Superior Force, Submission, and Cooperation

[Library Guy]

Axiom

Never make enemies faster than you are capable of killing them.

LG Roy

 

[longeyes]

The Cold War is at odds with this theory. The reason the Soviet Union lost was because they couldn’t afford the cost of winning.

Who says they lost? Look around you at the values of America's elites. We are the Soviet Union redux. This is all out of the Antonio Gramsci playbook, set in motion decades ago.

 

[agricola]

Its an appealing theory, though for that matter it doesnt go far enough (Old Fuff comes closest) - the vast superiority of the West (and for that matter the Soviet Union in Afganistan) is irrelevant because that superiority is never brought to bear - the war / counterinsurgency campaigns are (now) always fought at or closer to the level of the "weak" opponent - individual or small-unit actions predominate, and there is no overwhelming use of force. The various nations of the West have entered almost all their wars since World War 2 (with the exception of the Falklands) with one or more of its limbs tied behind its back.

This is a somewhat perverse situation given the vast bulk of military history up to and including the Second World War (especially the two atomic bombs on Japan) demonstrating the opposite view - that if you are going to fight you had better commit sufficient force with sufficient backing to beat the enemy, even if this is overwhelming force when viewed against the enemy and results in vast enemy / enemy civilian casualties - the important thing is you win with as little loss to yourself as possible. To use a recent example, had the army going against Falluja in 2004 been Roman, Mongol, Medieval, Islamic, Macedonian, Spanish or almost any of the great powers of history, they would have given the occupants the chance to surrender, then (if it was refused), would have besieged it, took it and sacked it, giving no further thought to the wellbeing of the occupants. Instead we find ourselves in worse trouble three years down the line and with no end in sight.

This reluctance to take the gloves off is, of course, is a relatively new development (mostly since the Second World War) in military affairs, largely because of the increased concern over civilian casualties, combined with more scrutiny of military matters by the media (allegedly) on behalf of society, and its unquestioned acceptance as part of "the laws of war" since Nuremburg, even though it has no historical basis and is, in any case, probably self-defeating, since there are numerous occasions in which the use of overwhelming force to terrorize an opponent ends wars that might otherwise have dragged on for years.

 

[ceetee]

Still and all, though, this all presumes a clearly defined enemy, and a clear and compelling reason to fight. The waters we swim in today are murky at best. Since we have no clear reason why our servicemen and women have been sent out to fight, we're in the tenuous position of giving them all the support we can, while having no faith that their cause is a just one. We merely hope that eventually there will be an end, and that they come through it and see that end unharmed.

Also, since there's no clear reason why a certain population has been defined as our enemy, we see no reason to go carpet-bomb them off the planet. We know that whatever tasks "our boys" are set to will be accomplished... we can only hope that not too much death is incurred as a result.

 

[Thin Black Line]

This is all out of the Antonio Gramsci playbook...

I haven't heard that name since my Russian Studies days. Beria was much
more interesting from the hands-on perspective. This also brings up the use
of stealth, surprise, etc when it comes to the use of force. Do we warn an
enemy for months on end about an attack or just do it in a flash, without
warning, and withdraw? What about the reliance on air power if the objective
is not to hold ground and pacify a population, but rather to strike a blow?

Also, since there's no clear reason why a certain population has been defined as our enemy, we see no reason to go carpet-bomb them off the planet.

Such wholesale destruction would not be appropriate in my morals or beliefs.
But, under what circumstances would this be acceptable to most people today?

Survival in warfare, whether as a nation or man to man, has been the ability
to quickly strike a deadly blow from a distance. This is why the guy
with the assault rifle has a better chance defeating the guy with the .25
pocket pistol. But, what if the guy hides among the crowd in a market?
What if there are 1/2 dozen guys in the crowd? Of course, we are not going
to pull back and bomb the crowded market to get the bad guys --that would
make us no better than when the bad guys bomb the market to inflict terror.

