Posted on 04/21/2017 9:25:02 PM PDT by pboyington
The US military that won Desert Storm or Gulf War I in 1991 was a spectacular military, a gargantuan industrial age military with high tech weaponry and well trained personnel, that when called upon, achieved victory with the speed of Patton and the elan of Teddy Roosevelt.
Overlooking the vast eight mile carnage on the Highway of Death in Kuwait, destruction that was caused by a US Air Force and Navy that bore almost no resemblance to the two services now, a sergeant in the 7th US Cavalry remarked, “America sure got its money’s worth from those Joes.”
In 44 days, the largest military force assembled by the US and its allies since Normandy destroyed the world’s fourth largest army in a brilliantly led, fabulously executed air and ground war in the sands of the Middle East.
The ghosts of Vietnam were vanquished by men who had experienced the horrors and strategic errors of that war and who inculcated those lessons to the personnel they led.
Both General Colin Powell and the late General Norman Schwarzkopf had both served multiple tours in Vietnam and their experiences there made them highly skeptical of the press and its intentions.
Therefore, no reporters were embedded with combat units during the war.
The world was given a Nintendo video game, sanitized version of a war; while albeit short, had many elements of the nastiness of wars past, but appeared to be nothing more than a high tech cake walk.
Because there were no journalists in the field, the world never saw H.R McMaster, the President’s National Security Adviser, who was then a captain in the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment, fighting the Tawakalna Division of the Republican Guard at a now famous grid line dubbed the 73 Easting.
On McMaster’s left flank, the scouts from the 4th Squadron, 7th Cavalry were also battling the Tawakalna and the ghosts of the Little Big Horn, at a nameless speck of desert landscape known as Phase Line Bullet.
Later that night, grunts and tankers from the 1st Infantry Division, the Big Red One, hit the Guard at Objective Norfolk and before the night was over, found themselves engaged in close quarters fighting with fanatical Guardsmen in a place most of them want to forget, but can’t. Two days before, the Big Red One had spent the opening hours of the war burying Iraqis in the trenches alive with bulldozers.
On G Day +3, the US 1st Armored Division hammered the Iraqi Al-Medina Division of the Republican Guard at a place now known as Medina Ridge. The Battle of Medina Ridge was to date the largest tank battle since Kursk in 1943.
Yet, the world saw none of those battles being fought as they saw no Marines storming through Kuwait. There were no journalists; hence no video, no film, no photos; nothing to show the world except a few shots of B Roll of the Iraqi Army surrendering to Marines on the border. To the American public, the Iraqis were surrendering en masse, when in actuality the Republican Guard was going down with the ship. For example, the 10,000 man Tawakalna Division was virtually annihilated, including the division commander who died in an artillery barrage on the night of February 26, 1991.
While General Schwarkopf’s power point presentations enlightened the world, the soldiers and Marines found themselves in a Dante’s Inferno, with smoldering vehicles, dead Iraqi soldiers strewn over tank turrets in a man-made darkness of oil fires that smothered any sunlight and the vast remnants of an army, which littered the battlefield: rifles, helmets, sundry equipment and arms and legs that were picked at by packs of roving wild dogs.
War is hell…but the American public never knew.
The day Desert Storm ended, the death of the US military commenced.
The Pentagon, basking in glory and bowing to pressure from the public and crackpot feminists like Patricia Schroeder, started drinking the Kool Aid and they’ve never stopped. The war was a video game, a clean, quick rout. Modern war was now sanitized, where the bad guys would die at stand-off ranges of a mile or two and explode in little black and white pixels on Pentagon TV screens. In fact, war was now so quick and so easy that women should be allowed to serve in the combat arms and Special Forces.
Our victory in Desert Storm became the catalyst for every left wing wacko to hack at the military with a meat cleaver.
Since, 1991, the US military has been slowly coming apart at the seams. Stress cards, open homosexuality, transgenders on active duty, sensitivity training, pregnancy simulators for male troopers, lactation stations in the field, babies born on US ships of war, female graduates of Ranger School, including a 37 year old mother (it’s funny how the women looked so well fed), women in the SEALs, women in Marine infantry units and females in the field artillery (even though most cannot carry a 155mm round) are just some of the insanity that has taken place in the last 26 years, but which snowballed into hell under the Obama administration.
A social revolution engulfed the military, starting with Tailhook and continuing to this day. Warriors were forced out and feather merchants and PC flag bearers were promoted. Girl power was in and masculinity was out. The warrior culture was buried and a new culture was reborn that resembles corporate America, not the US military of yesteryear.
No, General Kennedy, it’s not your father’s army and that’s a problem, a big, festering problem.
And, now, with the world in flames, with ISIS blowing up Europe, with Putin pumping weights in the Artic while he watches his BMP’s on skis roll by, with Kim Jong-Loon on the loose with a toy chest of nukes and missiles and with Iran figuring out that Trump ain’t Barney Fife, the US military needs to be rougher and tougher and more ready for a fight than ever.
And, we ain’t. And, that’s the fact, Jack.
