Thomas E. Ricks's Blog, page 174

CSBA strategists explain how a weapon can help you win without ever being used

In a new study of strategy in an age of austerity, three CSBA authors, led by Andrew
Krepinevich, state that the B-1 bomber imposed disproportionate costs on the
Soviet military, forcing it to invest in air defenses "at the expense of
offensive capabilities, thereby pushing the superpower competition in a highly
favorable direction." Very Sun Tzu-ish!

They also argue that
given the basic resiliency of the United States, "a strategy that plays for
time or envisions the capability to contest a long-term competition appears to
be relevant today."

Another good line:
"Strategy is about taking risks and deciding what will not be done as well as
what will." This was the essence of the decisions Marshall and Eisenhower
contemplated in World War II: What was essential (keeping the Soviets in the
war, for example) vs. merely important (lots of other things).

Comment of the day: How a platoon sergeant talks to his men about their loads

This was posted the other day by
"Platoon Sergeant"
in the discussion of the photo
of the two loaded American soldiers taking a break in Zabul Province:

There is something I say to my soldiers when we get ready to patrol: "You are carrying 70 pounds of the
lightest sh*t the army has ever designed. I've been in for 11 years now
and we are light years ahead of what I had when I was a private. There is still
huge areas of improvement to be made in the area of load carriage, there are a
lot of better options available off the shelf that big army wont buy. There are
some good reasons for this, as well as some bad ones. I don't know enough
about procurement to give everyone an education.

We as an army have ignored up
until recently that body armor changes how a pack interfaces with your body. Go
to any light infantry unit in the army and you will see the most commonly
personal bought item is an aftermarket assault pack. The issued assault pack is
a carry-on bag for mid-tour leave, it lacks the necessary adjustment points for
good load carriage. Some go all the way with rucksacks, I personally
bought a Kifaru Armor Grip bag, specifically designed to work with body armor
and still carry weight on your hips instead of shoulders. It was a big
investment but it paid for itself when I had to air assault 112 pounds plus
body armor and basic load in it. The molle ruck is a great pack without armor, it's
hot garbage once you put an IBA, IOTV or PC on. My unit just spent $800 dollars
from ATS for a custom designed 60 mm mortar pack for my soldiers. I can't tell
you why the army has never thought of making a pack for mortars.

The plate carrier was a great
idea for Afghanistan (personally I would wear it all the time) but we bought a
poorly designed piece of equipment. Instead of buying one with a cummerbund
that distributes the load better, we bought one that just hangs off your
shoulders. I couldn't tell you why, SOCOM has been using one with a cummerbund
for years.

The army will never get away from
carrying heavy stuff, ammo is heavy, rockets are heavy, mortars are heavy, we
could be carrying them better but we're not. The army is not concerned about your
knees or back, despite the fact that the government will be paying our
disability for the rest of our lives. I've never understood that.

(HT to WOI)

Congress and defense: Somebody finally steps up to explain how this thing works

One of the puzzlements I've had for some time is why there are so few experts on
the politics of defense, especially in the role of Congress plays. One of the few people
who genuinely has studied this subject (which is different from participating
in it) is Pat Towell,
who covered the politics of defense for decades until going upmarket and
working for the Congressional Research Service.

I mention this because I've just been reading Towell's essay
in a fairly new book, Congress and the Politics of National
Security. I covered the military for decades, but I didn't realize it
until reading the essay that the Armed
Services Committees are anomalies, having unique and far more intrusive
powers than do other committees. "The Constitution assigns Congress a degree of
authority over the organization and equipage of the armed services that has no
parallel in terms of the relationship of the legislative branch with other
executive branch agencies," he writes. "The Senate Armed Services Committees
draws particularly strong leverage from the fact that promotions for military
officers-unlike those for civil servants-require Senate confirmation."

He also makes the broader point that congressional power is
more negative than positive. "In general, it is far easier for Congress to
block a presidential initiative than to force some course of action on a
reluctant executive, simply because it is easier to mobilize a blocking
coalition."

One quibble: He says that "talented members" still seek
seats on the armed services panels. I wonder if that is still true. From what
I've seen, since the end of the Cold War, congressional leaders have been
stuffing freshman onto those committees.

I think there is a great dissertation to be done on
successful congressional interventions in the Pentagon acquisition process.
Imposing the cruise missile on a reluctant air force is one such example.
Towell touches on this in an interesting passage about air mobility and
strategic lift, but I would bet there is much more to be said.

The two times he saw his father cry

From a guest post on James Fallow's blog by Eric
McMillan, who is writing a novel about his tours of duty in Iraq, one spent
commanding a Stryker company.