I guess we have to ask ourselves how we could pacify and search the entire
crowd --especially among people who would not appreciate us even being
there. Or, is it better to use the same stealthy tactics, move amongst
the crowd, and observe until the target is acquired.....and wait patiently.

No one stays in the crowded market forever.

 

[Orthonym]

Reminds me of some weird Southern Ante-Bellum writings

-of which I've read.

There was this one guy, Hinton Helper by name, who was opposed to slavery because it brought (horrors!) Negroes (OMG!) into the country. I actually looked into a book of his, printed 1850-something, paper still white, and they even let me check it out from the Ga. Tech library!

But.

There was also one of the Virginia Randolphs, I think, who was not a racist, but definately a slaver, who believed as Aristotle that most people had the "slave nature", whatever their color, and that people like him really were born booted and spurred to ride them.

 

[Orthonym]

Um, I meant definitely, not definately. Sorry.

 

[longeyes]

Gramsci

I haven't heard that name since my Russian Studies days. Beria was much
more interesting from the hands-on perspective.

This is a war on two fronts--or levels. The military and the cultural. Gramsci said to bore from within the cultural, infiltrate all of the social, economic, and moral underpinnings of a nation and transform it incrementally from inside.

Is it happening? You decide.

 

[ceetee]

Such wholesale destruction would not be appropriate in my morals or beliefs.
But, under what circumstances would this be acceptable to most people today?

It depends on how you define your enemy. One strategy during WWII was to drop liberal quantities of bombs over targets of military value. "Military value" meant everything from fuel storage to train stations. It was understood that not every bomb would hit a military target. Civilian losses were accepted as part of fighting the war. A case could be made that since a large number of civilians were actively employed in industries that directly fed the war effort (making munitions, war equipment, and the like) those "civilian" trargets were fair game.

The situation we find ourselves in now, though, is completely different. We've given ourselves billing as "liberators", but instead of liberating a subjected people, we're being seen (rightly or wrongly) as conquerors, and the orders our leaders are giving are making our personnel act the part of "boot on neck" conquerors. The rightness or wrongness of what we've done can be debated for years. What remains to be seen is... How do we extricate ourselves from the mire? Further, how do it in such a way as to be to our advantage, ant not to our disadvantage?

 

[Thin Black Line]

Civilian losses were accepted as part of fighting the war. A case could be made that since a large number of civilians were actively employed in industries that directly fed the war effort (making munitions, war equipment, and the like) those "civilian" trargets were fair game.

This is also the justification that terrorists use when they launch katushas
into civilian areas of Israel --they state killing women and children will reduce
the future male "occupiers" who would be available to the Israeli army.

How do we extricate ourselves from the mire? Further, how do it in such a way as to be to our advantage, ant not to our disadvantage?

This is why I go back to the Fortress America concept additionally modeled
on the way Switzerland maintains their borders, homeland defense, and
foreign policy with the rest of the world.

 

[Lonestar]

I think the difference between Iraq and Afghanistan, is that in Afghanistan we had a good relationship with the local opposition and was able to help select good, strong candidates for the future president and government. That's is what I love about the Green Berets, they sneak in and help the opposition, all we needed to do in Afganistan was assist the opposition, and everything went well (except the whole getting Bin Laden part).

If we would have kept on going in the First gulf war, backed the opposition, instead of letting Saddam slaughter them, we would have more better, stronger Iraqi people willing to step up after Saddam's downfall.

 

[ilbob]

Better yet, get Turkey to agree to a Kurdish state, and let the Kurds do their own thing, let the Sunnis have their chunk, and the Shia there little chunk. Give the population a year or so to move to where they want to be, and then just leave and let them work things out. The attempt to make the three groups that hate each other work together is going to take a lot of outside military force to accomplish.

