Thomas E. Ricks's Blog, page 199

Comment of the day: An Army officer credits Shadid with saving the lives of his soldiers and of Iraqi civilians as well

I just noticed this comment, posted
the other day by "Hunter."
I believe Anthony
Shadid's ashes were scattered on Wednesday around his ancestral home in
southern Lebanon:

-- 

Every night as we prepped for
mobilization and deployment I read from Night Draws Near to my CO
CDRs, 1SGs, and Staff. I have the dog-eared copy in my lap as I type right now.

His
moving account was in no small part responsible for making it clear to my
soldiers that the Iraqis are people too, just like you and I. Caught in the
middle of something they really wanted no part of.

Nearly
three million truck miles in Iraq over nine months with only 9 rounds fired in
5 escalation of force incidents ... but no one was ever hurt, coalition or
Iraqi. 60 IEDs for our predecessors became 2 IEDs for us. No one was hurt on
our watch....thanks in part to Anthony. RIP."

-- 

Hunter
also gets off a good line in the discussion of Lt. Col. Danny Davis: "If
you are going to bring the pain, you best have your ducks in a row."

Rebecca's War Dog of the Week: The BS Behind the Rats and Robot Rumors

By Rebecca Frankel

Best Defense Canine
Correspondent

Barking up the Wrong Tree (I): No,
Computers Won't Replace Human Handlers

In January, Wired ran a post that got my MWD-lovin' leash in twist. Word of it ricocheted around the Internet, prompting at least one seriously
inaccurate follow-up, and
riled up some spicy criticism among MWD handlers. The post, titled
"Army's Automated Dog Whisperer Will Train Puppies of War," draws attention to
three small-business contracts awarded by the Army to develop a technology
called Rugged Automated Training System (RATS).

Certainly news of the RATS -- specifically,
its goal to produce "a machine
that will reliably train small animals to detect explosives ... and provide an
objective unbiased measurement of the animal's sensitivity and accuracy" -- is
fascinating, as is the Army's interest in pursuing it.

The problem with the Wired post is that it misappropriates
language from the unclassified descriptions of
these contracts and relates it to canines, wrongly implying (nay, proclaiming
with its title), that the eventual success of RATS will transform the way MWDs
are trained. The post's author, reporter Katie Drummond, never qualifies or specifies the canine component in these three
contracts or the still-developing U.S. RATS program.

That's probably because
there isn't one.

"It's
completely a rat program," said Dr. Micheline Strand, chief of the Army
Research Office division funding the RATS research and manager of the program.
Dr. Strand, speaking from her North Carolina office this week, told me that
even while the Army is interested in exploring the detection capability of rats
they "are not meant to replace dogs in any way."

[[BREAK]]

Rats and
mice have piqued the interest of stateside researchers with reports of their successful
landmine and explosive detection abilities in Africa, Israel, and more recently, Colombia. Much of the appeal of these
rodents is how unlike canines they
are -- smaller, lighter, and without the emotional connection to their human
counterparts. It's also widely assumed that with the advent of RATS, training
these more diminutive mammals would be faster and less expensive, in part
because the human role could be minimized with rats. (Minimized, but not
eliminated as Drummond surmises in her post.)

But
all of the hype around RATS (and rats, respectively) is tentative and the
scientific investigation is in the early stages. Even if these RATS contracts produce results that
satisfy the Army's highest expectations, the technology is at minimum two years
away from even being produced.  

"Right now it's very, very basic
research," Dr. Strand said. The Army Research Office focuses more on exploratory,
long-term research. "It's looking at 'Can we do this?'" she explained. When it
comes to RATS, "We might say, 'You know, this didn't work.'"

The
teams currently working on RATS technology are still in Phase I of their
research and the details that make each pursuit unique are being kept under
wraps. I spoke with a representative from
each of the three teams and they all assured me that this technology is not
being developed with canines in mind, even if they speculated it would be
possible someday. In part, the objective with RATS is simply to determine,
through hard data, whether a rat's capability for scent detection is even on
par with that of a dog's.

To be fair then, we can't take
canines out of the RATS equation entirely. As Dr. Strand put it, "Dogs are a
proof of concept that an animal system is actually very, very good at finding
smells. Dogs show it can be done."

And MWDs -- when matched with
their handlers -- do it better than anything
else the military has yet conceived of in the
way of IED detection. Even if RATS is
successful and even if years from
now, the Army finds a way to apply it to canines -- something I have a difficult
time envisioning -- I still don't believe it could ever replace, let alone
surpass the effectiveness of the handler-canine working bond.

