Marine lieutenant colonel disputes that he was relieved of command

I went to my drill on Saturday in July. Went directly to the file cabinet and filled out a request to retire. I was called into the brigade commander's office about noon. After I told him my story he said okay. I left drill and never returned. I think I was officially retired in November.

I agree Sir. At least for the Army there is a year long plus process and if you desire to speed that process up you need approval from your CG. I'd love to hear about why he left and the difficulties of Command. Most officers I know would gladly take a Command any day and be grateful for everyday in that position.

I don't have any personal knowledge of this particular situation. Though I'll admit I am now very curious after reading the article.

Oddly enough, being a reservist in reserve status, his claim is POSSIBLE, though not necessarily plausible. Reservist "retirement" is a different beast. There are actually two "retirements." The first is simply a transfer to the "retired reserve", which is nothing more than an administrative holding status with HRC (essentially the same as IRR or IMA, though even less available). The second is when you hit age 60 (+/- depending on mobilization history) and file to actually get your money.

There are some administrative hoops that are to be jumped through for the former, but I'm not sure how "mandatory" they are vs recommended. In any case, for a drilling reservist, there is no TAP-SFL requirement, no terminal leave, no generation of a DD214, no post clearing, no visits to CIF, etc., etc. I believe that technically, all that is REQUIRED is that the request for transfer be submitted to HRC, approved, and an order issued. (I'm not even clear if the current commander has to sign off on it, I don't think so, though.)

As I said, I know nothing of this case, and hadn't heard of it until I saw this post. Having read the article, I can say that I know of situations that would tend to support the LTC's claim as well as situations that would tend to cast doubt on it. What's interesting is that there was clearly a lot of bad blood between the LTC and his AC higher and pettiness and vindictiveness on the part of at least one party.

Maybe in July of 2020, I'll tell some personal anecdotes...