December 23, 2004

Daily Roundup and Merry Christmas!

Loyal Readers! Chester will be celebrating the season with his in-laws and blogging will continue, though it will be light. Best wishes to all of you for a joyous Christmas and cheery New Year. We'll probably squeeze in a post or two over the next week, but make no promises.

Here's some things that caught our eye today:

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Sunday is the 60th Anniversary ofthe Battle of the Bulge, when Patton's Third Army smashed the 7 German divisions that had been held in check by a surrounded, starving, cold and fearless 101st Airborne.

Though many good stories come out of that fight, this is my personal favorite (the 82nd Airborne was in the fight too):

Dec. 23, 1944 - "Battle of the Bulge" - An entire U.S. armored division was retreating from the Germans in the Ardennes forest when a sergeant in a tank destroyer spotted an American digging a foxhole. The GI, PFC Martin, 325th Glider Infantry Regiment, looked up and asked, "Are you looking for a safe place?" "Yeah" answered the tanker. "Well, buddy," he drawled, "just pull your vehicle behind me...

I'm the 82nd Airborne, and this is as far as the bastards are going."

Awesome.

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All of iran's military is focused on defending its nuke sites. That means that if we act fast we can get two birds with one stone!

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If any of you dear readers are feeling especially generous, we'd love a subscription to East-Asia-Intel.com. This is one content-rich source that we could then plow right back into analytical posts on the ole blog here. Looks like they always have interesting under-the-radar stories ... [Thus far, all reader donations have been plowed back into the site here in one way or another . . . more on this in the coming weeks.]

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With friends like these . . .MEMRI reports that a Saudi government daily, Al-Watan, Accuses U.S. Army of Harvesting Organs of Iraqis. We suppose this doesn't increase our support in Saudi Arabia. Joseph Nye would certainly call it a failure of our "soft power." But it certainly helps the US the more Muslims are scared to death of our military. If you can't convince them you're a good guy, might as well convince them that you steal organs from dead insurgents . . .

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Lawrence of Irvine Learns Spying and Blogging Don't Mix?

We've received this somewhat humorous email from an Alert Reader:

A few weeks ago I sent you a copy of an article posted on The Angry Iranian Weblog.

The blogger, Lawrence Reza Ershaghi, is an Iranian who was living in Irvine California, and made no secret of his displeasure with the US. He seemed to eagerly await the rise of the Shia in Iraq, which he felt would result in Iranian hegemony in the Gulf. He had been posting articles once or twice a week until November 24. After that, nothing.

This week DEBKAfile posted this: "...Iranian spy teams have been spotted outside Israeli missions in various parts of the world, including one nabbed by the FBI watching Israeli consulates in Los Angeles, Atlanta and Houston. It was made up of Iranian Americans, Arab and Pakistani students - some of them US citizens, and all activists belonging to Muslim fundamentalist groups."

I suspect Lawrence may be spending the holidays as a guest of our government.

A very Merry Christmas to you, Lawrence, and we hope you enjoy the government cheese in whichever federal institution you now reside!

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de Atkine | Why Arabs Lose Wars

Thanks to an Alert Reader for posting this in the comments section: de Atkine | Why Arabs Lose Wars. Haven't read yet, but looks promising.

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How Did the Blogosphere Get Fooled on Ukraine?

Transatlantic Intelligencer offers a differeing opinion on Ukraine, which we believe has been expressed in comments on this site as well.

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More on Rummy

Instapundit.com offers more on Rummy.

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Blogs of War: Democrats Rip Pat Tillman

The commenters at Democratic Underground are ripping Pat Tillman to shreds. When the libs are themselves, it's so obvious why they are on the decline.

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BLACKFIVE: Note to Harrison Ford

This is outstanding. General Mattis istruly an amazing individual and Han Solo can't do him justice, regardless of his war views.

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Kyiv Post. SBU officer reveals insurrection plans

An Alert Reader has directed us to this story, wherein a member of Ukraine's State Secret Services spills the beans on Russian and government attempts to monkey with the upcoming new election:

Omelchenko alleged that weapons belonging to the Russian Black Sea Fleet based in Sevastopol have been transferred to Donetsk in order to arm groups of men who are to arrive in Kyiv Dec. 27 or 28 to incite violence.

Kuchma would then declare a state of emergency, the election results would be cancelled, and the new election would be postponed for as long as half a year, thus allowing Kuchma to stay in power until the recently adopted constitutional amendments come into force.
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According to Omelchenko, 30 groups of 30 men have already been formed and an unnamed Berkut (elite police force) officer will command the group of 900 men, which has been formed using former convicts, sportsmen and other irregulars. They will be armed with 100 rifles, 90 hand grenades and 25 kilograms of the explosive trotyl, Omelchenko said.

Is this true or just deft political propaganda by the opposition?

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Iraqi Politicians on Opinionjournal.com

Yesterday, Opinionjournal featured an article by Ahmed Chalabi, expressing his approval for the elections in January.

Today, they carry an article by Ayad Allawi> discussing some of the details of the elections.

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We Were Right to Disband Them

Tom Donnelly argues in the Weekly Standard that Bremer's decision to disband the Irarqi military was the correct one. We agree with his assessment:

Ultimately, it is putting the cart before the horse to believe that there can ever be fully legitimate and effective national military forces prior to the birth of a legitimate national government. Our greatest postwar military mistake in Iraq was thus not that we disbanded the old Iraqi army too quickly but that we moved to create a new Iraqi state too slowly.

We've stated as much in previous posts on this page. The problem in the immediate aftermath of the invasion was a lack of planning to create a new Iraqi government. This created a vacuum that was filled with the insurgency, who thought it had a hope of returning to the old regime. Were our successful invasion to have been more aggressively exploited politically, the insurgency might not have coalesced as strongly as it did.

This is all for the history books though. We're still going to win.

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Mosul

An Alert Reader has asked for our comments about the Mosul bombing. First let's look at this post, from an Army chaplain at the base, who describes the attack thus:

Any attack with casualties will naturally mean that eventually a very large number of care givers will be concentrated in one location. They took full advantage of that. In the middle of the mayhem the first mortar round hit about 100 to 200 meters away. Everyone started shouting to get the wounded into the hospital which is solid concrete and much safer than being in the open. Soon, the next mortar hit quite a bit closer than the first as they "walked" their rounds toward their intended target...us.

(Thanks to Belmont Club and instapundit for this one)

The chaplain describes a two-part attack: first, an explosion creates dozens of casualties. Then, as medical caregivers arrive and triage the wounded, mortars begin to bracket, or at least walk in on their position. Questions:

1. If it was an inside job just by a suicide bomber, why did initial reports, like this one, mention several explosions or impacts, and not just one?

2. If, as this report again states, the explosions were caused by mortar rounds and they got progressively closer to the site of the casualty triage area, then who was observing the fires and calling or signaling for its adjustment?

The situation as the chaplain describes it implies that after the initial suicide bomber, there was another individual inside the camp watching the rounds impact, and had the ability to call his comrades and adjust them. Belmont Club raises questions of counter-battery fire at the base. We suspect that the perpetrators used their mortars on the back of a truck and displaced before our counter-battery fires, if any such capability exists, could hit them.

Infiltrating one of these bases would not be difficult for a committed and disciplined terrorist. One could work there for months or weeks in a menial job and observe the layout, the routines of the occupants, and especially which targets were softer than others. The most difficult part of the operation would be signaling to the mortar crew -- how to do this and not be noticed? There is the off-chance that the observer was outside the base in some kind of overwatch position, but without knowing the surrounding terrain, we can only speculate. This seems less likely though in general.

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December 22, 2004

Buried on page A20 of the Washington Post

Anthony Cordesman, of the Center for Strategic and International Studies has published a report of Iraqi security forces, saying that they are better trained than in the past.

entagon figures show that the training of Iraqi military and police units has improved since the summer but that those forces will not be prepared to undertake security missions on their own until late 2006 at the earliest, according to a study released yesterday by the Center for Strategic & International Studies.

More:

According to figures provided by the Pentagon, the number of trained Iraqi army and police units is far below the number required. For example, as of Dec. 6, the Pentagon reported that 27,000 trained army troops were needed but that only 3,428 were listed as "trained/on hand." The figures showed that 135,000 police officers were required but that only 50,798 were "trained/on hand."

The Iraqi National Guard, which provides security forces to protect buildings and other key facilities, had a better ratio, with 40,115 troops considered "trained/on hand" of the required force of 62,000.

An interesting point is his criticism of the civilian institutions which lead the Iraqi armed forces. Little is mentioned in the press about he difficulties of creating a civilian national command apparatus. Cordesman's is the only mention of it that we are aware of:

A related issue, Cordesman says, is the "problem" caused by the interim Iraqi government, "which is not yet capable of unified and timely action" and "far too often tolerates ineffective or corrupt leaders for political purposes." He cites the example of the police leadership in Mosul, which was kept "long after it was clear that it should be removed."

Today, Iraqis are playing a larger role in screening candidates, Cordesman reports, and the interim Iraqi government, "while slow to do so, has begun to fire police that fail to show up for work, that cooperated with insurgents and . . . that are blatantly corrupt."

Like all forecasts, this one only extracts trends from current conditions. So many variables are at play that the actual timing of when Iraqis are ready to take over their security could be earlier or later. But this article is worth filing away in the "pattern-spotting" drawer . . .

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Indiana Jones may play Mattis in Fallujah film

Hollywood is considering a movie about the April battle of Fallujah and Harrison Ford is being approached to play then-MajGen James N. Mattis. The story will supposedly be based on Bing West's forthcoming book abou the battle.

We are skeptical of Hollywood's intent. Why focus on one battle that was embarrassingly called off early to the detriment of US and Iraqi security? West is a Marine Viet Nam vet and an excellent writer; "The March Up" which he co-wrote with a retired Marine Major General Ray Smith, is an excellent account of the invasion of Iraq. But Hollywood rarely portrays Marines in a positive light even when they are using a script by a Marine. Take "Rules of Engagement," written by James Webb -- who received a Navy Cross in Viet Nam as a lieutenant and later served as Secretary of the Navy in the Reagan Administration. That movie did not portray Marines in a great light. The good news is that the article says the film won't be made for something like four years, so perhaps there will be time for them to expand the script to include our recent trouncing of the quasi-terrorist state in Fallujah.

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Good news: Rummy Will Survive! (Bad news: US power is in its twilight . . .)

Despite the furor of some Senators who wish to run for President in 2008, despite a hostile media that plants questions to the Secretary of Defense, then manipulates the coverage of his answer, despite whatever recent USA Today polls say, The Adventures of Chester wholeheartedly agrees with John Podhoretz, who wrote yesterday in the New York Post:

Who knows? Maybe the president would have gently edged Rumsfeld aside after the Iraqi elections at the end of January.

But not now. Oh, no. Bush isn't giving you Rumsfeld's scalp.

He doesn't play the game your way.

Moreover, we agree with many commentators that an under-examined interpretation of Rumsfeld's "Army you have" statement was that the Army that we have is a direct result of 10 years of cuts in the 1990s -- cuts that were approved by the Clinton Administration, and voted for by the same Senators who now bash Rummy -- and who may have served in the military, but who've never run a Defense Department of 3 million.

Read more about the holiday Rummy-bashing in today's Washington Times. Is Rummy to blame for not increasing the size of the military? Certainly so. But what fate will befall any politician who calls for increases? Rummy (and the President's) forbearance in asking us to fund a larger force is a reflection of the political vagaries that will deem it suicide for them to do so . . .

It will be very interesting to watch the contortions of the media if and when the Bush administration realizes that the US military does in fact need to grow larger. For months and months, the drumbeat of media coverage of the war has accused the US of fielding too few troops in Iraq -- and accused the Iraq campaign of breaking our military, particularly the Army. This may be the case. But the goal of the press is to discredit the entire campaign and in that they fail. Instead, they miss the true story underlying the size of our forces in Iraq: we cannot increase it because we have no more to give. The US military is running at full capacity. 140,000 or so troops in one place for an indefinite period of time is the most we can field. This should give us pause. Is 140,000, with periodic surges to higher numbers, enough troops to stabilize a collapsed Saudi Arabia, a collapsed North Korea, or to deter China from any of its own adventures? or to do any two of these at once? If you believe in free trade, as do we, you must still ask yourself if our industrial base is large enough to manufacture the physical forces large enough to defeat China -- whose own industrial capabilities increase daily.

Eventually the US will be right that "transformation" -- a word with many meanings and a varied historiography -- will in fact transform the US military into an even more lethal force than it is now. The problem is that it will still be too small to guarantee the freedoms we cherish against the many wolves who would curtail them by influence, attack, or less ostensiblly frittering our forces away on a number of causes . . .

What will the press say when those in power take their reports to heart and ask for a huge military spending increase that will threaten the entitlements that are the currency of our discredited, paleolithic welfare state? We don't claim clairvoyance, but can guess the answer to that question . . .

The truth of the matter is that America's oft-mentioned status as the world's only superpower, or the world's only "hyperpower," as many would have it, is a myth. Our influence, while great at the moment, is fleeting, and will soon be worn down by more declared nuclear states, the proliferation of advanced weaponry, and richer would-be adversaries, who fear not our arms, because they know the will behind them is lagging. While they itch for the euphemism of "multi-polarity," meaning agenda-setting power to them and not the world's oldest and first democracy, we unwittingly aid them, by virtue of the smallishness of our military. Were it the 800 pound gorilla it was in the 80s or even early 90s -- and with the networked lethality our technology has bought us -- our future fights would be fewer, clearer, and more one-sided. But this is not to be the case without drastic change, as even now, the would-be multi-poles gather against us. Consider this opinion piece by a former CIA analyst, who argues that our military adventures in Iraq -- failing in his estimation, the fault for which lies with "the ineptitude of senior American civilian-defense officials and by careerism among the generals, many of whom know better but lack the spine to tell their superiors that the war in Iraq cannot be 'won'" -- is a direct cause for the rise in cooperation among China and Russia, pointing to our purported hubris as the reason. Could the reason not be that China and Russia desire a return to a more glorious past of Middle Kingdoms and Soviet imperialism, and that they see an opportunity to unbalance US dominance because -- gasp! -- our military is too small to deter them, and our national will is hollow?

Our power is fleeting and an enormous shift is required to maintain our dominance. And our dominance is just -- based on two centuries of enlarging human freedom. While the British may have been glad to look across the Atlantic and see an ally in the new defender of freedom that the US had become after World War II, we don't find ourselves in the same situation, no matter which ocean we glance across. Our security will not come from abroad, but from home.

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A Daily Briefing on Iran: Is Iran just weeks away from being a nuclear power?

A Daily Briefing on Iran: Is Iran just weeks away from being a nuclear power? Interesting . . .

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December 21, 2004

Osama the film

We just finished watching "Osama", and without spoiling the film, we'll offer a few thoughts:

First off, no term other than "gender apartheid" seems appropriate to describe the plight of women under the Taliban. It's not as though their speech is suppressed, or that they have no freedom of religion. It's much more fundamental than that. Women aren't allowed out of the home unaccompanied by a male relative, period. The Taliban religious police will stop and interrogate anyone who isn't following these rules. So the simple act of visiting a sick relative in the hospital takes daring and subterfuge to accomplish.

The film is the story of "Osama," a girl who pretends to be a boy in order to work and provide for her family. They have no male relatives – all are dead. Some observations:

She doesn't know how to pray: the Taliban hold women hostage in their sick "religion" but they don't allow them to participate in it. This is obvious when the girl is allowed to participate in prayers, but does not know what to do – and Muslim prayers are very regimented. There is a ritual to them that she does not understand.

The Taliban seem separate from the rest of the people in the film. They are immediately recognized by their beards, AK-47s, and whips, which nearly all carry. They are the only ones with vehicles – usually pretty late-model trucks with crew-served weapons in the beds – technical vehicles. They seem to live apart from society in some ways in that the rest of the people fear them. And how do they women know who is a Taliban sympathizer and who is not? There is a risk in every interaction they make.

The setting is what we imagined Afghanistan to be: spacious, open scenery, featuring mountains in the background, with little development other than walled cities made from mud. Little or no agriculture is visible throughout the film, which makes one wonder how they eat. The wages of endless war are evident everywhere: nearly every building seems to be sport bullet holes and there are old Russian BMPs and other military leavings to be found strewn about. In one scene they substitute for a playground for the boys, who are playing on a BMP. The most striking scene to us was the meeting of all the men to observe the Taliban administer justice near the end of the film. The meeting takes place in front of what long ago was some sort of municipal building perhaps – it has high columns in the front and probably used to have quite an impressive façade. But it is now cracked, peeling, roofless, and shot through with holes. The gathering of the men in front of this building and the capriciousness with which the senior Talib metes out punishments alludes to all manner of post-apocalyptic film-making in the West, from Mad Max to On the Beach, to even the more recent film A.I. – where the people torture robots for taking away their jobs and presuming to be human. There is some similarity here, as the women are tortured for not being robotic enough. Indeed, the most haunting images in the work are those of groups of women all clad in their blue burkhas. In whatever setting they appear – marching in protest, jailed, at a mock funeral – the effect of their faceless attire is to render them somewhat soul-less, like zombies in old horror films, but unwittingly so, and bent on their own redemption, rather than the suffering of innocents.

This was an excellent film, and if you buy or rent it, we recommend the interview with the director as well – where we learn that every episode in the story happened to someone. It is more a well-wrought merging of many true events than it is a fictitious movie, and it deserves to be watched and reflected upon.

UPDATE: We've added a link to "Osama" in the sidebar.

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11th MEU taking over Karbala Province

Not long ago, we noted that the 11th MEU had declared Najaf Province secure, and enemy forces there completely defeated. Now the 11th MEU is moving to Karbala Province, their mission being thus:

While in Karbala province, MEU Marines will conduct security patrols; train, equip and build leadership in the 401th Iraqi National Guard Battalion and police force; and conduct civil military operations in their area of responsibility southwest of Baghdad.

This seems like excellent news. The MEU has already had raving success at training the security forces in one province and will now tackle those of another. The Shi'ite dominated southern portion of Iraq seems on track to be completely stable by the time of the elections.

If you missed the last "Good News From Iraq" post of the year, check it out. It's a good one.

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December 20, 2004

More on "jointness" . . .

In order to fully dive in and explore the concepts of jointness that we've begun discussing here, we've begun reading "Victory on the Potomac: The Goldwater-Nichols Act Unifies the Pentagon," by James A. Locher III. So far it is very good and we think it will provide a number of interesting insights into the concept of jointness and the process through which its adherence by the armed forces was legislated back in 1986. (Link for this now in the sidebar as well.)

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The Adventures of Chester: "Osama" the film

Yesterday we said that we are watching the film Osama and hope to post about it. Well, we've made it through half of the film and will hopefully finish tomorrow.

[An aside: Our viewing experience has been buttressed yesterday by Mrs. Chester's desire to watch "Desperate Housewives," and tonight by her need to see the "Swan Pageant." These are both quite the counterpoints to a film about the lives of Afghan women under the Taliban. More tomorrow . . .]

