Unfortunately, I have too much experience with this...I'm afraid there were too many examples beginning at the end of the Vietnam era when one of the Army's mottos was "Zero Defects" (my father was assigned to an AIT brigade and it was on their unit crest)...one example of a toxic person being in charge occurred while I was in the Advanced Course...we were starting the Tactics portion of the course and the opening class session was presented by a lieutenant colonel who was the Tactics branch chief...after a harangue of a quarter hour or so, he began laying it on really thick about how incompetent and stupid we were...whether we had already commanded, came from mechanized, airborne, training units or God forbid, Special Forces...he showed contempt for all of us...he asked one poor soul in the front row (we were seated alphabetically, thank goodness) what the slew rate of a T62 turret was...the young captain shrugged his shoulder and said he didn't know...the LTC lit into him, called him incompetent and unprofessional and said that any of us that did know the answer to that should resign our commissions forthwith...and after a few parting comments, we had a break and the first instructor came into the classroom to set up for his session...
We began after a break and after a brief introduction, the poor captain presenting the class asked if we had any questions before he began...NOTE...there was a booth at the rear of each classroom that cadre and assistant instructors normally sat in...this poor guy did not do that....
The first question he was asked (and about 100 hands went up ) was "what is the slew rate of a T62 turret?" Poor guy answered he didn't see how that was important...200 infantry captains howled their indignation and it took the Chief of Staff of the Infantry School to restore order...for the remainder of the course, our class had serious issues with the tactics branch...the LTC was made to apologize for his tirade, but it was pretty much too late, especially since it was a very lame apology. Bastard made colonel anyway...