The Boston Globe - 13.08.2019

Metro

THE BOSTON GLOBE TUESDAY, AUGUST 13, 2019 | BOSTONGLOBE.COM/METRO

B

ARLINGTON, Va. —
Something remarkable
happened last week, but
we are a peripatetic na-
tion, trying to keep up
with incessant tweets,
natural disasters, and
unnatural disasters, like
mass shootings, that rob
us of sleep and perspective.
So while few noticed, three guys who
grew up around Boston played musical
chairs at the highest level of the Ameri-
can military.
General Joe Dunford, who grew up in
Quincy before he joined the Marines,
steppeddownaschairmanoftheJoint
Chiefs of Staff, replaced by General Mark
Milley, who grew up in Winchester, who
in turn was replaced as chief of staff of
the Army by General Jim McConville,
who grew up near Dunford in Quincy.
So, if you’re keeping score at home,
that’s South Shore 2, North Shore 1.
Milley, like most Army guys when it
comes to the Navy game, challenged the
scoring method and tried to claim as
North Shore guys a host of senior mili-
tary leaders who grew up in places like
West Roxbury. While showing Catholic-
school deference to General Milley, I at-
tempted to point out that West Roxbury
borders Dedham and is getting danger-
ously close to the South Shore. But the
good general doubled down.
“What about John Kelly?” Milley of-
fered. “Before he left for the White
House, he ran Southern Command.”
This was getting ridiculous. I was try-
ing to be a bigger homer than the new
chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and
I was losing.
Kelly is from Brighton, more specifi-
cally Oak Square, which is practically
Newton, which is practically MetroWest.
Milley was having none of it.
“We’re claiming Kelly,” he said.
I never served, but my dad and my
son did, so I know enough not to fight
with guys who have more bars on their
shoulders than there are bars on Dor-
chester Avenue.
Ifyoutaketheiraccentsaway,what
becomes clear about Dunford, McCon-
ville, and Milley is that they aren’t Bos-
ton guys so much as they are Americans,
scholar-soldiers in the classic sense of
the term. Book smart, battlefield smart,
briefing room smart.
They were in combat together. Ask
any soldier who they’d want to be mak-
ing decisions about their lives, and
they’ll tell you it’s a general who has
seen combat. Because generals who have
seen combat do everything in their pow-
er to keep the men and women under
their command out of it.
Politicians start wars. Soldiers don’t.
While highly skilled at planning for and
prosecuting war, modern generals like
Dunford, Milley, and McConville are
more focused on avoiding war at all
costs, because they have seen the costs.
They saw it in battle. While assigned
to desks at the Pentagon, they went to
Dover Air Force Base, to be there with
families when fallen service members
return in flag-draped caskets. So they
know. They know all too well.
I met Milley two years ago at the
opening of a Charlestown clinic for
Home Base, the program run by Massa-
chusetts General Hospital and the Red
Sox which treats the invisible wounds of
war: post-traumatic stress and traumat-
ic brain injury. I’ve met Dunford and
McConville at similar events.
Some worry that acknowledging the
toll service takes on the men and women
of the armed forces can hurt readiness.
Not these guys. As Dunford takes leave
for a well-deserved retirement, and Mil-
ley and McConville carry on, they be-
lieve taking care of the soldiers, sailors,
aviators, and Marines they send into bat-
tle is a sacred duty.
Given Massachusetts’ reputation as
the nation’s bluest state, it may seem
surprising that so many of its sons are
running the US military. “It’s not what’s
in the water,” General McConville was
saying, as we sat in his Pentagon office.
“It’s what’s in the people.”
Milley, a keen student of history, likes
to point out that the first shots fired by
what would become the US Army were
fired in Massachusetts.
And as McConville likes to say, he and
his Bay State brothers and sisters in
arms aren’t blue as much as they are red,
white and blue.

Cullen is a Globe columnist. He can be
reached at [email protected]

ThePentagon,

viaMass.

Kevin Cullen

By Gal Tziperman Lotan

GLOBE STAFF

Boston police officers knew who

they were looking for as they

climbed the stairs to a third-floor

apartment in Roxbury just after

noon Sunday. Earlier in the day, a

woman had contacted police to help

get her husband, Valdir B. Chaves,

out of their home.

They did, but Chaves returned

just a few hours later, fatally stab-

bing her in their bedroom in a blind

rage, officials said.

The officers found Chaves on the

second-floor landing, facing the wall

with his hands behind his back, ac-

cording to a police report.

“I need to go to jail,” he told offi-

cers, according to the report. “I am

ready to be arrested.”

The woman, Dora Chaves, was

38, Chaves’s lawyer said. She and

Chaves were raising four children

from previous relationships.

On Monday, Chaves, 43, was or-

dered held without bail on charges

of murder and assault and battery

with a dangerous weapon. At his ar-

raignment in Roxbury Municipal

Court, he wore a white Tyvek jump-

suit with the hood pulled over his

head and cinched to hide his face.

Chaves pleaded not guilty. Police

took the clothes he was wearing

Sunday as evidence, his lawyer, Earl

Howard, said.

“He is in a somewhat — I would

say a confused state,” Howard said.

