Army undersecretary retiring Friday

After leading the Army through one of the most turbulent periods in the service's history, Army Undersecretary Les Brownlee will retire Friday after more than three years in the position-18 months of which were spent as the acting secretary.

Brownlee led the Army through wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the largest nation-building effort since World War II.

When he wakes up on Dec. 4, he notes that it will be the first day in 42 years, nine months and three days that he will not be in service to his country.

Brownlee, a retired Army colonel highly decorated for his service during two tours in Vietnam, spent 14 years as a professional staff member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, including several as staff director, before becoming Army undersecretary in November 2001.

When Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld fired then Army Secretary Thomas White in April 2003, Brownlee became acting secretary of the Army, a position he served in until Nov. 19, when Francis Harvey became the new Army secretary.

Army Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Schoomaker, in a lengthy tribute to the undersecretary last Monday during a farewell ceremony at Fort Myer, Va., said Brownlee always put the Army's interests ahead of his own. "He cared about the Army as much as anyone I've ever met…he is extremely knowledgeable about soldiers and soldiering," Schoomaker said.

A number of soldiers injured in Iraq and Afghanistan and now recovering from wounds at Walter Reed Army Medical Center attended the ceremony. Brownlee has been a regular visitor at the medical center in northwest Washington.

In an interview with Government Executive Thursday, Brownlee said he sometimes thinks back to the preparations for the Iraq war and wonders if he might have done things differently. "I think everyone who looks at their past performance, if they're honest about it, has some regrets." At the time, Army planners were focused on preparing troops for chemical warfare. Saddam Hussein had used chemical weapons in the past and many believed he would use them again. Nobody anticipated the greatly increased requirements for more armor-for both troops and vehicles-that resulted when the insurgency gained momentum in the postwar period. Neither the Army nor manufacturers were prepared for the requirements. and while all troops now have body armor, it will be months before all vehicles are equipped with armor.

Brownlee has been a hands-on manager and a tireless advocate for soldiers, say those who work closely with him. He has spent every holiday in the field with troops since he became Army undersecretary. Before the Iraq war even began, he called Veterans Affairs Secretary Anthony Principi to discuss how the two leaders and their departments could work together more effectively. And when news broke that soldiers were receiving substandard treatment at overcrowded medical facilities in Fort Stewart, Ga., he defied the advice of some senior Army officers and immediately rearranged his schedule to visit the base the following day to meet with soldiers and medical personnel to find out what had gone wrong.

Brownlee and Schoomaker have worked together closely, something that has not always been the case with previous secretaries and chiefs. Among the most significant changes they have managed is the way the Army rotates personnel on the battlefield-instead of rotating individual soldiers on and off like so many widgets in an industrial plant, the Army is now rotating entire units wherever possible. That has strengthened unit cohesion, thereby improving both morale and tactical effectiveness, many observers believe.

It's one of the accomplishments of which Brownlee is most proud. "A lot of people think the Army is this big bureaucracy that's incapable of change. But once you get the chief and the secretary behind something, it happens," he said.

Even though he was acting Army secretary for a year and a half, Brownlee generally eschewed the trappings of the position. He never used the car to which he was entitled, or changed his nameplate to reflect his responsibilities, nor did he have his portrait hung in the corridor with other Army secretaries. But there was one exception. He used the letterhead of the Army secretary when sending condolences to Army families who lost loved ones on the battlefield.

"I felt [the families] deserved to receive a letter bearing the flag of the secretary of the Army," he said. He also felt it was essential that he know as much detail as possible about how soldiers died. His staff learned that it was not enough to provide him with the outlines of an incident. Brownlee wanted details. Was the soldier wearing body armor? Was the soldier traveling in an armored vehicle? How did he or she die?

"I considered that to be my responsibility to understand the circumstances under which those soldiers died," Brownlee said. He studied the condolence letters written by Gen. George Marshall and Abraham Lincoln and others to find the most fitting approach.

"I wanted it to be very clear [to the family] that this was not an auto-pen letter," he said.

While he is looking forward to some aspects of his retirement-resuming regular workouts at the gym, spending time with his family over the holiday for the first time in years-he clearly will miss the Army, he says: "My heart is with the soldiers."