The Syria Mess and the Pentagon’s Serial Failures

[bemildred]

When Robert Gates was Secretary of Defense, he found that the Pentagon was ruled by a culture of bureaucratic delay and careerism. This culture affected even such vital issues as getting effective armor to military vehicles, leading to many unnecessary deaths and mutilations by IEDs. In the middle of war, that is, the Pentagon was still in a peacetime military mode, a mode in which buck-passers, bureaucrats, and time-servers push paper, and award one another certificates of merit. One hand washes the other as everybody gets trophies, medals, and promotions at the end of the year.

The pathetic failure of the Pentagon’s efforts in Syria indicate that if anything, this culture of self-congratulation and failure is getting more entrenched. An extensive autopsy of the now-infamous Syria training program in the Wall Street Journal today has plenty of damning details about the White House’s lack of decisiveness and micromanagement. But it also details numerous lapses from the military leaders tasked with carrying out the training, all of which culminated in this farce:

“We, who are directly in contact with the Pentagon, I swear to God, we have no clue what is going on. It is very complicated,” [U.S.-trained rebel commander] Abu Iskandar said in late August as his group was falling apart.

Pentagon-trained fighters said they stopped wearing military uniforms provided by the Americans, fearful of being attacked. On Sept. 19, Col. Daher withdrew from Division 30, citing a lack of American support and coordination.

Col. Patrick Ryder, a U.S. Central Command spokesman, said nine of 54 members of the first class were still operating with the U.S. in Syria. Abu Iskandar said all but three fighters remain.

http://www.the-american-interest.com/2015/10/05/the-syria-mess-and-the-pentagons-serial-failures/

[bemildred]

1. Why foreign troops can’t fight our fights

In a pair of stunningly candid admissions during the past few weeks, the U.S. Central Command has signaled that a $500 million effort to train and equip Syrian rebel forces has failed. Just four or five fighters of a force planned to number 3,000 to 5,000 by now are active in the battle against the Islamic State; many more of those trained may now be fighting for the other side. A significant chunk of the U.S. military hardware given to the rebels has passed through their hands and into the possession of al-Qaida. Based on what is publicly known, the United States is worse off now than it was before it started training the rebels.

- Seen through a narrow lens, this failure illustrates how difficult progress against al-Qaida and the Islamic State will be without putting U.S. boots on the ground. Viewed more broadly, however, these CENTCOM revelations show fundamental defects in the idea that we can graft U.S. capabilities onto foreign forces to achieve our ends.

Train-and-equip missions like the one in Syria fall under the category of “security assistance” programs, which provide money, materiel or advisory support to foreign forces. The most expensive of these have been the massive efforts to build armies and police forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, with mixed success that I saw firsthand as an embedded adviser with Iraq’s security forces at that war’s height. Closely related are the “foreign military sales” programs, overseen by the State and Defense departments, that delivered more than $40 billion last year in U.S. weaponry and assistance to allies and partners. And then there is the State Department’s $2 billion portfolio of police training and assistance, along with various counterterrorism and military aid programs overseen by Defense. These efforts together are sometimes described as “building partner capacity” and currently include 148 countries.

The programs rest on a theory embraced across the U.S. government: Sometimes direct military interventions do more harm than good, and indirect approaches get us further. The theory briefs well as a way to achieve U.S. goals without great expenditure of U.S. blood and treasure. Unfortunately, decades of experience (including the current messes in Iraq and Syria) suggest that the theory works only in incredibly narrow situations in which states need just a little assistance. In the most unstable places and in the largest conflagrations, where we tend to feel the greatest urge to do something, the strategy crumbles.

http://www.stripes.com/opinion/why-foreign-troops-can-t-fight-our-fights-1.371806

[Dems to Win]

2. US military hasn't succeeded at anything since WWII

Lost in Korea

Lost in Vietnam

Lost in Iraq

Lost in Afghanistan

Couldn't protect the Pentagon with 45 minutes notice on 9/11


The only thing they are good at is spending money and randomly killing/injuring human beings.

[geek tragedy]

3. The military is very good at doing military things.

It's not so good at nation building, law enforcement, and diplomacy.

[bemildred]

4. The failure is really political, not military.

If the political classes insist on getting in stupid wars and losing them by neglect of military affairs in favor of election graft, there is little a person working for them can do other than try to do their job right.

[KoKo]

5. "The U.S. is running a vast, multi-country war effort that has become unhinged..."

From the Article:

This isn’t the Pentagon’s only embarrassing, dangerous, and costly failure of late. Think of the collapse of the Iraqi army in the face of ISIS, or the Afghan military. After 14 years of U.S. force building efforts in Afghanistan, we seem to have created a force that is better at raping boys than at fighting the Taliban. The failures in that country show that we have a military culture in which the greatest sin is rocking the boat. It’s apparently far better to let corrupt Afghan soldiers chain slave boys to their beds than to create some kind of public disturbance. This is a strategy of “hearts and minds” that will win popular support against the Taliban?

The U.S. is running a vast, multi-country war effort that has become unhinged from any serious strategic vision, and we have a military system in which the commanders who see the futility and try to do something about it (and there are plenty) are sidelined.

[malthaussen]

6. One factiod I've always found entertaining:

After we invaded Grenada, more medals were awarded than members of the military who fought in the attack. I remember when we used to laugh at dictators and Soviet generals for all the medals and fluff on their uniforms, and then I think of David Petraeus and all the fruit salad on his uniform... Dwight Eisenhower was authorized to wear about five rows of ribbons but rarely was seen with more than two. Petreaus had garbage all the way up to his shoulder straps -- made me wonder where he'd put them if he got any more to wear. One may consider this trivial, but I think, based on a nodding acquaintance with how iconography and decadence inform one another, that it is symbolic of the kind of rot the article is talking about.

-- Mal

[bemildred]

7. That was when I knew that reform had failed after Vietnam.

Grenada. They just had to invade somebody. Bullies.

[malthaussen]

8. As G.B. Trudeau had it back when Duke was Lt. Governor of Samoa,

"Begin Operation Frequent Manhood!"

-- Mal

[Joe Chi Minh]

9. Careerism is a curse in a war. So vile. Petty rivalries in self-

aggrandisement, leading to needless deaths further down the line. Bad enough between allies, but intra service and inter service within one's own military between some of the most senior officers has to be the absolute pits.

[oldandhappy]

10. Wonder when we will give up war as an answer.

War does not work
War is not effective
War is not a solution
War does not help, it hurts

[yurbud]

12. it doesn't help most of us. It helps a few a lot.

[yurbud]

11. the Pentagon can only invade or bomb countries the civilians direct it too. This is a rehash of

a Baby Bush dodge: claim you are just doing what the generals recommend (so they take the fall when the policy fails).