Many are waiting for Mad Dog Mattis to stick a pike in the heart of the military’s social engineering forever.
We are still waiting…
Perhaps, Secretary Mattis is so busy dealing with the thugs on the planet, that he has forgotten that the armed forces that will be engaging the thugs is still in trouble.
Secretary Mattis must once and for all shut down the feminist fantasy of women in the combat arms. There are thousands of jobs for women in the military where they can serve honorably and be promoted, without, in Mattis’ own words, ‘setting themselves up for failure in combat.’
Mattis also needs to get rid of the perfumed princes, and the feckless duds who have infested the senior ranks of the armed forces. I would rather have a sergeant with guts running a division than a two star coward who is more worried about his pension and future job on cable news than the mission and the troops.
The US military is still being led by people who believe that the military is nothing different than working for Google, except that the military has uniforms and weapons. When you eschew the glorious traditions of the military and combine that with ludicrous social engineering, you are setting yourself up for massive failure.
While the US military interpreted the results of Desert Storm incorrectly, the real lessons from that conflict are crystal clear. The US military functioned well in an environment that focused on the mission, not on political correctness, LGBT rights, day care centers on submarines and breastfeeding Rangers.
With our enemies stacking up against us, time is running out to fix the problems which were initially caused by a victory 26 years ago, in a war that has largely been forgotten.
the perfumed princes rang true....many of them a bunch of preppies with out true leadership skills.
Pretty good piece.
Two perfumed princes(s) pop to mind immediately.
Eric Shinseki and Wesley Clark.
There appear to be parts of the U.S. military that are still in fighting shape. Individual unit successes in Afghanistan would point to that. OTOH, the broader rot of PC culture has taken a toll. The Navy patrol boat surrender to the Iranians would seem to demonstrate aspects of that decay.
Bump....
I don’t see where it’s the war’s fault at all or the handling of the press.
Elections have consequences.
I don’t see where it’s the war’s fault at all or the handling of the press.
Elections have consequences.
“The warrior culture was buried and a new culture was reborn that resembles corporate America, not the US military of yesteryear.”
One look at every single one of our modern Generals confirms this, Mattis included.
I’m at Desert Shield Desert Storm veteran. There is a huge difference between open desert tank warfare and today’s fight. We can win the fight against Islam, but only if we are able to name the enemy and give it no quarter. In many ways today’s fight is much more difficult. As for the changes in the military that is indicative of general social moral decay.
It’s the media’s army, to sell the media’s advertiser’s products.
Good post. Definitely BFL.
nobody beats the U.S. in a conventional war and Saddam tried to fight a conventional war.
Not so much conventional wars going on anymore and ROEs became screwed up for the current wars.
also,
almost as soon as desert storm was over, Cheney & Powell started dismantling the military. It was ripe for a foo-foo take over.
“I don’t see where it’s the war’s fault at all or the handling of the press.”
I agree with that mostly, though I did hear people opine that Desert Storm was pushbutton and war was not like the old days. But mostly it was our decision makers in Government with no backbone.
The vaunted Dick Cheney piled on early to destroy careers after Tailhook. I think his lesbo daughter influenced him.
But number ONE cause, THE cause, was a year later when Bill Clinton was elected and He and Hillary flooded the white house and DOD with radicals on a mission. Anyone remember that comment at the first Clinton inauguration? A Clintonista was offended at a military flyby afterwards.
They were told, “Hey, those planes belong to US now”.
They meant it.
for later
“The warrior culture was buried and a new culture was reborn that resembles corporate America, not the US military of yesteryear.”
One look at every single one of our modern Generals confirms this, Mattis included
General Norman Schwarzkopf saw it coming and retired. He turned down the US Army Chief of Staff position and wanted no part of it. He was one of our last, real fighting generals.
You are correct...Mattis is more of an intellectual and politician than warrior.
You are right on.
I no longer like or respect Dick Cheney or any of the Bush family.
Thanks for your service and sacrifice.
*** “I’m at Desert Shield Desert Storm veteran. There is a huge difference between open desert tank warfare and today’s fight. We can win the fight against Islam, but only if we are able to name the enemy and give it no quarter. In many ways today’s fight is much more difficult. As for the changes in the military that is indicative of general social moral decay ‘ ***
Ditto
Bump
>>Mattis also needs to get rid of the perfumed princes, and the feckless duds who have infested the senior ranks of the armed forces.
I would rather have a sergeant with guts running a division than a two star coward who is more worried about his pension and future job on cable news than the mission and the troops.<<
Needed to be resaid
Colin Powell should have been kicked out of the Army for his involvement in the My Lai massacre and it’s subsequent cover-up in Vietnam. He lied to the Americal Division commanding General as his G-2 when he could easily have gotten on a helicopter and witnessed first hand what went on down there. But he stayed in his air conditioned hooch and wrote one of the most disgusting, lying reports in American military history to that point just glossing over, and essentially writing a fictitious account of what had really gone on there.
Ptuh on Colin Powell! Forever.
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