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Occupations up close and personal

Last week, National Review Online featured a five-part series of excerpts from Stephen Vincent's book, "In The Red Zone," the story of his time spent traveling through Iraq. The excerpts are very interesting and the book looks promising. (See link in sidebar.) Here are the links: Steven Vincent's In the Red Zone on National Review Online, Part I, Part II, Part III, Part IV, and Part V

Yesterday we were reading a bit of John Dower's work on the US occupation of Japan, "Embracing Defeat." (See link in sidebar.) We were wondering if something of the Japanese experience might be relevant to that of the Iraqis. Dower, whose work earned every possible book prize imaginable, including a National Book Award and a Pulitzer, has this to say about the Japanese experience:

I myself find the concrete details and textures of this extraordinary experience of a whole country starting over absorbing, but they do not strike me as alien, exotic, or even mainly instructive as an episode in the history of Japan or U.S.-Japanese relations. On the contrary, what is most compelling from my own perspective is that defeat and occupation forced Japanese in every walk of life to struggle, in exceptionally naked ways, with the most fundamental of life's issues – and that they responded in recognizably human, fallible, and often contradictory ways that can tell us a great deal about ourselves and our world in general.

What else does Dower say in his introduction?

The ease with which the great majority of Japanese were able to throw off a decade and a half of the most intense militaristic indoctrination, for instance, offers lessons in the limits of socialization and the fragility of ideology that we have seen elsewhere in this century in the collapse of totalitarian regimes.

In his travels in Iraq, Vincent notes the way that Iraqis often would take a conspiratorial view of the reasons behind their present circumstances:

From denouncing U.S. soldiers, it was a short step for the cop to declare his support for Saddam, anger at the "infidel" and hatred for Zionists, the whole ascending scale of rage climaxing with his view of Iraq as the victim of a worldwide conspiracy.

Similarly, Dower notes about the Japanese,

. . . the preoccupation with their own misery that led most Japanese to ignore the suffering they had inflicted on others helps illuminate the ways in which victim consciousness colors the identities that all groups and peoples construct for themselves.

Vincent notes the same attitude at work in Iraq:

Iraqis refuse to accept that their society allowed a monster like Saddam to take power. Instead, they see him as an aberration, as if he were a maniacal gunman who suddenly burst into their homes, seized their families, and terrorized their neighbors, until the police finally stormed in and captured the lunatic. Now, standing amidst the ruins caused by the raid, they say to their rescuers, "It wasn't our fault this madman got in here. Thanks for getting rid of him — now, how soon are you going to repair our house?" They overlook that from 1968 to 1980, Iraq lived happily under the control of the Nazi-inspired Baath Party, while reaping the benefits of an oil-rich economy. (How many times did I hear how wonderful Baghdad was in the 1970s?) Not until Saddam seized complete control of the nation in 1979 and launched the war on Iran — and then on the Kurds, and then on Kuwait, and then on the Shia — did they realize they belonged to a madman. But by then it was too late.

Dower paints quite a portrait of the dynamism that seized Japan during its occupation – a facet of life in Iraq that has already been noted a great deal:

. . . it was in this atmosphere of flux and uncertainty that the Americans proceeded to dismantle the oppressive controls of the imperial state. it remained for the vanquished themselves to fill this new space, however, and they did so in often unexpected ways. Support for socialist and communist agendas exceeded anything the Americans had anticipated, as did the explosive energy of the nascent labor movement. Mid-level bureaucrats emerged as initiators of serious reform. Prostitutes and black-market operatives created distinctive, iconoclastic cultures of defeat. Publishers responded to a huge hunger for words with publications that ran the gamut from sleazy pulp magazines to incisive critical journals and books as well as wide-ranging translations of Western writings. portmanteau concepts such as "love" and "culture" were discussed obsessively, and the adjective "new" was coupled with promiscuous abandon to almost every noun in sight. Private attachments supplanted the old state-enforced dictates of public morality. Connoisseurs of decadence emerged as popular critics of the unsavory wartime cult of "wholesomeness." New heroes and heroines were discovered and idolized, new celebrities rocketed to pop-culture fame. Messianic religions flourished, and pretenders to the throne emerged. Millions of ordinary people spoke out in community meetings and in letters to the press as well as in a small avalanche of communications to the occupation authorities. Tens of millions found themselves longing for material affluence of the sort their American overlords so conspicuously enjoyed.

Though Iraq's circumstances are quite different from those of Japan, there seem to be more than a few similarities between their situations and the reactions of both populaces. We've noted before that while Saddam had quite a personality cult, and the police-state to enforce it, he did not have the same clearly-defined ideology that past totalitarians had -- that is to say, that while Saddam's state was quite adept at terrorizing its own people, it was not so much so at indoctrinating them into some sort of fascism that took root. Otherwise, our war with Iraq would have been more of a total war, and we would not say we were liberating Iraq, we would easily say we were occupying it (Vincent spends quite a bit of time discussing the semantics of the liberation/occupation, especially in Part V above.), just as we did with the Japanese. Nevertheless, the same sorts of mentalities and Sturm und Drang seem to apply. Arthur Chrenkoff, an Australian blogger who grew up in Eastern Europe (and is a Friend of Chester), posted about post-totalitarian-stress-disorder a bit back, and his thoughts are quite relevant to this discussion as well.

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Overview of the Iran - EU Agreement

The Middle East Media Research Institute has just published a very long piece discussing Iran's agreement with the EU over nuclear technology. The piece is excellent and features no less than 47 different links to supporting documents. Among the highlights are that Iran has been guaranteed by the EU not to have its case refered to the Security Council. This has been reported on already, but is important to remember. In exchange, the Iranians agreed to

a "voluntary, non-legally-binding, confidence-building measure," the duration of which, according to the Paris Agreement would depend on two conditions: a) negotiations with the E.U. over a long-term arrangement regarding Iran's nuclear activity; and b) No IAEA resolution taken against Iran.

Surely we are not the only nes who think the Iranians made out like bandits on this deal?

Another interesting bit is that

Iran's position throughout the negotiations was that in principle it had the right to engage in nuclear activity and to enrich uranium because of its membership in the NPT – and that it would never relinquish this right.

This does not bode well for the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Iran has now effectively used its status as a signatory to blunt diplomacy aimed at preventing Iran from doing what it signed on not to; yet another case of a post-Cold War twist in the former global order of things . . .

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"Jointness" is catching on . . .

We've been pushing the adoption of the idea of "jointness," mandated by law, here at The Adventures of Chester for at least a month. Today the Wall Street Journal encourages "jointness" concepts for the Department of Homeland Security. Here's the editorial, since it is subscription only. More on this topic tonight . . .

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Wall Street Journal
December 20, 2004
Pg. 14

Defense Lessons
By Edward L. Rowny

I was present at the creation of the National Security Act of 1947. Two years later, as a result of enabling legislation, the Department of Defense was born. Still, for the next 40 years, although nudged along by Secretaries Robert McNamara and Melvin Laird, the effective integration of the armed forces languished. In 1986, the Goldwater-Nichols Act finally established the policies that truly built a structure for the armed forces which fully utilized all the talents of the disparate services. This structure was tested in the first and perfected in the second Gulf War.

Two of the changes made stand out to me as paramount. The first was to establish a joint structure in which the commanders reported directly to the secretary of defense. The second was to direct that no officer would be elevated to general or flag rank without first serving in a joint organization. Similar changes are needed to make the Department of Homeland Security fully effective.

Creating an effective Department of Homeland Security is in many ways a more daunting task than creating the DOD. Instead of melding five uniformed services, the DHS must mold 22 widely disparate civilian and military agencies of 180,000 people into a cohesive whole. Rather than languishing for nearly 40 years, hoping that the wrinkles will iron themselves out, we should learn from the DOD experience and strive to reach the goal for the DHS in one-tenth the time.

Earlier this month, the Heritage Foundation and the Center for Strategic and International Studies issued a report on how to make the DHS effective. Their 40 recommendations are a good framework on which the DHS could be remodeled, perhaps by a Lieberman-Cox Bill. A debate in Congress on these recommendations should begin immediately. I learned from bitter experience that it is a mistake to legislate an organization with the hope of improving it as time goes by. Delay only nourishes entrenched bureaucracies and fuels turf battles.

Space prevents me from discussing all 40 task-force recommendations. Instead, let me mention those that I think are of greatest significance and urgency:

Establishing a policy undersecretary. No organization can succeed unless it has a group of planners advising the boss on what to do. It is high time the DHS got some planners.

Establishing a simpler structure for congressional oversight. No secretary of a federal department can afford the time and effort to report to 88 separate congressional committees. One standing committee each for the House and Senate should suffice. This is probably the most difficult thing that Congress is called upon to do.

Further improving the exchange and coordination of intelligence within the DHS to include predicting likely scenarios for the next devastating attack, which is sure to come. For example, the likelihood of a dirty bomb arriving by container ship is too obvious to overlook. Only by accurately predicting the types of attacks and developing contingency plans can we prevent or overcome them.

Organizing the DHS into discrete agencies that do their jobs while maintaining their own separate identities. For an organization to be effective, it must have a clear-cut mission, good leadership, the proper resources, and a strong sense of camaraderie. Canada tried to do this by placing all of its soldiers, sailors and airmen into a single organization with a common uniform. It failed. The department of Defense has kept the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines as distinct, proud organizations in which brotherhood and unity of purpose and morale flourish. The DHS should follow this model. The Coast Guard, Transportation Security Agency and others should keep their own uniforms; wearing a badge with the DHS logo is sufficient to identify them as belonging to an integrated department.

Developing a policy and creating a mechanism for dispensing federal monies to states and localities. Every state has a legitimate claim for federal funds to prevent and combat terrorism, and the sums requested soon become astronomical. The DHS must determine how much the federal government can afford to spend for homeland security and dispense it to states on a strict basis of most critical need. There is no place for pork barrels.

Clearly delineating leadership roles and organizational authority in critical areas such as biodefense, cyberdefense and critical-infrastructure protection. Attacks on our food supply or on Wall Street's communications network could be more devastating than another 9/11. Policies for handling biochem attacks with voluntary rather than imposed quarantining, such as "Self-Shielding" used by Canada during the SARS episode, need to be developed. One of the great successes of the DHS to date has been the establishment of a Science and Technology Division to seek out and bring in 21st century tools to prevent and fight terrorism. This admirable initiative should be continued.

Establishing a highly effective gaming and exercise structure similar to the DOD's wargaming exercises. In combat, a soldier does what he has been trained to do. Similar training must be established for first responders by the DHS.

Creating a culture and establishing policies for integrating the responsibilities of the DOD and DHS. The DHS has been looking inward and must begin looking outward. The DOD has traditionally looked outward and must begin looking inward. The recent establishment of a Northern Command and changing National Guard mission priorities are moving the DOD in the right direction. The DHS should follow suit and similarly change its outlook.

While I do not agree with every task-force recommendation, most of them are not only sound but deserving of priority action. Perhaps Sen. Joseph Lieberman, who did a splendid job as the leading congressional architect of the DHS, and Congressman Christopher Cox, who has shown similar leadership in the House, could take the initiative. Debate on these issues should begin now on a bipartisan bill that should be first in line for the 109th Congress.

Mr. Rowny is a former ambassador and Lt. Gen. U.S. Army (ret).

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How much harm can one US Army officer do?

Seems like just enough to keep the Chinese on their toes.

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Iranian Missiles Threaten US Troops

This seems rather obvious, but the news part is that it is being stated explicitly by a Bush administration member. What does this mean? Seems like the Bush administration and other conservative news outlets are bringing more and more attention on Syria and Iran lately . . .

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New Law to Spread the Use Of CIA's Analysis Approach

The Washington Post reports that some of the CIA's analysis techniques will now be mandated throughout the intelligence community:

For example, the new national intelligence director must pick an "individual or entity" to be responsible for ensuring that "elements of the intelligence community conduct alternative analysis of the information and conclusions in intelligence products." Such analysis is commonly referred to as "red-team analysis."

This all seems to be rather neutral news. Could be good or bad depending on how the regulation is implemented. So long as it results in the _timely_ production of viewpoints that would otherwise not be considered, then it seems a plus.

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December 19, 2004

is the clock ticking (again)?

Awhile back, we asked Is the clock ticking? that is, toward another attack on the US.

We heard a recent statistic that every time bin laden releases a _video_ tape, there is a major attack or more than one, within 53 days. We've been trying to verify this, but the log provided int he post above is the best we could do.

Questions have arisen in several quarters recently about the personal physical security of bin Laden given that he is able to issue to many messages . . .

Just pointing these things out . . . perhaps the US can't pressure the ISI too hard for some reason . . . interesting . . .

UPDATE: Forgot to mention that on the strength of the bin Laden -video and attack link, the FBI arrested some 700-800 Muslims the weekend before the US election -- many for relatively minor reasons, like immigration violations. These were people it had already been keeping an eye on for some time, hoping to glean intelligence by watching them. They then interrogated all and found no reason to keep them. Heard this secondhand from a friend in a position to know. Checking stories from the Monday before the election, November 1st, might show some corroboration.

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OpinionJournal - Extra

The Wall Street Journal's OpinionJournal does a good job of offering commentary on the growing role of blogs in political discourse in particular, and communications in general. They have about one articles a week or so about blogs or blogging or the blogosphere.

Friday's article by Daniel Henninger is yet another interesting take on the blogosphere and is worth your time.

[Here's another good one they had about blogging recently.]

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"Osama" the film

While reading through National Review articles not long ago, we stumbled uponthis article, offering a favorable review of the film "Osama," which won a Golden Globe for best foreign film last year. We've rented this film and will watch this evening and offer thoughts later . . .

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Iraqi Security Forces Improving

IRAQI SECURITY FORCES, MARINES CAPTURE 72 SUSPECTED MILITANTS
and IRAQI SECURITY FORCES FOIL 2 INSURGENT ATTACKS are two CentCom stories that seem to have slipped under the radar of the rest of the press earlier in the week. Excerpts from the first:

The policemen and soldiers immediately returned fire, holding their ground and summoning their quick-reaction force. Marines were also called to assist but were not needed, as the ING decisively repulsed the attack. Several of the attackers fled to a nearby mosque, where the ING found them and a variety of weapons and ammunition.

In a full sweep of the area, the ING detained 34 suspected insurgents. The soldiers also discovered a car bomb across the street from the police station. Marine explosives experts were called in to defuse and dispose of the bomb.

And from the second:

Two Iraqi police stations came under attack with small arms fire during a coordinated effort by insurgent fighters to overrun the stations in western and eastern Mosul. The Iraqi police and Soldiers from the Iraqi National Guard successfully repelled the attacks, preventing a reoccurrence of the events of Nov. 10 when many police stations were abandoned and later looted.

This is the third and fourth time since then where insurgents have tried but failed to take police stations, proving that the Iraqi Security Forces are growing stronger each day.

We haven't been tracking the performance of individual Iraqi units as closely as we'd like here at The Adventures of Chester, but it seems that there are quite a few that are performing well and improving continuously, while some others might be characterized as being in a "start-up" stage and have yet to prove themselves. This would make sense, though, given the difficulty of building unit cohesion and tactical skill from ground up. As an aside: it seems that the US press does a poor job of identifying Iraqi units by name when discussing their performance, opting instead to lump them together as "Iraqi security forces," without any identifying information. Of course, this fits the narrative of chaos and incompetence that most news organizations produce and advocate.

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December 18, 2004

NK Defection News

Stories about defections in NK keep coming and coming.

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Blogging resumes tomorrow . . .

The Adventures of Chester will return full-force Sunday afternoon and evening . . . stay tuned!

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December 15, 2004

Slow tonight . . .

Blogging will be very light tonight. If The Adventures of Chester could direct you to one site today, it would be here and here for some very interesting posts over at Belmont Club about the impact of the Iraqi elections on the region in general and the Iranian regime in particular.

Please don't forget the Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge, which ends tonight at midnight pacific.

We're awfully proud of the great showing that readers of The Adventures of Chester have given in this contest: our site remains in fourth place and has raised $2003. Thanks to all of you who've contributed! We said at the outset that we wanted to prove that our readers could soundly trounce those of other blogs and that's about the size of it! If you haven't donated yet, please consider -- tonight's your last chance!

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December 14, 2004

Thanksgiving at Camp Fallujah

I stumbled upon this today and thought it worth mentioning. It is a letter home from a female Marine Lance Corporal Civil Affairs specialist somewhere near Fallujah. I have not edited it, except to remove her name.

----------------------------

From: LCpl K.
Dear Mom and Dad,

I, as most would of thought, was expecting a very
homesick Thanksgiving. Although I wish I could have been home, my Thanksgiving was filled with motivation and inspiration. To start off, the unit got together and the CO said a couple of words to the unit. He complemented us for our hard work, and was extremely impressed with the plans we have for the future.

We then had lunch with some MRE crackers, popcorn, and SPAM. Afterwards, like we do most days, we prepared for the convoy into the city. It was a good convoy and all went well. While we were in the city, we were asked to get together because the General wanted to talk to us. The General being, General Casey, a four star General in the Army who is in charge of Iraq. He again complemented us on the good work and sacrifices we are making. He told us that our hard work had paid off and there is no longer a safe haven for insurgents in Iraq. He then said something that would inspire the weakest of heart. He said, "The enemy was willing to die for there cause, and you gave them their wish". He told us that next year when we are home for Thanksgiving we will be truly grateful for all the gifts in our life. We can look back at this Thanksgiving and be proud of what we are doing.

Filled with juice and energy, we convoyed back to Camp Fallujah. As we came to the first gate to the camp, I was in shock because a Marine Corps Major was standing at the post. Along with the Major was a 1stSgt. I reported to the Major what convoy we were and how many packs we were carrying. He told me to proceed and have a Happy Thanksgiving. As we came to the second gate, a Marine Capt and a SgtMaj were standing the post. There was not a PFC or LCpl to be found. None of the posts had young Marines at them; Officers and Staff NCOs manned them all.

The command decided that the young Marines were going to have the night off to get some good chow. It was unbelievable, and a wonderful site. The leadership took charge and took care of the younger Marines. This filled me with a pride indescribable with words. I am so honored to be a part of an organization like this. Marines taking care of Marines with such unselfishness.

As I went to Thanksgiving chow with my brothers and sisters, the IMEF Commanding General LtGen Saddler and the IMEF SgtMaj, SgtMaj Kent were serving chow. The amazing part was that they were so enthusiastic about it. Everyone was in a great mood, and ready to take on anything. It makes you think that if a 3 star general in the United States Marine Corps can serve turkey to a bunch of 18-20 year old Lance Corporals, then you can suck up whatever you have to do and stop complaining. So, as I went to bed, I felt very Thankful and indeed blessed for a great life. Tomorrow, I am sure will be full of fighting and disaster, along with the added stress of little sleep and cold days and even colder nights. But for tonight it's Thanksgiving and everything is okay.

