Archive for the 'Obama Administration' Category

It is no secret that the Iranians continue to supply weapons to Iraqi Shi’a insurgents, and even deploy their own Quds to perpetrate violence inside Iraq.  From the June 2009 issue of the Sentinel at the Combatting Terrorism Center at West Point.

On may 6, 2009, Iraqi Army and police auxiliary units supported by U.S. advisers discovered a cache of weapons hidden along the banks of the Tigris River in Amara, the capital of the majority Shi`a Maysan Province. The hoard included 150 copper plates for use in Explosively-Formed Projectile (EFP) roadside bombs, which have the highest per-incident lethality rate of any explosive device used in Iraq. Along with the professionally milled copper cones were 70 passive infrared firing switches used to precisely detonate EFP devices as vehicles enter the killing zone. Fifty rocket launching rails were also located, composed of modified carjacks designed to elevate 107mm and 122mm rockets for relatively accurate long-range attacks.

This is recent indication of the extent and magnitude of involvement of Iranian elements in the affairs of Iraq – and by extrapolation the U.S. because so many U.S. Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines have died in Iraq.  While this was a weapons cache, a static display of involvement, the kinetic fight against Iranian elements went on on unabated even as late as autumn 2008 according to intelligence reports mined by the Sentinel.

The Hawr al-Howeiza marshes further to the south offer another clear example of insurgent groups seeking to defend their lines of communication and supply to sanctuaries and logistical networks in Iran. The Hawr al-Howeiza has long been a major smuggling route between Iran and Iraq due to the difficulties of policing the maze of waterways that permeate the border. U.S. and Iraqi Army forces have strung a line of border forts across the Hawr al-Howeiza, supported by FOBs north and south of the marshes at Musharrah and Qalit Salih, respectively. U.S. forces met resistance as soon as the process began in the autumn of 2008. Large Iranian-made 240mm rockets were used to attack U.S. FOBs around Qalit Salih, and the frequency of mortar and rocket attacks increased against the U.S. FOB in Majar al-Kabir. Each month since September 2008, two to four EFPs have been laid on U.S. access routes to the marshes. These attacks have borne the classic hallmarks of Lebanese Hizb Allah training in terms of configuration of passive-infrared telemetry, remote-control arming switches and encasement in molded insulation foam “rocks.” Other roadside bombs included 10 well-concealed daisy-chained 155mm artillery shells on the access roads between the FOB in Qalit Salih and the Hawr al-Howeiza field. These attacks confirmed to patterns previously noted by UK explosives ordnance technicians when British forces last patrolled the areas in 2005.

So just how effective has Iranian involvement been in Iraq?  Steve Schippert gives us an important metric.

Immediately, the context you need: Since the beginning of U.S. operations in Iraq in 2003, fully 10 percent of our combat fatalities there have come at the hands of just one Iranian weapon — the EFP (Explosively Formed Penetrator), designed by Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps specifically to penetrate the armor of the M1 Abrams main battle tank and, consequently, everything else deployed in the field. It is how the Iranian regime has been killing your sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, mothers and fathers serving in Iraq.

I’ll wager you were not aware of that rather damning statistic. How do I know it? Well . . . I asked a friend in the Pentagon in 2007.  If ambitious journalists would like to share this with their readers and viewers, please do. The numbers are not secret; I am sure they have even been updated. Perhaps they were published elsewhere around the same time. If they were, chances are you never saw it. And those who have seen the figure likely saw it right here at The Tank on National Review Online. Because I wrote it. Over and over.

The current number of U.S. warriors who have perished in Iraq is at 4322.  This means that some 430 Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines have been killed in Iraq either by Iranians or Iranian supply weapons or trained insurgents.  We judge even this number to be likely a very low estimate.  Take note, however, that this doesn’t include the many more thousands or U.S. warriors who have no legs, who have lost hearing or eyesight, or who have lost proper brain function because of Iranian-supplied IEDs.

The previous administration battled Iran in Iraq, while still failing to see and treat this as the regional war that it is.  Democracy programs at the State Department were killed under Condi Rice, and up until late 2008 Iranian elements were given free access to Iraq.  The only success in battling Iranian elements came within Iraq itself, a victory to be sure, but costly nonetheless.

Has Iran learned any lessons from this, and how will the current administration interact with Iran?  If the recent failure even to give verbal and informal support to fledgling freedom fighters on the streets of Tehran wasn’t enough, we now have the Obama administration to thank for one of the the most shameful incidents in American history.

There are a few things you need to know about President Obama’s shameful release on Thursday of the “Irbil Five” — Quds Force commanders from Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) who were coordinating terrorist attacks in Iraq that have killed hundreds — yes, hundreds — of American soldiers and Marines.

