Sharp-witted and unwilling - some say unable - to keep his opinions to himself, Sheehan has alienated his fellow brass with merciless public critiques of the military. A longtime frontline officer, he thinks about what makes sense in the field - which isn’t always the same thing that flies in Washington’s budget-hearing rooms. His basic complaint is that the armed forces are clinging to vast bureaucracies and enormous weapons systems created to fight a war that never came. In the aftermath of the peaceful fall of the Soviets, he argues, the Pentagon has failed to keep pace with the rapid changes in the world, leaving the armed forces unequipped to deal with today’s smaller, ““lower intensity’’ conflicts in places like Bosnia, Somalia and Haiti. Sheehan envisions a lighter, smarter military, able to intervene before the shooting starts. He has called for shrinking the number of troops in Europe; railed against spending billions on a new generation of fighter planes when there isn’t a country in the world that can match the current F-15s, F-16s and FA-18s; and taken on fellow marines, telling them the army should take over some of their missions.
Within the military, few are neutral about Sheehan. His admirers, like retired Adm. Leon Edney, call him ““visionary.’’ Early supporters included Colin Powell and Frank Carlucci. His detractors say he’s ““superficial’’ and ““half-assed,’’ a ““drive-by intellectual’’ who gets a kick out of being provocative. (Sheehan was unavailable for an interview last week.) But there is one thing that maddens - and scares - the brass even more than Sheehan’s heretical views: the chance he could become their boss.
For months Defense Secretary William Cohen has been searching for a nominee for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to replace Gen. John Shalikashvili, who retires this fall. It hasn’t been easy. At the Pentagon, it’s generally agreed that many of the senior candidates are uninspiring, and the smart ones too junior. Another problem: some of those who are eligible simply don’t want the military’s top job, which has become a dispiriting bog of cutting budgets and managing sex scandals. At least two candidates removed their names from Cohen’s list. The secretary thought he’d found the solution in Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, Shalikashvili’s personal choice. But Ralston was forced to pull out last month when it was revealed he’d had an adulterous affair. Now ““Cohen’s pretty much gone back to scratch,’’ one defense official told NEWSWEEK.
One name that stands out is Sheehan’s. A ramrod-straight 6 foot 4, he is, at 56, a classic marine: his 35 years in uniform took him from Vietnam, where he won a Silver Star, to the gulf war, where he planned the canceled marine amphibious assault. But Shalikashvili and the other Joint Chiefs have explicitly warned Cohen against even considering Sheehan. The marine is too iconoclastic, they say - and the other chiefs would rebel. They urged the defense secretary to find a milder, less assertive candidate in the Ralston mold. In fact, Pentagon sources say, the chiefs liked Ralston mainly because they thought he wouldn’t make trouble. So, for now, Cohen - who is still having trouble establishing authority over the Pentagon - isn’t eager to challenge them.
That could change if Cohen runs out of qualified candidates. He hasn’t - yet. After two army JCS chairmen in a row (Powell and Shalikashvili), the secretary is under pressure to give another service a shot. There are two or three possible picks in the air force, including Chief of Staff Ronald Fogleman. But they have detractors, too, and few officers stand out in other branches: Tailhook and other internal battles have so badly stripped the navy’s top ranks of talent that few in the Pentagon believe it has a viable pick. The Joint Chiefs know this all too well; that is why they’re watching very closely to see if Cohen moves toward Sheehan. The secretary doesn’t dislike Sheehan. In May he offered him the job as Ralston’s number two, a pick the Joint Chiefs grudgingly went along with. ““They knew they badly needed his ideas, but they didn’t want to give him the visibility that the top job would bring,’’ one senior military official told NEWSWEEK. To their relief, Sheehan declined. If Cohen comes knocking a second time, they may not be so lucky.
