I know this story is a sacred cow for many and Marcus Luttrell is undoubtedly a hero, but take his accounting of the events leading up to the firefight with a grain of salt.Originally Posted by jmm99
Books ....
My wife tells me my order from Amazon has arrived, including this one: Rules of Engagement? A Social Anatomy of an American War Crime. Operation Iron Triangle, Iraq. The blurbs indicate this is more a forensic study (with documentation) - so, perhaps more to a lawyer's interest than general interest.
Anyway, I expect I will be doing some reading in the next few days, since the order also includes Luttrell's Lone Survivor: The Eyewitness Account of Operation Redwing and the Lost Heroes of SEAL Team 10, which also was an ROE and Laws of War problem....
and two books by Grossman, On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society; and On Combat, The Psychology and Physiology of Deadly Conflict in War and in Peace. These could be total bullroar, but the blurbs looked interesting.
I know this story is a sacred cow for many and Marcus Luttrell is undoubtedly a hero, but take his accounting of the events leading up to the firefight with a grain of salt.
"The status quo is not sustainable. All of DoD needs to be placed in a large bag and thoroughly shaken. Bureaucracy and micromanagement kill."
-- Ken White
"With a plan this complex, nothing can go wrong." -- Schmedlap
"We are unlikely to usefully replicate the insights those unencumbered by a military staff college education might actually have." -- William F. Owen
Truck load of salt, perhaps..
They tell me.
We must have acquaintances in common.They tell me.
"The status quo is not sustainable. All of DoD needs to be placed in a large bag and thoroughly shaken. Bureaucracy and micromanagement kill."
-- Ken White
"With a plan this complex, nothing can go wrong." -- Schmedlap
"We are unlikely to usefully replicate the insights those unencumbered by a military staff college education might actually have." -- William F. Owen
Possibly. Mine and I suspect yours
were involved in the aftermath and the -- is there a foremath?
Anyhoo, cleaning up is hard to do.
Pre-math?were involved in the aftermath and the -- is there a foremath?
Anyhoo, cleaning up is hard to do.
I won't play the "do-you-know..." game, but as you know, there are those who know a lot about the circumstances and individuals involved who have elected not to speak out, so I'll honor their decision. I know they have their reasons. America needs a hero sometimes.
"The status quo is not sustainable. All of DoD needs to be placed in a large bag and thoroughly shaken. Bureaucracy and micromanagement kill."
-- Ken White
"With a plan this complex, nothing can go wrong." -- Schmedlap
"We are unlikely to usefully replicate the insights those unencumbered by a military staff college education might actually have." -- William F. Owen
When all's said and done, most folks do the best they can
with the hand they're dealt. Can't ask for more than that. We can and should ask that sometimes the dealers do a better job...
They don't always do the best they can with the deck they're given.
Absolutely agreed.
"The status quo is not sustainable. All of DoD needs to be placed in a large bag and thoroughly shaken. Bureaucracy and micromanagement kill."
-- Ken White
"With a plan this complex, nothing can go wrong." -- Schmedlap
"We are unlikely to usefully replicate the insights those unencumbered by a military staff college education might actually have." -- William F. Owen
And Grossman derives from Marshall...
...who annoyed Hackworth by responding to his Vietnam criticisms that "war is war".
Hmm. You just named three flakes in one comment --
and got 'em in ascending order of flakiness, too.
My opinion, of course. Good job.
War is war, no one should get annoyed at that. Warfare differs wildly from time to time and place to place and person to person. Marshall and Hackworth were legends in their own minds. Grossman is less dangerous but not all that much though he is getting smarter as he gets older. Marshall and Hackworth did not; Hack in fact, got worse.
I'm reading On Combat for my Psychology 101 class. It's not bad so far.
SFC W
Youse guys own a salt concession ...
or what ?
Yes, I will heed your advice in reading the books - having read Marshall on Marshall, Hackworth on Marshall and Hackworth on Hackworth, following that advice will not be hard. Actually liked Hackworth's TV persona, lacking any personal knowledge of the man.
Grossman is an unknown quantity to me - anyway, those two books were for my personal consumption (perhaps, a better picture of my dad; probably not).