First, of the 4,322 Americans killed in combat in Iraq since 2003, 10 percent of them (i.e., more than 400) have been murdered by a single type of weapon alone, a weapon that is supplied by Iran for the singular purpose of murdering Americans. As Steve Schippert explains at NRO’s military blog, the Tank, the weapon is “the EFP (Explosively Formed Penetrator), designed by Iran’s IRGC specifically to penetrate the armor of the M1 Abrams main battle tank and, consequently, everything else deployed in the field.” Understand: This does not mean Iran has killed only 400 Americans in Iraq. The number killed and wounded at the mullahs’ direction is far higher than that — likely multiples of that — when factoring in the IRGC’s other tactics, such as the mustering of Hezbollah-style Shiite terror cells.

Second, President Bush and our armed forces steadfastly refused demands by Iran and Iraq’s Maliki government for the release of the Irbil Five because Iran was continuing to coordinate terrorist operations against American forces in Iraq (and to aid Taliban operations against American forces in Afghanistan). Freeing the Quds operatives obviously would return the most effective, dedicated terrorist trainers to their grisly business …

Third, Obama’s decision to release the five terror-masters comes while the Iranian regime (a) is still conducting operations against Americans in Iraq, even as we are in the process of withdrawing, and (b) is clearly working to replicate its Lebanon model in Iraq: establishing a Shiite terror network, loyal to Iran, as added pressure on the pliant Maliki to understand who is boss once the Americans leave.

Fourth, President Obama’s release of the Quds terrorists is a natural continuation of his administration’s stunningly irresponsible policy of bartering terrorist prisoners for hostages. As I detailed here on June 24, Obama has already released a leader of the Iran-backed Asaib al-Haq terror network in Iraq, a jihadist who is among those responsible for the 2007 murders of five American troops in Karbala. While the release was ludicrously portrayed as an effort to further “Iraqi reconciliation” (as if that would be a valid reason to spring a terrorist who had killed Americans), it was in actuality a naïve attempt to secure the reciprocal release of five British hostages — and a predictably disastrous one: The terror network released only the corpses of two of the hostages, threatening to kill the remaining three (and who knows whether they still are alive?) unless other terror leaders were released.

Michael Ledeen has reported that the release of the Irbil Five is part of the price Iran has demanded for its release in May of the freelance journalist Roxana Saberi. Again, that’s only part of the price: Iran also has demanded the release of hundreds of its other terror facilitators in our custody. Expect to see Obama accommodate this demand, too, in the weeks ahead.

So this report begs the question: is a free lance journalist so valuable that the President of the U.S. would release terrorists who had managed the killing of well over 400 U.S. servicemen?  The obvious answer to that question is no, which leaves us with only one other alternative.

Finally, when it comes to Iran, it has become increasingly apparent that President Obama wants the mullahs to win. What you need to know is that Barack Obama is a wolf in “pragmatist” clothing: Beneath the easy smile and above-it-all manner — the “neutral” doing his best to weigh competing claims — is a radical leftist wedded to a Manichean vision that depicts American imperialism as the primary evil in the world.

Sadly, McCarthy’s analysis is the only logical one left.  If there is no pragmatic reason to take an action, one must search next for ideological ones.  And the ghosts of hundreds of sons of America haunt us still.

You know all about National Security Advisor Jim Jones’ terse warning to the commanders in Afghanistan that they had gotten all of the troops they were going to get?  As it turns out, Mullen decided that he would respond by giving Jones a pop to the back of the head.

WALLACE: You talked about troop levels. I want to talk about not just in southern Afghanistan but throughout the country…

MULLEN: Sure.

WALLACE: … because there seem to be mixed messages this week about our troop level policy for Afghanistan.

National Security Adviser James Jones was quoted this week as telling U.S. commanders they are not to expect any more troops beyond what the president has already promised.

You were quoted the next day as saying the top new commander, General McChrystal, is going to make a review, and he can ask for as many troops as he wants. Admiral, which is it?

MULLEN: I’ve had — I’ve had discussions with General Jones, also with the president, and I think we’re all committed to making sure we resource this correctly.

President Obama has committed the forces that we’ve asked this year. General McChrystal, who is the brand-new leader there, is in the middle of an assessment. He’ll come back in about 45 days with his assessment in terms of what he needs.

My guidance to him had been, “Tell us what you need, and then come back and we’ll work that.” And it’s guidance that both General Jones and the president understands and support.

I think one of the points is we have to make sure that every single American that is there is one that we absolutely need.

In addition, the commander on the ground has to assess with a new strategy, and he’s a — and new leadership — really zero base — not just what’s there, but what he needs for the future, and we expect that sometime the end of July or middle of August.

