Years ago a buddy of mine who participated in the initial invasion of Iraqi Freedom, told me a story as US forces were gearing up to head into Fallujah. He said he couldn’t confirm or deny it. Could have been urban legend, could have been the truth.
Anywho....It came down to one thing, Moral Courage.
Military leadership meets in a room to discuss the battle plan to head into Fallujah, knowing that it’s going to be really bad. House to house, door to door.
The psyops and civil affairs folks had been dropping leaflets telling folks to get out, but that also allowed the bad guys to set boobytraps everywhere.
The CO looks around the room and asks each person in it if their unit was ready. One by one they all said they were ready to go.
Until he got to the crusty Delta Force CSM, that said something to the effect of....Sir, everyone in this room is lying to you. I can tell you that my guys aren’t ready. And if my guys aren’t ready then none of the men under the command of everyone else in this room is ready. We need more time and more training to get them ready for what they’re about to walk into.
As the story goes, the operation was delayed 2 weeks to give the grunts time to train, learn and hone their skills.
Guys like that do not exist, very much anymore. If they do, they’re usually run out of the military and police departments. What the country and world gets are Yes Men that have not a care in the world for the 12 Marines and 1 Navy Corpsman that died for no reason whatsoever.
When I look at someone like President Trump, I pretty sure he wants to be surrounded by guys like the Delta CSM. Folks that will give it to him straight and help him reach a decision. Instead, he was surrounded by people like all the Yes Men in that room that day. And, here we are.
But....more important than any of that.....NO MEAN TWEETS!!!!!!
Urban legend. The Marines hit Fallujah and they were ready and did not go through two weeks of training first. It was a standard infantry assault that they are well trained and practiced in long before they arrive in the war zone.
We need mean tweets. It keeps everyone on their toes. Plus, it identifies who the pussies are.