Leadership
J Carroll
When the United States finally entered into the Second World War in 1941,
Franklin Roosevelt did many things and took many actions in short order.
War monger that he was, his administration actually had a clue and a plan.
Three of his immediate actions are worth noting here.
First - The Ban on photographing Americann dead and wounded was revoked.
Roosevelt stated that he wanted America to see what the ultimate price paid
by the services would be. Combat casaulty footage and service photos would
be given the widest possible circulation.
Second - He ordered the War Department to form and distribute combat
photography teams among the Services.
He wanted Americans to see how we fought as well as who and what we were
fighting so that the American people would know what - exactly - we were
fighting FOR. These films also provided great traning tools.
Third - He had the Treasury Department create a special issue of American
debt instruments refered to in promotional campaigns as "War Bonds".
Post war, these were what we all now know as Savings Bonds.
He did this to remove what he knew would be a huge influx of money into the
system as war production was ramped up. It contained inflation to some
degree, created savings for the masses and tamped down black market
activities. It also had the unintended, but extremely powerful, consequence
of giving the vast majoruty of Americans a way to make their own heart felt,
direct, and personal sacrifice in support of the war effort. Americans
responded - big fucking time.
In other words, he lead his country, and the world, to a resounding victory
based on shared sacrifice.
What he DID NOT do was tell the American public to go shopping.
America's lack of support for George Bush and his "war" has it's seeds in
the supercilious and unserious fool in the White House who can't now, not
could he ever, lead warm piss to flow from a boot with the instructions
printed on the heel. He doesn't have the slightest inkling of what real
leadership is.
Fuck you George W. Bush.
You have certainly fucked us all, each and every one.
--
John R. Carroll
www.machiningsolution.com
Vitor
> When the United States finally entered into the Second World War in 1941,
> Franklin Roosevelt did many things and took many actions in short order.
> War monger that he was, his administration actually had a clue and a plan.
>
> Three of his immediate actions are worth noting here.
>
> First - The Ban on photographing Americann dead and wounded was revoked.
> Roosevelt stated that he wanted America to see what the ultimate price paid
> by the services would be. Combat casaulty footage and service photos would
> be given the widest possible circulation.
>
> Second - He ordered the War Department to form and distribute combat
> photography teams among the Services.
> He wanted Americans to see how we fought as well as who and what we were
> fighting so that the American people would know what - exactly - we were
> fighting FOR. These films also provided great traning tools.
>
> Third - He had the Treasury Department create a special issue of American
> debt instruments refered to in promotional campaigns as "War Bonds".
> Post war, these were what we all now know as Savings Bonds.
> He did this to remove what he knew would be a huge influx of money into the
> system as war production was ramped up. It contained inflation to some
> degree, created savings for the masses and tamped down black market
> activities. It also had the unintended, but extremely powerful, consequence
> of giving the vast majoruty of Americans a way to make their own heart felt,
> direct, and personal sacrifice in support of the war effort. Americans
> responded - big fucking time.
The war took a few weeks to finish. This is a different conflict. One
mission was completed and and now there is a different threat. Should
we level Baghdad and Faluja like we did to Dresden and Berlin? If you
are saying that we are not going after the real heart of terror Iran and
Syria, I will agree. We have the most restrained war with very
restrictive rules of engagement for the troops and yet they are branded
mass murders. Should all Arabs be interned, like the Japanese? The
truth is the US public doesn't have the stomach for real war.
We learned long ago you don't inialate cities in a guerrilla war. Small
groups are the threat and such only weaken the objectives. What
overwhelming conventional strategy would you propose?
>
> In other words, he lead his country, and the world, to a resounding victory
> based on shared sacrifice.
We had that victory with the defeat of Iraqi army. Now the threat is
new it is a different enemy.
>
> What he DID NOT do was tell the American public to go shopping.
>
> America's lack of support for George Bush and his "war" has it's seeds in
> the supercilious and unserious fool in the White House who can't now, not
> could he ever, lead warm piss to flow from a boot with the instructions
> printed on the heel. He doesn't have the slightest inkling of what real
> leadership is.
The war would be over if the forces of oppression would submit to the
will of the people and join the political process or should we just make
Iraq a parking lot?
Insurgencies Rarely Win – And Iraq Won’t Be Any Different (Maybe)
By Donald Stoker
Page 1 of 1
Posted January 2007
Vietnam taught many Americans the wrong lesson: that determined
guerrilla fighters are invincible. But history shows that insurgents
rarely win, and Iraq should be no different. Now that it finally has a
winning strategy, the Bush administration is in a race against time to
beat the insurgency before the public’s patience finally wears out.
STR/AFP/Getty Images
Not invincible: The that insurgents can’t be beaten is a myth, because
history shows otherwise.
The cold, hard truth about the Bush administration’s strategy of
“surging” additional U.S. forces into Iraq is that it could work.