One Motivated LCpl

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Note to self: Keep eye on Castro and Chavez

Castro is warning the US that "Cuba will become from one end to the other an enormous wasp's nest that no aggressor, however powerful, will be able to overcome."

And he's hanging out with his buddy Hugo Chavez, who is rapidly turning the clock back to the 1930s in Venezuela.

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The Imperatives of Elections on Schedule

The Middle East Media Research Institute is running a new series about the upcoming elections in Iraq. The first part is entitledThe Imperatives of Elections on Schedule and is a roundup of Iraq and other Arab opinion about the upcoming elections, put together by one of MEMRI's senior researchers. Very interesting stuff.

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More on China's suppression of intellectuals . . .

After reading this excellent summary of suppression of intellectuals in China, I began to wonder . . . if the Commies think it's bad now, what will they do about the blogosphere?

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China questions leading critics

China is proving once again that a liberal economy and classical liberalism don't go hand in hand. Intellectuals in China are now "terrified" at the prospect of a new crackdown on dissent.

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Blogger Challenge Update

Alright, loyal readers, time for another update from the folks at Spirit of America. They tell Chester:

On Thursday, Omar and Mohammed from Iraq the Model and Friends of Democracy, Kerry Dupont from SoA and I met with President Bush in the Oval Office. It was a half-hour meeting with the President. Paul Wolfowitz was also
there . . . here are two items.

About half way into the meeting the President said to Omar and Mohammed, "I want you two to know that we are going to stay until the job is done. It doesn't matter what the rest of the world says. It doesn't matter what the UN says. We are going to stay until the job is done. It's important that your country knows that." It was a powerful and moving moment.

After talking about Spirit of America, Pres. Bush turned to Omar and Mohammed and said, " You see gentlemen, that is the beauty of America. Inever met this man before but he's out there helping to win this war on terror just as much as Wolfie here. That's what I believe in." He went onto talk about the importance of private-sector, grass roots initiatives like SoA.

So there you have it from POTUS's mouth folks: Spirit of America is helping win the war. Be a part of the Blogger Challenge. Please consider donating to SoA.

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December 13, 2004

Programming News

Loyal Readers: Posting this week will be unfortunately light. Mrs. Chester is in the midst of studying for a big exam and requires use of the trusty iMac in the evenings. Hopefully, I'll be able to squeeze in a solid post or two.

Fear not! While prevented from blogging, I am always searching out new and exciting information to discuss in these pages. Over the next few days, if blogging is difficult, I'll be reading:

1. Grand Strategy in War and Peace, edited by Paul Kennedy (ht: Bill Roggio at the fourth rail)

2. Three separate monographs from the International Institute for Strategic Studies:
a. Saudi Arabia and the Illusion of Security by J. E. Peterson
b. Whither Iran? Reform, Domestic Politics and National Security by Shahram Chubin
and,
c. Civil-Miliary Relations and Peacekeeping by Michael C. Williams.

We'll see if these prove to be of interest or use here.

In the meantime, if there are scant updates here, please don't forget that the Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge ends in about 48 hours. If you have been holding out, this is your chance. Donate here. It's tax deductible, and supports freedom in the Middle East.

Thanks to all of you who have used the Amazon links in the sidebar to order books (and gifts?) this holiday season. This is a great way for you to support this site, as The Adventures of Chester receives a very small fee for every purchase originating here.

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Is the Middle East Changing?

The Weekly Standard is optimistic about the prospects for Arab-Israeli relations in 2005.

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LA Times thinks we have no Iran options

The latest mainstream press story on Iran's nuclear program, U.S. Options Few in Feud With Iran, sticks to the script that we have little leeway in what happens.

Facing diplomatic gridlock, unappealing military options, internal ideological divisions and major domestic and foreign political constraints stemming from the Iraq war, Washington has little choice but to watch and wait.

If this is true, it is a result of either a lack of imagination, or the personnel changes within the administration. But I doubt it's true.

Washington's war planners have updated their scenarios for a possible showdown with Iran. The national security bureaucracy has conducted war games, and officials have been "gaming out" other ways the United States could respond if diplomatic efforts to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon were to fail.

But they describe the efforts as "prudent contingency planning" that should not be interpreted as saber-rattling. If anything, the process of studying a potential conflict with Iran seems to have made some Bush administration officials more cautious. One possible outcome that alarms planners, senior officials say, is that Tehran might order terrorist retaliation if the United States were to strike Iranian nuclear targets.

U.S. officials are particularly worried about the potential for Iran to use the militant Lebanese group Hezbollah, which it funds and supports, to hit American targets in Iraq, step up attacks in Israel, target U.S. embassies and consulates around the world, or even to strike inside the United States.

American officials have called Hezbollah "the A-team" of terrorism, potentially more deadly than Al Qaeda, with possibly dozens of cells around the world.

"Hezbollah gives Iran a global weapon that we need to understand," the second senior administration official said.

If we are concerned about Hezbollah now, how much more concerned will we be if it has access to nuclear weapons at the whims of the mullahs? Is it not possible to launch raids on Hezbollah in conjunction with attacks on Iran? Hezbollan as it stands today will look like child's play compared to the threats and coercion it is capable of after Iran goes nuclear – just one of the many reasons for Iran to do so.

Any scenario under which the U.S. attacks Iran, overtly or covertly, will have to include plans to batten down the hatches at myriad American diplomatic targets overseas where retaliation could be expected, the official said.

Easily enough done. Quietly evacuate non-essential personnel and move the Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Companies into reinforcement roles in the areas in the region that are vulnerable. Use a battalion or so of infantry if necessary.

U.S. economic targets abroad could also come into the cross hairs. And some think a cornered Iran could launch preemptive strikes of its own, as some Tehran officials have threatened recently.

Let's get this straight: Tehran has warned about launching pre-emptive strikes of its own and we're still talking to them? The next conversation should use Margaret Thatcher's response to Saddam when he mentioned using WMD: tell them to take a Polaroid of Tehran because there will be nothing left but glass when the shooting's over. Here we have a regime that – even the Europeans think – is clandestinely pursuing nuclear weapons, and it is warning us of its pre-emptive capabilities? What will it warn us of when it has nukes? Will it warn us?

Several American officials have said they believe Hezbollah has "sleeper" cells raising money in at least five major U.S. urban areas. The question in officials' minds is how those cells might react if the U.S. were to clash with Iran.

"Five major urban areas" seems a bit too specific for mere whimsy. If the cells are there, we must be watching them and it is a small step to arrest them. Certainly we can do so before making any strategic moves? Arrest them all and then arrest everyone in their cell phone lists. See what shakes out. If they are innocent, let them go.

The Pentagon, officials said, is paying less attention to Iran than it is to Syria, which the administration believes is the source of much of the funding for the Iraqi insurgency. With 150,000 U.S. troops deployed in Iraq for the foreseeable future, top military officials rule out the possibility of a large-scale ground offensive against Iran.

Hear ye, hear ye! The Adventures of Chester will soon publish its series on right-wing critiques of the war, and the first will examine the size of the US military, among other things. We should be ashamed that after putting 500,000 troops in the Arabian desert for upwards of 12 months around 14 years ago, that we now struggle to maintain 150,000 there for two years. The US military is too small and this fact is already constraining our options and threatening our security. The left decries Iraq as breaking our current forces – in hopes of giving one more reason why the invasion was a poor idea. Instead, they are strengthening the claim that our military is too small.

Airstrikes could set back any nuclear program temporarily, but a determined Tehran government could rebuild it in as little as three years, outside experts said. Some warned that Iran had learned the lessons of the Israeli airstrike that destroyed Iraq's nuclear reactor at Osirak in 1981, after which Tehran dispersed its nuclear activities and fortified its facilities to thwart an air attack.

Who says we can't then hit them again? We'll return to these options soon in the Iran series.

Overall, this LA Times article shows the administration conveniently split between those who think military action would work, but is a bad idea, those who think military action wouldn't work, but that we have no other options, and those who think we have no options period. If any of this is true, it is not the Bush Administration that I voted for. But I'm doubting that it is true.

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Another staff-officer war story . . .

[This is just a short war story tied to recent events . . . but hopefully interesting. Also, the last war story enticed about $300 in contributions to Spirit of America's Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge, so perhaps this one will be equally successful. There are only three days left. Donate here. And here's my first war story from last week.]

The day after arriving in Ad-Diwaniyah in mid-April, 2003, the battalion intelligence officer, Captain J., and I, headed out from the university to make liaison with elements of an Army battalion that was currently in control of the city. We wanted to see what they could tell us about the disposition of the city and its safety. One of their companies had established a base for itself in an empty warehouse on the grounds of a large industrial and rail facility on the western edge of the city. We found it only after driving past it several times and seeing their OE-254 long range VHF antenna sticking off the rooftop.

The company commander gave the two of us and our driver a warm reception and offered to show us where his battalion CP was. We hopped back in the Humvee and followed his directions.

The Army battalion had set up its command post in a former training facility for an Al-Quds Division – one of Saddam's "elite" paramilitary forces that he planned to use to "retake Jerusalem" one day. The camp was on the southwestern edge of the city, bordered by a highway on one side and a railroad on the other, if memory serves. There were large ammunition caches on either side of the camp – acres and acres of munitions, though that would not be obvious to my battalion until later.

The Army battalion was very hospitable and their S2, or intelligence officer, quickly gave Captain J and me an update about the disposition of the city. An A-team of Green Berets had been in the city for much longer than the infantry battalion, and had attempted to establish a local government with a local cleric in charge, but the cleric had been run out of town by unhappy townspeople. Other than that, there was little news to report abut the city. No problems were expected from the townspeople. At night we could hear gunfire throughout the city, but it was supposedly largely celebratory, according to the intelligence officer.

We thanked them and headed back to the university. Over the next week, the Al-Quds training camp would become the home to the entire 1st Marine Division for a week or two as it recocked, and refitted itself for the next phase of the campaign: the post-conflict phase, when various battalions would perform security and stabilization operations.

**

Shortly after the remainder of my battalion arrived at the university, I was given a new task. Our part of south-central Iraq was to fall under the command of the 1st Marine Regiment, and the regiment had set up a headquarters in Al-Hillah, about an hour's drive to the northwest on Route 8. I was told to accompany the company commander for Charlie Company and go meet with the battalion staff of 1st Battalion, 4th Marines, one of the subordinate battalions of the 1st Marine Regiment. We would see what manner of engineering assistance 1/4 in particular, or 1st Marines in general, needed from us.

1/4 had established itself in a warehouse facility on the south side of Hillah, a good bit removed from the center of the city (and its traffic) and in a self-contained complex, which allowed for good security on all sides. One of the buildings on the compound was s storage facility for food to be distributed to the populace through one of the old regime's food programs. Another building had been a small pistol manufacturing site, where knockoffs of Bulgarian Makarov .38 caliber pistols were strewn about the floor in various stages of production – though none of them finished. I picked up a sample of a yet-to-be completed lower receiver to take back and show my bosses. [See an example of a Makarov here.]

Since at the last moment our battalion executive officer, or second-in-command, had decided to join us in our trip to Hillah, there was little for me to do in terms of liaising with the infantry battalion, except to be present and remember everything that happened for future discussion. This constituted a great deal of what I did during the war. Quite often I was the only lieutenant in a room full of lieutenant colonels. Just as often I was in a receiving mode to transfer information back to my bosses at the battalion. Occasionally I would be fortunate enough to be a fly on the wall in a truly important meeting – as when I sat in on the 1st Marine Division's Course of Action Brief to General Mattis for actions north of the Euphrates River – encompassing the division's plan to destroy two Republican Guard Divisions. Lasted three hours and there was never a dull moment.

**

The reason I tell these stories is to show that in mid-April I traveled a fair amount through the Babil province of central Iraq. (I would get to travel even more later, but that's for another story.) What I'd like to discuss is something I noticed wherever I traveled.

When we arrived in Diwaniyah, there were still a fair number of Saddam murals all over the place. Every city had five or six prominent Saddam murals or portraits. The entrance to the university had a large portrait of Saddam right next to the gate. It was tile over concrete, reinforced with rebar and removing it was no small task, so Mrines painted some slogans over it instead.

After we had been in Diwaniyah for a week or so, many of the Saddam murals had been painted over by the residents of the city – and they had replaced Saddam's image with that of a religious cleric. I had no idea who this was, and why the locals, whom I assumed were Shi'ites, so revered him. The portraits were well-crafted and showed the cleric with an austere look about him, but with a sense of triumph in the background – as though his very austerity had somehow contributed to a great victory. As I traveled more throughout the MEF's portion of Iraq, I found his image everywhere – and in a growing number of places. At first it was a mural or two, but soon, Iraqi taxicabs had small postcard-sized prints of him in the windshields of their cabs, facing outward. I found his image in Samawah, in Hillah, in Diwaniyah – and perhaps evern Nasiriyah, though I'm not sure. In any case, it was clear he was quite a popular fellow.

Back at the battalion headquarters, I discovered who he was through an article on the Early Bird, which is available through the classified internet that the military uses, so that troops deployed, with no other communications means can at least have some news. The man's name was Ayatollah Mohamed Bakir Al-Hakim and he was a major Shi'ite cleric.

Al-Hakim came from a long geneology of Shi'ite religious leaders. Hakim's political activities during the 1970s led to his imprisonment in 1972, 1977 and 1979. He fled to post-revolutionary Iran in 1980. There he founded the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) and remained in exile until his return to Iraq on 12 May. While in Iran, according to the article I read, he gained a distaste for theocracy. He came to dislike the Iranian form of government. He also organized a resistance movement to Saddam's government.

Upon the liberation of Iraq by the US, Al-Hakim returned to Iraq and moved his organization, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution of Iraq, with him back to Najaf, where he had begun. There he began to re-establish the SCIRI as a political force.

Again, though, Al-Hakim, was not the theocrat that may be expected. According to this article in Al-Ahram, the Egyptian newsmagazine, Al-Hakim

has tried to dampen widespread fears in Iraq regarding the role of the faqih (religious scholar) in administrative as well as religious leadership, arguing that the Iraqi people should decide on the form of government they want, and must participate in the making of political and social decisions. He has proclaimed his commitment to civil society, political diversity and free elections.

As I sat in the battalion headquarters and read about these things, I tried to imagine the deft political maneuvering that was certainly taking place amongst Iraq's Shi'ites now that they were free from Saddam. The calculations, the plans, the alliances, and the moves – an entire political society had been given a free market of receptive minds on which to work whatever programs, policies and agendas it could. It was stunning to imagine.

**

After I left Iraq, our battalion left one company reinforced behind to provide engineering support to the security and stabilization battalions. They stayed for an additional 4 months.

At the end of their stay, the scheduled movement back to Kuwait was delayed by civil unrest in and around Najaf, which required that they stay a bit longer. The civil unrest resulted from an assassination.

Ayatollah Mohammed Bakir Al Hakim was killed on August 29th, 2003, by a car bomb that also killed 124 other Iraqi's.

Speculation in the Muslim world at the time was inconclusive as to who might have killed him, ranging from Sunni's to other Shi'ites, to the Israeli's to the Americans themselves. From what one reads of Hakim, he seems to be what Americans could best hope for in Iraq: a religious scholar who opposed Saddam, yet was also opposed to a religious state, and wanted to include all Iraqis in a new government. He seemed a decent man, if this obituary is accurate.

**

So now we hear that the Iraqis have founded a new alliance of political parties and it is expected to sweep the elections in January. [See The Adventures of Chester's first report on this here.]

We also learn that one of their key candidates is Abdul Aziz Al-Hakim, the brother and successor of Mohamed Bakir Al-Hakim.

Already, the western press is claiming that the election will lead to a Shi'ite monopoly on power that will alienate the remaining Sunni's, who will never participate in a government – and perhaps even lead to a Shi'ite theocracy in Iraq. See an opinion piece in this weekend's International Herald Tribune by Marwan Bishara: Iraq: Elections are no savior. Mr. Bishara's analysis is not ground-breaking, when one considers that the IHT is just a compendium of articles from the Washington Post and the New York Times. But he is convinced that

the United Iraqi Alliance, a coalition of mostly Shiite parties organized under the auspices of Grand Ayatollah Ali Husseini al-Sistani, is expected to win a large majority in the 275-seat assembly, enabling it to write up Iraq's constitution. A Shiite domination of Iraqi politics will further polarize the ethnic divide already aggravated by the war and push the door wide open toward a civil war.

Mr. Bishara is especially suspicious of Ayatollah Al-Sistani:

eferred to as a "moderate" for not advocating resistance against the American occupation, the fundamentalist cleric is also seen as a "democrat" for being adamant on holding elections when parts of the country burn. Beyond that, little is known about how he thinks or what he is planning.

What is certain, however, is that the ayatollah is a spiritual leader with no political experience or interest, whose only connection to the rest of Iraq, indeed the world, is a network of politically minded functionaries and clergies with sectarian agendas and ambiguous liaisons within and outside Iraq. They feed him information and implement his general directives as they see fit. Today, they are dividing the assembly seats among their close allies in the Shiite parties. That is hardly a cause for optimism.

In fact, members of Sistani's entourage are thought to be concealing their true intentions in accordance with the Shiite religious code of Taqiyah, or concealment in the face of danger, which was adopted through centuries of discrimination against them as a small minority within the Muslim world. Sistani's men are exploiting America's need for elections (when all other justifications for the war have been discredited), to prepare for Iranian-style clerical control over a predominantly secular Iraq. In recent days, Arab leaders, including Yawer, have warned against blatant Iranian interference in Iraq and a "dramatic geopolitical shift" in the region resulting from the elections.

Mr. Bishara offers no evidence of the preparations by Sistani's men for clerical control over Iraq. But he goes even further, with his own counter-proposal to the status quo:

Why then does Washington insist on a policy that strengthens the fundamentalists and inflames ethnic strife, instead of empowering secular or Arab majorities in a federal democratic Iraq?

Is Mr. Bishara in the same world that we inhabit? Somehow, the US, by giving the Iraqis the freedom to hold elections for the first time ever, is complicit in the rise to power of Shi'ite Muslims. Doesn't Mr. Bishara understand that the clearest way for the Sunni's to participate in politics is to join the government, join the elections, and end the insurgency? He says the Shi'ite takeover of politics "will probably not last long as the conflict escalates into an open ethnic war inflamed by extremists on both sides." Are we really to believe this? I am holding Mr. Bishara to his word. We will revisit his forecast as time passes to see how correct he is.

There are plenty of reasons to be optimistic about Iraq. All who have been there, and who aren't journalists, report that it is a country of growing dynamism, and the insurgency is isolated and has no support among the populace. Iraqi bloggers like Iraq the Model are among the most bullish on their country's future – a good sign.

The next few months will be quite interesting.

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December 12, 2004

The Future of the Iranian Nuclear Program, Part V

[The long-awaited return to the Iran series! See Part I, Part II, Part III, and Part IV.]