We’ll see if the administration deploys the necessary troops and does the necessary logistics to ensure that the campaign ends acceptably.  In the mean time, it couldn’t be clearer.  Jim Jones is not a serious man, and as a sign of his impotence and uselessness to us in his current position, Mullen has had to tell him to shut up because he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.  Jim Jones should resign.

Prior:

Calling on National Security Advisor James L. Jones to Resign

Afghanistan: The WTF? War

Jules Crittenden has an important report concerning the view of Operating Enduring Freedom from inside the administration.

During the briefing, (Brig. Gen. Lawrence) Nicholson had told Jones that he was “a little light,” more than hinting that he could use more forces, probably thousands more. “We don’t have enough force to go everywhere,” Nicholson said.

But Jones recalled how Obama had initially decided to deploy additional forces this year. “At a table much like this,” Jones said, referring to the polished wood table in the White House Situation Room, “the president’s principals met and agreed to recommend 17,000 more troops for Afghanistan.” The principals — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton; Gates; Mullen; and the director of national intelligence, Dennis C. Blair — made this recommendation in February during the first full month of the Obama administration. The president approved the deployments, which included Nicholson’s Marines.

Soon after that, Jones said, the principals told the president, “oops,” we need an additional 4,000 to help train the Afghan army.

“They then said, ‘If you do all that, we think we can turn this around,’ ” Jones said, reminding the Marines here that the president had quickly approved and publicly announced the additional 4,000.

Now suppose you’re the president, Jones told them, and the requests come into the White House for yet more force. How do you think Obama might look at this? Jones asked, casting his eyes around the colonels. How do you think he might feel?

Jones let the question hang in the air-conditioned, fluorescent-lighted room. Nicholson and the colonels said nothing.

Well, Jones went on, after all those additional troops, 17,000 plus 4,000 more, if there were new requests for force now, the president would quite likely have “a Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moment.” Everyone in the room caught the phonetic reference to WTF — which in the military and elsewhere means “What the [expletive]?”

Nicholson and his colonels — all or nearly all veterans of Iraq — seemed to blanch at the unambiguous message that this might be all the troops they were going to get.

Jules goes on to cite some “folksy” counterinsurgency quotes, something with which we have also dealt concerning Operation Khanjar.  He also mentions that Woodward buried and obfuscated his lede.  True words – let’s unpack them a bit.

We learn several things from this article.  First we learn the limitations of Woodward’s reporting, or the editing at the Washington Post, or both.  This report is monumental.  Obama ran against the campaign in Iraq, unequivocally stating that the troops needed to be in Afghanistan.  This was stated too many times to count, in too many different venues and publications to recite.  It’s now clear that he will allow somewhat less than 70,000 U.S. troops to deploy to Afghanistan at any one time, regardless of what might have been advocated half a year earlier.

In a separate but roughly parallel evolution, Dr. John Nagl was advocating 600,000 troops for Afghanistan based on the model in FM 3-24.  The Center for a New American Security saw the advent of Dr. Nagl as its President, along with Andrew Exum as a fellow.  CNAS now advises the Obama administration, and will likely never again advocate 600,000 troops for Afghanistan.  They are assisting the administration in the development of a strategy that doesn’t rely on the force size advocated in FM 3-24, regardless of what might have been advocated half a year ago.

There is his story.  Woodward has written books on less than this, but the main story gets buried in the balance of the report.

Next, we learn that National Security Advisor James Jones isn’t qualified for the job.  It’s his job – while all of the other principals are outlining a strategy and force projection that they believe will be endorsed by the President – to be whispering in the ear of the President: “Listen to them, but only so far.  Iraq has taught us that this is harder than we think it will be on our first or even second or third take.  If they’re telling you that the Afghan National Army can substitute for our own troops, they aren’t accounting for the drug addiction, incompetence and treachery of the Afghan Army.  This will be long term, protracted, part of the long war.  Iraq was long and hard, and Petraeus rightly said that Afghanistan would be the longest engagement in the long war.  Fully expect for them to come back asking for more troops, because they will need them.  You are a wartime President, sir.”

But he didn’t whisper these things in the ear of the President.  Instead, he sat at a table with Marine Colonels who didn’t give input to the strategy and told them that to Obama, Afghanistan is a WTF? war.  Learning and evolution by the administration or troops in the field are not options.  You get no more forces.  It’s time to put a serious man in the office of National Security Advisor.  Jones isn’t it.

Finally, most of America doesn’t listen or know what is going on in either Operation Iraqi Freedom or Operation Enduring Freedom, and certainly they wouldn’t be able to describe the differences between the U.S. and the ISAF.  All they see are the reports on Television, and even the military families don’t know the real status of things in Afghanistan, most of them.  But CNAS has no excuse.  They know.

