Lieutenant Colonel Matthew Dooley’s career has been effectively destroyed by General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, various complicit members of the Pentagon and the military and, most of all, political correctness on the part of the U.S. government.
Col. Dooley, who was awarded the Bronze Star, the fourth-highest combat decoration, is a West Point graduate and highly rated armor officer who served in Iraq, Germany, Bosnia and Kuwait. He was, until recently, the instructor of a course to fellow officers on the dangers of radical Islam at the Joint Forces Staff College (part of the National Defense University).
His downfall came at the hands of 57 Islamic groups who began complaining a year ago that the U.S. military and intelligence counter-terrorism training instructors and materials were anti-Islam.
Included the group of complainers was both CAIR (Council on American Islamic Relations) and ISNA (Islamic Society of North America). Both CAIR and ISNA were named as unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Terror Funding Trial, largest ever terror-funding trial in U.S. history. Both are listed by the Muslim Brotherhood -- whose publicized doctrine is to destroy American from within -- as two of it “working organizations.”
As a direct result of the complaints by the Islamic groups, the U.S. government instituted broad, sweeping reviews and eventual purges of its counter-terrorism training materials. Islamic groups were allowed into the FBI and other institutions to approved or disapprove the materials. The Pentagon complied with the review, as did all of the branches of U.S. armed forces.
At that time, the Pentagon found no fault in any of its courses or instructors. Col. Dooley’s course, which he began teaching in 2010, had been taught the same way since 2004. All the material for the course was approved by the university. In his evaluations from last year, Col. Dooley was referred to as a superb officer.
Yet changes were being made. Representatives
from the government, including John Brennon, the chief counter terrorism advisor, instituted new terminology in the "War on Terror." No longer were Al Qaeda fighters called "Islamic extremists;" they became simply “extremists.” Gone was any mention of the ideology driving their "extremism."
The Islamic groups also demanded that employees who promoted (in their opinion) "biased" training about these "extremists" be "effectively disciplined."
However, Col. Dooley’s course was not singled out until close to six months later when one of his students lodged a complaint to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. It was then that Col. Dooley’s course was suspended. Ironically, the complaint was not even about Col. Dooley, but about a guest lecturer he had brought in.
The guest lecturer had been talking about "what if" scenarios, a common way the military strategizes: Envision a potential scenario and figure out how to deal with it.
In this case, the guest lecturer asked what would happen if Islamic extremists gained control of Pakistan's nuclear weapons and began destroying U.S. cities. How should the U.S. respond?
The faculty handbook at the university where Col. Dooley was teaching his course says that students and faculty are to express opinions "free of limitations, restraints or coercion by the university or external environment." Further, it states that "no subject or issue is considered taboo."
In a particularly telling passage, the handbook says that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (i.e., Gen. Demsey) directs the university to "establish a
climate of academic freedom within the university to foster thorough and lively academic debate, and to examine national security issues. To continue to craft the best possible national security policy for the United States and offer the best possible advice to U.S. leaders and students, the faculty of the university must be free to examine policy from all viewpoints."
Still, a new review of the government’s counter-terrorism training materials and instructors was ordered by Gen. Dempsey on April 24, 2012. At a press conference the next day, a spokesman singled out Col. Dooley and told reporters that his course was "inflammatory."
In May, an internet site called Wired "broke" the story about the government’s focus on Islamic terrorists in their counter-terrorism training materials. They had obtained some of Col. Dooley’s course materials and accused him of advocating a "total war" against Islam. In the article, Marine Lt. General George Flynn, Gen. Dempsy’s deputy for joint force training, told Wired that Dooley’s course was teaching that "Islam had already declared war on the West. It was inflammatory."
The site published a briefing by Col. Dooley in which he said, "Political Correctness is killing us: How can we properly identify the enemy, analyze his weaknesses, and defeat him, if we are never permitted to examine him from the most basic doctrinal level?"
The same day the Wired story broke, Gen. Dempsey excoriated Col. Dooley at a press conference, referring to him as "the individual."
At the press conference, Gen. Dempsey said, "It was just totally objectionable, against our values, and it wasn’t academically sound … academically irresponsible."
One month later, a general on Demspey’s staff at the Penatgon ordered Dooley to be removed as an instructor "for cause." The university was ordered to produce a negative officer evaluation report on Dooley.
In the military, this is known as a "career ender."
Dooley hired Richard Thompson, president of the non-profit Thomas More Law Center, to represent him in an appeal against the negative report.
In an interview with the Washinton Times, Thompson said the Pentagon is trying to appease the Muslim Brotherhood.
"What happened here was this whole idea of political correctness deterred the ability of our military to speak frankly about the identity of the enemy. Once you allow political correctness to overwhelm our military, then we are really going to have an impact on our national security," Thompson is quoted as saying.
The Times reports that the negative officer evaluation report, issued on August 29, prompted two Republicans on the House Armed Services Committee to send a letter to Gen. Dempsey last week asking why such harsh action was taken.
The newspaper obtained a copy of the letter which read, "Since [the Depart. Of Defense] had already directed [National Defense University] to cancel the [course], and LTC Dooley was then relieved as its instructor, we would like to know why the [Defense Dept.] was compelled to further discipline LTC Dooley by jeopardizing his reputation and his future in the service. It is our understanding that LTC Dooley did not violate any established University practices, policies or [Defense Dept.] regulations to merit a negative [officer evaluation report]."
The letter was signed by Reps. Thomas J. Rooney (R-Fla) and Duncan Hunter (R-Ca).
Further, Thompson told the Times that Dooley had made it clear that the presentations were not official U.S. policy. Thompson also said that he is considering filing a civil suit in the U.S. District Court against Gen. Dempsey.