This post will examine the military capabilities of Iran. We want to know several levels of information:
a. What is the size of the Iranian military? What equipment and forces does it possess, and how much of each?
b. What is the disposition of the Iranian military? How well is it maintained, how frequently is it exercised, and in what capacity?
c. What is the experience of the Iranian military? Are its personnel battle-scarred veterans of past campaigns, or are they novices?
d. What is the philosophy of war of the Iranian military? How is war conceptualized within its services?

The information that I've found doesn't lend itself to these exact categories, but they are worth stating explicitly nonetheless.

First, the size and equipment of the Iranian military, its maintenance readiness, its exercise frequency and current dispostion: The magazine of the Air Force Association has quite a bit of good information in a December, 2002 article entitled, "The Iran Problem." The article has some tidbits about Iran's ground forces:

Epic, World War I-style battles with Saddam destroyed about 60 percent of Iran's heavy land weapons, according to Western estimates.

Today, with a population of more than 65 million to draw from, Iran has about 513,000 men in uniform. Another 200,000 to 350,000 are in the reserves, estimates Center for Strategic and International Studies expert Anthony H. Cordesman.

The army totals around 450,000 men. Of these, about 125,000 are Revolutionary Guards--ideological elite units formed after the fall of the Shah in 1979 to protect Iran's new theocracy. Iran's inventory of main battle tanks stands at roughly 1,100, with 1,200 other armored vehicles and more than 2,500 major artillery weapons.

The army also has about 100 AH-1J attack helicopters, but the readiness of these aircraft is unlikely to be very high.

So here are some raw numbers with which to start. Seems similar to Saddam's ground forces in overall organization, but Iran's are probably much better in terms of maintenance and training. How much of the ground force is conscripts? This would be good to know.

Here's more on ground forces, from an article entitled "The Revolution of Military Affairs and the Middle East: If this is a Revolution, then we are the Counterrevolutionists." (PDF available here: http://www.cia.gov/nic/PDF_GIF_2020
_Support/2004_05_25_papers/military_affairs.pdf)

The Iranian main battle tanks are the Russian T-72 tanks of which iran possesses roughly 400. These constitute roughly 25% of the armored forces of the Iranian military. Iran possesses and unknown number of anti-tank weapons as well as a number of wire-guided ATMLs, [anti-tank missiles] all old-generation weapons.

Now back to the Air Froce Association, for some excerpts about air and naval forces:

. . . earlier this year, Iran took delivery of a shipment of North Korean gunboats that US intelligence believes will be converted into guided-missile warships. Combined with other recent naval and coastal defense acquisitions, which range from Russian Kilo-class submarines to Chinese Silkworm anti-ship missiles, the new boats could help Iran control important sections of the Persian Gulf in a crisis--including the strategic Strait of Hormuz. [2002]

Today, Iran has only about 150 aging US-built aircraft left. These include 66 F-4D/Es and 25 F-14-A/Bs, which are about 60 percent serviceable, according to a net assessment drawn up by Cordesman. Iran has long tried to evade the US embargo on parts for these airplanes by purchasing through third parties.

The backbones of the Iranian air force today are 24 Su-24 Fencers and 30 MiG-29 Fulcrums. These Soviet-era aircraft are about 80 percent serviceable, claims Cordesman. If Iran acquires a nuclear weapon, the Fencers could be used as an interim delivery capability, pending perfection of an adequate ballistic missile.

Iranian units also include 14 RF-4E and five P-3F reconnaissance aircraft. The air force has a limited aerial refueling capability. Air defense relies mainly on 100 Hawk missiles from the Shah's era, with a scattering of newer, shorter-range Soviet- and Chinese-made models.

Iran has for years had an across-the-board program of WMD development. Although it is a party to the Chemical Weapons Convention, it has produced and stockpiled blister, blood, and choking chemical agents, according to US intelligence. It has a biological weapons arsenal and may be able to indigenously produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon by late this decade, says a CIA estimate.

Iranian officials have spoken openly of their desire for missiles with a range beyond that of their Shahab-3, which can hit targets up to 800 miles away. The CIA believes Iran may flight-test a missile of intercontinental capability later this decade. The Iranian military has already deployed unmanned aerial vehicles, including some configured for attack, and may be seeking more sophisticated such aircraft to serve as a WMD delivery capability.

So we glean from this that Iran's aircraft are aging, and its air defenses are limited. Aside from numbers of missiles, it would be better to know the capability of the network connecting them – is it countrywide or localized?

Of note in the above article is that the CIA estimates that Iran may flight-test an intercontinental missile later this decade. This year, only two years after the CIA was quoted, Iran successfully tested a 1200-mile range 'strategic missile'.

More on the Air Force, from the article about RMA in the Middles East:

. . . the Iranian air force is based on American F-14A Tomcats and F4E Phantoms and Russian Mig 29s. All excet the Mig 29s are older-generation jets. These are supported by a helicopter attack fleet of limited size and reach. These planes are equipped with Phoenix and Sidewinder air-to-air and Sparrow missiles, and with maverick and Russian Fajr a-Darya air-to-surface missles. Iran possesses a very small fleet of reconnaissance UAVs, but is clearly behind all the modernizing armies in the Middle East in terms of such aircraft.

It appears that the Iranian military has one large-scale military exercise every two years. We can glean some more info from articles about Iran's various wargames in the past few years.

In 1998
From CNN:

Troop movements already observed include tanks and artillery pieces along with "thousands of troops" of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, said the official.

The exercises are expected to last for several days.

In 2000
Iranian Navy to Hold Exercises in Persian Gulf

He said the naval exercises, code-named "Vahdat 79" (Unity 79), will be held in an area of 5,000 square meters, covering the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Oman and strategic Strait of Hormuz, the state IRNA news agency reported.

Some 130 ships and submarines, 58 airplanes, choppers and unmanned planes as well as 7,000 troops will take part in the large-scale war games.

Safari said the C-802 surface-to-surface missile will be deployed on IRGC's "Tondar" vessel for test fire. But he did not disclose any technical details about the missile.

In 2002
This article implies some level of interoperability or coordination between their services:

The Iranian army staged military exercises in the Sea of Oman on Tuesday to mark the anniversary of retaking of a border city during the Iran- Iraq War, the official IRNA news agency reported.

Ground, navy and air forces took part in the war games to mark the liberation of Khorramshahr in Iran's Khuzestan Province, where fierce battles took place during the 1980-1988 war.

Destroyers, submarines, warships, gunboats, amphibious personnel carriers were involved in the exercises, IRNA said.

The military exercise is expected to continue with navy exercises on Wednesday.

In 2004 (as previously reported in The Adventures of Chester from an article worth reading at WorldTribune.com, here.)

Iran Exercise Reaches Climax:

Officials said the main stage of Payrovan-i Vilayat-2004 took place on Wednesday in southwestern Iran near the Iraqi border. They said air and ground units launched a night-time offensive on a mock enemy in a demonstration of Iran's rapid deployment capability.

They included the use of infantry, artillery, and armored units in an offensive backed by fighter-jets and helicopters. At the same time, engineering and bridging units erected bridges for infantry crossing.

Do the Iranians really have a joint military as they would have us think? Are their forces as capable as they seem from their press releases? Are these exercises meant to impress their own populace as much as the US or Israel?

Another excellent article in the Autumn 2004 Parameters, the journal of the US Army War College, takes issue with the idea that the Iranian military is well-maintained at all:

Iran’s geographic girth lends itself to a country with large standing armed forces, but Iran’s military today is weaker than it was in the wake of the revolutionary euphoria of 1979. The Iranians militarily lived off the Shah’s US-provided arms and equipment to survive the Iran-Iraq War, but the war nearly exhausted their inventories and put enormous wear and tear on equipment holdings. They have managed to make due, in part, by cannibalizing American equipment to keep fewer armaments running, but these stopgap efforts are increasingly more difficult to muster to prolong the longevity of the military inventory. The Iranians also are using illicit means to bypass US restrictions on the export of military equipment to Iran. Iran has been hard-pressed to find direct external weapon suppliers to replace the United States. Michael Eisenstadt observes that in recent years Russia has been Iran’s main source of conventional arms, but Moscow has agreed not to conclude any new arms deals and to halt all conventional weapons transfers since September 1999.

Iran's most powerful asset is its ballistic missile force, which could be engineered to carry weapons of mass destruction. See this very informative report on Iran's Ballistic Missile Capabilities, which states that Iran is believed to possess some 20 or so Shahab-3 long range missiles, with a range of 800 miles and an accuracy of 2,500 meters – not very good, but great for harassing assembly areas or delivering WMD.

The Experience of the Military

Much of the literature of the Iran-Iraq War from 1980-88 discusses the incredible human-wave attacks used by both sides. Any military personnel who remain no doubt remember this and wish to avoid it as a tactic. As the Parameters article states,

Tehran must have shuddered when witnessing the American military slashing through Saddam’s forces in the 2003 war. Iran already had a sense of its conventional military inferiority compared to American forces. Years ago Tehran received a direct taste of that from the American re-flagging operations in the Persian Gulf during the Iran-Iraq War, when the US Navy readily destroyed much of Iran’s conventional naval capabilities, leaving Iran to harass shipping with irregular hit-and-run gunboat attacks. In the spring 2003 war, American and British forces accomplished in about a month what Iranian forces had failed to do in eight years of war with Iraq between 1980 and 1988. Tehran cannot fail to appreciate that Iranian conventional forces would have little chance of resisting a US military assault.

And they are no doubt preparing their conventional forces to resist as best as possible – either through a linked, joint interoperability, or through the guerrilla warfare they have seen be so successful in Iraq.

Philosophy of War

Making the jump from human-wave attacks to a joint military force is quite a long leap, both conceptually and from a training and funding standpoint. While the Iranians may understand what makes the US so lethal, they probably cannot put together the necessary parts to replicate our lethality, as much as they might like to. Nevertheless, we don't want to completely discount their conventional forces. Let's leave it like this: their conventional forces are a more formidable adversary than the Iraqi forces, and are somewhere near the level of a second- or third-rate western power. returning to "The Revolution of Military Affairs and the Middle East:

There is little doubt that these two states may have wanted -- under ideal circumstances -- to take full part in the RMA in the Middle East, at least to the extent that states such as Egypt and Turkey have done in the last decade. The Keyproblem, however, is the limited access of hese states to RMA technologies, due to their strained relations with the United States. The major weapons supplier of those states is Russia, whoe RMA capabilities have been both obsolete and limited. Moreover repeated pressure from the United States on Russia and Western European states has limited both the number and the types of systems these supplieres were wiling to provide Syria and Iran. Consequently, these states have had significant problems in modernizing their armed forces . . . the Iranian and Syrian armed forces are laden with obsolete weapons systems and have barely entered the modern era in terems of their major conventional weapons systems. Both states rely on traditional force structures, rely heavily on Soviet military doctrine, and take fairly traditional approaches to conventional warfare.

Further resources:

Asia Times article about the A.Q. Khan network

The Iranian Air Force:
IIAF Imperial Iranian Air Force
Scramble on the Web - Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force (IRIAF) and a chronology of its missile tests: Iran Missile Milestones.

The Iran-Iraq Air War
Iran-Iraq War In The Air 1980-1988 by Tom Cooper and Farzad Bishop

Loads of Info on Iran – all kinds (though much of the military content is outdated)
AllRefer - Iran - Very Detailed Country Guide to Iran (around 200 Pages) | Iranian Information Resource

An MSNBC Summary
Secret empire: The Iran files

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Outing the Newest Spy Satellite

A few days ago, we reported on remarks made on the floor of the Senate by Sen John Rockefeller, criticizing a new secret acquisition as being unnecessary, too expensive, and endangering our national security. We speculated that it might be a weapon, given that it is opposed by four Democratic Senators.

Today, the New York Times has outed the program as a spy satellite, meant to add to the existing capabilities of two others launched in the 1990s, under the program name "Misty." The Times then goes on to offer one hundred reasons, via various Democratic observers, why the new satellite is a bad idea. The brilliant thing in this bit of "reporting" is that no defenders of the program are going to be dumb enough to speak out in favor of the new satellite's capabilities only to see those published on the front page of the Gray Lady. They might give a lukewarm, carefully worded response in its defense, but it will likely be so cryptic about the capabilities as to make the overall statement useless. So let's examine carefully each of the arguments against the new satellite, if that is what it is, that the Senators and the New York Times make. The program is a

new $9.5 billion spy satellite system that could take photographs only in daylight hours and in clear weather, current and former government officials say.

Doesn't that sound useless? Of course the Times has made it sound as wasteful as possible right off the bat. Only in daylight and in clear weather? How could that possibly be of use? Our satellites routinely take photo montages (for lack of a better word) of a variety of places all over the globe, for an even greater variety of uses. They take infrared photos, thermal images, high res photos, and maybe even x-ray images, though I'm not sure on the last . . . doesn't plain old photos sound boring?

Outside experts said on Thursday that it was almost certainly a new spy satellite program that would duplicate existing reconnaissance capabilities. The Washington Post first reported the total cost and precise nature of the program on Saturday, saying that it was for a new generation of spy satellites being built by the National Reconnaissance Office that are designed to orbit undetected.

Fantastic! The total cost, purpose, and size of a new intelligence gathering program has been published by the Washington Post! This is great news (for our would-be enemies)!

Some current and former government officials expressed concern that the disclosure of the existence of the highly classified program might be harmful to national security. They said Congressional Republicans were questioning whether the public hints first dropped by four Senate Democrats opposed to the program, including John D. Rockefeller IV of West Virginia, might have represented a violation of Congressional rules. Mr. Rockefeller's office said earlier in the week that the senator had consulted with security officials before making a carefully worded statement on the Senate floor that described the classified program as unnecessary and too expensive, but did not identify it further.

Whenever the lowliest Lance Corporal is given a security clearance, he is taught that talking around an issue is just as bad as talking about it. For example, if I am emailing you a document with sensitive info, and I call you on an unclassified line and say, "Hey, did you get the thing about the stuff?" this is still a violation of security for the information contained therein. Adhereing to these rules can be frustrating at times, but they apply to Senators just as they do to military officers. If one of our adversaries (hmmm China?) had been paying attention to what was going on around the bill which contained this new program -- not a farfetched proposition at all -- he can now put two and two together. So perhaps Mr. Rockefeller consulted with security officials before making his statement, but this amounts to covering his own backside, not our collective national hindquarters.

. . . critics, including Democrats and Republicans on the Senate Intelligence Committee, have questioned whether any new satellite system could really evade detection by American adversaries and whether its capabilities would improve on those already in existence or in development.

Well, this is certainly a discussion we want to have in public! Thanks gents, for airing these concerns! It would be interesting to see page-view stats for the NYTimes online in Beijing today. More:

"These satellites would be irrelevant to current threats, and this money could be much better spent on the kind of human intelligence needed to penetrate closed regimes and terrorist networks," said a former government official with direct knowledge of the program. "There are already so many satellites in orbit that our adversaries already assume that just about anything done in plain sight is watched, so it's hard to believe a new satellite, even a stealthy one, could make much of a difference."

Could "former government official" be someone who has been fired? That's what I would do to someone who recommends only funding weapons and reconnaissance programs that are relevant TO OUR CURRENT THREAT. Hello! Ever hear of the folly of planning only for the past war, and not future wars? Here it is again, but instead, we only think of the current war, and not future wars. But that's only half of the idiocy of this statement. What are some of the things that an adversary might do in plain sight, for which there are no other ways to do them? The official is assuming that our adversaries are only terrorist groups, and perhaps the underground nuke programs of other countries. But how do you hide troop movements from satellites? Can a satellite not detect the presence or absence of ships in a harbor, of guards on a frontier, or of the recent activities in any of a number of locales, and then analysts can deduce from there? Perhaps the opponents of this system so readily criticize it because they are 100% convinced that the adversaries we face could have no large-scale forces that are impossible to hide from satellites? They focus on Al Qaeda, but forget China.

A compromise between the Senate and House that was approved in both chambers this week authorized spending on the program for another year. Money for the program had earlier been allocated as part of a defense appropriations bill that reflected strong support for the system among members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees.

If a compromise was reached, why are they complaining? And who are the Republican members who supposedly also question this program? Why are there no quotes from them, and why are they not named? If Mr. Rockefeller can out a secret satellite program, surely he can say which members of his opposing party are with him?

But Mr. Rockefeller and other Democrats on the Senate intelligence panel, including Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, said in calling attention to the issue this week that they would seek much more aggressively to scuttle the program next year.

This is great. So let me get this straight. You approved the funding for a multi-billion dollar satellite program just so that you could then demean it publicly, give away its secrets, and then not fund it next year? How much money are you spending on this program this year, since you intend to end it next year? Could you call that a waste? Why not refuse to compromise, and publicly out the satellite in the process, raise a fury with your friends in the press, then save the money from this year's program costs?

The existence of the first stealth satellite, launched under a program known as Misty . . . the first such satellite was launched from the space shuttle Atlantis in March 1990. A second Misty satellite is believed to have been launched in the late 1990's and is still in operation, current and government officials said. The program now in dispute would represent the third generation of the stealth satellite program . . .

Let's return to the opening description of the satellite, that it can only take photos "in daylight hours and clear weather."

I ask you: is this a useless capability? Only if we believe our enemies are non-state actors hiding in caves, or North Korea, building nukes in underground caverns. Doesn't it seem that of all the various types of imaging and imagery our satellites are capable of producing, that high-resolution photographs are among the most basic and fundamental? Doesn't it seem that it might actually be quite useful to have high-resolution photographs of a particular piece of terrain. The natural contours and makeup of an expected battlefield can be reconnoitered over a long period of time -- say several weeks -- and can be just as useful if gathered at day as at night. I know this for certain -- I have been the recipient myself of such intelligence products. Moreover, a great deal of information can be gleaned, inferred, and deduced from careful examination of such images. The US employs entire legions of experts with PhDs in imagery, topography, geology, etc etc etc to analyze such images. Their collective salaries are miniscule compared to the loss of one American life due to an unprepared battlespace.

Moreover, these images are often used to create militry maps, which is a fundamental, yet not very sexy part of any successful military operation. And maps have a half-life. Roads can be moved, new buildings put up, bridges added, marshes destroyed, fields burned, forests -- deforested. Having the ability to create an imagery update to an existing map can change entire battle plans. And this update can happen over the course of several weeks before the battle -- when weather will allow, if that is truly a concern.

Sen Rockefeller and his moronic cronies seem to think that two of such satellites are enough. The span of time between launches -- let's say almost a decade, based on the article -- leaves us thinking otherwise. How degraded is the original satellite from 1990? Moreover, what level of bandwidth is it capable of using for transmission? Light-year like leaps in this area have been made since 1990. Can one satellite cover the entire surface of the earth? Can two? Wouldn't a third help?

Since September 11th, we have been treated to tale after tale of the incredible decline of our human intelligence-gathering capabilities in the decades preceding. We have heard time and again that the US concentrated too much on technical means of intelligence-gathering -- to our own detriment. In this bit of news, we hear this argument again by the above "former government official": "this money could be much better spent on the kind of human intelligence needed to penetrate closed regimes and terrorist networks."