Like us, they know that the Afghan National Army is shot through with drug use, even during combat operations and patrols.  For a pictorial depiction of what Exum himself called depressing, see this video of the incompetence and drug use.  Like us, they also know that Afghanistan may not be able financially to support an Army as large as the one envisioned as the replacement for U.S. forces.  Then there is the treachery, such as at the Battle of Bari Alai where it is believed that Afghan troops colluded with the Taliban to kill U.S. troops.  CNAS knows that the Afghan National Army is no replacement for U.S. troops, and that the campaign in Afghanistan is under-resourced.  Jim Jones knows it too, as the Colonels have told him so, even if he chose not to hear it.

So we now know that the current administration sees Operation Enduring Freedom as the WTF? war.  We know that the National Security Advisor doesn’t have the fortitude to whisper the hard things in the ear of the President.  We know that the President doesn’t really want to deploy more troops to Afghanistan, and we also know that the Colonels want more troops to cover their area of operations.

This sets the stage for the coming phase of the campaign.  We have seen this before in Iraq: hasty turnover to the ISF and more difficult counterinsurgency than had previously been planned.  The dissimilarity is a President who was willing to send the necessary forces to get the job done.

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The Huffington Post links our Operation Khanjar category in their coverage of the most recent Marine Corps operations in the Helmand Province, as well they should.  We have extensively covered, analyzed and commented on the campaign in Afghanistan for several years now, including detailed coverage of Marine Corps operations in Garmser and Now Zad for about a year (and beginning with reports that couldn’t be found in the MSM).

One Twitter post is interesting: “It is cool that the new Afghan operation is named “Khanjar“, an Arabic word. Anyone else think this will drive the right-wing media crazy??”  Drive the right-wing media crazy as it did with Operation Al Fajr, or Operation Alljah?  Seriously?  Does anyone know any media analyst or reporter, right or left wing, who is driven crazy by the names of operations?

But continuing with our main point, the commenters extend the love to the U.S. Marines.

I’ve said before that our combat Marines are doing a job that 99.99% of us are either unwilling or incapable of doing ourselves. They’re doing a great job and I hope their mission is successful …

Get some, Marines!  I wish I could be there with you …

Hooah! …

Maybe, finally my friends and neighbors will rest in peace …

There are a few dubious comments too.  But another Huffington Post article early in 2008 (linking the LA Times) cited Marine Major General Gaskin saying that the gains in Anbar were permanent.  Essentially, mission accomplished.  No comments, except one asking if we were “Tired of the NeoCons getting away with their crimes?”

Some of this love would have been nice in 2004 – 2008 when more than 1000 Marines perished in the Anbar Province of Iraq.  Ah, but that wasn’t Obama’s war, was it?

As for Obama’s war, Jules Crittenden has linked and commented on a Washington Post article that is stunning in its revelation about how the Obama administration sees this and similar Afghanistan operations.

During the briefing, (Brig. Gen. Lawrence) Nicholson had told Jones that he was “a little light,” more than hinting that he could use more forces, probably thousands more. “We don’t have enough force to go everywhere,” Nicholson said.

But Jones recalled how Obama had initially decided to deploy additional forces this year. “At a table much like this,” Jones said, referring to the polished wood table in the White House Situation Room, “the president’s principals met and agreed to recommend 17,000 more troops for Afghanistan.” The principals — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton; Gates; Mullen; and the director of national intelligence, Dennis C. Blair — made this recommendation in February during the first full month of the Obama administration. The president approved the deployments, which included Nicholson’s Marines.

Soon after that, Jones said, the principals told the president, “oops,” we need an additional 4,000 to help train the Afghan army.

“They then said, ‘If you do all that, we think we can turn this around,’ ” Jones said, reminding the Marines here that the president had quickly approved and publicly announced the additional 4,000.

Now suppose you’re the president, Jones told them, and the requests come into the White House for yet more force. How do you think Obama might look at this? Jones asked, casting his eyes around the colonels. How do you think he might feel?

Jones let the question hang in the air-conditioned, fluorescent-lighted room. Nicholson and the colonels said nothing.

Well, Jones went on, after all those additional troops, 17,000 plus 4,000 more, if there were new requests for force now, the president would quite likely have “a Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moment.” Everyone in the room caught the phonetic reference to WTF — which in the military and elsewhere means “What the [expletive]?”

Nicholson and his colonels — all or nearly all veterans of Iraq — seemed to blanch at the unambiguous message that this might be all the troops they were going to get.

So much for the love from the Huffington Post to the Marines – they only love them sometimes.  And it appears that Obama doesn’t share the same love, at least in terms of supplying them with troops … even if they ask for more.

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The Obama administration is struggling to find the right response to the elections and aftermath in Iran.

The political unrest in Iran presents the Obama administration with a dilemma: keep quiet to pursue a nuclear deal with Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the country’s supreme leader, or heed calls to respond more supportively to the protesters there — and risk alienating the Shiite cleric.

President Obama and his advisers have struggled to strike the right tone, carefully calibrating positive messages about the protests in an effort to avoid giving the government in Tehran the excuse to portray the demonstrators as pro-American. Nevertheless, the Iranian Foreign Ministry yesterday summoned the Swiss ambassador, who represents American interests in Tehran, to complain of “interventionist” comments by U.S. officials, the official Islamic Republic News Agency reported.

In an apt summation of the administration’s position yesterday, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton told reporters: “We are obviously waiting to see the outcome of the internal Iranian processes, but our intent is to pursue whatever opportunities might exist in the future with Iran.”

The explanations for this reticence are mainly twofold.  First there is the romantic belief in the virtue of the vote.  As long as it can be demonstrated that the consequences resulted from free and fair elections, then the goal has been met to reflect the will of the people.  But the notion that it is the duty of the U.S. to spread democracy across the globe doesn’t have many supporters, and rightly so.

History has shown that democracy doesn’t always yield results that are in the interests of our own security, and the pursuit of ambitions that would have a deleterious affect on our sovereignty and security would make a two-headed monster of U.S. foreign policy.  It is – or should be – the duty of the State Department, the Armed Forces, and the intelligence community to further the security of U.S., not to sacrifice it for romantic ideals.  The administration’s observations that Ahmadinejad may have actually won the election or that we should not involve ourselves in Iran’s electoral politics are a ruse.  Even if Bush flirted with pressing the growth of democracy throughout the world, the Obama administration has demonstrated absolutely no such tendencies.

The second explanation for this reticence has to do with seeing the world through pragmatic eyes.  Oddly enough, with the silence of the administration this argument has primarily been advanced by Bill O’Reilly on behalf of the Obama administration over the past several nights.  If we are seen as taking sides against the Iranian regime, the argument goes, then the power centers of Iran (the Mullahs, Iranian Revolutionary Guard) can make things much more difficult in Iraq and Afghanistan, and thus we have had to walk circumspectly.

The problem is that this argument presupposes that Iran has made a deliberate choice to stand down in military actions in both countries as a result of some good will towards the U.S., while the very same choice is simultaneously contrary to the best interests of the Iranian regime.  This behavior, if true, would go directly against history and everything we know about the Mullahs.  There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever to suggest that the Mullahs have made such a good will gesture concerning either Iraq or Afghanistan.

But the likelihood is that neither of these two explanations comes anywhere close to being right.  The deep confusion, the dumbfounded silence, the childish bewilderment, betrays a more serious problem.  The administration doesn’t know how to respond because this isn’t supposed to be happening.

Rather than there being evil inherent in other regimes, it’s supposed to be the heavy-handed meddling, the arrogance and the poor foreign policy of the U.S. that has caused the problems throughout the Middle East and Central Asia.  The world is supposed to be populated by good people who have only the best of intentions, and with enough coaxing, explanations, good will, promises, arguments and lawyerly presentations, peace and cooperation will be and must be brought to the world.

Only when Obama looks across the scene, the vote has obviously been rigged, the IRG stands ready to brutalize its own people, the Mullahs still want nuclear weapons, and the Mullahs have cast their lot with Ahmadinejad as the puppet du jour.  The fruitful negotiations that the administration so desperately wants show no hope of getting off the ground, and even if they did, they would be with an illegitimate regime.

None of this comports with the world view.  As Netanyahu was recently told by an American official, “We are going to change the world. Please, don’t interfere.”  But as we are beginning to see, situations that contradict the world view don’t result in amending that world view.  They simply stupefy the administration.  Thus they stare in disbelief and silence as Iran goes up in flames.  It’s all a matter of presuppositions and world view.

In Palau Taking the Uighurs for 200,000,000 Dollars, The Captain’s Journal noted the absurdity of spending this kind of money on a handful of Chinese Muslim terrorists.  It amounted to the cost of more than 100,000 sets of body armor for our troops, and the Chinese are going to a tropical paradise on the Island of Palau.  At any rate, we called them “terrorists.”

Joshua Foust took issue with this characterization, and sent a link to Obsidian Wings along (noting that it wasn’t my “cup of tea” – and he is certainly right), as well as a few other links.  He asked if I had any more data on them to justify calling them terrorists?

