Posted on 04/24/2006 9:16:20 AM PDT by Diver Dave
Once on fast track to be captain, Kirk Lippold now works at a desk. Last in a two-part series. WASHINGTON -- For 5½ years, the Washington military and political establishment has not known quite what to do with Kirk Lippold.
Cmdr. Lippold was the skipper of the USS Cole when al-Qaida terrorists committed a suicide bombing in the Yemen port of Aden on Oct. 12, 2000.
The attack, from a small barge that pulled alongside the Cole, blew a 40-by-40-foot hole in the guided-missile destroyer. Seventeen sailors died and 42 were wounded.
After he led an intense three-week effort to prevent the Cole from sinking, the Navy gave Lippold a medal for having saved the $1 billion ship, prevented further loss of life and maintained the moral of his traumatized crew.
(Excerpt) Read more at modbee.com ...
Gen. Zinni had the bright idea to dock the ship in Aden. Interesting eh?
Rumsfeld Critic Zinni: USS Cole Blunder My Fault
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1617172/posts
"Klinton didn't allow access to armor or apache gunship support during the Rangers, SEALs and Delta missions in Somalia either."
He did not provide it to the Marines either when we asked for armor specifically. That stupid decision was one of the first he had to make after taking office, but the don't ask, don't tell policy was much more important than whether we Jarheads needed armor. (see tagline)
Semper Fidelis
I was referring to the articles misspelling, not you, sorry!
Able Danger mention at end of story ...
Vice Adm. Thomas Wilson, director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, wrote to all DIA personnel this week to explain the protest resignation of a DIA analyst in October. The analyst, Kie Fallis, quit the day after the USS Cole was attacked by suicide bombers in Aden, Yemen. Mr. Fallis charged that a report he had written on the threat of a terrorist attack in Yemen was suppressed by senior DIA officials.Mr. Fallis' resignation letter stated that he had "significant analytic differences" with DIA superiors over a terrorist threat assessment produced in June.
U.S. intelligence officials said there were warnings, but they arrived too late. The National Security Agency issued a report shortly after the Cole was bombed warning of attacks in the region —too late to be useful.
Adm. Wilson said he asked the Pentagon inspector general (IG) to investigate Mr. Fallis' charges. In an awkwardly worded statement, the three-star admiral said on Wednesday the IG "found no evidence to support the public perception that information warning of an attack on Cole was suppressed, ignored or even available in DIA." What about the private perception?
The admiral's statement drew smirks from several intelligence officials. It relied on a dodge often used by intelligence analysts to dismiss unwelcome information. Saying there is "no evidence" —like that presented to a court of law — is often used to mask the fact there is lots of intelligence to the contrary that spooks would rather not talk about in public.
I take issue with what the writer *omitted* from the story: that the USS COLE attack happened under Clinton, Berger, Cohen, Albright, Gorelick's 'traitorous eyes', which stymied "Able Danger', who had intel that the attack might happen, but were blocked from warning about it. Why did the naval guards have no mags in their weapons? Who ordered that crap? A simple reading of the Able Danger Archives makes the hair on my neck stand-up. But the OTM conveniently omits the facts, in pursuit of their agenda.
Testifying before the Senate Armed Services Committee in October 2000, a week after the Cole attack, the then-recently retired Zinni said: "I pass that buck on to nobody."
The Rumsfeld critic explained that he personally signed off on berthing the Cole in Yemen even though "their coast is a sieve for terrorists."
"The threat conditions in Aden were better than elsewhere," he insisted, citing risk assessments for Sudan and Saudi Arabia.
Gen. Zinni said that cutbacks in the size of the Navy's fleet during the Clinton years made it necessary to use regional ports for refueling, noting: "Ten years ago, we did all refueling at sea" using Navy oilers.
Still, prior to the Cole attack, there's no record that Gen. Zinni ever complained about Clinton era defense cuts.
In what may be an even more troubling development, a report indicates that the leading Rumsfeld critic may have inadvertently played a role in tipping off Osama bin Laden to an impending U.S. cruise missile attack two years before the Cole episode.
Two days after President Clinton ordered the attack on bin Laden's encampment in Khost Afghanistan, the Associated Press reported:
"Kuwait's Al-Watan newspaper, quoting unidentified sources in London today, reported that Pakistan leaked to bin Laden news about an impending U.S. strike. The sources said the leak was aimed at limiting casualties, so that bin Laden would have less justification for a counterattack.
"A Pakistani government source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that Gen. Anthony Zinni, commander of the U.S. Central Command, was in Peshawar the day before the attack to meet with Pakistani officials.
Normally any unidentified boat approaching a US man of war anchored in port, is hailed to stop 100 meters out, and if failinig to hold distance, is fired upon.
Kirk Lippold would have had to violate this standing order to remedy the problem, and many say he should have done, in secret.
The deck watch on the USS Cole did not have ammo in its guns to do its job, and was correspondingly slack.
Absolutely!
As an E-5, I stood POOW armed with a .45, albeit unloaded, but I had 2 clips on my belt in the "old Navy" (not the clothing retailer). As an E-3 and E-4, I stood ASROC security watches fully armed. Didn't matter what port we were in.