“He’s not too sure of what’s going on

here.” Chaves had been working as a

deliveryman,Howardsaid.

Chaves and his wife had an argu-

STABBING,PageB

Man pleads not guilty in wife’s death

Suspect removed,

later returned home

PAT GREENHOUSE/GLOBE STAFF

Valdir B. Chaves appeared in Roxbury Municipal Court Monday.

Chaves had argued with his wife on Saturday night, officials said.

By Deanna Pan

GLOBE STAFF

In the world of high-performance

sailing, Sandra Tartaglino was a ti-

tan and a trailblazer.

As one of the few female skippers

of Formula 18s, a popular class of

two-person catamaran sailboats,

Tartaglino competed at some of the

highest levels of sailing, according to

her fellow competitors, including

several world championships and

extreme distance events, like the

Worrell 1000,

a 1,000-mile

race between

Florida and

Virginia

Beach.

On the

first Sunday

in August,

she won her

division in

the Buzzards

Bay Regatta.

A week later,

she would

compete in

the New Eng-

land 100 Re-

gatta in Newport, R.I., an event she

organized to celebrate its 30th anni-

versary.

It would be her last race.

Around 2:45 p.m., Sunday, a cou-

ple driving a powerboat plowed into-

Tartaglino’s vessel in Narragansett

Bay, killing the experienced 60-year-

old sailor.

The state’s Department of Envi-

ronmental Management is investi-

gating the incident and expects to re-

lease a preliminary report this week.

According to the department’s

spokesman, “alcohol was not a fac-

tor” in the crash.

Tartaglino’s death has reverberat-

TARTAGLINO,PageB

Sailing

world

mourns a

pioneer

Tartaglinocalleda

topfemaleskipper

Report into crash

expected this week

By James Pindell

GLOBE STAFF

W

OLFEBORO, N.H. — While most Democratic presidential candi-

dates are worried about how they can build support, Vermont

Senator Bernie Sanders may face a different task: how to retain as

many supporters as he can from last time.

In 2016, Sanders easily won the

New Hampshire primary, defeat-

ing the eventual nominee, Hillary

Clinton, with more than 60 percent of the vote. Given the

current field of candidates, the math is clear: If he can con-

vince just half of those voters to stick with him he could

pull off another win.

This might be why attending a Sanders campaign event

in 2019 in some ways mimics a Donald Trump rally: lots of

media-bashing, a reprisal of popular topics from his last

campaign, and a lot of preaching to the converted.

On Monday night, Sanders addressed a crowd of 350 here against a scenic backdrop of

a gazebo and Lake Winnipesaukee. Of two dozen attendees who were interviewed by the

Globe, almost all said they have decided to support Sanders in the New Hampshire prima-

ry in February.

Among them were Kyra Dulmage, 33, a middle school teacher from Dover whose cat’s

name is Bernie.

“Sanders is the real deal,” she said. “He has been consistent in his ideas for decades. I

wanted to come and show support.”

SANDERS,PageB

BACK IN THE

GRANITE STATE

Bernie Sanders’ big

challenge may be

hanging onto his

2016 supporters

MATTHEW J. LEE/GLOBE STAFF

In Wolfeboro, N.H., Monday, Senator Bernie Sanders held a town hall-style meeting at which he

addressed a crowd of about 350 people.

‘Sanders is the real deal. He has been consistent in his ideas

for decades. I wanted to come and show support.’

KYRA DULMAGE,a middle school teacher from Dover

By James Pindell

GLOBE STAFF

WINDHAM, N.H. — It doesn’t hap-

pen often on the campaign trail: A presi-

dential candidate comes to the first-in-

the-nation primary state and tells them

what they are doing wrong.

But on Monday, US Representative

Seth Moulton, the Salem, Mass., Demo-

crat and long shot for his party’s 2020

nomination, had no qualms about slam-

ming laws that have uniquely defined

New Hampshire.

Speaking to the local chamber of

commerce, Moulton noted the state

hasn’t legalized marijuana, but it puts

state-run liquor stores on the highway —

“a crazy injustice.”

The decades-long (and often fraught)

project of expanding the number of

lanes on Interstate 93 from the Massa-

chusetts border to Manchester, Moulton

said, “makes no sense” because it just

feeds the congested traffic farther into

Boston.

Moulton said he would prefer high-

speed rail, such as that being built in

China, adding that transportation solu-

tions “cannot be investing in 1950s in-

MOULTON,PageB

SJC says pot odor not

enough to search on

The smell of unburnt marijuana

alone is not probable cause to

search a warehouse in Massachu-

setts, unless other evidence points

to illegal activity, the state’s Su-

preme Judicial Court wrote in a

ruling Monday. But the court said

there was other evidence in this

case to support the search.B

Rowdy behavior draws

police to Encore

Three people were taken into custo-

dy early Monday at Encore Boston

Harbor following separate distur-

bances at the casino, State Police

said. Several people were subse-

quently arrested.B

MoultontoN.H.:Changeyourways

Candidate levels criticism even as he seeks votes

US Representative

Seth Moulton rapped

I-93’s expansion,

among other things.

Sandra Tartaglino

competed at some

of the highest

levels of sailing.