DARPA knows though Bill Keller and even Bill Sweetman may not...
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Originally Posted by
carl
I understand the importance of doctrinal definitions to the military. But to the civilian, those make no difference. Military intervention, raid, tactical or strategic or whatever, it is the our forces going into a country or place and doing military things. The doctrinal fine points are lost on most people and mostly on me too.
The doctrinal fine points and the names aren't important -- what is actually done in that other country is very important. Long term stay versus short stay are understandable by most. Doing no harm as opposed to doing great harm are also fairly easily understood concepts. What works and does not work seems to be a slightly more difficult concept even though there's plenty of history out there about both sides of that...
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True of course, but selectively destructive. And historically, military forces have often been used to build things, especially infrastructure.
Poorly and inefficiently...
That's one of those world has changed things -- and yes, human nature, too -- pick and shovel work is not needed so much in current engineering and is not in the cards for today's armed forces; the kids hate manual labor. :D
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... let's pick one from after the conclusion of WWII, South Korea. We intervened in civil war and it worked out pretty good for several generations of South Koreans.
Here's where that definition stuff get into things. Did we intervene or did we join and assist one nation that had been invaded by another? That was not a civil warm it was a state on state conflict...
We stayed, not to nation build, do COIN or FID support which is what you seem to espouse, but because there was not an official end to that war between the two States, both of which still exist and both of which are still de jure at war. We stayed prepared to engage in combat operations if necessary -- not anywhere near an intervention for humanitarian or development purposes. South Korea pulled themselves up, we provided very little aid to that effort.
Got another one? You can go back further if you wiah, I was just trying to make it easy on you and relevant to today's social norms (human nature may not have changed much but those norms sure have).
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We can also pick one where we didn't intervene where I think we could have and should have, Rwanda. We suffered no hurt at all but 800,000 Rwandans did.
We can disagree totally on that one. Not one iota of US interest there. We would have 'intervened' halfheartedly, done a poor job and Clinton would've pulled out rapidly making it a fiasco of greater magnitude than it was. We quite likely would have done as much or more harm as good and almost certainly would have done the USA no favors.
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Then why on earth should we do it?
Because it is cheaper and far more effective than long term intervention. We can of course continue take that easier but eventually more expensive and invariably less effective route and continue to play by the opponents rules on his court but it seems sorta dumb to me. YMMV.
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Punitive expedition or raid or not, the Pershing adventure is the same thing to a civilian. Our forces went in and mucked about for a bit to no great purpose.
Okay, so regardless, you want an armed force to go in and muck about to no great purpose? Have you considered a job at CNAS? :wry:
The object is to go in to attack a limited objective, quickly and harshly and leave rapidly. That is done to avoid an open ended Mexico or Afghanistan like effort. I don't think any civilian has any difficulty with that concept unless they have an ideological bent which opposes that or espouses another sort of effort and thus they wish to deliberately conflate or confuse things.
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That is because Hezbollah has not done much by, for or with us. They are Lebanese and interested in Lebanon and Israel. As of yet they are no great threat to us cause the don't want to be.
That's what Clinton AND G.W. Bush thought about AQ...
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The world has changed. Human nature has not and won't so I don't think I missed anything.
We can differ on that as well. Human nature may be a constant but it has been overlaid with a veneer of mores and attitudes that I have difficulty recognizing and that my father wouldn't recognize. The nature may be in there but it's buried under stultifying norms.
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There is no getting around physics...The only other option is a strike from the sea...And also the Navy is falling apart.
Also on most all that. While much is now correct, there are ways...
As an aside, on the basing thing, our payments to and tolerance for the well known proclivities of the Pakistani Army and the ISI are not as much wishy washiness as it is that basing requirement. It may be a fact of physics -- but, geopolitically, it's a strait jacket and one that can and should be eliminated instead of encouraged.
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Americans are very sensitive to airplanes going down and especially aircrew getting captured. That would go double if say a C-17 was forced down and the whole crew and all the soldiers in the raiding party went into the bag.
And even on that. You're closer to right on that, particularly the bit about capture -- that is one major cultural shift (more for the Armed Forces than for the American populace...). I think its easily handled but acknowledge many will not agree. Won't know until it happens -- the American people in my observation are far more tolerant of casualties, captures and military misadventures than the Politicians and the Media seem to think.
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Social engineering not so much. Humanitarian purposes yes; but only if practicable and only if done with vigor. It was practicable in Rwanda, it isn't in Darfur.
After a brief partial agreement, we're back to disagreeing on Rwanda but can agree on Darfur -- probably for different reasons... ;)
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The effectiveness of strategic raids is neither here nor there if we can't physically do them. We can't physically do them unless we have big bases in the region to launch or support them from. We won't be able to maintain big bases in the region unless we dominate it which sort of leads us right back to where we are now.
