Tag: war

About six years

That’s how much time the American can-kicking in Iraq bought. Of course, it is readily apparent that this was rather like going buying time in order to go from the frying pan into the blast furnace.  Another prescient selection from William S. Lind’s forthcoming ON WAR:

A piece in the December 27, 2007 Cleveland Plain Dealer, “Vote on fate of Kirkuk postponed,” by Tina Susman and Asso Ahmed of the L.A. Times, reported that: “Kurdish lawmakers agreed Wednesday to a six-month delay in a referendum on whether the oil-rich city of Kirkuk should join the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan or remain under Iraqi central government control….Also Wednesday, the head of the Iraqi parliament’s constitutional review committee, Humam Hamoudi, said he would request a three-month delay in rewriting the national constitution. That would mark the fourth time the target date…has been put off.”

As the Iraqis kick the can down the road, so do the Americans. The American-funded Sunni militia, aka the Concerned Local Citizens or the Awakening, has grown to 72,000 volunteers in nearly 300 communities in Iraq. They have been credited with reducing violence in some of Iraq’s most violent areas. But many people, including some Sunnis, worry that the groups could destabilize Iraq.

The concern is a valid one. With our usual charming naiveté, we seem to think the Sunnis have become our friends. But they are merely using us to help them get ready for the next round with the Shiites and, in the case of Kirkuk, the Kurds.

They were indeed, as “destabilize” is a mild way of putting it. That American-funded Sunni militia, aka the Concerned Local Citizens aka the Awakening aka the Islamic State, is now engaged in successfully fighting that anticipated next round with both the Shiites and the Kurds. They’ve not only taken Kirkuk and are pressing the Kurds hard in the north, but are also threatening to besiege a Baghdad ruled by a crumbling Shiite US-puppet government.

As in the case of al Qaeda, the Islamic State was directly subsidized by the American government. If this sort of repetitive blowback does not suffice to convince you that expansionist imperialism abroad is a fool’s game, then one can only conclude that you are one of those Aristotle characterized as impervious to information. We don’t always have to do something, especially when that something has the predictable probability of making matters worse.

A 4GW fiasco in realtime

You don’t have to be an expert in 4th Generation Warfare to know that the US decision to resort to air strikes against the Islamic State was going to backfire:

The U.S.-led air war in Syria has gotten off to a rocky start, with even the Syrian rebel groups closest to the United States turning against it, U.S. ally Turkey refusing to contribute and the plight of a beleaguered Kurdish town exposing the limitations of the strategy.

U.S. officials caution that the strikes are just the beginning of a broader strategy that could take years to carry out. But the anger that the attacks have stirred risks undermining the effort, analysts and rebels say.

The main beneficiary of the strikes so far appears to be President Bashar al-Assad, whose forces have taken advantage of the shift in the military balance to step up attacks against the moderate rebels designated by President Obama as partners of the United States in the war against extremists.

The U.S. targets have included oil facilities, a granary and an electricity plant under Islamic State control. The damage to those facilities has caused shortages and price hikes across the rebel-held north that are harming ordinary Syrians more than the well-funded militants, residents and activists say.

At the start of the air campaign, dozens of U.S. cruise missiles were fired into areas controlled by the moderate rebels, who are supposed to be fighting the Islamic State. Syrians who had in the past appealed for American intervention against Assad have been staging demonstrations denouncing the United States and burning the American flag.

If there is one person who desperately needs to read William S. Lind’s forthcoming ON WAR, it is Barack Obama. And it wouldn’t hurt if whoever is presently in charge of the US military response to the Islamic State would do so as well.

Islamophobia at the UN

I take personal offense at this reprehensibly Islamophobic comment by a UN official, who implies that devoted members of the religion of peace would allow anyone to come to harm after taking control of a Syrian city:

Thousands of people “will most likely be massacred” if Kobani falls to Islamic State fighters, a U.N. envoy said on Friday, as militants fought deeper into the besieged Syrian Kurdish town in full view of Turkish tanks that have done nothing to intervene.

I’m sure the Turks are amused by the passive-aggressive criticism of their failure to defend the very Kurds who have been violently rebelling against their rule for decades, if not centuries. It’s one thing to wipe out your enemies. But one can hardly criticize a people who, upon seeing someone else doing it for them, shrug, look on, and say, “you know, defending those people is really neither our problem nor our interest.”

Anti-gun liberals would do well to keep this in mind come the day of the zombies. When they’re screaming “somebody, please do something!” I suspect there will be more than a few well-armed conservatives and libertarians who will look on with a faint smile and say, “now, weren’t you the very sort of idiot who a) brought the zombies to town, and b) tried to take my guns away?”

After all, did not the Bible say that the hearts of men would grow cold?

The State is losing

William Lind presciently anticipated which side would have the advantage back in 2006:

Among the critics and reinterpreters of Fourth Generation war, the bad is most powerfully represented by Thomas Barnett’s two books The Pentagon’s New Map and Blueprint for Action. Barnett divides the world into two parts, the Functioning Core and the Non-Integrating Gap. This is parallel to what I call centers of order and centers or sources of disorder, and I agree that this will be the fundamental fault line of the 21st Century. Barnett’s error is that he assumes the Functioning Core will be the stronger party, able to restore order in places where it has broken down. In fact, the forces of disorder will be stronger, because they are driven by a factor Barnett dismisses, the spreading crisis of legitimacy of the state. By ignoring Martin van Creveld’s work on the rise and decline of the state, Barnett’s books end up anchoring their foundations on sand.

The implications go far beyond the obvious regions of the Middle East and Ukraine. What we’re seeing in Spain, in Belgium, and in Scotland are the early phases of crises of the State which will likely result, eventually, in either a) a different, more decentralized order or b) disorder.
And the increasingly rapid growth of diversity in the USA is a distinct sign of incipient crisis of State legitimacy and eventual disorder.

Wargaming reveals weaknesses

A USMC ops planner’s experience explains the key benefit of wargaming:

Back in May of 2012, I was holding an Operational Planning Team for a Major Pacific OPLAN. This was a big event. We flew in over a hundred participants for almost three weeks of work. I fought with my boss, the G5, over several key points about this OPT and I eventually was able to do things how I wanted. I spoke directly with the CG everyday during the OPT, with three formal briefs to him. Because we were a Joint Force Land Component Command for this OPT, we had players from all services and Special Forces (which is basically it’s own service.) I had interagency players, a full Red Cell, Green Cell, and Red Team. This was the biggest non-exercise event I witnessed in my three years at the MEF. And it was my FIRST OPT and first opportunity to be on the dot for a critical event. I routinely worked bast 1900 and worked past 2100 twice during the three weeks. This was BIG and IMPORTANT and we only had one chance to get it right. I didn’t really know what I was doing, but I am smart enough to get help from smart people. I leaned heavily on three key personnel who had been around awhile and knew what they were doing. And they were great. We got through Problem Framing and Course of Action (COA) Development and were ready for the COA Wargaming step. The CG had settled on one COA, and we were testing it to see if it worked. COA wargaming is another area I fought with Col XXXX on and one. He agreed to let me run it my way and get out of it what I thought I needed.

So, we started the wargame. On the second (SECOND!!!) turn, the Red player took his turn and we were all face with the extremely obvious and extremely uncomfortable realization that our one and only COA was untenable. The result of 2 1/2 weeks worth of intensive work had just failed catastrophically in front of the audience. In the middle of the uncomfortable silence, broken by teeth sucking, I looked to the three officers who had been helping my so much throughout. All of them slumped their shoulders and looked away. One of them actually walked out of the back of the room. I was faced with the uncomfortable realization: “No one is going to save me.” This is the real world. There isn’t an answer in the back of the book. There is no instructor stepping in to bail you out. You are on your own and it is all on your shoulders. I looked out at the OPT and realized that my reputation, this entire event, the time and energy of over a hundred people sat on my shoulders and had no opportunity to start over and fix it. This is what it means to be a planner. It is all on you.

So, I used my favorite OPT tactic and said, “Everybody take 10!” I grabbed my two trusted agents (LtCol XXX and Maj XXX who worked closest with me, LtCol XXX will come up again in three slides) and went into the back room to discuss what we should do. They were both a little shell-shocked and no help. So, I fixed it. The problem, as it turned out, was timing. I adjusted the timing and changed the character of one force and its mission. And we recocked the wargame with the new COA. And it worked. It worked so well that, with minor modifications, it went into the plan of record. We have since referred to that wargame as the most successful COA wargame ever, because it identified a critical flaw in the COA and we were able to adjust the COA to opvercome the flaw.

The challenge, of course, is that people have to be willing to accept the information produced by the wargaming session. In vast bureaucracies like the U.S. armed forces, they are much more likely to sweep any uncomfortable information thus gathered under the carpet and pretend everything is fine, because in most cases the real world test will never come and the planning flaws will remain undetected.

It is eminently clear that the Obama administration does not have anyone advising it who is well-versed in wargaming, or rather, it is not listening to anyone who is.

The cost of foreign interventions

Take these numbers and cram them down the throats of everyone who declares the USA absolutely has to intervene in the latest round of Levantine slaughter:

By the end of the year, Congress will have appropriated more money for Afghanistan’s reconstruction, when adjusted for inflation, than the United States spent rebuilding 16 European nations after World War II under the Marshall Plan.

A staggering portion of that money — $104 billion — has been mismanaged and stolen. Much of what was built is crumbling or will be unsustainable. Well-connected Afghans smuggled millions of stolen aid money in suitcases that were checked onto Dubai-bound flights. The Afghan government largely turned a blind eye to widespread malfeasance. Even as revelations of fraud and abuse stacked up, the United States continued shoveling money year after year because cutting off the financial spigot was seen as a sure way to doom the war effort.

As the Pentagon winds down its combat mission there at the end of the year, it’s tempting to think of the Afghan war as a chapter that is coming to an end — at least for American taxpayers. But, as things stand, the United States and its allies will continue paying Afghanistan’s bills for the foreseeable future. That commitment was solidified Tuesday as the American ambassador in Kabul and Afghanistan’s security adviser signed a bilateral security agreement that will keep a small contingent of NATO troops there for at least two years.

The United States and NATO partners recently agreed to spend $5.1 billion a year to pay for the army and police, until at least 2017. Western donors are expected to continue to give billions more for reconstruction and other initiatives, recognizing that Afghanistan won’t be weaned off international aid anytime soon. In fact, the government appears to be broke.

The actual figure is $109 billion. That is nearly $1,000 per taxpayer. And what did you get for your money? It’s one thing to say “we must do this” or “we must do that”. But then, recollect that it’s going to cost you over $1,000 in order to feel good about pretending to prevent one group of murderous foreigners from killing another group of foreigners, who not infrequently were previously murdering the other group.

And, of course, that doesn’t count the $42.50 you’ll be spending every year on the Afghan army and police. Or the social and economic costs of importing the inevitable allies and refugees to the USA and settling them there.

Brave women warriors

What was that again about women being capable of front-line combat?

The man who scaled the White House fence and was able to run through the front doors made it farther into the building than was previously reported, CBS News has learned. Secret Service Director Julia Pierson is scheduled to answer questions about the incident when she appears at a hearing of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Tuesday morning.

The man, 42-year-old Omar J. Gonzalez, ran unobstructed for 70 yards across the front lawn of the White House before entering through the North Portico. On the way, he brushed by a Secret Service officer with a drawn gun, sources tell CBS News’ Bill Plante.

Gonzalez then proceeded to run through the entrance hall to the cross hall of the White House, past the staircase that leads up to the first family’s residence. He was confronted by a female Secret Service agent, who he overpowered, and made it all the way to the East Room, Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, told CBS News, citing whistleblowers.

If trained, armed Secret Service agents aren’t able to deal with unarmed lunatics, what chance do they have against battle-hardened ISIS soldiers and elite Spetsnaz special forces?

And just think, the people overseeing these jokers are responsible for dealing with the Ebola crisis….

Competitive asset-stripping

Russia calls the globalist bluff:

Russian courts could get the
green light to seize foreign assets on Russian territory under a draft
law intended as a response to Western sanctions over the Ukraine crisis. The draft, which was submitted to parliament on Wednesday
by a pro-Kremlin deputy, would also allow state compensation for an
individual whose property is seized in foreign jurisdictions.
Italian authorities this week seized property worth about
30 million euros ($40 million) belonging to companies controlled by
Arkady Rotenberg, an ally of President Vladimir Putin targeted by the
U.S. and European Union sanctions.
The draft law, published on a parliamentary database,
would allow for compensation for Russian citizens who suffer because of
an “unlawful court act” in a foreign jurisdiction and clear the way to
foreign state assets in Russia being seized, even if they are subject to
international immunity.

Asset-stripping sanctions aren’t going to be very effective if the Russians simply compensate those whose assets are stripped by taking them from Western companies with Russian assets. This could have some interesting knock-on effects in the NBA.

And isn’t it remarkable how the sanctity of free trade is so readily disrupted when something is at stake besides the livelihoods and standards of living of the working and middle classes?