Here we see the pendulum swinging in the opposite direction: reducing our technical intelligence-gathering means while the problem of our dearth of human intelligence is but merely identified and not yet fixed -- and won't be for five or so years. To those who ask, how would you have the pendulum swing, I say, why must there be a pendulum at all? Fund both and don't look back and we'll all sleep better at night.

UPDATE: Nearly forgot about one of the main reasons to continue forward with these programs. If we don't our ability to produce them ever again will be severely degraded. Already, much of what NASA figured out how to do in the 1960s is lost ot its own institutional memory. We cannot let this happen to our most sophisticated and difficult to produce weaponry and technology, namely, nuclear missiles, satellites, and submarines. In the summer of 2001, I read an article in Wired magazine that discussed how difficult it is for the nuclear weapons program at Los Alamos to find new PhD candidates. I can't find the article now, and have bigger fish to fry this afternoon (Iran, Part V coming up next), but I'll link to it if a reader sees it.

UPDATE 2: Thanks to Alert Reader "tequila rose" for finding a link to the above-mentioned Wired article. Looks like it was 2002, not 2001. Read it here . Excellent article.

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December 11, 2004

Opposition wins election in Taiwan

The Kuomintang, or KMT, the Nationalist Party in Taiwan and the opposition to the Democratic People's Party, or DPP, have won the election.

Looks like Chen Shui Ban will have to rethink his ideas of blatantly pushing for signs of independence from China (like changing the name of Taiwan's institutions, etc.)

We welcome thoughts from those in Taiwan, or anyone else.

While we fully support the freedom of the Taiwanese from China, these election results certainly seem to be in the favor of the US, because we will likely be able to concentrate on North Korea and the six-party talks, and not be distracted by other crises in the Pacific theater.

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December 10, 2004

Fallujah, the Morning After - The torture house and the merry-go-round.

Another great dispatch from Bing West, with the Marines in Fallujah. He is writing a book about the battle.

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Kerik Pulls Out as Bush Nominee for Homeland Security Job

Bernard Kerik has removed his name for nomination as the new chief of Homeland Security, due to concerns about the immigration status of a former housekeeper.

This is perhaps the most ironic story of the year. The man whose new position would have required him to be responsible for securing the borders of the republic has disqualified himself due to his own presumed lack of understanding over the status of the nation's immigrants.

If there were ever a one-man microcosm of a specific foreign policy, Kerik is it. Our nation's immigration policy, both the de jure rules about who is supposed to get legal passage, and the de facto results of who comes in illegally, is a shambles.

Perhaps Kerik's fall will convince the administration to enact major immigration reform that does not include opening the borders to Mexico completely. Such a move should only be done, if at all, in conjunction with drastic economic, judicial and political reform in Mexico. The deal would be something like this: "Sure, you can continue to let your poorest citizens immigrate to the US and benefit from the remittances they send home; but in exchange, you must reform your system aggressively such that in a decade or so, they will have no reason to leave in the first place. At that point, capital, goods, and labor will all flow across the border as necessary."

This is entirely possible with strong leadership.

UPDATE: We appreciate the comments of "Mark in Mexico" who has a much more pessimistic view of the future of Mexico. Thanks Mark. We've had limited visits to Mexico, though living in Texas, we plan more. If the situation is as dire as you describe it, then perhaps we must content ourselves with tightening the border and working to assimilate into Western culture those who come across.

Random followup thought: We had a professor at Duke who had written much of the Nafta legislation as a congressional staffer. He told us that the true reason for Nafta was no economic, but instead to provide stability to Mexico's government such that things like the currency crisis of 1994 wouldn't happen again -- perhaps presumably to stem immigration, though he was not that explicit.

If and when we do make it to Mexico, we'd like to post about it here . . .

Another random followup thought: Victor Hanson's "Mexifornia" is an excellent book about the effects of immigration in California's central valley. Adding a linnk in the sidebar . . .

Also, we thought this article in City Journal was very interesting, but we're not sure we agree with it. Since we live in San Antonio, and are white, and therefore a minority, we've become very interested in issues of Hispanic assimilation. San Antonio is a great place. Things seem little different here from any other American city of similar size, but we haven't been here long enough yet to tell . . .

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December 9, 2004

Don't forget the Blogger Challenge!

The Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge has but 5 days remaining! Don't forget this great cause this holiday season!

Donate here, if you can! Thanks to those who have!

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Here's to our depraved sex culture!

Yesterday, we examined the new US policy of "Regime Transformation" in North Korea and we also discussed the revisions to North Korean criminal laws.

The Taipei Times has another story today about North Korea's new "crackdown on dissent." The funniest line in the article:

Pyongyang also said human-rights activists were smuggling in radios to spread outside news and "depraved American sex culture" and undermine the government.

I said last week: they can't stop the flow of information. It will break the regime. They've got gulags. We've got Britney Spears.

In other Asia news, the Japanese are threatening sanctions on North Korea because

the remains given to Japan by Pyongyang were not those of Megumi Yokota.

The government for its part is waiting to see how North Korea will explain the discrepancy between the results of DNA testing in Japan and Pyongyang's claims that the remains were those of Yokota, who was abducted by North Korean agents in 1977 at age 13.

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Late pre-election surge by Taiwan separatist party is setting off alarm bells

The International Herald Tribune states that the parties and political forces favoring independence are gathering momentum in the final run up to Taiwan's parliamentary election on Saturday:

But widening support for the party lately has forced President Chen Shui-bian and his ruling Democratic Progressive Party to tilt further toward independence as well, a trend that could be a harbinger of increased tensions in the Taiwan Strait in years to come.

One of the main questions is whether or not Chen will try to change the name of many of Taiwan's organs, from "Republic of China" to "Taiwan":

Hours before a TSU rally Sunday, Chen unexpectedly announced that he wanted to change "China" to "Taiwan" in the name of state-owned enterprises like China Telecom. He also proposed to change the name to Taiwan on the economic and cultural offices that it maintains in more than 70 countries, including the United States, that recognize Beijing instead of Taipei.

An Alert Reader, who is in Taiwan, and wishes to remain anonymous, emails Chester with this report:

People I have talked to recently feel that the DPP or Pan-Greens (President Chen Shuei Bien’s alliance) will win the Dec. 11th elections over the Pan-Blue alliance. If you look at the recent history of the politics here the DPP came to power (won the presidency) with only about a third of the vote. That was 4 or 5 years ago. That was because the KMT (Koumintang) party had split in two. However just recently President Chen won the presidential election outright against the combined forces opposed to him, although it was by the skin of his teeth (about 30,000 votes). So, the momentum is in favor of the DPP.

Just recently President Chen has made known his wish that the names of schools, state firms and foreign missions change their names that have to do with China. In other words Taiwan agencies that call themselves anything that has to do with China would change their name. Sounds like a distinct but small step away from association with China. Naturally the USA came out against the idea. I was in Taipei two nights ago and had supper with some Taiwanese at the American Club. While eating one of the ladies there who was speaking Mandarin Chinese said, “I am speaking a foreign language.” She was facetiously referring to President Chen’s move away from China.

Today in my Chinese class (I am studying Chinese), I asked my teacher a number of questions about all this. She was very cynical of politics but believed that the DPP would win the upcoming election. I also asked her how China could woo Taiwan. She is well aware that their method to date has been the iron fist. Her reply was that there was no way. I think there are many here who believe that there is no joining with China again. I think too from what she said that there are some who feel that the US will bail them out in the event of war. However she was not under that illusion. Help from the USA is not a sure deal since we are stretched so thin. I hope this is helpful.

It will certainly be interesting to see what happens on Saturday and in the aftermath.

Written by Chester at 10:30 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

NPR: Major Alliance Emerges in Iraq

This is huge.

The alliance includes Iraq's largest Shi'ite parties, a prominent Sunni tribe, and smaller non-Shi'ite groups. It has the blessing of the country's number one Shi'ite leader, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. The alliance could dominate Iraq's national election in January and become Iraq's pre-eminent political force.

It must be really, really good news if it made it into NPR. No other media outlet we've found is covering this, which also means it is probably good news. The coalition

includes groups from Iraq's other communities, the Sunni Arabs and the Kurds, and from Iraq's numerous minorities . . . They're calling it the United Iraqi Alliance . . . [according to a key aide of Sistani,] "this particular alliance has really brought in very divergent views -- people on the extremes of the political spectrum -- so to bring these people together was not an easy thing to do."

. . . Both of the two largest Shi'ite political parties are in, the Dawa party and the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution of Iraq. These were exiled parties during the Saddam Hussein years based in Iran . . . there are also Sunni groups which were especially courted to broaden the appeal of the alliance beyond the Shi'ite community. Sheik Fawaz Jarbah is probably the most influential Sunni to join. He is the head of the Shamar tribe, one of the largest tribal groups here, representing many Sunnis and some Shia who live in the north of the country around the city of Mosul. The Iraqi insurgency is made up largely of Sunni Arabs and some formal Sunni groups . . . have announced they will boycott the election. But Sheik Jarbah expressed the belief that such a boycott will not be effective:

"God willing, we hope that they vote in this election, and honestly, that good security conditions are provided, and if it is possible for most of the people, Sunnis and non-Sunnis to participate, the Iraqi people hope from this election to form a national government that could accomplish achievements for the nation."

The article continues that Sadr talked with the alliance, but his name is not on its slate of candidates, though he supports the alliance. Sadr apparently opposes having elections while Americans are in the country.

This is a key sign that the US/coalition strategy to sunder the links between foreign fighters and Sunni Ba'athist fighters is working. The foreign fighers have been isolated and scattered -- predominantly in the Triangle of Death area if any remain there -- and the Ba'athist fighters are faced with a choice: continue fighting, and grow weaker by the day, or join the electoral process.

Notably, nearly every mainstream US news outlet is reporting on the staged question to Rumsfeld yesterday in Kuwait, and not this story.

Figures.

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Senator: Mystery Spy Project Dangerous

Four Democratic Senators have voiced their concerns that a new secret spy program is a threat to national defense. None of the AP's sources would say what it is though. The article makes some guesses:

The rare criticisms of a highly secretive project in such a public forum intrigued outside intelligence experts, who said the program was almost certainly a spy satellite system, perhaps with technology to destroy potential attackers. They cited tantalizing hints in Rockefeller's remarks, such as the program's enormous expense and its alleged danger to national security.

A U.S. panel in 2001 described American defense and spy satellites as frighteningly vulnerable, saying technology to launch attacks in space was widely available. The study, by a commission whose members included Donald H. Rumsfeld prior to his appointment as defense secretary for Bush, concluded that the United States was "an attractive candidate for a Space Pearl Harbor."

Sending even defensive satellite weapons into orbit could start an arms race in space, warned John Pike, a defense analyst with GlobalSecurity.org, who has studied anti-satellite weapons for more than three decades. Pike said other countries would inevitably demand proof that any weapons were only defensive.

Perhaps a directed energy weapon, or some other form of space-based platform is in the works. Perhaps even some sophisticated eavesdropping technology. Here at TAOC, we believe it is likely a weapon if opposed by Democratic Senators.

The internet is of course awash in various theories. Hereis one site offering some speculation about future weapons platforms. We make no comments on these whatsoever.

Written by Chester at 8:06 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 8, 2004

Chester and Submarines

We've had several recent posts about submarines -- particularly about China's purported new missile sub.

I have always had a fascination with submarines despite being a Marine.

My dad, when in his 20s, used to work at the Electric Boat Division of General Dynamics in Groton, Connecticut and helped construct submarines. He always used to tell me stories about building them when I was a boy. He even tried to enlist in the Navy to join the sub force, but being deaf in one ear since birth, they wouldn't take him.

When I was in college, subs interested me because of the three-dimensional nature of their environment: much more like flying than driving a ship, I've always thought.

Once, while in Naval ROTC, Admiral Bowman, the four-star admiral in charge of the Navy's nuclear power program (and therefore submarines) at the time, and also a Duke grad, came and spoke to our NROTC unit. He was a great speaker. That morning the handful of us who were Marines had an amphibious warfare class and he slipped in and joined us for a bit. Very down to earth, and very much a warfighter. He told us that there might be a tendency for Marines to think of submarine officers as "pencil-necked geeks." He recommended that we check out the book "Blind Man's Bluff," to learn a little more about the sub community.

The reason I write all of this is to give a high recommendation to that book -- I've just put up a link to it in the sidebar. Truly fascinating stuff, spanning all of the Cold War. Would make a great stocking stuffer.

I found out later that Naval submarine officers are actually prohibited by regulation from commenting on the contents of "Blind Man's Bluff." That has to mean something . . .

Written by Chester at 11:41 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Wednesday Blogger Challenge Update

Spirit of America has sent Chester another update on the Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge:

SoA Leading in Motley Fool "Foolanthropy" Drive

Spirit of America is in first place among the 5 charities recommended for holiday giving by the Motley Fool personal investment Web site. If we receive the most donations through the Motley Fool, they will donate an extra $10,000 to us. Conveniently, this would cover most of the cost of our supporter events this month. So if you are considering a donation to Spirit of America, please go to this page first and click the "Donate" link at the bottom of the page. Then you can go to any page on our site and we'll track your donation as coming through the Motley Fool. It'll help!

Give The Spirit of America this Holiday Season

We now support giving "the Spirit of America" as a gift to your friends and family. Instead of a new necktie for dad please consider making a donation to your favorite Spirit of America project as a gift. When you do, you'll get a certificate to print and give or we'll send an email telling your them about your gift. This is a gift that makes a difference. It also fits all sizes. Guaranteed. You can give a Spirit of America gift here:

For the holidays, give Spirit of America!

Blogger Challenge

The "Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge" is in its last week. So far, 162 bloggers have raised more than $52,343 for Spirit of America projects. Whoa! Thank you bloggers!

It might seem strange to link to the Motley Fool site above, but an extra $10,000 would be nice for Spirit of America. If you'd rather donate through The Adventures of Chester, you can do so here. Thanks to all who have donated! Our little site has raised $1890 as of today!

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A new blog to watch? The Becker-Posner Blog

The Becker-Posner Blog: " Becker is a Nobel-prize-winning economist who in addition to scholarly publications on a wide range of economic issues including education, discrimination, labor, the family, crime, addiction, and immigration, for many years wrote a monthly column for Business Week. Posner is a federal circuit judge and also a writer of books and articles in a variety of fields, including antitrust, intellectual property, and other fields in which economics is applied to law, but also topical fields such as impeachment, contested elections, and national-security issues. "

Written by Chester at 10:35 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

US Pursues "Regime Transformation" in North Korea

There is now a name for our North Korea policy: Regime Transformation, according to Stephen Hadley*, expected to replace Condoleeza Rice.

This jives with what we know about US efforts to distribute radios in North Korea, and Chinese and South Korean efforts to put cell-towers along the border. Maybe a grand bargain has been struck . . . (past posts on NK: here,here,and here.)

In other NK news, North Korea has made a revision to its criminal laws. For example, the regime has stiffened its penalties for participation in an armed riot. Now one can be sentenced to more than 5 years for joining in. On the face of it, this seems bad news, but we think it is excellent. Notes the article:

Unconfirmed reports of rioting in protest of food shortages have been made recently.

And the law is for ARMED riots. So let's be clear: North Koreans are conducting armed riots against the government! Hmmmm.....

[as always, we are attempting some aggressive pattern-spotting]

*[Interesting . . . Hadley possesses a law degree, not a PhD. Seems like most National Security Advisors are academics.]

Written by Chester at 9:09 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Communist China's sub circled Guam first

The Chinese sub that entered Japanese territorial waters three weeks ago, first circled Guam, according to the Japanese press.

Surely they are testing our defenses and reactions, and those of the Japanese as well.

From the end of the article:

China is believed to have learned a hard lesson when its military activities were contained by U.S. aircraft carriers during a period of cross-strait tension in 1995-1996.

Chinese military authorities realized the need for quick deployment of submarines east of Taiwan.

China has since conducted submarine drills and collected navigational data in areas between the so-called first line, which connects the Japanese archipelago and Taiwan via the Nansei Islands, and the second line, connecting the Ogasawara (Bonin) and Mariana islands.

If you've ever asked a US submariner how he refers to his sub, he'll say "boat." If you ask him, "well then, how do you refer to surface ships?" He'll say, "Targets." It is extremely difficult for surface ships to hide from "boats." Perhaps the Chinese wish to make our carriers vulnerable.

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Hello From the land of the Pharaohs Egypt

Hello From the land of the Pharaohs Egypt looks like a promising blog from Egypt. One to keep an eye on.

Written by Chester at 8:46 PM | Link | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Marines Defeat Terrorist Attack on US Consulate

Since the story about the attack onthe US Consulate in Saudi Arabia broke, we've been wondering if the Marine Security Guards were involved. The Marine Security Guard Battalion sends small teams of Marines to guard embassies and other US posts all over the world. Now we know that they were able to hold off the attackers until the Saudi police destroyed them.
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New York Daily News
December 8, 2004

Marines Saved 'Em From Qaeda
By Corky Siemaszko, Daily News Staff Writer

When the Jihadis burst into the U.S. Consulate in Saudi Arabia, guns blazing and screaming, "Where are the Americans!," the diplomats quickly fled to a panic room.

"I certainly was worried," Consul-General Gina Abercrombie-Winstanley said yesterday, a day after the daring daylight Al Qaeda raid that left two Americans wounded and five consular workers dead.

"It's not good to hear gunfire outside but I did have complete faith in the security of the building."

That's because the five militants who managed to shoot past the Saudi guards at the gate were no match for the Marines manning the main chancery building - where the American staff had sought sanctuary.

Witnesses said the terrorists fired on Marines from behind trees and forced several workers to serve as human shields, ordering them to yell "God is Great!" as they shot over their shoulders.

But the Marines held them off, giving Saudi special forces enough time to help repel the attack. Three of the attackers were killed, two more were wounded. And there were unconfirmed reports that one of Saudi Arabia's most-wanted militants, Saleh Al Oufi, was among the captives.

"Marines were performing heroically protecting the chancery and the citizens who were inside," Ambassador James Oberwetter said. "The chancery building was not breached."

Still, the fact that the terrorists were able to get as far as they did "shows the need for improvement," he said.

The slain consular workers were from Yemen, Sudan, the Philippines, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, the State Department said. Al Qaeda claimed credit yesterday for the attack on "one of the bastions of the crusaders in the Arabian Peninsula."

The militants "clearly understood how cars entered the compound and, in my view, had scoped it out," Oberwetter said.

They slipped into the consulate on foot by following a diplomatic car past the concrete barriers, but were confronted by the mission's first line of defense.

"The terrorists began to engage the local Saudi staff at the gate, who returned fire and a great firefight broke out," Oberwetter said. "Regrettably the terrorists were not taken down there and were able to access the compound."

Witnesses say that once inside, militants burned the U.S. flag, terrorized staffers and took hostages.