William
Gressick, the principal investigator on RATS working for Barron Associates,
Inc. in Charlottesville, VA spoke with full confidence about the work he was
doing with rats, but acknowledged the integral role the dog-handler bond plays
in MWD training. "It seems very unlikely to me that, using a computer, you
could reliably train a dog to achieve the performance that a handler does. We
can't speculate on what the future will hold, but right now I can't see
that."

A final note: This post is the
first in a series devoted to upending the more egregious misperceptions currently
circulating about MWDs. If you have a question or know of a related issue that
might be addressed (or debunked) here, let us know. I'll do my best to provide
answers and bring in other experts in the field whenever possible. (The series
title comes courtesy of the talented Mr. Ricks.)

Rebecca Frankel, on leave from her FP desk, is currently
working on a book about military working dogs.

 

Army reading list: Good but a bit of a hole where Iraq and Afghanistan used to be

I think the new
Army reading list is one of the best I've seen. It is more than the usual
greatest hits collection. It has some of those (Stephen
Ambrose and Once an Eagle, for
example) but also Carlo
D'Este's Eisenhower, H.R. McMaster's Dereliction of Duty, and Jorg
Muth's Command Culture. It even
has a couple of good books on the Korean War-Fehrenbach's This Kind of War and Appleman's East
of Chosin.

It is a surprisingly balanced list -- the Civil War, World War
I, World War II, the Korean War and the post-9/11 wars are all well
represented. But I couldn't help but think that the Iraq
section was a little weak. If nothing else, I would have included Jim
Frederick's Black
Hearts. 

It also is interesting to compare the chief of staff's list
to that of
the junior officers. There is some overlap, but the younger officers' list
feels slightly more serious to me -- more Rommel and infantry, less Starfish and Spider (which may be a great book, for all I know -- I
have not read it -- but to me it sounds like a song by Prince). Instead of pop
culture bizness books, I'd recommend something about how expert leaders operate
under stress, such as Gary Klein's Sources
of Power: How People Make Decisions.   

Also, given that we are on the edge of a large
demobilization following a war, I think the list should nod to the issue of the
vet returning to society, perhaps with Jonathan Shay's Odysseus
in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming.

A Canadian strategic assessment of the American mood: cranky and disengaged

Americans are unhappy and in a hunker-down mode, says a strategic assessment
by a Canadian defense institute that is
being rolled out today:

Americans are war-weary, disappointed with
what has been achieved at great expense, and feeling exploited by ungrateful
allies. Debate is intensifying over how national interests should be defined
and the degree to which the security of Americans requires expenditure of lives
and treasure in faraway places. The rising mood of disengagement coupled with a
fragile economy will make it very difficult for the administration to send
large forces anywhere in 2012 unless security interests are openly threatened
or humanitarian need is overwhelming.

Hey vets: Not a job fair, a hiring fair

This sounds like a nice innovation to
me. It's all happening this weekend at the old Bethesda Naval Hospital, which
has a stupid new name.

My friend Shannon O'Reilly writes:

The
100,000 Jobs Mission is holding a hiring event with the U.S. Navy
this Saturday, Feb 25, from 10:00 to 15:00, at Naval Support Activity in
Bethesda, Maryland, home of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. The event is open to all veterans, transitioning servicemembers and military
spouses. This is different from traditional job fairs by aligning candidates to
specific companies and positions based on their interests and qualifications
BEFORE the hiring event begins. Hiring managers will be on site to
conduct interviews and are prepared to make offers that day. Registration is strongly
encouraged prior to the event. (URL: http://www.100000jobsmission.com/)

More
than 20 employers from diverse industries will be at the event, seeking to hire
veterans and military spouses for jobs ranging from entry level to management
positions. Participating companies include: JPMorgan Chase, Lockheed
Martin, ManTech International Corporation, Orbis and many others. If
you or someone you know is a veteran and is looking for a job, please share
this information and encourage them to register!
Please note, proof of military service is required for base access
(military ID card, veteran ID issued by VA, or DD-214 plus a photo ID).

Maybe the way to go after al Qaeda is using a new organization: 'Killer NGOs'

By Col. Gary
Anderson (USMC, Ret.)