I must confess that I know between little and nothing about them (although I do know that there is a budding Chinese Muslim insurgency in Western China).  I have better things to do than spend my time studying this particular group.  The choice of words was instantaneous (in a post that took five minutes to write) and not meant to convey a wealth of knowledge about the Uighurs.  Michael Yon and I were also chatting about this, and Michael wondered if they happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Perhaps so.  But Michael and I certainly agree on one thing.  Give them to me (Michael and I will have to fight over them).  LT Nixon also wants them.  Catch: we get the $200,000,000 too.  So I’ve got to throw down with Michael and LT Nixon over the Uighurs.  They are younger than me, but I have wisdom and treachery working on my side.

Keeping the Uighurs would actually be easy I think.  I would just hire a few of the bad dudes I work out with (I still hurt from all of those inclined bench presses I did on Friday), and let them hang with me along with the bad dudes.  We could chain ourselves together and make field trips to the grocery store and gym).  I think $200,000,000 would handle the expenses.  Oh, and picking up TVs and heaving them across the room would be off limits – and I would implement that rule by use of force if necessary.  Neither would I allow discussions of Muslim separatist movements, and yes, I do consider that to be a bad policy, one that I would have a right to control.

Concerning the money the U.S. government paid to get this done, as LT Nixon said – “Uncle Sucker.”

Postscript: Based on where he is, you should expect interesting things coming from Michael Yon in the near future.

Closing GITMO has its price.  The Chinese Muslims at GITMO, called the Uighurs, included four who had been cleared of charges by the U.S.  Bermuda has agreed to take them in and allow them to pursue citizenship.  As for the balance of the Chinese terrorists captured on the field of battle, all thirteen of them?  Well, the tiny Island of Palau with a population of 20,000 has agreed to take them in for whopping $200,000,000.  This amounts to $10,000 per person for every citizen.

Now.  Let’s assume that front, rear and side SAPI plates (small arms protective inserts), plus the soft panel ballistic protection against shrapnel, plus the carrier, costs a total of $2000 for complete body armor (this figure is slightly to moderately exaggerated).  This means that for what we have spent on sending thirteen terrorists to the Island of Palau we could have purchased 100,000 full sets of body armor for Soldiers and Marines.

It also means that wounded warriors who are being denied coverage will still have to plead with the authorities for full recognition of their wounds from war, both mental and physical.  So while our warriors need body armor and rehabilitation and assistance, Chinese Muslim terrorists have been released to Bermuda (where most people cannot afford to go on vacation) and other such Islands.

This means that to finally address the issue of each Chinese Muslim terrorist has cost us $15,384,615.  Extremely conservative estimates are that Baitullah Mehsud has around 20,000 fighters at his disposal.  Disposal of them will cost us a mere 308 Billion Dollars if history is any indication of the future.  It’s time for another spending package.  Call up Timothy Geithner and tell him to get the printing presses rolling.

Note: Updated with Further Thoughts on the Uighurs

From the New York Times:

Having sent the Iranian people a video greeting on their New Year, President Obama is now inviting them to help celebrate a quintessentially American holiday, the Fourth of July.

Last Friday, the State Department sent a cable to its embassies and consulates around the world notifying them that “they may invite representatives from the government of Iran” to their Independence Day celebrations — annual receptions that typically feature hot dogs, red-white-and-blue bunting and some perfunctory remarks about the founding fathers.

Administration officials characterized the move as another in a series of American overtures to Iran. The United States has not had relations with Iran since the American Embassy in Tehran was seized by protesters in 1979; the country’s diplomats have not been formally invited to American events since then.

“It is another way of saying we are not putting barriers in the way of communicating,” said one administration official. “It is another way of signaling that there is an opportunity that should not be wasted.”

A second official said the ban no longer made sense, at a time when the United States was actively engaging with Iranian officials elsewhere. In March, the administration’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard C. Holbrooke, chatted with Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Mohammad Mehdi Akhondzadeh, at a conference in The Hague.

Of course, the U.S. has “chatted” with the Iranians for twenty fives years.  Now it has devolved into grovelling to them over hot dogs and picnics.  Truth is stranger than fiction.  If I was tasked with the duty to design and formulate a plan to make Obama look weak and effeminate before the world, I couldn’t have done any better than he is doing himself.

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PRESIDENT OBAMA’S VISIT TO RIO RANCHO, NM

Today is May 14, 2009.  President Obama came to visit Rio Rancho, NM and hold a kind of “town hall meeting” of sorts.  I did not vote for Mr. Obama, however, I felt compelled to go and be present at his visit.  There was no way I could obtain a ticket so I contacted the Governor’s office and explained that my son is currently on his fifth deployment to the war zone and that we had lost our older son, eight years ago, who was a US Marine.  In short order, I received two tickets to attend.  I wanted to speak directly to the Governor and the President, but, that would not happen on this day.  Maybe some day in the future it will, we’ll see.

