Airpower Jumping Off In Syria

[slapout9]

Pentagon is confirming that F-22 Raptor
lead the raids!

[slapout9]

Raw footage of first Air strikes against ISIS>


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qA6mXr1CTAg

[Bill Moore]

Once again we confuse air power and targeting with strategy, and once again it will fail if there isn't more to the strategy. The only thing stone age about this is relying on air power as a substitute for strategy. I posted this on the blog.

An Arab and western coalition bombing extremists is an important step in the conflict against Islamic extremism, but if it isn't coordinated with ground forces it won't have much of an impact. According to sources in Syria Assad was notified, which only makes sense from a force protection aspect. Shoot at our planes and we'll crush you. Can't help but wonder if we and the Arab coalition would be willing to form a temporary alliance with the devil to crush ISIL? Mao and the Chinese Nationalists formed a temporary alliance to fight the Japanese, and then went back to killing each other. Initial reports are that the targeting had minimal impact on ISIL because they already dispersed and moved into private homes effectively neutralizing air power. When you have that many in the coalition the probability of the designated targets being leaked is high, so we're spending a lot of money on high end munitions to accomplish what? Strategic communications? Overall I remain hopeful we will take decisive action when the conditions are set, but will also remain suspect unless there is more to the strategy.

[slapout9]

Once again we confuse air power and targeting with strategy, and once again it will fail if there isn't more to the strategy. The only thing stone age about this is relying on air power as a substitute for strategy. I posted this on the blog.

An Arab and western coalition bombing extremists is an important step in the conflict against Islamic extremism, but if it isn't coordinated with ground forces it won't have much of an impact. According to sources in Syria Assad was notified, which only makes sense from a force protection aspect. Shoot at our planes and we'll crush you. Can't help but wonder if we and the Arab coalition would be willing to form a temporary alliance with the devil to crush ISIL? Mao and the Chinese Nationalists formed a temporary alliance to fight the Japanese, and then went back to killing each other. Initial reports are that the targeting had minimal impact on ISIL because they already dispersed and moved into private homes effectively neutralizing air power. When you have that many in the coalition the probability of the designated targets being leaked is high, so we're spending a lot of money on high end munitions to accomplish what? Strategic communications? Overall I remain hopeful we will take decisive action when the conditions are set, but will also remain suspect unless there is more to the strategy.

Bill. After 13 years and 2 Trillion dollars of failed boots on the ground the President didn't have any choice but to switch to the always dependable Air Force and Navy Air Operatons and then phase II CIA/SF operations of training a local Arab Army and finally to phase III operations of destroying ISIL . Sounds like Strategy to me.

[Bill Moore]

Bill. After 13 years and 2 Trillion dollars of failed boots on the ground the President didn't have any choice but to switch to the always dependable Air Force and Navy Air Operatons and then phase II CIA/SF operations of training a local Arab Army and finally to phase III operations of destroying ISIL . Sounds like Strategy to me.

Sounds more video games and cartoon hour to me. Means and ways disconnected from ends at the strategic and operational levels and minimal impact at the tactical level. The illusion of doing something for political gain is a strategy, but not a good one.

[slapout9]

Sounds more video games and cartoon hour to me. Means and ways disconnected from ends at the strategic and operational levels and minimal impact at the tactical level. The illusion of doing something for political gain is a strategy, but not a good one.

So what other options does the poor guy have (can't believe it I actually am defending President Obama)We have had the greatest failure of Generalship since Vietnam.

The only Strategy we offer the President is..........
1-spend more money we don't have
2- spend more us lives while the locals laugh at us
3-spend more time we don't have
4- create more us maimed and PTSD injured from years of violence
and all for what? Who wins rich Arabs,Iran,Russia,China?

IMO we should be using hash tag bombing. B-52s wing tip to wing tip,nose to tail and fly east to west one day and then north to south the next(hash tag pattern). Then drain every Rich Arabs bank account in the entire middle east.

We need Major Kong!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snTaSJk0n_Y

[Bill Moore]

So what other options does the poor guy have (can't believe it I actually am defending President Obama)We have had the greatest failure of Generalship since Vietnam.

Hard to compete with Bush's administration to invade Iraq and then the subsequent management of it for a strategic failure of leadership that weakened the U.S..

The only Strategy we offer the President is..........
1-spend more money we don't have
2- spend more us lives while the locals laugh at us
3-spend more time we don't have
4- create more us maimed and PTSD injured from years of violence
and all for what? Who wins rich Arabs,Iran,Russia,China?

Using your logic above, certainly airpower doesn't answer 1-3 and the last part of part 4.

The bottom line is that air power is essential, I'm not anti-airpower, I'm anti confusing airpower with a holistic strategy. For this type of targeting you need guys on the ground to both identify targets and then exploit the results of the bombing (take and control the terrain, and enable pursuit of the adversary). Sec Kerry said there were a lot of folks on the ground, implying regional country intelligence services, which is probably true and they can enable targeting. Then again what do we ultimately want to accomplish? That isn't clear to me yet. What does defeat of IS mean? We do have a lot smart people in JCS, State, and NSC, I know shocking coming from me, so hopefully there is more in the cards than we're seeing.