tarboro, North Carolina. He was raised just outside the tiny enclave of Speed. He attended North Carolina State University where he majored in textiles; he also enrolled in the Army ROTC program, becoming a commissioned officer upon graduation. He served two years as an Army Ranger, one of which was in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. He had committed to work for a large textile company after his Army commitment was fulfilled, but found himself missing his Army commitments and comrades. After a year in textiles, it was back to the Army and a life-long career that would take him to the very top of the Nation’s military leadership.

Shelton was a natural born leader and manager of men and material assets. He led from the front, was candid and honest with superiors and subordinates, and always stood up for his troops. He never shied from making a controversial decision, even if it was “against the grain”, and his judgments were always based on a firm knowledge of the facts behind any situation. And Shelton was not the kind of general you wanted to get mad. He picked few fights throughout his life, but when he did, he was tough as nails.

What one takes away from reading this autobiography is: a sense of what leadership is all about; how huge an undertaking is the management of a military organization, be it a battalion (600 soldiers), brigade (5,000 soldiers), a division (18,000 soldiers), a corps (@75,000 soldiers), or the entire military (over 2 million soldiers).

The book contains fascinating accounts of Operation Agile Provider (Haiti), Operation Desert Fox (Iraq), the wars in Bosnia and Kosovo, and the invasion of Afghanistan following the horrendous events of 9/11.

Shelton also provides an in-depth study of the management styles of Presidents Clinton and George W. Bush, and of his Secretaries of Defense, William Cohen under Clinton and Donald Rumsfeld under Bush. He is scathing in his portrayal of Rumsfeld and his associates Paul Wolfowitz, Stephen Cambone and Doug Feith. But he saves his best for Senator John McCain.

Here is a brief look at the awful time he had with Team Bush:

“There are two kinds of relationships between a Chairman and a Secretary of Defense. There was the kind I had with Bill Cohen, where we worked together and protected each other’s flanks. And there was the McNamara-Rumsfeld model, based upon deception, deceit, working political agendas, and trying to get the Joint Chiefs to support an action that might not be the right thing to do for the Country but would work well for the President from a political standpoint.”

Shelton’s relationship with President Bush was another matter, one of mutual respect if not total admiration. His analysis of the former President’s performance matches that of many others—loyalty is on the one hand is an admirable virtue, but an unwavering loyalty to subordinates at the highest levels who make boneheaded decisions that damage the interests of the Nation is not the type of leadership that best serves the Country.

I owe another debt of gratitude to Charlie Rose for bringing this book to my attention. I caught the end of his interview with Shelton early one morning when watching his show on the Bloomberg Network. Thanks again Charlie for another brilliant recommendation.