Best Defense
department of modest proposals                             

We need new thinking in the hunt for Al
Qaeda. If you didn't like Iraq and Afghanistan, you are really going to hate
Somalia and Yemen. This nation needs a better strategy for fighting terrorists
than invading every country where we find them with a force as large as the one
that hit the Normandy beaches. Al Qaeda is, after all, a Non Governmental
Organization (NGO), albeit a very evil one; and we have to figure out how to
deal with it without creating a major regional war every time we uncover an al
Qaeda cell.

Failed
and failing states are the kind of places that Al Qaeda and its affiliate are
looking for. Afghanistan and Iraq are too hot for Al Qaeda to operate in,
and Pakistan is becoming that way. It is true that Iraq was never a haven for al
Qaeda until our invasion led to a civil war in that country, but al Qaeda
operatives saw opportunity in chaos and exploited it. The 9/11 attacks were
enabled by the fact that al Qaeda found sanctuary in Afghanistan and used it to
launch attacks on the ultimate enemy, the United States. Preventing another
9/11 has been a priority for the last two administrations, but no one has yet
articulated a way of dealing with them short of using a sledgehammer to kill
the proverbial fly.

Here
is an alternative: If al Qaeda is an NGO, we begin to encourage and support
"Killer NGOs" to destroy it in the countries that it infests.

If
al Qaeda is an NGO, it is a malignant one. But it is like other NGOs that
primarily pursue peaceful change in two ways. First, Al Qaeda doesn't answer to
any government. Second, it survives on donations. Unlike political parties, it
doesn't seek to dominate the people it infects; it desires merely to use them
for international ends. The best way to fight an NGO might be with another NGO.

What
would an anti-al Qaeda "Killer NGO" look like?

--First,
it would have to consist of natives of the region where it operates; its
message would be to reject the outside influence of foreign Islamist
extremists.

--Second,
it would need a competent military component. Militias are a dime a dozen and
usually they are predatory. A small cadre of skilled fighters with cohesion and
a cause can easily defeat the kind of rabble that al Qaeda pays to act as its
muscle in areas that it infests. This is not a mercenary
organization such as Blackwater. Mercenaries don't fight for a cause; they
fight for money.

--Third,
a killer NGO needs a development arm. In a failed or failing state
without a social safety net, a local NGO capable of supplying rudimentary
medical, educational, and nutritional support is a welcome addition in places
where hope is a scarce commodity

--Finally,
a killer NGO needs a media arm that will get out its story and discredit that
of Al Qaeda and its affiliates. A strong message of local self-reliance and
rejection of exploitive foreigners is always a powerful one in the Third World.
It has been used against us when we have been a visible presence. The difference
here is that we are not a presence in the places most at risk of al Qaeda
infestation; nor is it in our interest to be. We are present, and will continue
to be in places where we have vital economic or geopolitical interests. Yemen,
Somalia, and the southern Philippines don't generally make that list, and that
is why they become attractive to al Qaeda and its affiliates.

What
happens if a killer NGO goes bad? We stop funding it. Unlike unpopular
governmental regimes that do bad things, we are under no treaty obligation to
support a NGO that goes bad. There are thousands of NGOs around the world. They
are born and die every day. There is no loss of national prestige in
withdrawing support to a rogue private entity.

The
opposite is always possible. Some of these organizations might succeed wildly
and become legitimate political parties with interests aligned to ours and
democratic aspirations. We always have the option of reinforcing success.

We
should of course retain the alternative of chasing al Qaeda across the world in
a lethal game of "Where's Waldo" with Special Forces and drone aircraft, and
that option should never be taken off the table. If a particularly dangerous
situation arises, we need the capability of direct action. But we need to
consider options that are less expensive politically and economically. To make
a medical analogy, al Qaeda is an infection. Direct military action is like
chemotherapy. It can do nearly as much harm to the infected host as the disease
itself. Killer NGO s would be a carefully targeted antibiotic. Chemotherapy is
always an option, but it should not be the first choice.

The
American public has lost its desire to wage counterinsurgency and counter-terrorism
operations on the scale of Iraq and Afghanistan. Nipping and al Qaeda generated
problem in the bud before it becomes a 9/11-type strategic threat is
a clear preference. Encouraging and supporting killer NGOs is one more tool
that we can add to our strategic kit that is both inexpensive and of low risk
to American service personnel.

Gary
Anderson is a retired Marine Corps officer. He teaches a class on alternative analysis at the George Washington University's Elliott School of International
Affairs. He currently is on sabbatical in Afghanistan.