Oberwetter gave no details of the hostage-taking but said Saudi forces "freed the compound from the five terrorists."

Written by Chester at 8:42 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Iran Update

Two days ago, we covered the uproar that greeted Iran’s President Khatami at a recent university appearance (more: here.)

MEMRI: The Middle East Media Research Institute, which “explores the Middle East through the region's media," now has a transcript from various coverage of the event, and offers links to video as well, though I couldn't get them to work.

Note that when Khatami refers to nukes, he says,

"The way we have dealt with the nuclear issue has removed a grave danger that threatened Iran. If we had not acted in an intelligent and calculated manner, we would have faced problems now."

Does he mean that he successfully used diplomatic means to stave off an attack?

Given the university outburst, no wonder the mullahs want to shut down blogs and other internet traffic. (See last post below).

Perhaps Khatami was unable to implement any reforms because hardliners rigged the legislative elections.

Here's yet another analysis stating that Iran has bought itself time to further its nuke program via diplomacy. Iran fully intends to resume its uranium enrichment in the future. Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi said as much in October, 2003, before complying with European demands at the time:

"We suspended uranium enrichment voluntarily and temporarily. Later, when our relations with the I.A.E.A. return to normal, we will definitely resume enrichment." Early in 2004, Kharrazi continued this line, arguing that "it’s our legitimate right to enrich uranium."

Iran has repeatedly stated to its own populace that the rationale for its nuclear weapons program is to deter foreign aggressors. But perhaps a better way of explaining their zeal exists. Perhaps the mullahs know that with a little foreign encouragement, their populace would rebel against them.

Written by Chester at 8:03 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Iran Mullahs to Confiscate Sites & Blogs, Replace Content

From an Alert Reader:

Iran Mullahs to Confiscate Sites & Blogs, Replace Content

Written by Chester at 6:40 PM | Link | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 7, 2004

Slow Evening

Loyal Readers: A social commitment has prevented posting this evening. As time does not permit the precise attention our regular topics deserve, I'll resume tomorrow . . . until then . . .

And thanks to those who continue to contribute to the Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge -- now halfway complete. As of this writing, The Adventures of Chester has raised $1815 for this great cause.

Written by Chester at 11:11 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 6, 2004

From a Marine Lieutenant in Fallujah

Thanks to an Alert Reader, who has sent me the following email. I've edited it slightly for content. No date of its origin was given, so I'd say sometime in the past two weeks.

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We have been really busy out here lately and therefore I haven't had the opportunity to write too many updates. Sorry.

As many of you know I have been involved in the Battle of Fallujah (Operation Phantom Fury) for the past few weeks. It has been the wildest experience of my time in the Marine Corps.

My Battalion was the Main Effort during the attack. We were given the Jolan District and the southern suburb we call "Queens." These two areas, without a doubt, were the insurgency stronghold in the city.

We cleared every house (3 times) (bulldozed over a hundred with a D-9) and faced the insurgents one-on-one. This is the way they preferred it. For these guys, there is no honor in being martyred by a Abrams Tank or a Bradley. They want the opportunity to take out an American Marine. That was fine with us!

We were led into the city by the Army's 2/7 Cavalry. They had the Tanks and Bradleys but only had about 90 dismounted troops who were capable of clearing out the small areas these guys hide. They did a great job though.

We have about 900 Marines in my Battalion. Every single guy performed like a seasoned professional and all did so with honor. They really gave it their all. 22 Marines in my Battalion gave their lives for our country during this fight and over 200 Marines earned the Purple Heart. Without a doubt, Third Battalion, First Marines (3/1) had the toughest mission for a reason. We did the dirty work no one else wanted to do. Thousands of dead insurgents will back me up on that statement.

We had been prepping for this fight for the past few months. We made numerous "feints" or false attacks into the southern portion of the city where all of their bunkers and fighting positions were located.

We would act like we were moving in for a large attack (with tanks, air strikes, lots of troops and trucks, etc...) and take pot shots at the city. After doing this a few times it was obvious they thought this was the direction we would do our major attack when the time was right. This was the side of the city that the Marines attacked back in April. Closer to the actual attack date, we dropped leaflets, passed messages over the radio, television and mosques speaker systems warning the "good citizens" to leave the city. Furthermore, we shut off all the electricity, water, cell phones, etc.. a few days prior to the attack. Finally, we continuously sonic boomed the city with jets at the speed of sound (this really pissed them off), played Rap/Rock 'n Roll Music and taunted them over loud speakers (this really! , really pisses them off!!) and began to shape targets with bombs and artillery.

We attacked the city from the North, under the darkness of night, and took them by surprise. For the first day or two the insurgents were exposed outside of their houses while trying to get to alternate fighting positions in the North of the city. Our pilots picked these guys off one by one. Once we entered the city and started to move south, the fighting was up close and personal and the use of mortars, artillery and air support was really limited. It is too complicated to know where all of the friendly units are within the city.

Booby trapped doors, car bombs, trip wires, dropping grenades through spider holes in the rooftops, pre-positioned machine guns, RPGs, snipers from the rooftops and minarets (mosque steeples), mortars, and land mines. These were their means of fighting (we encountered all these types at some point in time). They knew the houses they were hiding in and where the most complex hiding spots were located. The spots that gave them the best geometry to fire on us without us seeing them. These guys were smart, well trained and worst of all, willing to fight to the death. These were not the nickel and dimers we have been facing on the outskirts during the months leading up to this.

They knew how to fight us in an urban environment. They didn't challenge the tanks and armor and blended in the city without obvious signs to target. They would move house to house and fall back as we approached. They had weapons/ammo staged in every house. It was really complex.

After clearing the houses (over 3000) 3 different times and still finding insurgents, we just started to bulldoze the houses with D-9's.

It was awesome. They were not expecting it and it was hilarious to watch. I have some great photos. I have great photos of the whole attack. A ton of good stories too. You will have to buy me a beer or two to get the good ones out of me though.

Bored yet?

My Battalion is the unit that had Kevin Sites (NBC Reporter) attached.

We had the guy who allegedly murdered a wounded insurgent (I think he is faking it!). There is an investigation and I am sure the military will come to the correct conclusion. Not much else to comment on there.

We also found/searched Zarqawi's house (it was really shabby), tons of propaganda, money, weapons, ammo, torture chambers (sickos out here), videos of suicide bombings and beheadings, and the list goes on. We killed Chechnyians, Syrians, Moroccans, Saudis, you name it. This was the "show" for all of the weirdo terrorist/jihadist in the world. We found other things that are still classified and I hope will be made public someday soon. You wont believe it. Bottom line is, this was a necessary mission.

The day before we step off on the attack, my Battalion had the 1st Annual Ben Hur Thundering Third Chariot Race. You might have seen a few pictures on the news. It was the tension breaker we all needed.

We had confiscated some horses and carts a while back. We dressed up a number of Marines to look like chariot drivers (Spartans, Romans) and race the horses. These horses were in terrible shape. One was named "Ribs" -- for obvious reasons if you had seen the horse up close.

Eventually only one horse would race so we had time trials to determine the winner. It was hilarious. I will never forget it.

I am just back to get a shower and change of uniform (it's been 17 days) and then I am heading back into the city. We should be there until the elections are done with and then we can come back home. We haven't let the people back into Fallujah yet. That is when it will get interesting. I am sure we will see roadside bombs, car bombs and suicide bombers by the truck load. We are trying to clean up the dead bodies and clear the streets of rubble before they can come back in.

Hopefully we will not be pressured to let them in anytime soon.

Written by Chester at 11:18 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Several Under-reported stories . . .

Loyal Readers: when I say that I have many posts planned, and then two hours go by without any, you can blame that on the slowness of blogger. Here is a compendium of things that have caught my eye today:

Iran Buying Nuke Materials Left and Right

Iran has purchased large quantities of beryllium according to one "non-US diplomat, citing intelligence gathered by his country."

Thanks to an Alert Reader for giving Chester this link.

Chester's next post on Iran is being delayed because the same Alert Reader has a 246 page file documenting Iran's weapons program, with links, and it would be silly for Chester to post without reading that first.

Oh, by the way, Iran today launched the largest military exercise in its history, right along its border with Iraq. Isn’t that interesting? What’s the response in our press? Snore.

Seems like a great opportunity to get operational intelligence on the capabilities of the Iranian military. Let’s hope our people are watching carefully. Also, perhaps we could trick Iran into engaging our ground and air forces in an open battle. We would absolutely crush them. This won’t happen though. Everyone learned after the Gulf War, in the words of the then-Indian defence minister, “Don’t attack the United States without nuclear weapons.” For more on that, see above. India, of course, detonated its first nuke 7 years after Gulf War I in 1998.

Does ”Students are wise, they detest Khatami” rhyme in Farsi?
----------------------
What would the catapult look like?

Wired News: Boeing Converts 737 Into Bomber is an interesting story directed to me by an Alert Reader who wished to follow up on the weekend’s post about Taiwan and China’s new submarine. He says that it is difficult to imagine a 737 landing on an aircraft carrier. This is true, but who knows? Chester does not possess enough expertise in jet propulsion to say if this could happen.

Perhaps in the future we could examine the vulnerabilities of sea-basing and “expeditionary maneuver warfare” to the growing submarine forces of the third-world.
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Some Historical Sources

As things heat up in Northeast and East Asia, it might be useful to learn a little more about some past conflicts there -- especially those that aren't as well-known as Korea or WWII. So here's some links to:

The First Sino-Japanese War

The Russo-Japanese War on Wikipedia

The Russo-Japanese War Research Society

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Could it be that Japan is attempting to bolster its military prestige abroad by committing troops to Iraq, and not just to cememt ties with the US? When Iraq is a stable, well-functioning democracy, quite a bit of political capital will have been earned by those nations that contributed.

Japan is certainly not afraid to do its share, though its citizens are not fans.

See also: Japan's defence chief upbeat on security in Iraq.

Oh, and Japan is thinking of occupying a barren island, just as an outpost to deter China.

----------------------

Written by Chester at 10:14 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Friends of Iraq Update

Mrs. Chester is at work tonight and I've got a long night of blogging planned. There is no way I'll get to everything I'd like to, so I'm making no promises . . . but there is much to cover.

I'd like to thank Alert Reader "Chris" who made a $500 donation to the Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge yesterday. His commitment is truly inspiring, but he tells Chester it is nothing compared to the sacrifices of our troops. Thanks, Chris.

Anyone who'd like to can contribute here.

Also, another Alert Reader actually works for Spirit of America and tells Chester via email:

"Thanks for all the mentions on your site. While we welcome donations, you should tell them that anyone is welcome to attend the events."

Here's more:

The theme of the events is "Grass roots America, Grass roots Iraq - the Untold Story." We can promise you'll gain a rare, ground-level "real world" perspective on Iraq. Food and beverages will be served

There are events in New York, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. If you'd like more information, please visit the Spirit of America website.

I've asked permission from the Spirit of America folks to publish their email addresses so interested readers can correspond directly with them and get the correct info on the California events.

If any Alert Readers go to these events, we'd really like a report, whether by post, or emailed to Chester (see sidebar for email address)!

Written by Chester at 8:07 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Operation Plymouth Rock is Complete

Little-noticed, and even less reported, Operation Plymouth Rock is complete and the Black Watch is back in Basra and will be home by Christmas.

From the Central Command Release:

The commander of the 24th MEU said the integration of the British forces into the MEU’s area of operations was remarkably seamless.

“For a unit that hadn’t trained with us to roll into a tough environment and begin combat operations immediately demonstrates just how well led and highly professional they are,” said Col. Ron Johnson. “They proved as good as their reputation, and the Marines felt at home among them.”

If anyone can find an article listing the number of deaths and casualties the Black Watch absorbed during its month-long sojourn outside of Basra, The Adventures of Chester would realy like to see it, given the whining of the British press when it was moved.

More from Centcom:

Soon after the battlegroup’s highly publicized movement into northern Babil, insurgents targeted the newcomers. Two attacks killed five Black Watch soldiers within days. Their mettle tested, the unit seemed to grow stronger. From their windswept, no-frills desert base -- dubbed Camp Dogwood -- on the west side of the Euphrates, the British soon punched across the river. With Marines to the south and east, the Black Watch squeezed the insurgents from the west and paved the way for nine days of successful precision raids.

Plymouth Rock was a success:

The operation resulted in the capture of more than 200 anti-Iraqi militants and the discovery of 11 weapons caches, as pro-Iraqi forces continued to thin insurgent ranks and chip away at the supply of munitions used to foment chaos and violence.

It seems that the casualties among the Black Watch were few, though of course tragic. Rather than pointing this out, the British press is shifting attention to "the fate of tens of thousands of Iraqis thought to have been killed" during the war.

British journalists: your countrymen have been victorious in a historic battle and since not enough of them died to satisfy your headline-making death quota, you handwring about unsubstantiated rumors of civlian casualties -- which as we know are nearly always inflicted by the insurgency on purpose, and only by the coalition by accident! This is of course, lost on many, who claim that the coalition actually kills anyone who tries to tell the truth about casualty figures.

Pathetic.

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While we're on the subject of the Black Watch, and not to kill the joy from their success . . .

There is a brief allusion in the October Telegraph article -- first linked above -- about the fate of the British armed forces:

Although the way in which the Government handled the affair further angered senior officers, already furious that they will disappear in the amalgamation of the Scottish regiments, they believe that their men will eventually win over the local population.

The "amalgamation of the Scottish regiments" is a nice euphemism for "decreasing the size of the British military while Britan is at war."

Perhaps the truth is that the British press is unhappy more "jocks" of the Black Watch didn't die, because that would save Britain the trouble of cutting the regiment altogether.

Hundreds of years from now, when the next dark age is over, historians will shake their heads at how we allowed western civilization to swirl down the toilet so easily. In risk management practices, when you evaluate any given incident that has resulted in a loss of life, limb or property, you usually find that there were a series of errors, and that if something different had been done at any one point, the entire incident would not have happened. When we read stories like this one, we are witnessing one such point in such a traumatic incident -- but the property destroyed will turn out to be our complete way of life.

Written by Chester at 6:26 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 5, 2004

Update

Loyal readers: Today has been frustrating. Blogger was on the fritz for the vast majority of the morning and afternoon. And I was halfway through a post I'd spent an hour on when my browser shut down with no warning this evening.

There is so much to comment on, but time is not on my side . . .

On Japan, I wanted to address the comments of an Alert Reader in the posts from my last Japan piece -- I think we agree and the fault is mine for writing poorly. The question is not a rise in Japan's militarism -- as the regional press, English-language Japanese press, and International Herald Tribune types would have it be. No, the question is one of Japan becoming a fully-functioning member of the world community at long last -- and we should welcome and encourage the support of its military, not lean on half-century old fears of a racist fascism taking root there. Anyway, that's the 30-second version of that post.

On Iran, I have a few good links from another Alert Reader. I'll try to get these out later tonight, but that post won't be as substantial as past Iran posts.

I will return now to what I was working on before Safari failed me: The Rightist Critique of the War, Part I.

Written by Chester at 10:04 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Various Quick Thoughts

We've noticed that most of you who order books through the Amazon link usually get military-related ones (surprise!). If you are looking for great Christmas gifts, The Adventures of Chester highly recommends the Aubrey-Maturin novels, beginning with "Master and Commander." They are very well-written and well-researched tales of swashbuckling derring-do. And the British Navy is cool. I've added links in the sidebar to the first book, or to a box set of all of them if you are ambitious.
[And don't worry: we can see what books are ordered, but not by whom; your privacy is safe.]

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Written by Chester at 3:40 AM | Link | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

The Latest Attempt to Influence Taiwanese Elections

In March, 2004, Chen Shui-ban was elected President of Taiwan for a second four-year term. His Democratic Progressive Party is seen to be much more in favor of formally declared independence from China by most observers.

On December 11th, Taiwan will hold legislative elections, and Chen's party will attempt to capture a majority for the first time ever. (See background on this here)

The CIA World Factbook notes:

note: debate on Taiwan independence has become acceptable within the mainstream of domestic politics on Taiwan; political liberalization and the increased representation of opposition parties in Taiwan's legislature have opened public debate on the island's national identity; a broad popular consensus has developed that Taiwan currently enjoys de facto independence and - whatever the ultimate outcome regarding reunification or independence - that Taiwan's people must have the deciding voice; advocates of Taiwan independence oppose the stand that the island will eventually unify with mainland China; goals of the Taiwan independence movement include establishing a sovereign nation on Taiwan and entering the UN;

As most know, Taiwan has the potential to be quite a flashpoint for conflict. Many players have a stake in the outcome of the elections, and are making their moves . . .

The World Economy

Global business wants stability in cross-straits relations. Taiwan is quite a player in world trade, especially in semiconductors.

Standard and Poor's cut Taiwan's credit rating to AA-/A-1 on Tuesday, and noted the rise in tensions as a principal reason. The new rating reflects a negative outlook for the island.

Could the rating cut have an influence on the island's leadership? Seems it could break two ways: they might think that toning down their independence talk would be better for stability. Or they might think, well, if we're damned if we do and damned if we don't, we might as well go ahead and suffer the consequences.

A rating cut by S&P seems like it would have little effect on the average voter though -- but who knows? Macroeconomic news is followed differently in other countries. US voters would sleep right through a rating cut, but perhaps it's different in Taiwan . . .

The United States

The US is pursuing two tracks: it is working very hard to convince the Taiwanese not to declare independence and trying to convince China that it still believes in one China. And it is also making preparations to defend Taiwan if necessary -- and letting those preparations be known. [Quick tangent: this is a truly interesting article, suggesting, among other things, that any China-Taiwan conflict in which the US participated would invariably incur the participation of South Korea -- through its defense treaty with the US -- and North Korea, through similar arrangements with China. Japan of course also has a treaty with the US.] The US has also sold Taiwan a lot of weapons.

China

The People's Republic of China most certainly does not want Chen's party to win. China has also pledged to crush independence attempts on Taiwan [note the slant in that article from the Chinese press].

China has made attempts to influence every round of Taiwan's elections, the most memorable of which was 1996, when China launched missiles and military exercises, and the US dispatched two aircraft carriers in a show of force.*

This round of elections is no different. The news on Friday that China's military has launched the first of a new class of ballistic missile submarines in what defense officials view as a major step forward in Beijing's strategic weapons program, is disturbing for many reasons, but the most interesting thing about it is the timing -- one week before Taiwan's elections. The story bears close scrutiny:

The new 094-class submarine was launched in late July and when fully operational in the next year or two will be the first submarine to carry the underwater-launched version of China's new DF-31 missile, according to defense officials.

"When fully operational, it will represent a more modern, more capable missile platform," said one official familiar with reports of the new submarine.

A second intelligence official said building submarines is a top priority of the Chinese, and the Type 094 will be "China's first truly intercontinental strategic nuclear delivery system."

The new Type 094 was spotted by U.S. intelligence agencies at the Huludao shipyard, located on the coast of Bohai Bay, some 250 miles northwest of Beijing.

