WASHINGTON -- Army surgeon general Lt. Gen. Kevin C. Kiley, who is under fire in the controversy over care of wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, will resign.
The Army made the announcement on Monday. Kiley submitted his retirement request on Sunday, the Army said.
Kiley led Walter Reed from 2002 to 2004, and was recently asked to take temporary command of the facility again.
He is the third high-ranking official to lose his job over revelations of substandard living conditions and bureaucratic delays at the facility overwhelmed with wounded from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Army Secretary Francis J. Harvey resigned his post March 2. Defense Secretary Robert Gates was reported to be unhappy that Harvey named Kiley to lead the medical center after firing Maj. Gen. George Weightman shortly after The Washington Post broke the story about moldy, mice-infested quarters for some pateints.
Weightman and Kiley both apologized in a Senate hearing last Monday for what they acknowledged were lapses in leadership.
"Mistakes were made. I was in charge," Maj. Gen. George Weightman said.
"We did not see where some of these soldier-patients were living, and we should have. There are 371 rooms in Walter Reed, where we house our outpatients at Walter Reed. Twenty-six rooms in Building 18 were in need of repairs," Weightman said.
"As we've seen over the last several days, the housing condition here in one of the buildings at Walter Reed clearly has not met our standards. And for that, I am personally and professionally sorry, and I offer my apologies to the soldiers, the families, the civilian and military leadership of the Army and the Department of Defense and to the nation," Kiley said.
An independent review group on Walter Reed's conditions led by former Veterans Affairs Secretary Togo West began work last week, the Defense Department said. Its findings are due within 45 days.
President George W. Bush will also named a bipartisan commission to look into conditions at military and veterans hospitals nationwide. It's being led by former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole and former Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna Shalala.
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