Screw the prime directive.
Posted on 12/12/2009 6:22:26 AM PST by Kaslin
Gen. Stanley McChrystal's long-awaited testimony before Congress on the Afghanistan "surge" was, according to one account, "uneventful." The general himself, another story noted, was "a study in circumspection." And questioning from lawmakers was, said a third, "gentle."
That's a nice word for it. "Ineffectual" is more like it. Throw in "callous," too, given House members' obligations to constituents in the war zone, operating under what are surely the most restrictive rules of engagement (ROE) in U.S. history.
But not a single lawmaker appears to have ventured one question about these dangerously disarming ROEs, which, in Gen. McChrystal's controversial view, are key to the success of his "counterinsurgency" strategy. What kind of a commander puts his forces' lives at increased risk for a historically unsuccessful theory that depends not on winning battles against enemies, but on winning the "trust," or, as we used to say (and as Gen. David Petraeus put it in Iraq), the "hearts and minds" of a primitive people immersed in the anti-Western traditions of Islam?
That would have made a nice ice-breaker of a question for any lawmaker troubled by the Petraeus-McChrystal policy of elevating Afghan "population protection" over U.S. "force protection" to win "the support" of this 99 percent Islamic country, and the rules that American forces must follow to do so. If, that is, there were any lawmakers so troubled.
Things really tightened up back in July, when Gen. McChrystal essentially grounded air support for troops except in dire circumstances. This, in the words of British defense intelligence analyst John McCreary, is "like fighting with a hand behind your back." And with deadly results, such as the September firefight in Ganjgal where three Marines and a Navy Corpsman were killed when, according to McClatchy newspapers' Jonathan S. Landay, repeated requests for support were nixed due to "new rules to avoid civilian casualties."
As the Washington Times recently reported, the McChrystal counterinsurgency rules now include: No night searches. Villagers must be warned prior to searches. Afghan National Army or Afghan Police must accompany U.S. units on searches. Searches must account, according to International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) headquarters, "for the unique cultural sensitivities toward local women." ("Islamic repressiveness" is more accurate, but that's another story.) U.S. soldiers may not fire on the enemy unless the enemy is preparing to fire first. U.S. forces may not engage the enemy if civilians are present. U.S. forces may fire at an enemy caught in the act of placing an IED, but not walking away from an IED area. And on it goes.
Here's another ROE that Gen. McChrystal should have been asked to justify to all Americans who hope to see their loved ones return home in one piece. The London Times recently reported that Marines, about to embark on a dangerous supply mission, were shown a PowerPoint presentation that first illustrated locations of IEDs along the way and then warned the Marines "not to fire indiscriminately even if they were fired on."
Even if they were fired on? Could they fire at all - even "discriminately"? How long does Gen. McChrystal think troops can hold their fire and maintain healthy morale? And how about a progress report on the investigation into that deadly disaster at Ganjgal? Congress wasn't interested in any of these questions.
The Times story went on to note: "The briefing ended with a projected screen of McChrystal's quote: "It's not how many you kill, it's how many you convince."
Another question: How many you convince of what, general? Of the depravity of child marriage? Of the injustice of Sharia laws that subjugate women and non-Muslims? Of the inhumanity of jihad?
Of course not. In an oblique reference that likely took in Islam, Gen. McChrystal told Congress: "I think it's very important that from an overall point of view, we understand how Afghan culture must define itself, and we be limited in our desire to change the fundamentals of it.
Fine. I don't want to change Afghan culture, either. But acknowledging its roots in an ideology that is anti-Western is crucial to devising strategy for the region. That's obvious. But not to any of our leaders.
Final question: Are such leaders, civilian and military, doing their duty when they send the nation to war with a strategy that totally ignores jihad, the war doctrine of the enemy?
Reading this sure makes my BP go up. ROE’s like this will just make the surge take longer and get more troops killed.
In boot camp recruits are broken down to nothing so that they can be built up to the standards set by the service. I believe in war, especially against an ideological foe like Islamists or the warrior cult that ruled Japan through WWII, the enemy has to be utterly and completely broken down to nothing. Then you can fashion the country any way you like.
I wonder if we should have been put on a much larger “war footing” right after 9-11 and gone all out like WWII.
Screw the prime directive.
Well, if all the freepers are complaining about COIN mission in Afghanistan, they should have supported Joe Biden's Counter-Terror mission there instead.
Dear Ms West.
War is far too important an issue to be left to the Journalists
This strategy, since you seemed to have missed it, worked in Iraq. Do try to keep up with the facts rather then cling to the Dinocon theories of how to wage Asymetrical war.
Asymetrical war waged the Dinocon way
Americans: Yo, all you Afganies. Now we know you all have been oppressed and terrorized by Taliban and the Russkies for about 30 years so we came over here to show you a better way. So gather round and we are going to teach you this thing called Democracy. We want to teach you this cause we figure if we get can get enough of you following this ideology you will not follow the ideology that preaches it is a good thing to fly airplanes into buildings full of our civilians.
Now the first things you need to learn is this part about the Rule of Law. Study the sub chapters on Innocent until prove Guilty, Trial by Jury, Right to Legal Representation and really important, the chapter on outlawing Cruel and Unusual Punishment. Ok, now while you do that, we are going to arbitrarily round up and kill any Afganies who we think maybe have ever talked mean about us.
