Our Exhausted Military

Came across this very dispiriting article in the 'Guardian Unlimited' this morning about the fatigue and exhaustion gripping the US military. If you read only one article today, read this one. Talking about the ill-effects of the decision to invade Iraq, the strain it put on our military has always been one of the things we bring up.

But, this article brought home how fatigued and degraded our military has become due to the Iraq occupation in a manner that was hard to imagine before.

Excerpts:

Exhaustion and combat stress are besieging US troops in Iraq as they battle with a new type of warfare. Some even rely on Red Bull to get through the day. As desertions and absences increase, the military is struggling to cope with the crisis (snip)...

Hanna and his men are not alone in being tired most of the time. A whole army is exhausted and worn out. You see the young soldiers washed up like driftwood at Baghdad's international airport, waiting to go on leave or returning to their units, sleeping on their body armour on floors and in the dust.

Where once the war in Iraq was defined in conversations with these men by untenable ideas - bringing democracy or defeating al-Qaeda - these days the war in Iraq is defined by different ways of expressing the idea of being weary. It is a theme that is endlessly reiterated as you travel around Iraq. 'The army is worn out. We are just keeping people in theatre who are exhausted,' says a soldier working for the US army public affairs office who is supposed to be telling me how well things have been going since the 'surge' in Baghdad began.

That last part is what makes this so...dispiriting. If your PR people...The people helping to put the positive spin on the Iraq war, are saying these things...well.

Remember, these are the soldiers and people who are backing up the rosy assertions of 'progress' supposedly happening because of the much vaunted 'surge.' Their own PR guys in private are not buying the BS that they are ordered to tell the media and the world.

This should make it crystal clear that we should take all those false proclamation of 'progress' that we are starting to hear, with the grain of salt most of us probably already where. [And if you've been reading me you know I've devoted a few blog posts to questioning the 'progress' of the 'surge']

They are not supposed to talk like this. We are driving and another of the public affairs team adds bitterly: 'We should just be allowed to tell the media what is happening here. Let them know that people are worn out. So that their families know back home. But it's like we've become no more than numbers now.'(snip)
A week later, in the northern city of Mosul, an officer talks privately. 'We're plodding through this,' he says after another patrol and another ambush in the city centre. 'I don't know how much more plodding we've got left in us.'

When the soldiers talk like this there is resignation. There is a corrosive anger, too, that bubbles out, like the words pouring unbidden from a chaplain's assistant who has come to bless a patrol. 'Why don't you tell the truth? Why don't you journalists write that this army is exhausted?'(snip)..

And it's not just that that the multiple 15-month tours, the lack of a clear mission or goal, or the daily violence they encounter that is simply exhausting a few soldiers. This war is effecting the overall readiness and effectiveness of our armed forces. This next excerpt drives this point home:

The anecdotal evidence on the ground confirms what others - prominent among them General Colin Powell, the former US Secretary of State - have been insisting for months now: that the US army is 'about broken'. Only a third of the regular army's brigades now qualify as combat-ready. Officers educated at the elite West Point academy are leaving at a rate not seen in 30 years, with the consequence that the US army has a shortfall of 3,000 commissioned officers - and the problem is expected to worsen.

And it is not only the soldiers that are worn out. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have led to the destruction, or wearing out, of 40 per cent of the US army's equipment, totalling at a recent count $212bn (£105bn).

The article talks about increases in desertions and absenteeism, about the lowering of standards of enlistment (scraping the bottom of the barrel), about increasing the age of enlistment all to maintain this ultimately unsustainable war stocked with soldiers.

And one of the scary things is...the situation is getting so desperate that the big 'D-word' is coming up as a possible option, when, before, to even mention it as a possibility would have caused officials in the Pentagon and White House to roll their eyes.

The Draft

'War tsar' calls for return of the draft to take the strain

America's 'war tsar' has called for the nation's political leaders to consider bringing back the draft to help a military exhausted by wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In a radio interview, Lieutenant General Douglas Lute said the option had always been open to boost America's all-volunteer army by drafting in young men in the same way as happened in Vietnam. 'I think it makes sense to consider it,' he said. Lute was appointed 'war tsar' earlier this year after President Bush decided a single figure was needed to oversee the nation's military efforts abroad.

Rumours of a return to the draft have long circulated in military circles as the pressure from fighting two large conflicts at the same time builds on America's forces. However, politically it would be extremely difficult to achieve, especially for any leader hoping to be elected in 2008. Bush has previously ruled out the suggestion as unnecessary.

Lute, however, said the war was causing stress to military families and, as a result, was having an impact on levels of re-enlistment. 'This kind of stress plays out across dinner tables and in living-room conversations within these families. Ultimately the health of the all-volunteer force is going to rest on those sorts of personal family decisions,' he said.

Disturbing indeed, and such a policy would effect me [I am draft age after all]. Although, in my opinion such a policy would be extremely unlikely. Not even Republicans in Congress would support the reinstatement of the draft. And on that point I hope I am right.

The Ill-Effects of the Iraq Invasion/Occupation

This war is stretching our armed forces to the point of breaking and and to the point where some military officials warn political leaders to keep their minds open to a draft, yet there are still those who would wish to extend our involvement in Iraq indefinitely. Why?!

For the sake of our armed forces, for the sake of the brave men and women in uniform who risk their lives every day doing their jobs, lets bring them home. Lets bring them home as soon as possible. Lets end this long, horrendous national nightmare!

Because, lets be frank, as much as I and others dislike this war and its continuance...we are not the one living in constant danger of snippers or of IED's. We are not the ones on the front line having to execute the awful policies and prerogatives of their idiot leadership in Washington. This is real for them in a way that I, and other who've never served in Iraq could ever hope to understand.

Lets play our role and help bring about the end to this misadventure.

For them

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Roundup 8/12/07

I know I've been pretty inconsistent with the whole blogging thing. You should continue to expect that for at least the next couple weeks. Note: A lot of these articles of from as long as 5 days ago (I believe)...yeah, I've been pretty bad about writting.

Obama Foreign Policy/ Fall Out from Debate

After some initial strong words about unilateral strikes in Pakistan [I wrote about it..needless to say I was not happy about that part], it seems Obama is softening his tone with regards to Pakistan

Democratic presidential contender Barack Obama said Wednesday it's critical for Pakistan to be a constructive ally in fighting al-Qaida, one week after his hard-line pledge to hunt down terrorists in that country even without consulting President Pervez Musharraf.

Obama declined to criticize the Bush administration's policies on Pakistan, and expressed sympathy for Musharraf, who faces a growing militant backlash in his Muslim nation.

Good backtrack, although some damage has already been done. Needless to say the the Pakistani government, nor its people were very happy about his initial remarks. What a dumb thing to say in public.

Glenn Greenwald on the 'Foreign Policy Community' and its problems - I agree with Greenwalds analysis. Like him it surprises me how in the world of foreign affairs, scholars and thinkers who continually get very important issues [ like Iraq] can still be looked upon as respected thinkers to be consulted for what comes next. Why!? Their advise and cheerleading is what got us in this clusterfuck in the first place.

America is plagued by a self-anointed, highly influential, and insular so-called Foreign Policy Community which spans both political parties. They consider themselves Extremely Serious and have a whole litany of decades-old orthodoxies which one must embrace lest one be declared irresponsible, naive and unserious. Most of these orthodoxies are ossified 50-year-old relics from the Cold War, and the rest are designed to place off limits from debate the question of whether the U.S. should continue to act as an imperial force, ruling the world with its superior military power.

Well I agree with his analysis for the most part. Except that I disagree with Greenwald that Obama said anything inherently wrong or immoral with his, in essence, policy of unilateral strikes when necessary.

I think its inadvisable in 99 percent of situations but as there is a chance that it would of been necessary, I cannot say we do not have the option. For example: What if the world was not with us on the Afghanistan conflict...what if the Taliban refused to turn over bin Laden [it did refuse], what if it knowingly provided it a safe-haven for al-Qaeda to set up training camps and strike at the US [it did], but what if no other nation would help us...? In that situation I think the invasion of Afghanistan would still have been necessary.

But Obama recently, completely ruled out the use of nuclear weapons to strike (or counterstike) at known terrorist targets in Pakistan or anywhere. And, I agree with him...

I know what you are thinking: Doesn't that go against your 1% chance thing just talked about above.

Well, no.

You see there is NO situation in which it would be correct or justifiable to use nuclear weapons in any nation in order to kill terrorists. The use of nuclear weapons for that purpose is too horrible and unthinkable...the carnage, the massive, massive amounts of innocent civilian dead, the rightful damage to our international image, and the example it would set for other nuclear powers should make this option absolutely unthinkable.

Second, if you have good enough intelligence to aim a nuke at, you stand a good enough chance of getting him through conventional means. There is no need for nukes. At all


Obama's 'New Foreign Policy' vs. Old Coventional Wisdom Orthodoxy

Read this memo from Founding Executive Director of the Harvard University Carr Center for Human Rights Policy and a foreign policy adviser for Barack Obama - Sammantha Powers.

It's slams the old foreign policy and the problems it has caused [go to Iraq, don't talk with Iran, don't talk with adversaries or you reward bad behavior etc...] and proposed new methods.

The memo:

It was Washington’s conventional wisdom that led us into the worst strategic blunder in the history of US foreign policy. The rush to invade Iraq was a position advocated by not only the Bush Administration, but also by editorial pages, the foreign policy establishment of both parties, and majorities in both houses of Congress. Those who opposed the war were often labeled weak, inexperienced, and even naïve.