Marc Lynch says don't intervene in Syria, but Jeffrey White says do it indirectly

I think Lynch is
right. (As you might
expect.) It is not a feel-good position to take, but I do think his
hands-off policy is rational.

Meanwhile, Jeffrey White calls for an indirect
campaign, including arming the opposition.

These seem to be the two basic
options being discussed.

Meanwhile, it has been a lousy week
for journalists
in Syria.

The adventures of Lt. Col. Danny Davis: His plan to lead the U.S. invasion of Iran

For
a reservist, Lt. Col. Danny Davis (author of the recently touted
and then critiqued
report on the Afghan War) sure gets around. I was told yesterday that when he
was a major, he proposed that the United States conduct a ground invasion of Iran by
air dropping an armored division northeast of Tehran and then doing a tank
assault into the city.

I also was told that he proposed to General
Abizaid that he be promoted to lieutenant colonel and put in command of the
lead tank battalion in the assault.

So
I wrote to Lt. Col. Davis to ask if all this was correct. He promptly wrote
back, very nicely. (Reading his note below, I don't know why he would consider
a private letter sent to a general by an individual operating in a non-official
capacity to be classified. Nor do I see how something can be both private and classified,
but these are minor issues).

Here
is his note:

nice
to hear from you - i am grateful that you sought out the facts instead of
simply publishing an inaccurate, partial-truth.



i will tell you that the one quote you cite below is a gross
mischaracterization of a private, classified document I did in fact write,
and contains blatantly inaccurate information.  six years ago i sent
a private, classified letter and associated classified report to one
individual that had as its subject Iran.  it is unfortunate that
someone is leaking isolated pieces of this classified document, out of context, to
members of the media.  unlike whomever is leaking this information, i
will not discuss known   classified
material in public.   

thanks
again for asking about this before publishing something. as i understand it you
did not agree with my report or some of its findings and thus i respect
you all the more for seeking out my take on this deceptive quote before
you publish your blog.



let me know if i may be of further help,



--danny

Why I am more optimistic about Afghanistan than I am about Iraq

I've had this gut feeling for a few
years now that in the long term, Iraq
is going to be messier than Afghanistan.

An e-conversation last weekend
clarified the feeling for me, like hot ghee: In Afghanistan we
haven't fundamentally changed the situation. (Kabul has long been at odds with
the provinces, Pashtuns have long thought they should run the country, Pakistan
still thinks it has to have control over who controls Afghanistan.) But in Iraq,
we changed the game. We established the first Shiite-dominated Arab state in
many centuries. That is true whether or not it becomes an ally of Iran (which I
think it will, but who knows?). So I think it will take much longer for the
dust to settle in Iraq.

Speaking of Iraq,
Michael Knights had a good piece that I think runs counter to the Joel
Wing view. Knights reviews the data and concludes
that, "it is not a stretch to say that the incidence of Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence
has doubled since November 2011." Al Qaeda is reviving and the insurgency is
re-coalescing, he adds.

In a similar piece, Lt. Col. Joel
Rayburn, one of the smarter people I ran into in Tell Afar, where I ran into a
lot of smart people, writes
about Iraq that, "the nation's politics lie in disarray, with no clear route
back to stability."  In addition, he
observes, "the sectarian lines that divided Iraq's communities in the civil war
of 2005-08 are hardening once more." He thinks the country is heading toward
soft partition.

"Historians will puzzle over how a
nine-year American military campaign resulted not in democracy, but in an Iraq
led by a would-be strongman, riven by sectarianism and separatism, and
increasingly aligned with America's regional adversaries," Rayburn glumly
predicts.

(HT to JR)

Hey Nat. Geo., will Marseilles really be W. Europe's first majority Muslim city?

That's what National
Geographic says,
in the last paragraph of a new article: "It may well be the first western
European city with a majority of its residents from Muslim backgrounds."

Probably better for the magazine to have said it may be the
first majority Muslim city in western Europe in about 700 years. If I recall my
history correctly, in the 13th century, many western European
cities, such Granada and Cordoba, were majority Muslim. I remember being told
that Cordoba (AKA Qurtuba) was at one point the world's largest city and had
3,000 mosques. Not long before that, the entire island of Sicily was an Arab
emirate. Dunno if it ever was majority Muslim, but I'd bet Palermo was.

(HT to Al D.)