We again disagree in part. What you say is true as far as is now publicly known. My belief is that need not remain true -- in fact I strongly believe it will not; we have the capability to remedy the shortfalls you identify, they've all been well known for years. We have deliberately chosen not to openly develop things in a head-in-the-sand risk averse effort to NOT do such raids and thus deny the Government that capability. The Armed Force may be able to keep that charade up a bit longer but I have a gut feeling that they won't be able to do that for long -- again, we'll have to wait and see.
Glad you read Defeat into Victory.
It points out quite well that an Army can be misused to turn victory into defeat...;)
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Originally Posted by
carl
Human nature hasn't changed. American mores have as you indicate. My observation on human nature has more to do with the people of the world. You can do an awful lot with a pick and shovel overseas and you will have lots of guys who want to swing them.
True on that last but I thought we were talking about the US Army and its operations / operating techniques. Americans can do pick and shovel work and will if pushed and the basic nature can reassert and give you a fully functional, thinking, independent human being -- but you've got to scrape off that veneer first and the Politicians will resist that to the death because they like that veneer and the complaisance and compliance it brings...
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How about the Philippines? (I know you're expecting that and have a reply pre-printed.).
My pre-printer's broke... :D
Philippines? Which time?
Today? Good pick -- note that it is low key and there is no introduction of major US Forces, only low key advice and assistance. It not an intervention, it is FID assistance which is beneficial. That is quite sensible and to be encouraged as much as large troop commitments should be discouraged. Good intel, diplomacy before crisis level is reached and low key military and development assistance are fine -- it's commitment of large bodies of troops that create more problems than they can solve. There's a secondary issue with the purpose of any intervention. They can vary but just have to pass the common sense ("Will this make things truly better or worse?"). If that answer cannot easily be determined, then with a small footprint there is far less risk of making things worse. A large footprint will almost invariably create problems that will force mission alterations that can go rapidly downhill. That is true of any force; it is particularly true of the US forces which are incredibly bureaucratic and ponderous while being aggressive -- a very bad combination that militates (pun intended) against the flexibility and skills required to properly conduct most operations other than war. We can do it, we'll rarely if ever do it right or well simply because we can't.
Post WW II? No real intervention there, no troop commitment.
Post the Battle of Manila Bay in 1898 ? That was not an intervention by any definition, it was the seizure of a nation to colonize it. It involved a war with the then Colonial power and their ejection, running into a full scale war with local nationals and only later became a sort of 'intervention' of the COIN / FID sort -- not too humanitarianly oriented, though (yet another reason for my post WW II restriction earlier; human nature may not have changed but what's broadly acceptable in treatment of others and the limits of engagement capabilities therefrom descending sure have...).
The Philippine War started off not as an intervention but as a full scale, nominally declared war; the issue being viability of a free and independent Philippine state. The stupidity and aggressiveness of the US Army contributed to that war in spite of orders from DC to avoid it (shades of I-Rak...). It was conducted as a mid intensity war initially, with real atrocities on both sides and officially ending in 1902. Our use of segregation and concentration camps plus some of the rather harsh tactics enabled that 'win' and then, the 'war' thus won, things descended into a low grade insurgency which lasted over ten additional years.
I doubt conditions today will lend themselves to a US 'intervention' that effectively runs out a ruling or colonizing nation, takes on the citizens of the country involved in a 'war' that ranges between mid intensity combat and low grade insurgency for thee years and kills about 30K+ members of that nations forces plus over 200K civilians. If it then devolves into a low order insurgency for ten more years with still more deaths and atrocities, I can picture the NYT headlines...:D
I'll acknowledge that particular War and Insurrection did not lend themselves to strategic raids as an alternative. One cannot seize another nation with strategic raids (fortunately, there isn't much call for such seizures on the horizon), however I also do not think it can be classed as an intervention of the type we are discussing. If one wishes to call it that, one can but one should then acknowledge that it took 13 years or so and caused a lot of casualties -- expensive for results achieved IMO -- and that it was a classic example of 'mission creep' that is almost inevitable with commitment of a military force into another nation where some object to that presence. As for its 'success' -- that's problematic, arguable and up to each person to assess (Would the Philippines have better progressed without US presence? We cannot know, the US was there) but there is no question that the overall cost-benefit ratio was quite bad.
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CNAS won't have me. I can't get through Clauswitz and didn't read Galula's second book. I keep thinking "What did Clauswitz have to say that Slim's SGT didn't and what is in the other book that isn't in The Village?"
A bit in both cases. Those books aren't at odds, they complement each other. Every war is different.
The folks at CNAS have probably read most all those. Problem is that they seem to have cherry picked them to get the tropes they want and ignored the rest , a rather natural human tendency... :wry: