This Is Quite a Week to Face Congress When You've Been Implicated in a Prostitution Scandal
Answer the question, Admiral.
WASHINGTON—In May of 2016, The Washington Post published an astonishing account into corruption in the United States Seventh Fleet in Asia. At the scandal's center was a Malaysian business-slash-bag man named Leonard Glenn Francis—"Fat Leonard" was his nom de scandale—who apparently had been feeding a staggering array of goodies to various high-ranking Naval officers, and who also had placed moles within the Navy's hierarchy to cover up for him.
Leonard Glenn Francis was legendary on the high seas for his charm and his appetite for excess. For years, the Singapore-based businessman had showered Navy officers with gifts, epicurean dinners, prostitutes and, if necessary, cash bribes so they would look the other way while he swindled the Navy to refuel and resupply its ships. In the end, federal agents settled on a risky sting operation to try to nab Fat Leonard.
They would lure him to California, dangling a meeting with admirals who hinted they had lucrative contracts to offer. He took the bait. On Sept. 16, 2013, Francis was arrested in his hotel suite overlooking San Diego's harbor. It was the opening strike in a sweep covering three states and seven countries, as hundreds of law enforcement agents arrested other suspects and seized incriminating files from Francis's business empire.
Getty ImagesThe Washington Post
A 51-year-old Malaysian citizen, Francis has since pleaded guilty to fraud and bribery charges. His firm, Glenn Defense Marine Asia, is financially ruined. But his arrest exposed something else that is still emerging three years later: a staggering degree of corruption within the Navy itself. Much more than a contracting scandal, the investigation has revealed how Francis seduced the Navy's storied 7th Fleet, long a proving ground for admirals given its strategic role in patrolling the Pacific and Indian oceans. In perhaps the worst national-security breach of its kind to hit the Navy since the end of the Cold War, Francis doled out sex and money to a shocking number of people in uniform who fed him classified material about U.S. warship and submarine movements.
The whole story is an epic of mendacity and malfeasance in office, and all kinds of conduct unbecoming a Gambino underboss, let alone an officer in the United States Navy. Fat Leonard apparently knew everyone from flag rank down to the orderlies in the Seventh Fleet. He bribed everything but the barnacles.
All this suddenly reappeared this week when Vice Admiral Craig Faller, an aide to Defense Secretary James Mattis, appeared before the Senate to be confirmed as chief of the U.S. Southern Command (SoCom). On Monday, the Post published an account of Faller's attendance at one of Fat Leonard's sybaritic Christmas parties.
The evening after Christmas 2004 was a night to remember for more than 50 U.S. Navy officers from the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group. During a port visit to Hong Kong, they were invited to a free feast on the 56th floor of a luxury hotel, where they savored cocktails, cigars and courses of Oscietra caviar, black truffles and lobster thermidor.
Mingling with the guests were attractive young women dressed as Santa's little helpers, wearing red hats, black boots and skimpy yuletide costumes. Smiling at the center of the party was the host, Leonard Glenn Francis, a defense contractor who has since confessed to bribing scores of Navy officers in the worst corruption scandal in Navy history. Among those in attendance, records show, was Craig S. Faller, a Navy officer who has climbed the ranks at the Pentagon to become a vice admiral and the senior military assistant to Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.
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The Post reported that Faller had been under investigation for his involvement with Fat Leonard for three years before finally being cleared, and the newspaper also reported that Fat Leonard had provided Faller the services of a prostitute. Both the Justice Department and the Navy cleared Faller of any wrongdoing, the Navy concluding that there was insufficient evidence.
Getty ImagesTORU YAMANAKA
Needless to say, if you've lived under the shadow of this kind of thing, this is the worst possible week to have to explain yourself to a Senate committee sitting in judgment of your fitness for a better job. It fell to Senator Professor Warren to ask Faller about the party and about Fat Leonard. The two of them promptly talked past each other.