Insurgencies are rarely as strong or successful as the public has come
to believe. Iraq’s various insurgent groups have succeeded in creating a
lot of chaos. But they’re likely not strong enough to succeed in the
long term. Sending more American troops into Iraq with the aim of
pacifying Baghdad could provide a foundation for their ultimate defeat,
but only if the United States does not repeat its previous mistakes.
Myths about invincible guerrillas and insurgents are a direct result of
America’s collective misunderstanding of its defeat in South Vietnam.
This loss is generally credited to the brilliance and military virtues
of the pajama-clad Vietcong. The Vietnamese may have been tough and
persistent, but they were not brilliant. Rather, they were lucky—they
faced an opponent with leaders unwilling to learn from their failures:
the United States. When the Vietcong went toe-to-toe with U.S. forces in
the 1968 Tet Offensive, they were decimated. When South Vietnam finally
fell in 1975, it did so not to the Vietcong, but to regular units of the
invading North Vietnamese Army. The Vietcong insurgency contributed
greatly to the erosion of the American public’s will to fight, but so
did the way that President Lyndon Johnson and the American military
waged the war. It was North Vietnam’s will and American failure, not
skillful use of an insurgency, that were the keys to Hanoi’s victory.
Similar misunderstandings persist over the Soviet Union’s defeat in
Afghanistan, the other supposed example of guerrilla invincibility. But
it was not the mujahidin’s strength that forced the Soviets to leave; it
was the Soviet Union’s own economic and political weakness at home. In
fact, the regime the Soviets established in Afghanistan was so
formidable that it managed to survive for three years after the Red Army
left.
Of course, history is not without genuine insurgent successes. Fidel
Castro’s victory in Cuba is probably the best known, and there was the
IRA’s partial triumph in 1922, as well as Algeria’s defeat of the French
between 1954 and 1962. But the list of failed insurgencies is longer:
Malayan Communists, Greek Communists, Filipino Huks, Nicaraguan Contras,
Communists in El Salvador, Che Guevara in Bolivia, the Boers in South
Africa (twice), Savimbi in Angola, and Sindero Luminoso in Peru, to name
just a few. If the current U.S. administration maintains its will,
establishes security in Baghdad, and succeeds in building a functioning
government and army, there is no reason that the Iraqi insurgency cannot
be similarly destroyed, or at least reduced to the level of terrorist thugs.
Insurgencies generally fail if all they are able to do is fight an
irregular war. Successful practitioners of the guerrilla art from
Nathanael Greene in the American Revolution to Mao Zedong in the Chinese
Civil War have insisted upon having a regular army for which their
guerrilla forces served mainly as an adjunct. Insurgencies also have
inherent weaknesses and disadvantages vis-à-vis an established state.
They lack governmental authority, established training areas, and secure
supply lines. The danger is that insurgents can create these things, if
given the time to do so. And, once they have them, they are well on
their way to establishing themselves as a functioning and powerful
alternative to the government. If they reach this point, they can very
well succeed.
That’s why the real question in Iraq is not whether the insurgency can
be defeated—it can be. The real question is whether the United States
might have already missed its chance to snuff it out. The United States
has failed to provide internal security for the Iraqi populace. The
result is a climate of fear and insecurity in areas of the country
overrun by insurgents, particularly in Baghdad. This undermines
confidence in the elected Iraqi government and makes it difficult for it
to assert its authority over insurgent-dominated areas. Clearing out the
insurgents and reestablishing security will take time and a lot of
manpower. Sectarian violence adds a bloody wrinkle. The United States
and the Iraqi government have to deal with Sunni and Shia insurgencies,
as well as the added complication of al Qaeda guerrillas.
But the strategy of “surging” troops could offer a rare chance for
success—if the Pentagon and the White House learn from their past
mistakes. Previously, the U.S. military cleared areas such as Baghdad’s
notorious Haifa Street, but then failed to follow up with security. So
the insurgents simply returned to create havoc. As for the White House,
it has so far failed to convince the Iraqi government to remove elements
that undermine its authority, such as the Mahdi Army. Bush’s recent
speech on Iraq included admissions of these failures, providing some
hope that they might not be repeated.
That’s welcome news, because one thing is certain: time is running out.
Combating an insurgency typically requires 8 to 11 years. But the
administration has done such a poor job of managing U.S. public opinion,
to say nothing of the war itself, that it has exhausted many of its
reservoirs of support. One tragedy of the Iraq war may be that the
administration’s new strategy came too late to avert a rare, decisive
insurgent victory.
Donald Stoker is professor of strategy and policy for the U.S. Naval War
College’s Monterey Program. His opinions are his own. He is the author
or editor of a number of works, including the forthcoming From
Mercenaries to Privatization: The Evolution of Military Advising,
1815-2007 (London: Routledge, 2007).