It’s not just the Army and all the services practice this level of institutional cravenness and dishonesty. Deceit and covering up errors is a long time practice in the US uniformed armed forces.
The article is older but more true over time.
The gravest peril of the tacit acceptance of dishonesty, however, is the facilitation of hypocrisy in Army leaders. The Army as a profession speaks of values, integrity, and honor. The Army as an organization practices zero defects, pencil-whipping, and checking the box. Army leaders are situated between the two identities—parroting the talking points of the latest Army Profession Campaign while placating the Army bureaucracy or civilian overseers by telling them what they want to hear. As a result, Army leaders learn to talk of one world while living in another. A major described the current trend: It’s getting to the point where you’re almost rewarded for being somebody you’re not. That’s a dangerous situation especially now as we downsize. We’re creating an environment where everything is too rosy because everyone is afraid to paint the true picture. You just wonder where it will break, when it will fall apart.
https://press.armywarcollege.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1465&context=monographs
Now this research is even older but hints at this being a problem forever; the essay is from 1970.
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