The maintenance by the United States of civilian control, to a high degree, over an apolitical but mammoth military is a most fragile, unlikely, and valuable achievement.
One reason it has been preserved is that it is one of those rare practical things that can actually be addressed by the management of set-piece media kerfuffles and the theater of wise old men. "Gentlemen, you will permit me to put on my spectacles, for I have not only grown gray but almost blind in the service of my country."