 

[Stretchman]

Didn't work in India with Pakistan, and won't work here. You want a solution to the situation. Pick a side and stay on it. Be it Shiite, or Sunni, choose and commit. Otherwise, forget about it. If republicans and Democrats started going at it, there's no way anyone could stop them without promising a whole lot of collateral damage for both sides. We need to pull the ground troops back from the cities, and show them what an IED looks like when it comes on the tip of a cruise missile. We could hang out in the desert, or make some space of our own somewhere, and concentrate on the real reason we are there, which is oil.

We need to get the heck out of Baghdad. Period.

And we need to stop caring about whether or not the Iraqis ever get their heads together. We need to start worrying about the oil, and maybe the opiates, and how to get them from there to here, without the problems we are having now. That's where we need to invest our money. Then the Iraqis, sunnis, shia, and kurds will have enough money there to blow each other to kingdom come if they want. I personally don't care.

Long as they don't touch the oil, the money will keep rolling in for them, and they can shoot it out like the gunfight at the OK Corral. Me, I'll be playing the theme from the Beverly Hillbillies, and singing all the way to the bank.

Do you really think there's another reason for this? Really? Do you think that they think there's another reason? Really truely? Come on, take some advice, and go for what you really know. Go for broke. Go for the real victory. And waste anyone who stands in your way. CNN and the hippies may not think much of you, but by golly, the arabs sure will. You will be speaking a language that they fully understand after that. And they, in turn will be speaking to you one that they do. Of course, after that, they will eventually get us to leave, but not before the infrastructure is in place for them to do what they want. Without messing with the US again. And there will be peace in the Mid east. Once the people who live there, whose country it is, can be allowed to be right about something. And that something is that all the Americans really want is the oil. Which, IMO, is true.

SO stop the lie, and do what we went there to do, and get it over with, so our troops can come home, and Ford can sell trucks again.

Stretch
Quit cigs 4W 12h 25m ago. So far saved $171.10, 1,140 cigs not smoked and counting ...

 

[Thin Black Line]

If we would have kept on going in the First gulf war, backed the opposition, instead of letting Saddam slaughter them, we would have more better, stronger Iraqi people willing to step up after Saddam's downfall.

According to Baer there were oh so many opportunies to do this, including
with Iraqi generals in his book. There were many many other missed opportunities
in the ME thanks to the politicos.

http://books.guardian.co.uk/extracts/story/0,6761,631433,00.html

We need to pull the ground troops back from the cities, and show them what an IED looks like when it comes on the tip of a cruise missile. We could hang out in the desert, or make some space of our own somewhere,

Going back to my "bad guys in the crowd at the market" this would mean
opting for a sniper which requires a good position from which to observe
and act when the opportunity presents itself. Acting requires an exit --an
escape route-- lest it becomes a suicide mission. The exit route must be
planned in advance. Obviously, this is a current problem as are the ever
changing targets.

Another course of action is to use someone who is a native to that market.

I think the part of the problem is that the politicos are in bed with too many
people in the market and there is too much pillow talk. We have left the
concept of "peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations,
entangling alliances with none" (Jefferson). We could never be everyone's
friend, but we also have too many entangling alliances when it comes to
our commerce with other nations.

Probably makes it very difficult to give the sniper team a green light even
when the target presents itself if one is also worried how it will affect business
the next day. I'm talking wholesale business with one of the venders, not
the shoppers walking around.

 

[MacEntyre]

Why do we no longer declare war?

IIRC, WWII was the last time congress declared war.

Why do we eschew declarations of war?

 

[QuestionEverything]

Here's a little question for the posters in this thread... if the US was invaded and taken over by a foreign military seeking to install a new government they saw as being more just, would you throw flowers and greet them as liberators? Or would you snipe and blow up the occupying troops whenever you got the chance? The insurgents in Iraq are motivated by patriotism, no more and no less.

 

[gc70]

The insurgents in Iraq are motivated by patriotism, no more and no less.