I growled my way through the first 20 pages of the first ROE book (which does have a lot of original documentation in later chapters). Let's say that the author and I have some basic differences on the Laws of War and ROE/RUFs. Which is not bad - scarcely worthwhile reading a book that completely agrees with me. Slow reading though. Hey, that's wrong - so, compose the counter-argument in my head. Next paragraph, same thing.
Regards to all you wise men
Mike
I think he'd gotten smarter by the time he wrote that,
I thought it was a lot better than "On Killing." Eight years later and the presence of co-authors probably helped. I've also talked to folks who've been to his recent lectures and apparently he's gotten still smarter. Some people do that as they age -- I, of course, elected not to do so...
I'm probably excessively suspicious of anyone who puts much reliance on psychology; while I acknowledge it's a discipline and has merits, I also believe people are very difficult to pigeon hole and that events can affect or change people in unexpected ways. I've seen veritable Tigers fall apart at small provocation and mousy types take on a Company -- literally. You never know what drives people...
According to Hackworth
...the only good unit seen in Vietnam on their co-tour was his old one. They did everything perfectly.
Never crossed paths with any of the gentlemen, but that part of Hackworth's story had me shaking my head and chuckling. Maybe it was accurate, I don't know, wouldn't claim the right to judge and don't believe my opinion matters. But had he been a bit less glowing in his praise (esp in comparison to all others) he would have convinced me.
Met both Hackworth and Marshall
As Vicky said, 'we were not amused.' LINK, LINK.
Marshall was a political, cheerful and sort of unfocused type IMO -- did have some good stories, though. At least he had a sense of humor and was funny.
Hackworth OTOH was one of those people you meet everywhere, not just in the service, and who are memorable only for the force of their egos and their focus on appearances.
My son met Grossman, says he's okay. More than he says about some other icons he's met who are named here on occasion...
Group brought LTC Grossman in to speak to us before OIF V. At the time, we didn't know much about him other than some idea about his controversial theories. We were not enthusiastic about listening to that. It turned out though that he actually had some good stuff about physiological and psychological reactions to stress as well as some good stuff on PTSD. I thought he was a pretty good speaker. A good friend of mine was a little less impressed. He refers to him as the Tony Robbins of combat stress theory.
SFC W
It's (I think so) a bit related:
The Israelis have again troubles with "Cast Lead" veterans speaking out about war crimes. An organization called "Breaking the silence" seems to have published a report with testimonies.
German newspaper source (newspaper with one of the best reputations in Germany)
My take on such things is probably already known, but I'd like to repeat myself:
War leads to war crimes, and the only sure way to avoid that seems to be to avoid war. Good example, discipline and control (good leadership) can only reduce the problem.
There's no white and black, and "our boys don't do that" is naive. Humans are almost the same everywhere, and they can turn ugly with an unpleasantly high chance once they've been subjected to war-like conditions.
It's about the environment, the conditions - not the boys.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_prison_experiment
True. Not likely to happen in the near future, though. No war, that is...
Yes, true indeed. While those are true statements, a degree of naivete exists in the world. Putting anyone into a situation of danger is going to bring some pretty normal reactions -- even if those reactions would not be normal absent the danger. For example, in a similar story LINK, the headline is "Gaza invasion: 'If you're not sure – kill'."
Yes. Exactly what almost everyone in that situation should logically be expected do...
Can't see how it is related, but this is the second bite at this one. Once the allegations made by some, were proved to be untrue, we now have a bunch of anonymous claims, which cannot be investigated.
I concur, but there is vast difference, between abuses, and war crimes. Shooting holes in someone rooftop water tank, is not a war crime. Selective definitions of what does and does not constitute a crime is being used for political purposes. British Troops allegedly killed prisoners in Basra. War crime? Abuse for sure.There's no white and black, and "our boys don't do that" is naive. Humans are almost the same everywhere, and they can turn ugly with an unpleasantly high chance once they've been subjected to war-like conditions.
GROSSMAN
Treat with extreme caution. I wrote a re-buttal to "On killing" a while back. He misuses several pieces of evidence and once challenged the core of his argument falls apart. Failure to participate in combat is not based on a lack of desire to kill. For example, he cites Marshall, but not Wigram. I have it in my list "misleading works."
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
Can we more correctly say "two or more armed groups"?Warfare is a struggle between two armed groups.
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