IS DAVID GRANGER THE EISENHOWER OF GUYANA?
SOLDIERS who enter politics have, shall we say, a chequered history. It usually ends in tears. It is not their metier. They are used to commands being obeyed, strict hierarchies, not too much backbiting and little or no argument. Politics is not like that. It is the land of spin, half truths, promises unfulfilled, Machiavellianism as a way of life and frankly dirty dealings. Can David Granger enter that world from the relatively pure horizons of the GDF and the Guyana Review?
Let us take two recent examples in the Big Brother up north-the USA. (In Britain there is virtually no tradition of soldiers going into politics. When they do they quickly get their fingers burned and withdraw. Think about Lord West in Gordon Brown’s government).
Both Dwight Eisenhower and Colin Powell were in uniform before they were in the White House and the State Department. Eisenhower was riding on the crest of the wave of the U.S. (in reality the Allies) victory in World War Two. Eisenhower had a very ‘good ‘ war commanding Allied troops in Europe and his post War was equally prominent with spells heading Columbia University and NATO. In 1952 he was just what the US wanted- a firm, high-profile president to guide them as ‘leader of the Western World’ in their fight against communism worldwide, including fighting Cheddi Jagan in Guyana. ’Ike’ was effective but in a very laid back, father of the nation, way. Most of the running and policy making was left to his Vice President Richard ‘Tricky Dicky’ Nixon. We all know what happened to Nixon in the end. Eisenhower’s reputation, though has remained largely unsullied, even enhanced in retrospect.
Colin (or Koulin as he insisted on being called) was a different kettle of fish altogether Powell, the son of Jamaican immigrant parents, rose to be a four-star general in the US Army-the highest ranking African American in the US forces. A spell as National Security Adviser to President Ronald Reagan and as Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff gave him a taste for national politics and a profile to enter it. Eventually in 1991 George W Bush appointed him Secretary of State – the Foreign Minister of the U.S.
There he was outgunned, outmanoeuvred, outpoliticked and failed. A moderate in an administration replete with hawks and neocons like Donald Rumsfled, Dick Cheney and Condelissa Rice, he was a fish out of water, a soldier with no troops. His nadir came in the build-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003, when Powell, addressing the UN, was taken in by a paper produced by the British on WMD: Weapons of Mass Destruction, allegedly held by Saddam Hussein. That, to put it at its simplest, was a tissue of lies and half truths. Powell’s reputation never recovered. Today, he is a retired private citizen restoring classic cars with some directorships.
So, there we have it. One soldier who entered politics and came out smelling of roses, the other smelt of something entirely different. History is littered with soldier politicians who fail from Gamal Nasser In Egypt to Jerry Rawlings in Ghana. The portents are not good. Granger is a thoughtful liberal much more like Powell than Eisenhower. The GDF, which he headed, also has past ‘issues’ to get around, especially with the Indo-Guyanese.
Will Granger make the transition from soldier to politician? Not my call – it’s yours.