quote: Frederick W. Kagan, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute who has written about what he calls a military manpower crisis, argued that the involuntary call-ups were the latest sign that a larger ground force was needed. The increasing length of combat tours, the extensive use of National Guard combat units and the stop-loss orders all show the military is scrambling to meet the demands placed on it, he said.
"It is one of an avalanche of symptoms that the ground forces are overstretched by operations in Iraq and Afghanistan," Kagan said. "This administration needs to understand this is not a short-term problem, and it really needs a systemic fix in the size of the ground forces."
quote: "The bottom line is: Everyone is exhausted," Rieckhoff said. "It may be legal, but it is kind of like the difference between a contract and a promise. Overall we are eroding the promise made to our military."
I'm not sure what the answer is, but at some point, if this article is true, it would seem like the U.S. is going to have to find a way to either reduce the ground that it has to defend, or increase the number of troops, either with Americans, Iraqis, or other nationalities.
As the article notes, many British are going home soon. As other articles have mentioned, we are training the Iraqi military, who was supposed tobe replacing our troops as they were ready.
If the military is still calling up people now, isn't one strong possibility that it expects to need them for at least another year?
If things continue in this direction around the election, it's going to be interesting to see how this plays out amongst the voters this year. If this situation still exists in two years, does anyone believe that voters aren't going to want to do something different with the troops, since it will be fairly clear that they haven't been able to pacify Iraq in seven years?
I think if we leave Iraq before it is secure and able to defend itself and provide order, this may cause a lot of conflict in the Middle East as others in Iraq and without try and carve out their own power blocs. Not pretty.
So, I don't think we can leave before Iraq is secure, but on the other hand, I think the American people want to have some idea of what to expect.
One option given in the Atlantic by the Brookings Institute a couple months a go was to leave those areas of Iraq that were just seen as intractable alone and secure the rest of Iraq. In this way, there would be some security for the majority of Iraqis, and those Iraqis who didn't live in the secure zones would see the benefit of security and hopefully not be so eager to support those who fight the U.S.
In any case, my question to the forum is, what should change in Iraq, if anything? I know we've discussed Iraq at some length in other threads, but it's been a few weeks. What the hell, here's another. Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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Wouldn't work; you abandon an area to guerrillas, wonderful, they now have a secure base and use it for forays into the territory you're still guarding. This is basic Mao; establishing a base is, I seem to recall, the second phase of the Protracted Struggle.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:Originally posted by King of Men: Wouldn't work; you abandon an area to guerrillas, wonderful, they now have a secure base and use it for forays into the territory you're still guarding. This is basic Mao; establishing a base is, I seem to recall, the second phase of the Protracted Struggle.
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They already have a 'base'(s). They are called Iran and Syria and Saudi Arabia. Where do you think these guys are getting supplies and money from? Saint Nick?
There is such a thing as a defensive perimeter, not over-extending your forces, etc.
The main thing Iraqis need right now is security. That's the main reason we would concentrate on certain areas, to give those areas security and breathing space; to build schools and lead some kind of normal life without living in fear that every time their daughters stepped out the door they would get kidnapped.
The idea is that rather than try and do everything at once, we do things in stages. I believe the analogy of an amoeba was used in the article, that we would work on slowly retaking the country.
I know nothing about military strategy, so I'm just going off of what I read. In any case, I don't agree that Mao's quote necessarily applies to the situation.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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That's a good idea and another reason why we need more secure areas--to attract reputable foreign investment.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
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quote:Originally posted by Storm Saxon: They already have a 'base'(s). They are called Iran and Syria and Saudi Arabia. Where do you think these guys are getting supplies and money from? Saint Nick?
There is such a thing as a defensive perimeter, not over-extending your forces, etc.
There's also such a thing as giving your enemies shorter supply lines for their next raid. One thing is where their rockets and guns are coming from; you're right, there's not so much to do about that short of invading Syria. But quite another is how far they have to walk to get to a safe area after an attack. Why make it easy on them?
quote:The main thing Iraqis need right now is security. That's the main reason we would concentrate on certain areas, to give those areas security and breathing space; to build schools and lead some kind of normal life without living in fear that every time their daughters stepped out the door they would get kidnapped.
Um, yeah. What are you going to do, form a human chain around the protected areas? I mean, consider Baghdad, surely the heaviest concentration of American troops. How safe is it there? Or perhaps that's part of the area that's going to be abandoned?
quote:The idea is that rather than try and do everything at once, we do things in stages. I believe the analogy of an amoeba was used in the article, that we would work on slowly retaking the country.
Ah. Well, at least they know enough history not to call it the 'inkblot strategy'. Sounds otherwise just the same. That worked real fine in the last guerrilla war you had.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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Heavy patrols around the porous borders, with a German-style Wall - barbed wire, dogs, and whatnot. Iraqi troops should be good enough for that kind of garrison work. Keep the troops in for more than a year at a time; you'd think they'd have learned something from Vietnam, but apparently not. Stop paying for American 'contractors'; if you want mercenaries, there are far cheaper ones available.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Storm Saxon: Other than leaving, what is your suggestion?
Without getting into a huge political debate here in the forum, it is not really a great idea for us to just up and leave. If we do that we will really screw over a potential ally if things go south after we split. Unfortunately we have to stickit out and make sure the new government and military wil be able to keep themselves to together so that we don't come off as looking like we just left them to the slaughter of the rebels or what ever they are called.
Posts: 871 | Registered: Jul 2006
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