As for my take on the so called “town hall” meeting, I have some comments to make.  Let me firstly say, Mr. Obama is all of our Commander in Chief, so, no matter what we think politically, left or right, Mr. Obama is the one who now controls my son’s destiny at war.  My son has now served under three Presidents in his nine year career as an Army aviator.  So I have a stake in what the current Commander in Chief has to say.  But what did this new Commander in Chief have to say today here in New Mexico…?

Observing the crowd, and listening to what was being said both verbally and non-verbally (body language), it seemed as though all I heard from the crowd was, “Mr. Obama, please pay off my credit card bills and please pay off my house mortgage.  We’ve been too irresponsible to do it ourselves and you promised to give us all this free stuff….”  That is what it sounded like to me.  But I kept my mouth shut.  I am always considerate of my surroundings, wherever I am at any given moment.

In all fairness to Mr. Obama, he said one thing I agreed with.  Credit cards are not free money.  Duh……However, for some reason the people in the audience today, almost 3000 of them, seemed to think it is the governments’ job to pay their credit card bills.  No wonder they think that, we’ve seen the current administration bail out big time bankers to the tune of trillions of dollars and rising, so, perhaps it is only fitting that the average dumbed-down New Mexican should think the same about their personal credit card debt…..What a country…!

I find it really tough to be in the crowd of 3000 whiny New Mexicans complaining about how deep in debt they got themselves in while at the same time I have to worry about my son flying combat helicopter missions in Iraq, again, protecting the rights of these New Mexicans to ask for more free money from Mr. Obama.  I remember back, exactly eight years ago to the day, when my other son, 2nd Lt. Jesse James Spiri, USMC was operated on for a serious medical situation and was told he would die and that his government would not spend one dime to help him.  And he was a United States Marine Officer.  I think there is something wrong with this picture.  Now granted, this did not happen on Mr. Obama’s watch, but what is currently happening on Mr. Obama’s watch is this.  Our nation is even the more so at war now in the middle east and my younger son is there again.  And he would go another five times if called upon.  He, like is father, is a true patriot.  If the Commander in Chief says, “jump”, we both say “how high?”.

But…Mr. Obama wanted to talk about New Mexican’s credit card debt, not my son at war, today.  I was almost called upon, but Mr. Obama chose his questioners carefully.  He did not call upon anyone that looked like me.  Rather he chose to call on people that were in unions, worked for the Congressman’s office from district 3, etc.  He should have called on me.  I would have asked him this question…

“Mr. Obama, when you are finished paying off the credit card debts of all these irresponsible New Mexicans, and bailing out all those fat cats on Wall Street and their banker friends,  will there be any money left to continue the maintaining of the CH47 helicopter fleet the Army is using whose funds you have scheduled to cut?  My son has served his country on five deployments in the war zones of the middle east and there is talk that cuts in the Chinook helicopter community is imminent.  You have asked my son to fight the country’s wars and he has done so valiantly, but now, you have his helicopters on the chopping blocks so these irresponsible New Mexicans who cannot seem to stay away from Wal-Mart and Best Buy, want you to take care of them, while they scream against those fighting for our freedom and safety…What’s up with that..?” I would ask.

But, Mr. Obama did not call upon me.  Maybe he knew who I was.  Maybe he knew what I would ask.  I’m not sure.  But I know this, when he asks my son to go to war, as my son has just done, two weeks ago, I am forced to say, “Amen”, again.

Today, I saw Mr. Obama and heard him speak.  Many say how smart he is, how intellectual he is.  I found him rather boring today.  Oh, he knew a little about how to talk to a crowd, but, on this day, there was nothing really earth shattering that he said that struck a chord with me.  He is still my Commander in Chief.  I respect his position.  But I am not impressed with his talk today.  He didn’t say anything relevant to things I’m concerned about.  Once before, my government told me there was not enough money to take care of my son, a Marine.  Now, my government is telling me there is plenty of money to bail out bankers and New Mexicans that cannot pay their credit card bill from Wal Mart.  But my government is not saying anything about taking care of the helicopters my younger son is flying in war to give these irresponsible New Mexicans the freedom to ask the current Commander in Chief for some money to pay their credit cards off.

I’m not impressed.  But I will still salute the current Commander in Chief and pray that my son will be safe in his helicopter while at war.

Sincerely,

Jim Spiri

jimspiri@yahoo.com   505-898-1680

General McKiernan is out as the head of U.S. forces in Afghanistan.

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates today asked for the resignation of the top American commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David McKiernan, saying the U.S. military “must do better” in executing the administration’s new strategy there.

Gates recommended that President Obama nominate veteran Special Operations commander Lt. Gen. Stanley McChrystal to replace McKiernan, who would depart as soon as a successor is confirmed. Gates also recommended that Lt. Gen. David Rodriguez, the former head of U.S. forces in eastern Afghanistan who is currently serving as Gates’s military assistant, be nominated to serve in a new position as McChrystal’s deputy.