WARREN: I'M ASKING THIS QUESTION BECAUSE THIS COMMITTEE IS LOOKING AT A POSITION TO CONFIRM YOU TO THAT REQUIRES GOOD JUDGMENT. AND I KNOW THAT THIS WAS MANY YEARS AGO, BUT IT SEEMS TO ME YOU DIDN'T DISPLAY GOOD JUDGMENT AT THE TIME AND IT DOESN'T SOUND LIKE YOU SEE ANYTHING WRONG WITH THE DECISION YOU MADE BACK THEN. THE OTHER THING THAT STRIKES ME ABOUT THE SPECIFIC DINNER AND OTHERS THAT HAVE BEEN REPORTED IN THE MEDIA, IS THE DETAIL ABOUT THE SCANTILY CLAD WOMEN AND PROSTITUTES AT THESE PARTIES. YOU KNOW, THERE'S EVEN A PICTURE IN "THE WASHINGTON POST" STORY TO GO ALONG WITH THIS. IS IT NOW OR WAS IT THEN COMMON FOR SENIOR NAVY OFFICERS TO ATTEND EVENTS AT WHICH PROSTITUTES AND WOMEN IN SCANTILY CLAD OUTFITS WERE EXPECTED TO PROVIDE ENTERTAINMENT?
FALLER: SENATOR, EVERY DECISION I MADE IN MY NEARLY FOUR DECADES OF SERVICE HAS BEEN -- TRIED TO BE THROUGH THE BEST ETHICAL LENS WITH ETHICS COUNSELORS. ONE OF THE BENCHMARKS I USE IS WITH MY WIFE OF 34 YEARS OR TWO GROWN DAUGHTERS. IF THEY WERE PRESENT OR WATCHING ME OR SAW IT ON VIDEO, WOULD THEY BE EMBARRASSED OR WOULD I HAVE DISCREDITED THEM AND I CAN LOOK YOU IN THE EYE AND THE COMMITTEE AND I SAY I BELIEVE I PASSED THAT BENCHMARK.
Getty ImagesBill Clark
WARREN: IF I CAN ASK YOU TO ANSWER MY QUESTION, WHICH IS, IS IT NOW OR WAS IT THEN COMMON FOR SENIOR NAVY OFFICERS TO ATTEND EVENTS AT WHICH PROSTITUTES AND WOMEN IN SCANTILY CLAD OUTFITS WERE EXPECTED TO PROVIDE ENTERTAINMENT?
FALLER: NO.
(Ed. Note: It certainly was common at Fat Leonard's parties.)
WARREN: NOW, YOU UNDERSTAND WHY I'M ASKING THIS, ADMIRAL FALLER, EVENTS THAT FEATURE WOMEN AS OBJECTS OF ENTERTAINMENT CONTRIBUTE TO A CULTURE THAT DOES NOT RESPECT WOMEN, GIVEN THE PERSISTENTLY HIGH RATES OF SEXUAL HARASSMENT AND ASSAULT IN THE NAVY, ACROSS THE MILITARY SERVICES AND FRANKLY AROUND THIS COUNTRY, IT IS LONG PAST TIME THAT WE HAVE A CONVERSATION ABOUT EXACTLY THESE KINDS OF EVENTS. YOU HAVE BEEN NOMINATED TO SERVE AS THE FOUR-STAR COMBATANT COMMANDER TO THE U.S. SOUTHERN COMMAND AND YOU WILL HAVE MANY WOMEN OFFICERS UNDER YOUR COMMAND. WHAT DO YOU SAY TO WOMEN OFFICERS WHEN THEY SEE THAT THIS IS THE KIND OF EVENT YOU HAVE ATTENDED?
FALLER: SENATOR, I HAVE ALWAYS HAD THE UTMOST RESPECT FOR ALL SERVICE MEN AND WOMEN. THAT PARTICULAR EVENT REFERENCED IN "THE WASHINGTON POST" THERE WERE FEMALE OFFICERS PRESENT AND ONE FROM MY SHIP WOULD SAY AS I HAVE ALWAYS SAID, THAT VERY MUCH RESPECT AND THAT'S HOW I'VE TRIED TO OPERATE AND I BELIEVE THAT WOULD BEAR OUT AND I'M APPRECIATIVE OF THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE HAS -- AND HUMBLED THE SECRETARY OF DEFENSE IS SUPPORTING MY NOMINATION.
Damned if the admiral didn't sound just like Brett Kavanaugh, talking about his law clerks and the girls on his basketball team. Maybe everybody sounds like that this week. #MeToo isn't going anywhere, either.
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