"Two
years after I came home from Iraq and a year before my wife and I found out
that we were expecting a child, I stood beside my father at his mother's
funeral. He didn't cry. I didn't think that odd. I am, after all, my father's
son. I've seen him cry only two times in my entire life: When he sent me off to
war in Iraq, and when he watched me go back a second time."

Are the strategic costs of Obama's drone policy greater than the short-term gains?

By Joseph
Singh

Best
Defense department of remote-controlled warfare

The
international laws governing the use of force are fundamentally outdated,
reflecting a lost age of acutely-defined zones of war and peace, according to a
speaker at this week's panel discussion on armed drones and targeted killing.
Hosted by the German Marshall fund, the event was run under Chatham House
rules, thus none of the speakers will be identified in this post.

While
both panelists supported a convention governing drone usage, there are
convincing reasons to suspect that new international laws enacted to reflect a
changing global environment will remain wholly ineffective. Any legal framework
governing drone use will confront the perennial challenge of state behavior in
an anarchic system: Irrespective of the international laws and norms in place,
states will disregard codes of conduct if they perceive them to be contrary to
their national interests.

We know
that current international rules technically prohibit targeted killings, just
as the U.N. charter prohibits war. Even the federal government imposes its own
ban on assassinations. Issued by President Reagan, Executive Order 12333
strictly prohibits target killings, asserting that "no person employed by or
acting on behalf of the United States Government shall engage in, or conspire
to engage in, assassination."

However,
the expansion of drone use under the Obama administration does not result from
a murky international laws. It simply proves that a new legal framework will
fail to chart new norms on future drone use. Give a lawyer the task of
justifying any policy "and he will find the legal regime," said one of the
panelists.

The
debate over the use of drones has often been misconstrued as a debate on the
ethics, legality and unintended consequences of using remotely piloted vehicles
to engage hostiles abroad. Yet drones have been used by nations for decades and
their specific technological attributes should not be the focus of debate.
Instead, killing by drone speaks to a larger question of defining the
conditions under which nations should deploy such force.

Panelists
noted that in Afghanistan, ISAF has been very effective at using drones as part
of the larger military campaign. Strict rules govern the use of drones under
ISAF command. Under no conditions, for example, are drones used to attack
buildings, given the possibility that unidentified civilians may be inside.
Such rigidity results not solely from a belief in abiding by the rules of war,
but from a conviction that any civilian deaths threaten greater
instability. In the hinterlands of Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen, where ground
troops are unable to help vet potential targets or engage with local populations
to redress errors, drones have struck more fear and resentment in local
populations than confidence, one panelist concluded.

One
panelist said that new norms governing drone use are necessary to ensure the
security of America and her closest allies. I am not so sure. U.S. drone
activities could hypothetically be used to justify targeting American civilians
by hostile states, but America's military dominance should always deter such
behavior. Instead, limits on the drone program are necessary for America's
strategy in the Middle East, in order to rectify the long-term trend towards
radicalization that is seeded by short-term gains in targeted killing.

In a
post-Afghanistan and post-Iraq world, the use of drones speaks to a wider
unwillingness to use large-scale, high-risk military force to project American
power abroad, as both panelists noted. Drone technology allows the president to
remain active in the fight against terrorism without having to make unpopular
and costlier "boots on the ground" commitments. Ultimately, however, the Obama administration must confront the difficult truth that what is a useful tactic
in a broader military campaign cannot be substituted for an overall strategy.

While
targeted killings constitute a centuries-old practice in international
relations, the rapid rise in drone strikes raises important questions for the
Obama administration. Are the strategic gains achieved through drone deployment
sustainable given rising public outcry over targeted killings in Pakistan,
Somalia, and Yemen? Can targeted killing programs co-exist with efforts to help
support good governance, when those programs are perceived to undermine U.S.
credibility? Will those nations continue to tacitly permit the U.S. to operate
drones in their airspace when their public condemnations prove insufficient for
satisfying domestic audiences?

In the
near term, targeted killing has crippled Al Qaeda's leadership, and may serve
as an immediate deterrent to future recruits. Yet a whack-a-mole approach to
confronting the world's largest terrorist network should not be considered an
effective long-term strategy. Incentives to change these norms will only follow
an honest assessment of the long-term strategic benefits and drawbacks of an
expansive use of drones.

The hubris of the Obamites on Vietnam: Just because you weren't there doesn't mean you won't make the same mistakes

Vietnam? What's that? Obama
administration officials ask the
estimable James Mann.

"What does that
have to do with me and the world we're living in today?" inquires Susan Rice,
American ambassador to the United Nations.

Remarks like that
worry me. Just because you weren't alive during the Vietnam War doesn't
mean you won't go down that road. I generally am a fan of the Obama administration, on both domestic and foreign policy. But the one thing that
gives me the creeps is their awkward relationship with senior military
officials. Mistrusting the Joint Chiefs, suspecting their motives, treating
them as adversaries or outsiders, not examining differences -- that was LBJ's
recipe. It didn't work. He looked upon the Joint Chiefs of Staff as a political
entity to be manipulated or, failing that, sidelined. That's a recipe for
disaster, especially for an administration conspicuously lacking interest in
the views of former military officers or even former civilian Pentagon
officials.

In our system, White House officials have the upper hand in
the civilian-military relationship, so it is their responsibility to be steward
of it. That's the price of "the
unequal dialogue." If the relationship is persistently poor, it is the
fault of the civilians, because they are in the best position to fix it. The
first step is to demand candor from the generals, and to protect those who
provide it. Remove those who don't.

Anytime anyone tells me that the lessons of Vietnam are
irrelevant, that's when I begin looking for a hole to hide in.

The soldier's load: A response from an officer in Afghanistan who is a climber

By Lt. Lucas Enloe

Best Defense guest columnist

I can definitely understand Mr.
Woods' perspective, from a number of
levels. Having carried rucks weighing upwards of
60 pounds up mountains,
I can certainly say that it sucks. I'll admit
that I haven't done any
rucking in Afghanistan yet, where it would only
suck even more. That
said, Mr. Woods' argument that applying the
philosophy of extreme
alpinism would significantly reduce soldier
loads is wrong. As an avid
alpine mountaineer myself, I can safely say that
even the extremest of
alpiners would still be forced to carry heavy
packs on extended trips.
Take, for example, an 8-day trip up and around
Mt. Rainier. Even when
climbing with some incredibly talented and
experienced mountaineers, the
average pack weight was about 65 pounds. Food
weighs a lot. And that was
operating under the convenience of being able to
melt snow to get fresh
water. Soldiers in Afghanistan don't have that
luxury.

Imagine all the food, water, and gear a hiker
would need for even a
short three-day hike. Now add a weapon, your
basic combat load of ammo,
radios, and a week's worth of batteries. And
contrary to Mr. Woods'
point, even if I was carrying no extra weight,
I'd still need a
significant amount of water, you know, because
I'm doing combat patrols
at 7,000 feet in 95 degree weather. The problem
isn't that soldiers and
NCOs are taking more than they need, the problem
is that what they need
is pretty heavy. As much as I would like to say
"Yeah, let's make our
weapons and ammo and armor and water
lighter!" I know the ridiculous
amount of time and money it would take to do
that.

Mr. Woods then argues that somehow the 60 pound
ruck is a major cause of
difficulties in counterinsurgency operations,
and then implies (I think)
that we should do without body armor or helmets.
I don't think I need to
go into more detail other than to say that I
strongly disagree.
Unfortunately Mr. Woods' lack of military
experience is the primary
reason for a large part of his argument being
infeasible.

That's not to say that all of Mr. Woods' points
are wrong. The Army has,
to an extent, recognized the need for lighter
gear in Afghanistan (see
the introduction of plate carriers, M240Ls,
etc...), but I think it can
do better. By studying the design of similar
gear in the civilian
sector, I think we can make the load easier on
our soldiers. Take, for
example, the shape and design of our rucks. If
you compare your standard
issue ruck with some large-capacity expedition
packs made by companies
like Gregory or Arcteryx (or Mystery Ranch,
whose packs I've seen
running around in Afghanistan), and you'll notice
that the Army's ruck is
much rounder, whereas the packs are narrower,
but taller. Having carried
both I can say with absolute certainty that my
civilian pack is far
superior to my issued ruck. I think that by
studying the design
philosophy of civilian mountaineering equipment
the Army can continue to
improve our gear.

Again, though, any major changes in gear take
time and money. Until
then, we'll have to continue to rely on the NCO
corps to train our
Soldiers, both physically and mentally, to deal
with the burden they'll
bear in combat. I definitely welcome any disagreements
or other
perspectives on this issue.

Lucas Enloe is an Army 1LT currently in Afghanistan. He has
years of experience in walking uphill.

Wisdom from Cairo on changes in Egypt: Keep in mind how peaceful it has been

From a report
by the International Crisis Group:

... what is most surprising, arguably, is that there has not been more violence
-- that Egyptians, by and large, have engaged in spirited debate, taken to the
streets peacefully and participated in electoral politics. Morsi's victory,
though a bitter disappointment to a large number of Egyptians, is a signal of a
continued transition. Yet all this is enormously fragile, a brittle reality at
the mercy of a single significant misstep.

