: I just read "The Lost Fleet" series, and I'm going to bring it up
: for contrast. In The Lost Fleet, a commander who fought a desperate rear
: defense in the opening act of a long-running interstellar war is
: posthumously built up as a hero by his own government. Time wears away the
: details, until Captain (Promoted, again posthumously) 'Blackjack' Geary is
: synonymous with God. Politicians and fleet officers alike argue over the
: path to victory by appealing to what Blackjack would have done. Many
: citizens of the Alliance truly believe that Blackjack Geary is among the
: Living Stars, and will return to help the Alliance in its hour of need.

: A century later (I did say it was a long war, didn't I) they find his escape
: pod, dust off the cryogenics, and inform him that he's now in charge of
: the largest fleet ever assembled by the Alliance. Admiral and a bunch of
: other senior officers got killed, and he's got seniority by date of rank.

: Throughout the rest of the series, there is this real, palpable fear that
: Captain Geary is going to usurp the Alliance and establish a dictatorship
: the minute he gets the fleet back home. For some, it's not fear but hope
: that the infallible Blackjack Geary will pack out the deadwood and force
: the politicians to rule justly.

: On one hand, we have Blackjack. On the other, we have the Master Chief.
: One is a venerated hero with heaps of both political power and firepower at
: his command, and some pointed opinions about the rule of law. The other is
: a windup tin soldier. A modern Golem, basically. You can't make a leader
: out of that.

: I really don't see why ONI would go to the trouble of smearing the Chief as a
: traitor unless he's done something to deserve it.

On one hand, much of what The Hero of a Thousand Faces mentions is metaphorical, and likens the whole hero-cycle and world mythologies to concepts akin to karma in buddhism, or "world-energy" that needs to flow. It even alludes to the tyrant resembling a father-figure (which, given the inspiration the book was to Star Wars, explains the whole "Vader-dad" thing), which can go both ways, and some facets may exist or may not.

On another, there's also the theme of guardianship in Halo 5. You are correct in that the Chief has no political power on his own, but he's also on a journey of rediscovering his humanity as stated by the previous ViDocs and hinted at by Halo 4, and taking choices nobody else will agree on -- all while being one of the most lethal living things in the universe, AND having been given the geas by the Librarian, which we still don't know what else had it done to him, but in cut dialogue the Librarian told him to guide humanity. In any case, a modern golem that turns rogue would not be something people would like, especially if it comes to disagree with his orders, even if he'll be only on his own. Hood flipped out because of it.

It's just an hypothesis, to be honest, but if John goes the path of Joseph Conrad upon doubting more ONI's stuff and wanting to make right, but also failing due to being a single person, he's still taking the role of guardianship for humanity that he places even above the UNSC -- but in the wrong way, that gets him marked as a traitor.

"Who guards the guardians"... Nobody. The galaxy is screwed.