Patriotism to what? Iraqis appear to be deeply devoted to their tribe, clan, or religious sect, but have limited identification with a national entity defined by lines on a map.

 

[QuestionEverything]

Accounts by Iraqis I've read suggest that they do identify with Iraq to a degree (the war with Iran helped foment Iraqi nationalism), and most feel a strong allegiance to the regions in which they live. Fallujah, for instance, was known for being fiercely independent; after taking power, Saddam appointed a governor of Fallujah who was killed the next day. Saddam appointed another governor who lived for two days, and after that Saddam only meddled with Fallujah when he really needed to. The Sunnis and Shias both have coherent territories, and both now have the experience of being pushed around by foreign troops who can kill with seeming impunity.

 

[carebear]

If the US was invaded and taken over by a foreign military seeking to install a new government they saw as being more just, would you throw flowers and greet them as liberators?

If my government was run by a vicious tyrant and the new government being set up offered self-determination and real freedom? Then, yeah, I sure would jump on the "let's get this up and rolling so you can go home" bandwagon.

I wouldn't act in such a way as to impede my own path towards freedom and I wouldn't tolerate those who did.

 

[Thin Black Line]

Or would you snipe and blow up the occupying troops whenever you got the chance? The insurgents in Iraq are motivated by patriotism, no more and no less.

I take it you are suggesting a flip of "Red Dawn" where Americans are now
the soviet paratroopers and the Iraqis are the Wolverines? Be careful
since that will certainly confuse and inflame people here. Next thing you
know and someone will suggest we are the mohawk guys following the
Lord Humongous in the "Road Warrior."

I just saw yesterday in the news that the US gave Afghanistan a lot of
military equipment.....that did remind me of the soviets in the late 80s....

Invading a country that was a threat and an active participant in war (such
as the allies in Germany in WWII) is acceptable. Likewise, giving an ally,
protectorate, etc military equipment is acceptable. I have always been one
who believes in helping people help themselves. I guess we would have to
seriously question our involvement to help one religious faction over another
though. However, the US is doing just that right now in the ME. I find that
interesting considering the Christian heritage of the US and the fact that it
is leaving Christians out to dry, well let's be honest --DIE, in other countries
around the world right now.

I think we can say we are a completely secular nation now when it comes to
our foreign policy since our principal goals appear entirely economic. This
was becoming established back in the 1960s with the Congo.

 

[Thin Black Line]

I wanted to add this comment from General Casey yesterday since it is
key to the title of this thread:

"And I was reluctant throughout the fall to ask for additional forces ... when I knew I didn't have the political commitment from the Iraqis to allow us to do our jobs," Casey said.

Italics by TBL

 

[QuestionEverything]

If my government was run by a vicious tyrant and the new government being set up offered self-determination and real freedom? Then, yeah, I sure would jump on the "let's get this up and rolling so you can go home" bandwagon.

Even if a few of your family members were killed by aerial bombardment? In the months before the Iraq war I had a co-worker who lived in Yugoslavia when it broke apart. He told me that even when people hate their leader, they will choose his rule over domination by an outside power. Democracy isn't something you can force on a society; it has to develop by itself.

It's also amusing to listen to people say we needed to oust Saddam because he was such a brutal dictator. Uzbekistan's leader Islam Karimov enjoys boiling political prisoners alive and has ordered his troops to fire on demonstrations of his own people, but that's okay because he's a member of the "Coalition of the Willing." The state of Iraqi politics today makes it pretty clear that the country can only be stable under a theocratic government or under a dictator tough enough to keep the rival sects from fighting. Iraq is by all accounts less free and more dangerous to the US than it was before the war, since the theocrats are now free to shoot people who don't follow Sharia law and promote terrorism. And let's not forget that Saddam himself used to be a good buddy of the US:



More info at this link: http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/

 

[carebear]

I'm sorry, perhaps I misunderstood that the question you asked me was what would I do, in my country? Not some theocratic moron in Uzbekistan or Iraq?