What? No we are not going to bother with any of that messy Democracy stuff cause we are at war. And according to our Holloweird Movie guide to Military Action flicks any time you are at war you can waste anyone who pisses you off for what ever reason you want any way you want to do it.
According to Hollyweird, we don’t need nothing like proof or nothing we can just go wack any little freak just cause he pisses us off. Evidence? We don’t need no stinkin’ evidence. Our action movie heros never bother with any evidence. In the Movie we watch on TV says we are just suppose to go kill him because he pisses us off so that what we want to do here. Now quit talking back and learn our lessons on Democracy.
Afganie 1. Hey Mahmoud, why are we helping these clowns?
Afganie 2. What do you mean Achmed, they got rid of the Taliban!
Afganie 1. They did? Looks to me like they just took their place.
Afganie 2. Well ya so?
Afganie 1. Well at least the old thugs were from around here. These guys are not only from out of town they are not even Muslims. We may has well have Muslim thugs if we got to have thugs.
Afganie 2. You right, time to join the Jihad!
That is what Dinocon “Counter Insurgency doctrine as learned from watching TV dramas” would produce.
The only military man alive today that should be running this war is USMC General James Mattis, he understands what a fight is.
“I come in peace, I didn't bring artillery. But I am pleading with you with tears in my eyes: If you fu^k with me, I'll kill you all.”
-Marine General James Mattis, to Iraqi tribal leaders
Just one excellent argument for getting out of there. As long as 0bama is pres_ent, this war is inevitably going to end with US defeat and needless American casualties. He’s willing to enforce this to the point of absurdity.
If the primary rule is not to engage if there’s any possibility of civilian harm, GTHO. Then there’s only civilian harm in our absence, as there is in every country in the world.
Sounds as if he should be in the Peace Corps instead of the military.
As Recon Dad noted, Jim Mattis spoke a universal language to the tribal elders: "I come in peace. I didn't bring artillery. But I am pleading with you with tears in my eyes: If you fu^k with me, I'll kill you all."
It is a common failing of human nature to ascribe one's own virtues to others -- and to suffer bitter disappointment for having done so. Afghanistan's stone-age Islamic culture respects only force, and yields only to the one who applies it the most ruthlessly. If our leadership cannot commit to victory, then it time to bring our troops home.
But McChristol is like a military GENIUS! Clinton liked him. In 1996, After a year as a senior service college fellow at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, he moved up to command the entire 75th Ranger Regiment from June 1997 to August 1999, then spent another year as a military fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations!!!
And in 2003 he announced that he was pretty sure all major military engagements in Iraq were over.
All i can think of was those poor marines and sailors,, hunkered down, being shot to pieces. Visualize the looks on their faces as they hear on the radio that air support was denied from inside his command bunker.
If Hollywood was worth a spit, THAT would be grist for an entire movie. If Bush or Sarah was president, it still would be.
Special forces types have no business running the entire operation in the country. Unsuitable temperament,, to assault Fallujah for example.
I support this. I drilled this concept into my Platoon as well. Too many idiots start shooting for the sake of shooting whenever anything happens.
Pretty much every other bit of RoE here is suicidal, though. Thanks, GEN.
I knew we were f’cked when I read McChrystal’s memo, leaked to WaPo, when McChrystal wrote that he blamed our failure in afghanistan on ,” our preoocupation with the survival of our own forces” , WTF? We are too preoocupied with the survival of our own men and women?
And this man is leading our brave young men and women/ Dear Lord, how does this happen
google leaked Mcchrystal WaPo, page 6
chilling and sickening
There is an overemphasis on the effect of ROE's here. The Soviets and Brits didn't have any stinkin' ROEs when they tried to conquer Afghanistan....and they lost. Obama's War will not turn out well, ROE's or no ROEs's
I think what he was getting at is the same problem we had under Clinton in Somalia- not going out and vigorously engaging and killing terrorists wherever we can find them because it might incur risk to a politician's popularity at the polls. Instead Clinton dithered and ultimately what he feared most happened anyway. He was unable to deal intelligently with that error, so he did what liberals do best and pulled out to prevent further losses [in the polls]. He thus confirmed bin Laden's belief that American leaders will run at the sight of even minimal amounts of American blood, and emboldened OBL, who cited both our earlier retreat from Lebanon as well as our tail-tucked scramble out of Mogadishu as evidence that the US was ripe for attack the US in 2001, and would flee the Middle East if AQ could just bloody our nose.
And of all things,, you would expect a ranger officer, from the Clinton era, to have heard what happens when light infantry is denied heavy fire support and air. Blackhawk down. He has less of an excuse than anyone for this policy.
If soldiers are refused the use of their weapons when being shot at, it begs the question of why they are there at all.
“I think what he was getting at is the same problem we had under Clinton in Somalia”
Nope, he is REPEATING the mistake, not trying to fix that disastrous mindset. He is sending out troops, on feel-good missions, thinking he can win hearts of savages, and saddling our troops with outrageous ROE’s and denying them the superiority of our air support.
He is an incompetent, a creature of the “information age”. Because communication is easy, he thinks it therefore makes sense to approve every missile and bomb. He is sure to carefully investigate every firefight, like it was a police shootout at home. He has no business leading troops.
Has he ever been in a shootout?
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