Baghdad falling

Baghdad stands on the brink as we observe 4th Generation Warfare in action:

Fierce fighting has been reported on the outskirts of Baghdad where ISIS militants are attempting to seize control of the Iraqi capital – despite ongoing Western airstrikes against the terror group.

The fighting is taking place just one mile to the west of the city, with government forces desperately trying to hold off the militants, who allegedly killed up to 1,000 soldiers during clashes yesterday.

ISIS have held a number of towns and villages close to the Iraqi capital since earlier in the year, when government troops melted away following a lightning advance in the west of the country – enabling the terrorist group to seize further swaths of territory for their so-called caliphate.

Once ISIS takes Baghdad, I think it will be time to drop the “so-called” from the description of the caliphate. I’m far from only one who expected a new caliphate to arise in the Middle East, but I am a little astonished at the speed with which it has risen and filled the vaccuum left by the ill-considered American conquest of Ba’athist Iraq. Consider William Lind’s predictions back in 2004:

An article in the Friday, March 29 Washington Post pointed to the long-expected opening of Phase III of America’s war with Iraq. Phase I was the jousting contest, the formal “war” between America’s and Iraq’s armies that ended with the fall of Baghdad. Phase II was the War of National Liberation waged by the Baath Party and fought guerilla-style. Phase III, which is likely to prove the decisive phase, is true Fourth Generation war, war waged by a wide variety of non-state Iraqi and other Islamic forces for objectives and motives that reach far beyond politics.

The Post article, “Iraq Attacks Blamed on Islamic Extremists,” contains the following revealing paragraph:

In the intelligence operations room at the 1st Armored Division’s headquarters (in Baghdad), wall-mounted charts identifying and linking insurgents depict the changing battlefield. Last fall the organizational chart of Baathist fighters and leaders stretched for 10 feet, while charts listing known Islamic radicals took up a few pieces of paper. Now, the chart of Iraqi religious extremists dominates the room, while the poster depicting Baathist activity has shrunk to half of its previous size.

The article goes on to quote a U.S. intelligence officer as adding, “There is no single organization that’s behind all this. It’s far more decentralized than that.”

Welcome to Phase III. The remaining Ba’athists will of course continue their War of National Liberation, and Fourth Generation elements have been active from the outset. But the situation map in the 1st Armored Division’s headquarters reveals the “tipping point”: Fourth Generation war is now the dominant form of war against the Americans in Iraq.

And with the fall of Baghdad, Phase III of America’s war with Iraq will be complete and mark America’s defeat by the very 4th Generation elements of whom Lind warned ten years ago.

Dark portents of things to come

I had a very interesting conversation with a retired general today. (No, not the former USMC general of whom you’re probably thinking.) We were discussing how William Lind and his 4GW seminar had seen ISIS, or some reasonable facsimile therein, coming more than ten years ago. I thought it was interesting that the general, too, had picked up on this.

As I was editing Lind’s collection of columns that we will be publishing this fall, a few passages leaped out at me. Consider:

The current phase of the war in Iraq is driven by three different elements: chaos, a war of national liberation (which is inflicting most of the casualties) and 4th Generation War. In time, the 4th Generation elements will come to predominate, as they fill the vacuum created by the destruction of the Iraqi state.

That was written back in 2003. And that is exactly what has happened, as the non-state elements have replaced the Ba’athist national elements. Here is one that indicated, very early on, the likelihood that the resistance was not an amateur operation.

More significant than the destruction of two American tanks is the fact that Iraqi guerrillas are attacking tanks. This is an indicator that the guerilla war is developing significantly more rapidly than reports in Washington suggest. With the second stage of the Iraq war just six months old, one would expect the guerillas to be attacking only weak, vulnerable targets, such as supply columns. The fact that they are going after the most difficult of all ground targets, heavy tanks, is surprising. It means they lack neither confidence nor skill.

And finally, an early observation of the transnational nature of the developing 4GW forces.

One other indicator. A friend recently noted to me that the rapidly improving techniques we see from the Iraqi guerrillas bear a striking resemblance to those used by the Chechen guerrillas against the Russians. Might it be that we are not the only ones to have a coalition in Iraq?

ON WAR is going to be a monster of around 750 pages. Spanning six years of war, it is a treasure trove of military theory being formulated and refined in real time. If you have any interest in mil-SF, military history, or understanding the shape of the 21st century, it is a book you’ll almost surely want to read.