See, since I and my freedom-loving neighbors wouldn't be giving aid and commfort to those who supported tyranny, the chances of a bomb landing anywhere near my house would be low. We'd form an armed neighborhood watch and kill the pro-tyranny guys ourselves if they were stupid enough to show up in our neighborhood, saving our liberators the cost of a bomb. We'd give those liberators complete information on where the pro-tyranny insurgents were hiding and info on whatever plans of theirs I knew.

And since I love liberty, I wouldn't view that liberation as "domination as an outside power" merely as a helping hand. Since the liberators have stated they don't intend to stay and I can see by their own history they only leave military bases behind in willing countrys, even those of their defeated former enemies*, I wouldn't have reason to fear a real "conquest", simply the removal of the tyrant and his supporters, info on setting up a constitutional republic, a bit of assistance thereof and maybe some reconstruction aid.

After that I could look forward to enjoying democracy and having a nice powerful ally and trading partner.

*Germany, the rest of occupied and occupying Europe, Japan, South Korea, ad nauseum

 

[Thin Black Line]

Since the liberators have stated they don't intend to stay and I can see by their own history they only leave military bases behind in willing countrys, even those of their defeated former enemies*, I wouldn't have reason to fear a real "conquest", simply the removal of the tyrant and his supporters, info on setting up a constitutional republic, a bit of assistance thereof and maybe some reconstruction aid.

After that I could look forward to enjoying democracy and having a nice powerful ally and trading partner.

Good point. I would say this is why things are working better in Afghanistan
than Iraq due to the attitude of the general populace. Also, by intervening
in Afghan we in effect did away with a foreign ruling system --the Taliban.
Unlike the Sovs and the Tal, we are not trying to supress the native culture
and religion. We are not actively trying to supress the mainstream religions
in Iraq either, but again, it's native public perception of being sleighted by
the "outsiders" whenever we do intervene to protect the population from violence
and we just haven't been winning on that one. Hence, we can have the superior
force, a certain amount of submission, and mediocre cooperation at best.
American opinion about how we're doing in Iraq is completely irrelevant when
we've lost the public image war among the Iraqi populace. That's who
really matters "over there" when it comes to cooperation.

That's kind of where I would tell the semi-friendly vender "If there's something
really bad about to go down, let us know in advance and we'll see what we
can do from the rooftop next door." A certain amount of self-interest in
their own survival will come into play.

 

[QuestionEverything]

It must be nice living in such a black and white world. A whole ton of innocent Iraqis died during the initial invasion; such things are unavoidable in war. Those daisy-cutters don't care whether the people in their blast radius hate freedom or not, you know. Anyone who would support a foreign invader can't (or doesn't want to) imagine the devastation and misery that even a relatively good-intentioned occupying force will cause.

Conquest is exactly what the US has been doing in Iraq; the oil's being stolen and all the reconstruction contracts are given to Halliburton and other US firms instead of Iraqi companies that desperately need a boost. Iraq now has a puppet government no less corrupt than Saddam, theocratic militias are running rampant and electric power lasts about two hours each day. Democracy isn't in the Iraqis' political DNA, and anyone there would tell you they were much better off under Saddam. If the US does withdraw and leave the Iraqis to vote for a leader, they will immediately vote in theocrats who abolish democracy.

Germany and Japan are much different from Iraq; they initiated the war instead of having it forced on them like the Iraqis, and both of those countries had a strong national identity and some history of constitutional government before WWII. The US was also genuinely interested in helping those countries become functional democracies and provided them with economic support instead of pillaging their resources as in Iraq.

As for this thread's original topic, the reason for the lacking support of the Vietnam and Iraq wars is that neither had any merit, and the American people know this. The former was based on the "domino theory" that history has proven to be false, while the latter has no coherent justification other than "we want to steal their oil." The Founding Fathers would never have approved of the US playing global cop.