Barack Obama defied conventional wisdom and opposed invading Iraq. He did so at a time when some told him that doing so would doom his political future. He took that risk because he thought it essential that the United States “finish the fight with bin Laden and al Qaeda.” He warned that a “dumb war, a rash war” in Iraq would result in an “occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences.”

Barack Obama was right; the conventional wisdom was wrong. And today, we see the consequences. Iraq is in chaos. According to the National Intelligence Estimate, the threat to our homeland from terrorist groups is “persistent and evolving.” Al-Qaeda has a safe-haven in Pakistan. Iran has only grown stronger and bolder. The American people are less safe because of a rash war.

Over the last few weeks, Barack Obama has once again taken positions that challenge Washington’s conventional wisdom on foreign policy. And once again, pundits and politicians have leveled charges that are now bankrupt of credibility and devoid of the new ideas that the American people desperately want.

On each point in the last few weeks, Barack Obama has called for a break from a broken way of doing things.(snip)

Diplomacy: For years, conventional wisdom in Washington has said that the United States cannot talk to its adversaries because it would reward them. Here is the result:

* The United States has not talked directly to Iran at a high level, and they have continued to build their nuclear weapons program, wreak havoc in Iraq, and support terror.
* The United States has not talked directly to Syria at a high level, and they have continued to meddle in Lebanon and support terror.
* The United States did not talk to North Korea for years, and they were able to produce enough material for 6 to 8 more nuclear bombs.

By any measure, not talking has not worked. Conventional wisdom would have us continue this policy; Barack Obama would turn the page. He knows that not talking has made us look weak and stubborn in the world; that skillful diplomacy can drive wedges between your adversaries; that the only way to know your enemy is to take his measure; and that tough talk is of little use if you’re not willing to do it directly to your adversary. Barack Obama is not afraid of losing a PR battle to a dictator – he’s ready to tell them what they don’t want to hear because that’s how tough, smart diplomacy works, and that’s how American leaders have scored some of the greatest strategic successes in US history.

Good memo, and good foreign policy proposals for the most part. I think his stance on diplomacy is my favorite if not one of my favorite parts about his foreign policy.

Iran

Bush and Congress could collide on Iran - Basically, will Bush even see fit to come to Congress for authorization to use force in Iraq. All indication tell me that at this point he would find a way to claim that Congress cannot hamper his powers as Commander-In-Chief to wage a war in Iraq even though the Constitution is quite clear on this question.

If he were to strike Iran, he's just do it. The most Congress could do afterwards is complain about it after the fact, but there might be little Congress could do to keep him from doing it. I really hope I'm wrong about that.

And imagine what would happen. He strikes...and the criticism doesn't come because people are too afraid to say anything lest they be charged with wanting our military to fail in the current Iran mission. Speculation, I know. But who knows.

Iraq

Administration and war-cheerleader claims that the 'surge' has decreased sectarian violence has, like so many things they said, turned out to be false

Iraqi and American military officials say incidents of sectarian "cleansing" in Baghdad have decreased since a U.S. military clampdown began in February, but what is happening in Amil and neighboring Bayaa belies the claim.

Since May, Iraqi police say, more than 160 bodies have been found in Amil and Bayaa -- men without identification, usually shot and bearing signs of torture, hallmarks of sectarian death squads.

On many days, the number of corpses found in the two neighborhoods account for half of those picked up across the capital. Before the war, Amil and Bayaa were middle-class neighborhoods where Sunnis and Shiites lived easily among one another. Now, not only are they mainly Shiite, but they have become prime territory for Shiite militias looking to expand into the surrounding Sunni-dominated areas.

Like I say: Take administration claims with a grain of salt. Take military claims with a grain of salt as well.

Take General Petraeus much anticipated September Surge Progress Report with A HUGE grain of salt. Actual progress or not...the report will tell us that there is. So instead of pressure being put on withdrawal as September comes like those wavering Republicans are promising...

They instead will push for 'more time', and with that, withdrawal becomes the problem for the next president and Congress to undertake. [Both likely will be Democratic-controlled]

Dick Cheney Gets STUPIDER With Age

I bet this will surprise you. I knew his position back during the early 90's but its interesting that there is actual video of it. Really brings home how much of a dumbass he became.

Video Surfaces of Cheney, in 1994, Warning That An Invasion of Iraq Would Lead to 'Quagmire'

It's not the first time that citizen "investigative journalists" have uncovered some embarrassing, or telling, nugget from the past that apparently remained buried for years. But it has happened again with the posting of a now wildly popular video on YouTube that shows Dick Cheney explaining in 1994 that trying to take over Iraq would be a "bad idea" and lead to a "quagmire."

The people who put it up come from a site called Grand Theft Country, the on-screen source appears to be the conservative American Enterprise Institute, and the date on the screen is April 15, 1994. That looks right, by the age of Cheney.

I am definitely getting that video and will be putting it on my profile.

There is a saying: 'With age comes wisdom'

...Well, not always it seems.

Good night.