14 Nov 2000
YEMEN:
Report Says USS Cole Told Not To Fire First; Rules of Engagement Questioned
The Washington Post was reporting on Tuesday that sailors guarding the USS Cole when terrorists bombed it last month did not have ammunition in their weapons and were instructed not to shoot unless fired upon. Crew members told the newspaper that their "rules of engagement" prevented them from firing without obtaining permission from the ship's captain or another officer.
Petty Officer John Washak told the Post said he was manning an M-60 machine gun shortly after the Cole was hit. Washak said he waved the weapon at a second small boat that was approaching, but a senior chief petty officer ordered him to turn the gun away. Washak said he protested, fearing that the ship was still under attack. Rules of engagement aboard a U.S. warship are set by its captain following Navy "rules of engagement" guidelines. Citing an on-going investigation into the incident, Pentagon officials won't publicly discuss the specific rules in effect aboard the Cole.
According to a 14 Nov article in the Stars and Stripes, Senior Navy officials have reacted with skepticism to an article in the Nov. 14 Washington Post article. "I have nothing to say about that story," chief Pentagon spokesman Ken Bacon said at a Nov. 14 briefing. "There are a number of ongoing inquiries. I don't want to speculate. We should respect the [investigative] process. We all want a complete investigation."
Petty Officer Jennifer Kudrick, a sonar technician, said: "If we had shot those people, we'd have gotten in trouble for it. That's what's frustrating about it. We would have gotten in more trouble for shooting two foreigners than losing 17 American sailors." The Post reportedly interviewed about 20 members of the ship's crew.
Some said FBI investigators have told them the Cole may have been secretly boarded and surveyed by Islamic militants -- possibly including one of the suicide bombers -- as it passed through the Suez Canal a few days before the attack. The FBI also has been questioning crew members about the behavior of the Yemeni pilot who guided the Cole into port. Some described him as "agitated." Some crew members also said they thought Yemeni harbor workers acted suspiciously, and in retrospect, that they may have been aware of the impending attack.
Clark Staten, one of ERRI's senior national security analysts, said last night that the security problems associated with the U.S.S. Cole still require additional study, but that they may relate to an on-going issue concerning a need for "more rapidly changing rules-of-engagement." Staten pointed out that the Cole incident is not the only one in recent memory where U.S. forces were faced with a rapidly escalating situation which required a rapid change in their defense posture.
"Today's multidimensional terrorist threat requires a more rapid decision-making loop that that can adapt to the tactical situation as it evolves...the traditional method of establishing 'rules of engagement' may need to be modified in order to make it more dynamic and allow it to immediately change to meet emerging trends," Staten added.
He messed up in just one way, he failed to secure a "deadly force" perimeter (and mean it) because his vessel was in a foreign port and armed as a US warship must be, therefore always a potential target of opportunity. So they gave him one last attaboy for saving the ship. But my guess is that somewhere down the line the senior chain of command said....Wait a minute, this wouldn't have happened IF........
How do I know this? Well, in 1983 a drunken civilian with a death wish tried to ram his vehicle through the gates of the Division Ammunition Supply Point (where we kept the real "GO TO WAR" ammo) and a pfc promptly put a bullet thru the guys skull at a range of about 35 meters and closing...fast. I was serving as the Division Staff Duty Officer that weekend. So I was almost the first Army officer on the scene, aside from the MP's. The pvt did it right, so did the chain of command in issuing the deadly force orders. Gave the kid a nice attaboy and a pass (IIRC) on his next rifle quals. LOL.
Kinda like the movie CUJO if the protagonist had been the holder of a concealed weapons permit?
Scene ONE: Driver's car stalls and rabid dog jumps onto hood. Driver reaches behind hip and draws a .357 magnum revolver.
BANG....BANG....BANG!!!!
Roll credits.
That is usually done through the military chain of command. The guards on duty at the US Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983 were not allowed live ammo the day the suicide truck crashed into the building. Who's watch? Ronnie Reagan.
You're half right. (Or is that half-and wrong?)
"CDR" is what the Navy uses for correspondence (From the Correspondence Manual) and Cmdr. is proper usage by journalists (military and civilian) as defined by the Associated Press (AP) Style Guide.
I think AP stylebooks say CMDR. So it's not incorrect, as far as writing style goes.
This is what happens when we have liberals as Commanders in Chief...
I just read an article about the debacle at Desert One in Iran, and I could not believe Carter was ordering the Delta Force guys NOT to use lethal force in the event there was resistance while rescuing the hostages.
It is beyond belief, except that...it actually happened.
I am usually pretty much on the side of the Navy when they stipulate that nearly anything bad that happens on a ship rests on the shoulders of the Captain until proven otherwise. It is a harsh outlook, but there is a lot of history behind it to justify it (in my opinion)
That said, I do not believe this Captain should have been shoved into limbo the way he was.
Actually,
The way we in the military use rank abbreviations internally differs from the way it is communicated in the civilian sector. That style is considered proper by the military, and we are instructed to use that particular style of abbreviation when writing for/to civilians (i.e. for publication, invitations, letters etc).
Since I am intimately familiar with Army rank, I will use it to demonstrate:
A lieutenant colonel is a LTC in military documents, but a Lt. Col. for civilian correspondence
Similarly, a sergeant major is a SGM internally, but for civilian correspondence it is abbreviated as Sgt. Maj.
Each service has it's own unique "civilian" abbreviations.
I'm suprised he didn't order them to fly a "smiley face" ensign, and play "don't worry, be happy" over the loudspeakers.
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