The submarine is in the early stages of being outfitted and is not yet equipped with new JL-2 submarine-launched nuclear missiles.

The important thing to ask is: How quiet is it? If it can be found and tracked by our subs, then we can kill it before it shoots -- but finding and tracking is always difficult, no matter how loud a sub is.

The launching of the new missile submarine appears ahead of schedule. A Pentagon report on Chinese military power made public in May stated that the new Chinese missile submarine would not be deployed until around 2010.

A Defense Intelligence Agency report produced in 1999 and labeled "secret" stated that the new submarine is part of a program by China of "modernizing and expanding its missile force."

"Mobile, solid-fuel missiles and a new ballistic missile submarine will improve the force's ability to survive a first strike," the report said, "while more launchers, on-board penetration aids, and possibly multiple warheads will improve its ability to penetrate missile defenses."

The DIA report stated that China is expected to field one new ballistic missile submarine by 2020.

Great. Another slam-dunk for our intelligence services.

In a related development, U.S. intelligence officials said the Chinese suffered a setback in their JL-2 missile program when a test flight of the JL-2 missile failed over the summer.

The JL-2 missile program was delayed by the test failure but is continuing to be developed, the officials said. China conducted tests of the JL-2 in 2002 and last year.

So the missile doesn't work yet, but the sub has been launched? It looks like this story is the result of investigating by Gertz, and not a news release by China. The sub was launched in July. And our intelligence agencies said in May that it wouldn't be around til 2010. Since it was launched, perhaps the Navy has been able to track it and this was actually no surprise to the US government . . . or maybe the Navy is now scrambling to figure out where it is . . . but it was "spotted by U.S. intelligence agencies at the Huludao shipyard, located on the coast of Bohai Bay, some 250 miles northwest of Beijing." Perhaps the Chinese chose to reveal it . . . but certainly not on the slim hope that Bill Gertz would publish the story by himself . . . no one else has picked up on this.

The new submarine will make it more difficult for the U.S. military to take part in a defense of Taiwan because of the threat of nuclear retaliation, he said.

Bingo. There's more here than meets the eye -- is this careful strategerizing on the part of China? First, two weeks ago, they sent a sub into Japanese waters. Now the new sub story comes out on a Friday (yesterday) and then Saturday (today) Chinese diplomats are meeting with the US in DC.

The Pentagon has deployed a new missile defense system, but a spokesman for the Missile Defense Agency has said the current interceptor system is designed to stop a long-range North Korean missile, but not an attack from Chinese or Russian missiles.

That's just awesome.

A 1999 report by the House Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of China stated that the new missile submarine will likely benefit from stolen U.S. nuclear warhead designs.

Feels like a swift punch in the gut doesn't it?

The range of the JL-2 is estimated to be about 7,500 miles, enough "to strike targets throughout the United States," the report said.

"Instead of venturing into the open ocean to attack the United States, the Type 094-class submarines could remain near [Chinese] waters, protected by the [People's Liberation Army,] Navy and Air Force," the report said.

The new submarine will be a major improvement over China's current ballistic missile submarine known as the Xia, which is equipped with medium-range missiles.

The current Xia submarine is considered so noisy to underwater detection gear that its chances of surviving attack submarine strikes in ocean waters are limited.

Here again, we have the real question: how quiet is their new sub? If we're smart we've got a dozen LA class boats off the coast of their shipyard, listening to everything they hear and recording all of it . . .

The December Atlantic Monthly carries a story about the possibility of the Chinese using a submarine-based blockade to break Taiwan's will and force reunification. This has been a theory for quite some time. The article has some points that don't ring quite true: that "America's sub-hunting capabilities have atrophied since the cold war" may be true, but the capabilities of our new opponent, China, are nowhere near those of our old one, the USSR. The number of subs required to break the blockade would be "vast and risky . . . especially if US forces are still stretched thin in the Middle East." The Adventures of Chester completely disagrees -- subs are capable of operating without their battle groups, and how many subs do we need to fight the insurgency in Iraq? We don't even need them for their Tomahawks over there. Finally, the Atlantic sums it up by recommending that the US withdraw its security guarantee for the island, but let Taiwan buy as many weapon as it wants. Perhaps this would work in the intermediate term to stabilize the straits, but it does nothing for us in a week or so. And after China and Taiwan have had a conflict, the US will find itself without much influence in either country's affairs . . . why give up your influence in a region where the major regional power is aggressive in improving its standing? Plus, it just doesn't strike me as something that Bush would do . . . he's too loyal for that.
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Some stream of consciousness follow-up thoughts . . .

When China regained Hong Kong, it increased its GDP overnight by 26%. If China suddenly owned Taiwan, it would increase its GDP by 8 or 9% -- still though this is why the Chinese goal is to take Taiwan without breaking it. They won't mount an amphibious invasion -- whether they can or not . . .

While it seems disheartening that our missile shield won't stop Chinese missiles, don't worry. Also, though our intelligence agencies were wrong about the pace of development, others in government noticed. In 1998, the bipartisan U.S. Ballistic Missile Threat Commission voted unanimously that:

The threat to the US posed by these emerging capabilities is broader, more mature and evolving more rapidly than has been reported in estimates and reports by the intelligence community . . . The warning times the US can expect of new, threatening ballistic missile deployments are being reduced. Under some plausible scenarios -- including re-basing or transfer of operational missiles, sea and air-launched options, shortened development programs that might include testing in a third country, or some combination of these -- the US might well have little or no warning before operational deployment.

The Chairman of that commission was Donald Rumsfeld. We've talked about world-class pattern-spotters before on this blog; we should all be thankful that this man is going to continue running the Pentagon. He works 16 hour days, then routinely bests his younger subordinates in squash games; he has no desk and instead stands up between two tables to work -- doesn't sit all day; when it gets late at work and he tires, he flips on patriotic music and lifts dumb-bells for a few minutes; during his free-time, while defending civilization, he managed to write a book about his wife, saying "people will write many books about me, but they won't know what a wonderful person she is"; he regularly charms the heck out of anyone he encounters at state events; his long-time friends say he has the energy of 5 successful people; oh! and he's 72 years old. One of my all-time favorites. [Much of the info here came from "Rumsfeld's War" by Rowan Scarborough. See link in sidebar.] . . .

If China blockaded Taiwan would France help? In March, the French joined the Chinese military exercises meant to intimidate Taiwan's voters. France just takes the cake doesn't it . . .

Why wouldn't Taiwan want to be part of China? Plenty of freedom in China right? Wrong. China's embrace of a liberal economy shouldn't be equated with an embrace of classic liberalism.

Chester welcomes comments from former submariners or those living in Taiwan or China. I'd look for some good Taiwan blogs, but it's 3am and Mrs. Chester is going to kill me if I don't come to bed.

*[Aside: Can you believe how uncluttered that 1996 story from cnn is? The web was young and less commercialized then . . .]

Written by Chester at 1:18 AM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 4, 2004

Blogger Challenge Update

Loyal Readers! The Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge is going swimmingly after only 3 full days! Through your support, The Adventures of Chester has raised $585 as of this writing to support Spirit of America. I'm thrilled to see that we are near the top of the heap as well!

But let's not falter. There are still 11 or so more days in the Challenge. If you've been sitting on the fence, why not take the plunge and make a donation to the cause of freedom in the Middle East?

You know, it may be tempting to think things like, "How will gifts for Iraqi children or Operation Snapshot or library books for Iraqi children really contribute to freedom in Iraq?"

I am extremely optimistic about Spirit of America's efforts because their projects are suggested and created by our troops on the ground. So the commanders and troops who interact with Iraqi and Afghan civilians on a regular basis are those who know and recommend what ways will work best in building a free society.

Coupling the power of a well-run charity with the execution of the military is definitely a recipe for success! It's like taking the idea of "unity of effort" or "unity of command" and applying it to a great cause, rather than frittering away on one project without knowing if it helps out or not. This idea is definitely a winner, and media outlets like The Motley Fool and The Wall Street Journal have given kudos to Spirit of America for their efforts.

Again, thanks to those who have contributed and I hope those who haven't will consider doing so!

Remember, it's tax-deductible.
The Adventures of Chester has specified that donations made through our site go to the Unrestricted Fund, so staffers in the know can choose best how to allocate them.

One final thought . . . from the Journal article . . . go to Iraq The Model's archives and scroll down to the entry from October 20th. [having trouble with a permalink.]

In this post, the authors write about their first ever visit abroad, outside of Iraq. It is a great article and here's a brief quote:

Despite the generous hospitality of our hosts and the friendly treatment of the Jordanians, I couldn’t cast away the feeling that I was in an Arab country, that although peaceful but still not a free and democratic country and it brought back some of the precautions and fears I had before the war, and I started watching my mouth and making sure of avoiding certain words and phrases that may not be acceptable. It’s hard to explain, but I felt I couldn’t condemn terrorism or criticize Arab governments or Jihadists and such stuff that are still more tolerated at least in the majority of Arab countries.

Can anyone doubt that freedom of thought and expression is taking hold in Iraq? Can we doubt that it will have an enormous effect on the entire region? There is already more freedom of thought in Iraq than in Jordan!

You can be a part of it through your contribution! Just use the links in the sidebar, or go here.

Written by Chester at 1:50 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Programming Update

Chester has five posts planned for this weekend, not necessarily in this order:

1. on China
2. a response to an opinion piece in yesterday's WSJ
3. a piece on Iran's military capabilities -- hopefully with many links -- send them if you've got them
4. the first part of examining the rightist critique of the war's execution -- looks to be a three-part series, but that could change.
5. a wild-card post about anything that happens to come up.

So check back often.

Written by Chester at 1:30 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 3, 2004

Chester Responds to a Critic

One reader has taken issue with the account I gave of my time at Al-Qadisiyah that I posted two nights ago. See: War Story

I'd like to offer a detailed response to this reader. Here goes:

Dear Sir,

I see from the web site you were at Camp Edson. I remember Hwy 8 very well. I must protest your war story however. I can see you have quite the groupie "hanger ons".

Friend, say what you wish about me, but please know that you are doing little to advance your opinion by insulting my readers. I correspond with quite a few and the ones that email me are uniformly intelligent, polite and interesting. Several are Viet Nam vets. Careful.

None of which made any comments that did any kind of justice to your piece. It wasn't the war story that I was hoping.[sic]

Sorry your expectations were violated. Regular readers know that I was a staff officer. My stories are like this one -- not a lot of blood and guts. You should ask yourself sometime if the experiences of troops who were in support units is valuable at all from a historical perspective. Since that's all I have, that's what I wrote about. Feel free to post your own experiences at your own blog. If they're interesting and well-written, I'll link to them.

Also, you mentioned in a previous post -something about reservist [sic] being usually used for some kind of "rear guard",(protecting FOBs or some trash) which really pissed me off.

I have just spent 30 minutes looking through my archives for the post that you mention. I remember it. What I said was something along the lines that reserve combat units often get less than premier jobs. Not because they can't do them, but because the actives get put there first. I'm talking about Marine units -- I am not as familiar with Army reserve units -- you don't say what service you are/were in.

You are completely mischaracterizing what I wrote. It would be silly of me to say that reservists aren't skilled, or some such nonsense, for no other reason than that I happen to be one myself. Not active reserves, but my name is on that list in the Pentagon computer somewhere. They can reach out and grab me anytime.

I've never insulted reservists on this site. I've worked with a great many who were equally or more professional and competent than active-duty Marines. 2nd Bn, 23rd Marines, a reserve unit, was attached to the 1st Marine Regiment during the invasion. From what I understand they routinely beat the other units in various training tests before the war.

I didnt say anything based on others who had thought so highly of your site including my father.

Glad to hear he's a reader! Hope you'll both continue.

However, just letting you know, there were some "reserve" Marines killing a**holes left and right

Again, I've never said otherwise. Reservists are skilled and valuable and hard-working on the whole -- just like everyone else.

when guys like you were reading fiction ,

Polished off Heart of Darkness in about two hours one night. Heart of the Matter was more like 20 pages a day for two weeks.

While deployed, I also read Command in War by Van Creveld since I worked in a headquarters, and re-read "Combat Service Support in Desert Shield/Desert Storm" since that's what I was doing. Took a look at Rommel's Attacks too, but didn't finish it. PME is continuous. Was Chesty wrong to read "Lee's Lieutenants" while campaigning in Korea? Was Patton wrong to read the Koran while on his way to invade Morroco? or was he wrong when he re-read Caesar's Gallic campaigns and secondary literature on William the Conqueror's battles while in Normandy?

Before the deployment, General Mattis published a reading list -- much of it about the British campaign in Iraq in WWI. Would it have been wrong to read about this while deployed?

Did you take a CD player with you? Did you ever listen to music while deployed, at war? Did you ever think of reading anything instead? Absolutely nothing wrong with listening to music -- I had that too. But how can there be anything wrong with professional reading?

watching movies

Glad to see you making such excellent use of old stereotypes. Didn't have time for many of these til I was back in Kuwait and we were waiting for flights. I took a couple of DVD's with me -- all comedies, cause I thought they would relieve stress.

and making sure they get to chow on time.

Did you ever eat chow at all while deployed? If so, you have a support Marine to thank. Did you ever drink purified water, use a temporary structure, drive on an improved road, have fuel to be stored, live in a base camp, or have obstacles needing reduction? You're welcome. 7th Engineer Support Battalion did all of these things and more.

I never said my experience was sexy or that I am Audie Murphy. I've never made myself out to be anything more than what I was -- a staff officer helping to run a battalion. When Hugh Hewitt called me, I told him I had only been a lieutenant and never in a firefight. His producer will vouch for that.

You have no idea how depressing it can be to work on a battalion staff, especially in a support unit, in the midst of a major war, when your own first choice for a specialty was the infantry. The number of times I had bad luck in getting the assignment I wanted was one of the secondary reasons why I didn't stay in.

I would have given a kidney -- or an arm -- to be in a combat unit. Even on the staff. That's what I joined for.

If thats not accurate to your experience, then I apoligieze, [sic]

Gee, thanks.

but as far as war stories goes- like I said,thats[sic] not a real war story.

See above re: importance of support troop experiences.

And when others like me come to this site and read... Think of this as the edited version to what they really want to say.

They are welcome to say whatever they wish. My email address is in the sidebar and the comments are open to all.

Reservists often get bad-mouthed a great deal by active-duty Marines. In fact, there are really three kinds of stereotypes that we are witnessing via your post:

1. You think I have spouted a common stereotype about reservists -- that they aren't up to snuff. You are wrong.
2. You hold an equally wrong stereotype about support troops -- that we don't do any work and are all a bunch of useless softies. In this you are either inexperienced, naive, or both. And wrong.
3. Are you enlisted? If so, then we have another great stereotype in play: you seem to buy into the idea that officers are useless in general. Wrong again.

Anyone who's been around the block knows that there are good reservists and bad, good active duty Marines and bad, good officers and bad, good support troops and bad, etc, etc, etc.

If you didn't like my story, fine. I don't have many others so you don't have much to worry about. But don't insult my readers or combat service support professionals. It only makes you sound small-minded.

Besides, we all know the warfighters get the spotlight and are the prima-donnas -- and rightly so.

Written by Chester at 1:25 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 2, 2004

Bias, continued

Looks like Chester wasn't the only one who thought the media's stories on Fallujah border on the adsurd.

Check out what Max Boot has said today.

Written by Chester at 6:18 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

The Last Iron Curtain Is Crumbling

This is a great story from the Korean press.

The communications revolution is reaching North Korea.

How quickly will the regime lose control? Will it be slow or will it be fast?

Interesting that the regime is using freq-monitoring technology to track conversations . . . who wants to bet that the watchers are just as fascinated and hungry for info as the watched?

Keep putting those cell towers up! You can't stop the info flow!

I had a conversation with a colleague once in which we decided (at the time) that to pacify Afghanistan, the only real thing needed was to airdrop Britney Spears and a good metal band in and have them do free concerts around the country. Like it or not, nothing can stop the power of US pop-culture. We invented the convertible, jazz, jeans, cowboys, "greed is good" and on and on and on.

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Another topic from the Korean press: Is the history of Japan's militarism being revised?

Analysts have been saying for years that Japan would begin to flex its muscles. And they never get the story right in their own history textbooks. The average Japanese person's perspective of World War II goes something like this: "There was some sort of conflict, I don't really know much about it, and then the American nuked us."

This article focuses on comfort women, which were Korean women forced to work in brothels, serving Japanese military units throughout East Asia. Quite a sore subject for the Koreans.

US diplomacy and security relationships are the only things that keep these nations from being at each other's throats. Without us, there would be a crazy arms race like never before witnessed. Nukes too.

Written by Chester at 5:59 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Ukraine Analysis from Strategic Forecasting (StratFor)

For fans of StratFor who no longer receive their stuff since they went full-subscription-only (like Chester), here is a free analysis of the Ukraine situation
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THE BATTLE FOR UKRAINE
By George Friedman

The Ukrainian election crisis, which has pitted a pro-Western presidential candidate against a pro-Russian prime minister -- and in which allegations of fraud have kept the outcome in suspense for more than a week -- is much more than an internal problem. It represents a fundamental geopolitical crisis with the potential to define Eurasia for a generation. That might appear an extreme statement, but what happens in Ukraine will determine the extent to which Russia can re-emerge as a regional and global power.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia has faced an ongoing threat of disintegration. The insurrection in Chechnya is part of a broader tendency of Russian regions to seek greater autonomy or even independence. The Russians are resisting any attempts by Chechnya to break away because in their view, Chechen independence would be the prelude to a further disintegration of Russia. The state cannot be indifferent to its future.

Ukraine, which became independent after the collapse of the Soviet Union, has a strategic importance that transcends that of any other state in the region. Apart from size and economy, Ukraine's significance is geographic: it borders Russia and Belarus in the northeast. If Ukraine were hostile or controlled by hostile powers, Russia and Belarus would be indefensible. Ukraine represents a deep salient which, when combined with Poland and the Baltic states under Western control, would create an untenable military situation for Russia.

After Russia was defeated by Germany in World War I, it was forced to cede Ukraine to Germany. Germany returned it to the Soviet Union after its own defeat by the Allies. Again in World War II, Ukraine was a focus of the German invasion of the Soviet Union. The reasoning was partly economic -- Ukraine is a rich prize -- but also military: Germany understood that without Ukraine, Russia was so vulnerable it could not function as a major power. It would always be on the defensive.

This is not to say the United States, Europe or NATO have any intention of invading Russia. Far from it. Nevertheless, the Russians cannot afford to focus on intentions; they must focus on capabilities. Intentions can change quickly, capabilities much more slowly. But beyond the direct threat, the psychological consequences of a pro-Western, NATO-dominated Ukraine would serve to emphasize Moscow's inability to control events in its own sphere of influence and encourage disintegrative tendencies in Russian provinces.

The political crisis in Ukraine is a battle for the country's soul. It pits a pro-Western political coalition of interests against a pro-Russian coalition. It pits the western part of Ukraine against the eastern part. It pits a vision of Ukraine as part of Europe against a vision of Ukraine as part of the Russian sphere of influence.