The leadership shift comes as the Obama administration has voiced increasingly urgent concern about the surge in violence in Afghanistan as well as unrest in neighboring Pakistan.

“We have a new strategy, a new mission and a new ambassador. I believe that new military leadership is also needed,” Gates said at a hastily convened Pentagon news conference.

“I think these two officers will bring . . . a focus which we really need in 2009. And I just didn’t think we could wait until 2010,” Gates said.

Gates praised McChrystal and Rodriguez for their “a unique skill set in counterinsurgency” as well as “fresh thinking.”

We learn just a bit more about why this decision has been made through undisclosed sources.

The officials say McKiernan, who’s been top U.S. commander in Afghanistan for about a year was too much “old army.” McChrystal, on the other hand, was one of the top Special Operations Forces commanders who led the operation that killed al Qaeda’s top leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al Zarqawi. Gates and CENTCOM commander Gen. David Petraeus reportedly decided McChrystal was the most logical and best choice to lead the new counter-insurgency, counter-narcotics campaign in Afghanistan.

At The Captain’s Journal we simply cannot forget the awful judgment by General Rodriguez – probably parroting Army intelligence – that the Taliban were distracted and there wouldn’t be a spring offensive in 2008.  As for General McChrystal, his participation in the Zarqawi operation means that he knows how to accomplish high value target kills, a strategy that has failed us thus far in Afghanistan as a replacement for boots on the ground.  Thus far we aren’t impressed.

There is further trouble, and it is the phrase “counter-narcotics.”  The U.S. Marines in Helmand (24th MEU) specifically ignored the poppy, as their strategy was to kill the Taliban (some 400 of them) and provide for security for the population (begun before end of the campaign in Garmser, turned over to the British).  We have spoken against the poppy eradication efforts, as it will do little to accomplish the mission, but will infuriate the local farmers who are attempting to support their families and thus add to the insurgency.

As we have discussed, the Taliban raise revenue by any number of means, including kidnapping, taxes on small businesses, extortion, emerald mines, timber harvesting, and so forth.  A recent effort to replace poppy with pomegranates saw the Taliban at the town meetings, ready to tax pomegranates instead of poppy.  The problem is the Taliban, not the poppy.

It also doesn’t ring true to us that McKiernan is “old school.”  McKiernan showed great support and ownership of the U.S. Marine Corps operations in Garmser, from both the harder side to the softer side.  But this change does strike us as a strategic statement in Afghanistan.

McKiernan wanted a heavier footprint, just as did Mr. Obama during his campaign for Presidency.  He continually requested more troops.  John Nagl, who is now head of the Center for a New American Security (which, ironically, is currently advising the Obama administration), has stated that up to 600,000 troops would be required in Afghanistan, and advocated such a commitment.

The Captain’s Journal has advocated a larger commitment, but had never believed that it would require 600,000 troops, just more of the style of counterinsurgency conducted by the Marines in Helmand (minimal ratio of support to infantry troops, deployment to areas where the Taliban are the strongest, kinetics followed on by remaining in the AO to provide security for the population, etc.).  Yet reality seems to have sunken deep into the administration.  We don’t have 600,000 troops to commit.

In sparsely covered news, there also seems to be a deep reluctance to deploy more than about 68,000 troops in Afghanistan.  So another strategy must be employed.  It’s difficult to tell with certainty what this strategy entails, since this administration isn’t telling us and has declared the metrics for the Afghanistan campaign to be classified.  But a relatively good guess might be that heavier reliance will be made on special operations forces attacks on high value targets, which would be more of the same strategy that had failed us so far in Afghanistan.

Finally, there is a debate among counterinsurgency experts as to where to deploy what additional resources the administration is willing to commit – urban population centers or rural terrain where the Taliban function, get their resources, and enforce their government.  The former seems to have won.  The troops are going to the population centers, a mistake that the Russians made during their campaign.  The Russians were prisoners of their own armor and city boundaries until their logistical difficulties and constant drain of casualties took enough of a toll for them to withdraw in defeat.

We have been advocates for the deployment of special operations forces (and specialized billets) as part of and attached to infantry units.  Directing SOF to conduct raids against targets they won’t engage the next morning to examine and answer for the destruction is separating them from the counterinsurgency they need to support.  Disengaging SOF from the population is a profound mistake, almost as bad as disengaging infantry from performing these direct action kinetics.  Large forward operating bases to house large forces of support units were a strategic mistake in Iraq, and will be in Afghanistan.

The Captain’s Journal is less than sanguine about these changes.  Only time will tell if they succeed or fail.