Countering Lind-dinistas - if the mission is impossible, don't blame me

[Fuchs]

Very quick google search
http://e-collection.library.ethz.ch/...h-22383-31.pdf

There are always at least a few optimists.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Very quick google search
http://e-collection.library.ethz.ch/...h-22383-31.pdf

There are always at least a few optimists.

How do I translate this?

[Fuchs]

How do I translate this?

Give the 2nd page a try...

I can't agree with that. State has no more capacity for "nation-building" than the military does. As far as I can determine the US Government has no such capacity, which is why the job got dropped on the military.

Nation-building takes decades.

The establishment of a political system and quasi-consensus on the other hand can be largely accomplished in two years. State Dept. could have drawn together the various factions through diplomacy -with many career diplomats and politicians- towards such a quasi-consensus.

The military was fighting symptoms of political failure, not doing policy itself until it was too late. Bremer et al treated the challenge as an administration challenge when it was in fact a challenge of drawing diverging parties towards a quasi-consensus on how to run the country (how to distribute the spoils).

[TheCurmudgeon]

Fuchs,

Read "Schizophrenic Doctrine: Why We Need to Separate Democratization Out of Stability and COIN Doctrine" It was simply not possible to create a democracy in Iraq or Afghanistan.

I know people in the West want to believe that. They want to believe that everyone wants freedom. That is not the case. Sometimes they just want to survive.

I wish the answers I keep coming up with were different. But blaming the Army for the failures of the political elite is not going to change human nature.

Oh yeah, the second time I got the English. Thanks

[Fuchs]

You do know you sound apologetic?


Let's assume for a while that the mission was impossible.
That would be an even bigger failure than failing in a possible mission!

The top brass' job was to understand the limits of the own institution (to recognize that the mission is impossible) and to inform the political (civilian) leadership about its findings.
Said leadership surely insisted, but that's the moment when a non-failing institution would proceed to simply sacrifice its top brass one after one, as they insist on the finding.
They didn't for career reasons, and the army surely enjoyed all that growth in budget and numbers (all bureaucracies do) - and failed its nation by consuming a huge budgets, inflicting huge long-term costs, sacrificing lives and limbs and achieving close to nothing.


And you surely recognize that the alternative criticism above is not beyond the 3GW crowd's established repertoire, right?


The army cannot escape the blame for its failure; pointing at retired politicians doesn't deflect anything.

[TheCurmudgeon]

Fuchs. I am not apologizing, only offering condolences.

To blame the military is to absolve the civilians ... And those who believe that democracy was possible.

Worse, using it as justification to attack the military is simply unforgivable.

[Fuchs]

Worse, using it as justification to attack the military is simply unforgivable.

Hardly. The military is held in much higher regard in the United States than usual in most developed countries. A dent in its image is hardly unforgivable.

In fact, criticism and questioning the performance, capabilities and ways is very useful. Even criticism that misses a point can be useful in fostering an environment in which actual deficiencies are quickly exposed and remedied.

An army is an armed bureaucracy, and bureaucracies need constant oversight and pressure, or else they go astray on their autopilot which maximises their budget, personnel, and their leadership's comfort.

It's also very typical of bureaucracies to expect and demand respect for their work, and to react appalled to external criticism.



An army is supposed to serve its country (or its dictator).
The U.S.Army has evidently not served the interests of its country in the Iraq occupation, though it fooled itself into believing so and superficially it "served" (just to what end?).
It didn't serve by achieving an outcome better than no war nor did it accomplish its mission nor did it protect the country from the wastefulness of warfare by forcefully insisting on the impossibility of the mission.
It was in no way useful.

A trillion to three trillion dollars, thousands of KIA, ten thousands of cripples and nothing to show for it.


It would be an interesting sociology/psychology research project to identify what it takes to believe that the army did not fail its country grossly in that whole affair.