Of course the buck ultimately stops with the presidents - all four of them - but the utter failure from our star political journalists to internalize the fact that the military and The Blob spent 20 years lighting money on fire (giving it to connected contractors) and achieving absolutely nothing demonstrates that if they aren't just pentagon/blob spokespeople they might as well be.
Too many times, I’ve witnessed the US military attempt to dutifully carry out difficult & dangerous missions left to them by the miscalculations of civilian leaders.