The election has drawn in Western and Russian powers -- and, not coincidentally, has led to massive confusion in Kiev. The apparent defeat of the pro-Western party and candidate Victor Yushchenko drew the intervention of Europe and the United States, which demanded that the legitimacy of the election be examined in detail. As the crisis and the pressure have grown, even Prime Minister Victor Yanukovich, the pro-Russian apparent winner, agreed that new elections should be held -- but whether that pertains only to the disputed second round of voting or the entire two-phased process remains a point of debate. Moscow, for its part, has insisted that the election was free and fair, and has condemned both the Western intervention and the Ukrainian opposition's call for new elections, with Russia's Vladimir Putin telling outgoing Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma today that a new vote "would yield nothing."

At the strategic level, Russian officials believe that the West's concern for free elections is an attempt to pry Ukraine out of its relationship with Moscow and into NATO. The West is equally concerned that the Russian interest in Ukraine is part of a broader strategy to reassert Russian hegemony in the region.

Intentions are not important. The objective fact is that the political orientation of Ukraine defines the degree to which Russia is geopolitically secure. If Ukraine were to be in NATO, Russia would never be able to guarantee its own national security and would never re-emerge as even a significant regional power. If Russia were to dominate Ukraine, forging it into a three-way relationship with Belarus, Russia would be much more secure and in a much stronger position to influence events regionally and, in the long run, globally.

The stakes in Ukraine are, therefore, historic. The war with al Qaeda will end in due course. The question of Russia will then become critical. If Russia and Ukraine are split, Eurasia goes one way; if Russia and Ukraine are allied, it goes another.

Therefore, the disputed presidential election is certainly one election worth stealing.
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Don't you love how he throws out those little teasers? "The war with al Qaeda will end shortly." Someone should collect all of the books by these analysts (Friedman, Bodansky, etc, etc) and put them in a savings deposit box for about five years and then take them out and see who was right.

A good case for the importance of the election outcome, though he avoids any editorializing on whom the preferred candidate might be. This is normal for StratFor though.

Written by Chester at 5:44 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Bias? What bias?

1. All the big dailies (here, here for examples) are making hay with the troop increase tied to the election.

Watch for the "escalation" buzzword to be used in the MSM. They are always, always grasping for the Vietnam analogies.

From the Post article:

"The fact that we are increasing numbers, and the likelihood that the fighting will continue for a long time, highlights a fundamental problem: Our active-duty ground forces are much too small," said Eliot Cohen, a Johns Hopkins University strategy expert. "We should have begun expanding them some time ago."

He's right of course.

2. Here's a few headlines that are doing their best to cast our Fallujah victory as a loss. I'm not linking to the stories. A waste of time. Truly amazing:

Fallouja Fight Among Deadliest In Years For U.S.
Los Angeles Times

Seventy-one U.S. troops died in the November battle to retake the city of Fallouja, according to the top Marine commander in Iraq, a toll significantly higher than the previous count of 51 deaths.

Insurgency Leaves Mosul Ill-Prepared For Elections
USA Today

With only two months to go until Iraq's general elections, the local government has yet to devise a plan for registering voters in one of the country's largest cities. Insurgents torched most of the city's records during an uprising last month.

Enemy Gains Some Respect
Miami Herald

Standing in the rubble, the soldiers gathered the AK-47s and RPGs left by the group of fighters who had fled. The house, yet another in a line of dozens, if not hundreds, was blown apart by Bradley and Abrams tank fire.

And here's some from yesterday:

In Falluja's Ruins, Big Plans And A Risk Of Chaos
New York Times

...As military officials here prepare to start letting the first residents return to Falluja, possibly as soon as mid-December, they face an unusual challenge: how to win back the confidence of the people whose city they have just destroyed. Their task will be made harder by the need to deter returning insurgents, who will try to sabotage the reconstruction with attacks, commanders say.

Deaths In Combat Ricochet Here At Home
USA Today

...As if by ricochet, each American service man and woman killed in combat leaves behind a trail of secondary casualties: spouses, children, parents. Through Nov. 20, 45% of the 1,374 U.S. service personnel killed in Iraq and Afghanistan since September 2001 were married, the Defense Department says. Considered survivors, the widows and widowers of war dead are among the conflict's walking wounded. Amid heavy fighting in recent weeks, the toll is rising.

Monthly Death Toll Reaches Record Set In April
USA Today

Driven by a sweeping offensive against insurgent forces in Fallujah and other cities in the Sunni Triangle, November equaled April as the deadliest month for U.S. forces fighting in Iraq.

U.S. Troops Still Dying In Ramadi Amid 'Relative Peace, Tranquillity'
Los Angeles Times

Although ambushes and bombings are routine there, the city doesn't need a Fallouja-style crackdown, say officers with a military unit.

You see? There are actually many more casualties than we think. It's all a mess. We are losing. Can't you tell? It's so obvious. It's chaos! Chaos I tell you! Troops are dying! We should leave! How arrogant of us to even invade in the first place! AHHHHHHH!

Remember that old Teddy Roosevelt quote about the critics?

Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.
– Theodore Roosevelt, speech before the Hamilton Club, Chicago (April 10, 1899)

Written by Chester at 8:45 AM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

December 1, 2004

A War Story for you . . .

From Chester's Adventures in Iraq in April, 2003:

In mid-April my battalion was ordered to move from An-Numaniyah on the Tigris River, to the city of Diwaniyah in central Iraq. There we would set up a base camp for the 1st Force Service Support Group to provide services to the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force during the post-conflict phase of the campaign.

Our base camp site in Diwaniyah was the grounds of Al-Qadisiyah State University. Since all former regime property had become the province of the US government, we seized this university.

As the assistant to the operations officer, I was ordered to go ahead of the battalion with the communications officer and a handful of his Marines to scout out this site and act as a sort of quartering party. We already had one of our companies there, but since the battalion headquarters would move there, we wanted to be sure to get a good place.

The city of Diwaniyah had seen a good deal of fighting as US forces moved north to Baghdad. It is located near the intersection of two major highways, Highway 1 and Highway 8, and was right on the boundary between Army and Marine forces. Part of the Fifth Marine Regiment had attacked Iraqi forces in the city and on its outskirts, where a training base for the Al-Quds Brigade, a paramilitary force, was sited. On another occasion, a large number of Fedayeen Saddam -- several hundred -- had massed in the Diwaniyah soccer stadium. US Special Forces observed this and called in airstrikes, killing them all. So Diwaniyah had seen its fair share of this campaign . . .

. . . and Al-Qadisiyah University had been completely ransacked. It is on the edge of the city near an intersection of two main roads. At the intersection in the median was a 20'x 30' mural of Saddam and his glorious exploits. We had not been there three days before the residents had defaced it. I hope someone was able to collect some of those murals of Saddam -- it would make for quite a museum exhibition.

When I arrived at the university with the communications Marines, I found our company there. They were busy cleaning the place out. Every single building had been burned on the inside. The chemistry building had broken glass beakers and a funny smell everywhere. All of the records in the administration building had been dumped into the hallways and trashed. Every poster of Saddam had finger holes punched through his face. The library had been burned inside and piles of books, some merely ashes, others in good shape, lay strewn about on the floor. I rummaged through them and found a biography of Hussein with photos in the middle of his benevolence to the Iraqi people and showing him in action poses with his generals.

It seemed there had been two kinds of uprisings here at the university when the people felt the power of the regime slip away: the first must have been an orgiastic kind of event -- with the trashing of the buildings and the setting of fires. The second was more calculating: nearly everything of any kind of value in any building had been slowly picked over. Bathroom fixtures, windows, even the copper wiring in the HVAC system on the roof of the administration building -- all had been taken away as loot.

What must it have been like to be there when the government's power was gone and the people reacted violently, with both happiness and dread, and perhaps wistfulness too? What must the scene have looked like?

Bravo Company, cleaning out the buildings so our battalion could occupy them, had settled itself in the old English Department. Here was a real find: an entire room of English books had been spared. They were all classics. A Tale of Two Cities, Pride and Prejudice, The Great Gatsby. The Bravo Marines had put these in a separate room for safekeeping as they cleaned the buildings out.

I looked through the books and noticed many had hand-written English notes in the margins, in the kind of script that is too correct to be that of anyone but a non-native English student. There were notes in Arabic as well. The Iraqi students had carefully read these books and made detailed observations. What did they learn from them?

Many of the books had no covers, or improvised covers. Had they been smuggled in? Were they banned and read in private? Perhaps not. While Saddam certainly had a personality cult, he had no real ideology that required such detailed information control. But I'm sure that these books weren't discussed openly.

I borrowed three from the stack. Over the next six weeks, while sitting in the headquarters, between crafting battalion orders, I re-read Conrad's Heart of Darkness, and then read Graham Greene's Heart of the Matter. I thought them both appropriate to my circumstances. The third book was one without a cover, and every page was a photocopy. It had been pieced together from many different sources and was English poetry -- mainly the Romantics. I didn't read much of it, but one jumped out at me, given where I found myself:

Ozymandius
by: Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveler from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandius, king of kings:
Look on my words, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Marines many times found themselves looking into the ruins of a civilization, but it was not a great one, and one which we had gladly broken.

-------------------------------------------

Reading about Spirit of America's support of Iraqi universities reminded me of the 6 weeks I spent living in one. I hope you'll make a donation to the Friends of Iraq Blogger Challenge this holiday season.

Until tomorrow . . .

Written by Chester at 7:42 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

More North Korea Articles

Food in North Korea. And it contains links to other recent articles.

Written by Chester at 7:38 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

North Korea, continued . . .

Thanks to Alert Reader "Adam" for pointing our attention to today's story on what is happening in North Korea in the International Herald Tribune. Lots of interesting bits here:

"As long as Chairman Kim Jong Il controls the government, we have to negotiate with him, but it is becoming more doubtful whether we will be able to achieve anything with this government," Shinzo Abe, acting secretary general of the Liberal Democratic Party, said on Fuji TV on Sunday, referring to talks on North Korea's abductions of Japanese in the 1970s. "I think we should consider the possibility that a regime change will occur, and we need to start simulations of what we should do at that time."

This is huge! A major Japanese politician speaks about regime change in NK! Wow! Note that he doesn't say what the agent of the regime change will be, just that it could happen.

More:

There are indications that news is leaking out of North Korea by cellphone and that criticisms of the government are being posted in public places. Those developments and the angry response to recent legislation in the United States intended to flood the country with radios that can pick up foreign broadcasts suggest that the leadership realizes its one great achievement - near total information control - is threatened.

Persistent reports that anti-Kim leaflets and posters have recently appeared gained more credibility with the publication Thursday in Sankei Shimbun, a conservative Tokyo newspaper, of what was described as a photograph of a handprinted flier smuggled out of North Korea. . .

Read more about the leaflets here. More:

"Some residents have contacts with people in neighboring countries by hiding mobile phones in places with good reception, like tall buildings and hilltops," said a North Korean document photographed by a Japanese aid group that calls itself "Rescue the North Korean People Urgent Action Network." The group said the directive was published by the governing Workers Party of North Korea in November 2003. . .

Analysts say they have seen more high-level defections recently, possibly a result of more permeable borders and greater dissatisfaction.

In Seoul, an editor at Monthly Chosun, a magazine that follows North Korean affairs, said in an interview that when he was in northern China this year, Chinese officials showed him North Korean "wanted posters" for generals who had managed to reach China with their families. The editor, who asked not to be identified, estimated that in recent years, 130 North Korean generals had defected to China, about 10 percent of the military elite.

Of this group, the most significant, he said, are four who have been integrated into active duty with the Chinese military in the Shenyang district, along the Korean border.

We have glimpses here into a strange world that the western mind can barely fathom.

There is much to make of all of this. Let us speculate:

China, Russia, Japan, South Korea, and the US all have a stake in North Korea not having nuclear weapons.

All also have a stake in seeing North Korea open its borders to trade and information.

China, South Korea, Russia, and maybe Japan have a stake in North Korea not dissolving on their borders.

How can we resolve these many mutual interests? Some questions:

Could China foment a coup in North Korea?

Could they do so either by inducing the NK military to rebel against Kim, or by even participating themselves?

Could they install the NK Generals in a new regime?

Could the co-opted Generals (those who haven't defected) retain control of the nuclear program?

What's in it for China:
A new client state that is not a democracy but on which the Chinese can use their influence. They can force the new regime to open its markets to trade and information. The new regime could liberalize in the same way China has: slowly and over a long period of time, rather than immediately (like Eastern Europe), which is much more destabilizing. China would then have an open trading partner that is militarily powerful vs. the clients of the US (ROK, Japan). It increases the Chinese sphere of influence. China now has another state that is formerly communist, not a real democracy, but slowly liberalizing, and trading with China. Good for China.

What's in it for the Generals:
They get to gain power. They don't have to be ruled by a looney. They can visit abroad and get western goods and info.

What's in it for the US (if we're even told about it):
If the Chinese can guarantee via the NK generals the whereabouts, dispostion, and control of the NK nukes, and NK can then open up slowly without being a huge threat anymore, this is good for America.

What's in it for ROK (if they're in on it):
Get to open the North and change the regime without seeing Seoul go up in flames. DOn't have to worry about super-speedy reunification a la Germany, which would seriously drag their economy (think: The average NK peasant has no concept of capitalism, except that it is evil -- it will take decades to change this, however it happens).

What's in it for Japan:
Get to see NK no longer a threat, but Korean peninsula not united either. Good for Japan.

For Russia:
No vast waves of refugees flowing over the border.

Is this possible? The multiparty talks on NK mean that reps of these countries are seriously focused on NK. Could China pull it off?

The two key factors are:
1. The nukes: who controls them? how quickly can they be employed?
2. The Generals: how many of those that haven't defected would overthrow Kim? Familiarity breeds contempt. He is not a nice guy.

Ever see a John Woo film that ends with a Mexican standoff in a chapel -- like "Face Off"? Here is where we find ourselves, but on a regional scale.

[Japan was the focus of Chester's undergraduate degree. He holds a minor in Japanese and has lived there for extended periods and traveled extensively throughout the country. Hopefully he brings a little more to the table than the average journalist when it comes to speculating on East Asian security. But disagree to your heart's content in the comments section.]

Written by Chester at 6:58 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Enemy Forces in Najaf Have Been Completely Defeated

This is item number one for the most under-reported story of the day:

IRAQI SECURITY FORCES TAKE CONTROL OF AN NAJAF PROVINCE

FOB DUKE, Iraq –Approximately three months after decisive combat operations ended in Najaf, the 11th MEU commander declared today that Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) have formally assumed local control of An Najaf province.

Since fighting ended Aug. 28, no major incidents have occurred despite reduced MEU security operations in the city and the Ramadan holiday.

Go read the whole article. Why isn't this on the front pages?

There will be more stories like this in the next 18 months if we play our cards right . . .

Written by Chester at 6:50 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Protecting the Troop-Rotation Seam

The US will increase its troop presence in Iraq by around 9% as the next troop rotation begins, reports the AP.

An "increase" is a bit misleading; really a "spike" is a better way of viewing it.

We've mentioned the upcoming troop rotation in our defenses as an example of a seam in time. Letting the troop overlap remain for a bit longer than usual is a smart move, since the elections take place within this seam of time.

An Alert Reader has directed us to TechCentralStation, where another strong opinion about the foolishness behind delaying the elections has been expressed.

Written by Chester at 1:40 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article

Is Kim losing control?

The Christian Science Monitor details some interesting developments in North Korea. Excerpts:

Small signs often portend big changes in closed societies, especially in the secretive court of North Korea's Kim dynasty. Observers are wondering if this is just another mad whim from the palace - like the edicts forbidding women to wear red trousers or to eat hamburgers. Or if, after 3 million deaths from starvation on his watch, Kim Jong Il's star many finally be falling - something suggested by numerous North Korean refugees in recent interviews.

and

Interviews with dozens of North Korean refugees in China and South Korea reveal a popular disillusionment with Kim. The refugees blame him and hate him in a way they never hated his father, Kim Il Sung.

They suggest he hid the collapse of the economy in the 1980s from his father by feeding him a string of false statistics. People first began starving to death in the 1980s, but Kim Jong Il persuaded his father to accelerate the nuclear-weapons program and inflate the size of the military.

Kim Jong Il may have felt vindicated by these policy choices when so many other Communist dictators were swept away after 1989. Yet he barely hung on after his father's death.

Refugees speak of plots to assassinate Kim Jong Il in 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993, and 1995. In Pyongyang he narrowly escaped an attempt in March 1998 and another in 2001; this year he escaped by minutes an explosion at Ryonchon as his train returned from China.

and

By then, even the military and party elites were dying of hunger and Kim had to terrorize the population into submission. In February 1998, troops backed by 150 tanks occupied Songrim where the steel mill had shut down and hundreds of workers had already died of hunger. The troops stayed there for three months, staged public executions, and send hundreds into camps. He staged similar exhibitions of naked power in other key industrial cities, say refugees.

Refugees also indicate that opposition has become more open and daring. More and more pamphlets and banners are appearing calling for Kim's overthrow. Almost all refugees report seeing slogans such as "Down with Kim Jong Il" painted on walls, pylons, and railway carriages throughout the country. Statues and murals of the Kims have been defaced, and the halls erected for worship of the Kim family have been burnt down. Some officials have been found killed in their homes.

Although the food crisis is easing, with the World Food Program reporting a good harvest for this year, the country remains on the brink of starvation.

Kim has survived so far but he is coming under increasing pressure from outside. China has stationed an estimated 30,000 troops on the border and is pressing him to respond to Bush administration's renewed demands that he abandon his nuclear weapons. China's top leader will pay his first visit to both Koreas next year to help bring an end to the stalemate.

Can the North Korean regime survive the coming tidal wave of outside information about the world? During the height of the Cold War, when Soviet families would be exposed to the West, they often felt extreme anger at the lies that had been told them about our poverty -- when in fact ours was the highest living standard in the world.

What is the disposition of the Chinese forces on the border? Are they merely a border security force or do they have the ability to invade North Korea? If memory serves, they are more than a mere border force. Could the Chinese have them positioned there for humanitarian relief efforts should the regime collapse? There is no reason why humanitarian missions must be US or NATO-led. Such a move by the PRC would give it quite a bit of prestige among world militaries. Perhaps an Alert Reader or two has some more in-depth knowledge of the history of large-scale Chinese military operations beyond their own borders -- like their wars with India for example.

Once the floodgates of information increase from a trickle to a waterfall in North Korea, it is difficult to imagine that the regime will be able to survive.

We should open North Korea, overtly or otherwise, to the free-flow of information and trade. Information will undermine Kim's regime and trade will allow us to infiltrate it with spies.

Regime change in the world's most isolated, fanatical country is entirely possible with not a shot fired, given some creative covert moves. The trick would be to remove the government without completely destabilizing the region -- and losing control of their nukes.

Written by Chester at 10:36 AM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article