Hey Dragan,

>>Hard to compare the Serbian experience with the American, I agree. But we weren't lucky. You see, military experience, especially under duress, gives a candidate a sense of how to be a leader. Sometimes it teaches the wrong lessons, for example, look at Grant's presidency. But more often it's a good thing.
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>In a culture which believes in leaders, tough love and a few other cultural artifacts, it can be.
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>Also, another difference that I now remembered, is the difference between yesterday's guerrilla's generals and academy generals. The latter were exposed to other arts and sciences as well, and shaped by the general knowledge of the humanity, plus the code of honor or whatever other taming factor civilization imposed. The guerrilla generals learned everything from each other and from their enemy, mostly.
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>OTOH, the academy generals tend to think strictly inside the box. That's their weak spot.

That's a nice analysis of the different types of generals. Eisenhower would be an academy general while ...hmmmm.... Francisco Franco or Ho Chi Minh would be the guerilla type. On The Job Training, so to speak. We haven't had to many guerilla types in this country that I can think of...maybe Winfield Scott?

The bad thing about guerilla types is that they historically return from triumph to become dictators. Good thing we've avoided that.