Article

2016-10-28 Israel-Palestine-Jordan

Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.

Posted by g(r)omgoru 2016-10-28 03:42|| || Front Page|| [2 views ] Top

#1 Myth #1 https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars Look at the Post Cold War era, some are short and some are long.

Myth #2, I tend to agree

Myth #3, whether the US special forces is the best can be debated but there are not enough for most conflicts. Actually an interesting point here is that in Yom Kippur War, Israel government refused to use its special forces in battle because they were considered to be to valuable. Later they relented when the special forces demanded they be given a part.

Myth #4, no way a platoon sergeant total service is generally 7 to 15 years.

Posted by Bernardz 2016-10-28 05:04|| 2016-10-28 05:04|| Front Page Top

#2 Myth #3: The classic SF mission is one of 'force multiplier,' a highly skilled element which could train and equipment indigenous infantry forces to accomplish the mission. Their current employment in Mosul, Iraq could be said to be a good example (Foreign Internal Defense).

Do it all? No, but that has not stopped the current administration from subverting former SF missions and dedicating SF to the (pre-Mosel) Klingon drone war against ISIS leaders.

The fight currently ongoing near Mosel proves that winning involves the employment of large numbers of infantry to seize and hold key terrain. Simply taking out key leaders will not get the job done.

Posted by Besoeker 2016-10-28 06:05|| 2016-10-28 06:05|| Front Page Top

#3 #3 Myth

Special forces of various sorts are what the mathematicians call necessary but not sufficient. There is no doubt of the force multiplication power of excellent snipers or a Navy SEAL team. Ground attack aircraft like the A-10 make the infantry more capable of doing their job. But you can't win a war with only those elite forces.

This is really about career politicians and bureaucrats trying to find some way to use money that should be spent on defense on other things. The left does not want to have the proper kind of military because that takes resources away from their "bribe people with welfare and easy, stress-free, do nothing jobs in exchange for votes" program.

In the Cold War period, the left in Euroland was content to let the American taxpayer pay the real cost of defending their countries, thereby diverting tax revenues to "free" transportation, education, and health care programs. Worked for the politicians, worked for the people who got a standard of living well beyond what they would have had if they were honest about the true cost of fighting off the Soviet empire. Without the U.S. as their sugar daddy, no socialized healthcare, no universal college education, no cheap Eurail, etc.

The problem now is that the American left is trying to do the same thing, but there isn't any sugar daddy to fund it all and fight some sort of battle against radical Islam. This results in the huge actual government debt and the unfundable public retirement liabilities. While the Gulf War costs are a part of both of those, they are way less than half, despite DNC talking points.

Unless and until we can shrink the size of the nonmilitary public employee juggernaut to pre-Great Society levels, our debt will increase, our private sector economy will continue to decline, and we will not be able to mount an authentic defense against external threats. Unfortunately, much our population has become a bunch of postmodern, pathologically risk-averse, comfort seeking lotus eaters who value their magic government income stream more than the businesses, liberties, and lives of their private sector neighbors. It might be possible to tamp them and their hired mercenaries in the Democratic party down at some point, but right now it isn't looking too good. I think a lesson already learned by other nations the hard way is going to be learned the hard way once more, within a generation or two.

Posted by no mo uro 2016-10-28 06:26|| 2016-10-28 06:26|| Front Page Top

#4 A platoon sergeant requires 15 years of training and experience to be effective. A battalion commander may take 17 years.

Sort of missed out on WWII, didn't he. A lot of those were made in less than 4 years. It's called 'adapt or perish'. Very bloody, very high body count. Not the most optimal method if you're concern about your own body count, but none the less demonstratively valid.

Posted by Procopius2k 2016-10-28 07:50|| 2016-10-28 07:50|| Front Page Top

#5 How many of the Youth in the US are "snowflakes" being prepared for life in the Univ. 'Safe zones"?
How many have purple hair and an earring or two and are into body piercing ? How many families produce babies and raise actual families among the young people? How many live in their parent's basements and are Obese and entitled?

How many can pass the O Course or do a 15 mile hike in full gear? And if you do find a few men who will take it upon themselves to defend the rest will they be abandoned by the Secretary of State and left to die by civilians with an Agenda?

And what dos it matter anyway? Butt boys and Democrats, and free stuff..

Posted by Tyranysaurus Trotsky5538 2016-10-28 08:42|| 2016-10-28 08:42|| Front Page Top

#6 I think Myth 1 is true. Wars will tend to be short (at least if politicians have any brains) because the country does not have the temperament for a long conflict, even a vital one, and the media will turn that temperament against the war as soon as a Republican is in power.

Posted by rjschwarz 2016-10-28 09:35|| 2016-10-28 09:35|| Front Page Top

#7 Myth 1 - A couple of rough comments: 1) I disagree that our military leaders did not envision Afghanistan lasting longer than 15 years - they were talking 20 years plus in 2002. Our political leaders were/remain clueless and don't even talk Afghanistan any longer because their communities have little skin in the game. 2) Thus, wars would be shorter if the draft was in effect.
Myth 3 - While fighting the insurgencies in AF and IQ, SOF became the offensive arm of our military - kill/capture missions by the dozen every night - target generation - back out again. The BCTs drew mostly defensive mission sets and their offensive mindset atrophied - and our "manning, training, and equipping" focused on fighting a defensive FOB based war. Defensive systems (MRAPs) by the thousands, sucked up the money for replacing the M1s and Bradleys with whatever the Future Combat Systems should look like - something that win a war rather than just survive.
Myth 4 - 15-17 years is ridiculous. Seven years is the conventional wisdom in the line units to produce an effective leader and this time can be reduced if you recruit a more mature soldier (one with life experience - mid 20s). 18 year olds, unless they played a lot of high school ball and learned those disciplines, are hard to craft into leaders quickly, well, because they are 18 and do what 18 year olds do.

Posted by Tennessee 2016-10-28 10:07|| 2016-10-28 10:07|| Front Page Top

#8 P2K, a lot of those were made because of the ones who survived WWI. The experience from the Spanish-American war. The experience from the Civil War. The experience from the Mexican War. The experience from, hell, it is a built culture.

Crap, anyone who played Total War or Wargame knows this. But I guess everything old is new again.

Posted by swksvolFF 2016-10-28 14:19|| 2016-10-28 14:19|| Front Page Top

#9 Tennessee, Bush tried to prepare people for the long war, he just assumed he's have the cooperation of the Democrats throughout. Unfortunately cooperation turned to bloody knives rather quickly.

Posted by rjschwarz 2016-10-28 15:05|| 2016-10-28 15:05|| Front Page Top

#10 There is "war fighting" and there is "nation building" - and we tend to try to use the same people for both tasks, and that approach is nuts..

If you've not seen Thomas Burnett's take on the issue, here it is - 23 minutes well-spent: http://www.ted.com/talks/thomas_barnett_draws_a_new_map_for_peace#t-1405062

Posted by Lone Ranger 2016-10-28 17:39|| 2016-10-28 17:39|| Front Page Top

23:59 Blossom Unains5562
23:10 trailing wife
23:01 trailing wife
22:45 rjschwarz
22:40 Blossom Unains5562
21:37 James Comey
21:14 Procopius2k
21:05 Blossom Unains5562
20:51 Blossom Unains5562
20:50 phil_b
20:40 Blossom Unains5562
20:25 Skidmark
20:21 Skidmark
20:11 newc
20:07 49 Pan
19:41 M. Murcek
19:38 phil_b
19:23 Shipman
19:18 Blossom Unains5562
19:17 Shipman
19:15 airandee
19:14 Shipman
19:09 49 Pan
18:59 Bobby