Quit picking on poor Gen. Custer, he was just following Army doctrine of his time

By "Tyrtaios"

Best Defense department of
military revisionism

In the spring of 1876, a three-pronged campaign was launched by the U.S. Army to drive the Lakota (Sioux) back
to their reservation.

The first prong, under General John Gibbon, marched east from Fort Ellis
(near Bozeman, Montana). The second prong, led by General Alfred Terry (that
also included Lieutenant Colonel George Custer), headed west from Fort Lincoln
(near Bismarck, N. Dakota), while the third prong consisted of General George
Crook's force moving up north from Wyoming into Montana.

Unknown to Terry and Gibbon, on June 17, Crook encountered a camp near the
Rosebud Creek in southern Montana, and a battle ensued lasting about six hours. Although Crook was not defeated by the standards of the day, having held
the battlefield, it demonstrated the Sioux and Northern Cheyenne would fight
long and ferociously, and must have given Crook pause, as he decided
to withdraw his force to Wyoming. This broke one side of the triangle the
three prongs were supposed to create.

Meanwhile, while Crook was retiring back into Wyoming, Terry was moving
west up the Yellowstone River to the Little Bighorn with the 7th Cavalry, with George Custer scouting up ahead in advance after leaving Terry's sight on 22
June.

On the morning of the 25th, the 7th Cavalry was at a fork between the
Rosebud and the Little Bighorn Rivers, known as the Crow's Nest, where Custer
observed another large camp. It's possible there was a haze by the time Custer came to the Crow's Nest that prevented him seeing how very large the camp actually was.

Concerned the Sioux and Cheyenne might escape, and appreciating the element of
surprise, Custer decided to attack and moved down into the valley of the Little
Bighorn. However, prior to moving, Captain Frederick Benteen was ordered to
beak-off and head to the southwest with three companies to block what was seen
as a likely escape route. A few more miles from the Little Bighorn,
Custer again divided his command, ordering Major Marcus Reno to take three
companies along the river bottom and attack the village on its southern
tip, while Custer would lead the five remaining companies and follow Reno in
support.

As a side note, George Custer's two brothers, Thomas, a two-time recipient of
the Medal of Honor during the Civil War, and the youngest of the three, Boston,
were also with him.

Following the top of the ridge to an intermittent tributary of the Little
Bighorn, Custer may have finally realized the gravity of the situation as the
north end of the village came into view. We know this, and that he must
have become concerned, because he sent a message back to Benteen stating,
"Benteen, come on. Big village, be quick, bring packs, P.S. Bring packs."

The trooper Custer chose to deliver that message was bugler John Martini,
and he would be the last, with certainty, to see George Custer and his fellow
troopers alive. It is at this point that all movements by Custer and his
force are speculation, as no white survivors lived to tell the tale.
Unfortunately, Sioux and Cheyenne accounts of the battle were discounted at the time,
exacerbated probably by the Indians' fear of retribution in coming forward with
their accounts, and/or confused by language barriers, which created
inaccuracies, further complicated by fading memories as time went on.

Was George Armstrong Custer imprudent in dividing his command? Most people
with a passing familiarity with the events will immediately accuse Custer of
poor judgment, and say yes.

However, say what you will about the man's flamboyance and previous dash
toward battle, Custer was no fool in the real sense of the word, and he was a
fine cavalry commander. Some historians are reviewing his importance
at Gettysburg -- where he thwarted J.E.B. Stewart, who was coming around to support
Pickett.

One could argue Custer's tactics on June 25, 1876 were consistent with army
doctrine for that period in time, and appropriate for the situation as he at
first grasped it to be. It may be that Custer's biggest mistake was trusting
his subordinate commanders could, or even would support him as planned, and at
some early moment while the Indian attack built momentum, he must have
recognized his plan was faltering, and the luck he had been once famous for was
evaporating.

" Tyrtaios " is a retired Marine
with interest in events where quick decision - making might have changed
outcomes .

What NDU looked like from the Pentagon: A big fat pain in the butt

A former Pentagon official writes:

[Y]ou probably should have mentioned that the
'real reason' everyone hates NDU is because it's where the OSD SES/seniors go
to 'hide' after their political appointments/connections expire with a change
of administration. [T]his typically happens after the election, but before the
new crowd of appointees arrive. [T]hen, from NDU, these guys thumb their noses at
the JCS and the new political appointees at OSD, and hope they can survive -- at
NDU -- until their team returns. [T]he JCS especially hates this -- and you can't
really blame them. [I]f there is any partisan difference in this practice, the
dem[ocrat]s to it way more than the rep[ublican]s do, probably because more dem[ocrat]s typically
originate from academia. [I]'ve watched this happen over the last 30 years, and
had to deal with it when I was [at OSD].