Posted on 05/02/2012 7:50:41 AM PDT by Strategy
As the US beefs up its military presence in the Persian Gulf region, Pentagon strategists estimate that they would need less than a month to defeat Iranian forces should a military conflict take place.
US Central Command (CENTCOM) believes it can destroy or significantly degrade Iran's conventional armed forces in about three weeks using air and sea strikes, a defense source told The Washington Post.
"We plan for any eventuality we can and provide options to the president," Army Lt. Col. T.G. Taylor, a spokesman at CENTCOM told the newspaper. "We take our guidance from the secretary of defense and from our civilian bosses in [Washington] DC. So any kind of guidance they give us, that's what we go off of [sic]."
(Excerpt) Read more at rt.com ...
Whoops!
Great vanity, BTW, thanks for the link--I'd missed it the first time. Now I'm fully dreading October...
That is fascinating but not unusual for Russian papers with their very flexible standards for intellectual property. Can you post the URL? I seem to remember some WT headline about this. The number of similar stories mushrooming in the vernacular press in the middle east and Pakistan does make me think there is some sort of black propaganda operation underway. It is cheap and is a common psychological warfare ploy.
Seems to me that total victory and peace can be achieved in 30 minutes or less (or your bomb is free). Or whatever the flight time from an SSBN to their most inland city would be.
The first battle of Manasses pretty
much killed the “over in three weeks” meme.
We’ve seen this movie already.
McArthur swore the Chinese Army would stay put if the US continued to push the Norks back against the Chinese border.
They didn’t.
If we invade Iran, the Russians will too. Even if they don’t feel they have to.
And about 100 years to “nation build”.
Seriously! That term should be taken out of our lexicon entirely. Go in, kick ass, come home and tell them if they get uppity again, we’ll be back!
But it worked. How many men on both sides would have died if we invaded Japan? How long would the war have lasted if we hadn't bombed Germany? In that war, the thinking was “You started this, and we will kill every one of you unless you stop NOW!”
I have had the privilege to speak with some of the officers who were involved in the bombing campaign, and whole point was to kill and demilitarize civilians. After action reports suggest the demoralization failed completely (Read some of David Grossman’s work), but they did slow production and transportation of goods. It was a terror tactic. One that honestly didn't have the results that were expected.
Precision strikes are not as great as we are led to believe. You have know what and exactly where you target. Even then, if the target moves it gets away. The myth of surgical strikes is just that. A myth.
Sadly, the only way we could “win” Iran is kill enough of them that they stop. That is not something modern people like to think about, but it is how war was fought in the past. The theory of a quick, clean, war doesn't work if the other side is motivated to keep fighting in the rubble. We learned this in Iraq and Afghanistan. As many empires have learned before. If we are not willing to do that, then we need to seriously ask “Is this war something we need to do at all?”
Iran is not a direct threat to us. And starting a war because they might have nukes and be able to hit Israel is problematic at best. Preemptive wars are not very justifiable.
It’s what comes next that’s the sticky wicket.
Break stuff, leave with “get out of line again and we’ll be back and REALLY pissed off” and then LEAVE.
The goal is not conquest or even peace. The goal is to get them to stop stirring up trouble on the world stage. Removing their capability to do that is realtively simple. As usual, the liberal BS about “what comes after” causes problems. The answer is: Ignore it entirely. Let them figure it out - or not.
They will never like us. They can however be taught to respect us.
Nation building over there is hopeless. Money won’t solve the history of the people.
Nation building over there is hopeless. Money won’t solve the history of the people.
If a war is needed, Obama will start the war.
Are some of the trappings the same? Yes. That is why it worked. We have a lot of the trappings of Rome and Greece, but our culture is more along the lines of the germanic tribes that took over Rome. Look deeper than the outward appearances.
Finally, someone else who can see a winning stratergy.
Note that victory is not given a clear definition. I presume that they mean simply making sure that their military is torn down enough so that they could not attempt to make and successfully utilize nukes against anyone. To even repeat the Iraq 2003 invasion, well, I fail to see how that would take 3 weeks. Just for starters, we would be facing a much larger nation that would be much more united and cohesive if they were attacked. The goal should be a combination of regime change along with any necessary strikes against the military, but without planning a military invasion. Let’s not fool ourselves, the days of launching full scale invasions, one at a time, against any nation deemed a threat are over.
You’re right. Last time we really won was WWII. I’d as soon have a different CIC before we get involved in anything. His “rules of engagement” would do nothing for our troops except get a lot of them killed.
Would take all of about an hour were you to do it properly, and that includes flight-time. In fact, all our boys could stay home for some R&R and still get the job done.
Exactly, consider the source. In this case the source is Russia Today, a source often cited by the kook conspiracy crowd, the anti-Semitic crowd, lefties, etc. There’s no reason to give this story the slightest bit of credibilty. (it’s almost like listening to MSNBC.....)
At any rate, others are right, the USA has not won a war for 50 years because they stopped playing by effective rules and started the “feel good” affluent sensitive new-age-guy years. If the US used WWII rules the war against Iran would be over in a week. And we would own them as a territory following unconditional surrender.
As it is, it is only the common fiction from Russia Today.
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