The fanatic is sending letters to the families of fallen heroes urging them to become Muslims “to save yourselves from the hellfire”.

The sick campaign comes days after The Sun revealed Choudary’s plan to protest in the town famed for honouring Britain‘s war dead.

Twisted Choudary yesterday refused to face The Sun over his sick letter-writing campaign, whingeing: “I’m the most hated man in Britain.”

Cowardly Choudary tried to pretend he was out when reporters went to speak to him at his home.

He turned off his TV and fled upstairs before finally answering a call to his mobile.

He then moaned: “I’m not coming out, you’re trying to demonise me.” Dad-of-three Choudary, 42 – who lives in a £350,000 home in Leytonstone, East London, on benefits provided by the British taxpayer – also chickened out of our invitation to talk to the soldiers of 3 Para.

Choudary and his supporters are provoking outrage with their plans to write to the families of British troops killed in Iraq and Afghanistan, urging them to renounce their own religions and convert to Islam.

Their sick letter tells them to embrace Islam to “save yourselves from the hellfire”.

The warped rant also tells grieving parents their sons and daughters died in vain as they were tricked by the Government into fighting “a war against Islam”. Choudary first came to attention after hailing the 9/11 terrorists as “martyrs”.

He has since demanded an Islamic revolution in Britain, and said Business Secretary Lord Mandelson should be stoned to death for being gay.

The letter campaign comes just days after The Sun revealed Choudary and his Islam4UK group plan to march through Wootton Bassett, Wilts, carrying coffins to symbolise thousands of Muslims killed in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Residents of Wootton Bassett have turned out more than 100 times in the past two years to pay their respects as the bodies of fallen British heroes are taken from nearby RAF Lyneham to a morgue in Oxford.

Deluded Choudary’s letter says the march is not meant to be provocative. He even claims it has the support of some British troops’ families.

But thousands of decent British citizens have expressed their outrage. A Facebook page set up in opposition to the march already has almost 100,000 members.

Moderate Muslims have urged police to stop the protest to prevent a backlash by right-wing British groups.

Wootton Bassett’s Mayor Steve Bucknell said he was “dismayed” by the planned march, saying: “We will do whatever we can to persuade the authorities that it will be a very bad idea to allow this march.”

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Police confirmed they were aware of the planned protest and said they would take all steps necessary to maintain the peace.

Right-wing extremists have already threatened violence if the march goes ahead.

THE mum of a soldier killed protecting innocent Afghans told last night of her fury at Anjem Choudary’s plans.

Tracy Leslie’s son, Rifleman James Brown, 18, died stopping the suicide bombing of a busy market.

Tracy, 43, who will aid Help for Heroes in his memory, said: “It’s insulting to think this is wrong and disgusting to even talk about planning stunts.

“No matter what your faith is we should respect each other.”

‘He’s a racist’
THE wife of Royal Marine Mark Ormrod, who lost three limbs fighting the Taliban, said Choudary should be arrested and his group Islam4UK banned.

Becky Ormrod said “vile” Choudary’s plans to march through Wootton Bassett and to write to families of dead soldiers was inflammatory and racist.

She added: “To even consider it is beyond human decency. It is like spitting on the graves of our fallen heroes.”

Related posts:

1. Muslim cleric Anjem Choudary vows to continue Wootton Bassett march
2. Wooton Bassett defiant over plans for Islamic march
3. Anjem Choudary admits Wootton Bassett march is publicity stunt

The commandos, from the Army’s Delta Force and the Navy’s classified Seals units, have had success weakening the network of Sirajuddin Haqqani, the strongest Taliban warrior in eastern Afghanistan, the officers said. Mr. Haqqani’s group has used its bases in neighboring Pakistan to carry out deadly strikes in and around Kabul, the Afghan capital.

Guided by intercepted cellphone communications, the American commandos have also killed some important Taliban operatives in Marja, the most fearsome Taliban stronghold in Helmand Province in the south, the officers said. Marine commanders say they believe that there are some 1,000 fighters holed up in the town.

Although President Obama and his top aides have not publicly discussed these highly classified missions as part of the administration’s revamped strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, the counterterrorism operations are expected to increase, along with the deployment of 30,000 more American forces in the next year.

The increased counterterrorism operations over the past three or four months reflect growth in every part of the Afghanistan campaign, including conventional forces securing the population, other troops training and partnering with Afghan security forces, and more civilians to complement and capitalize on security gains.

American commanders in Afghanistan rely on the commando units to carry out some of the most complicated operations against militant leaders, and the missions are never publicly acknowledged.

The commandos are the same elite forces that have been pursuing Osama bin Laden, captured Saddam Hussein in Iraq in 2003 and led the hunt that ended in 2006 in the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader in Iraq of the insurgent group Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia.

In recent interviews here, commanders explained that the special-mission units from the Joint Special Operations Command were playing a pivotal role in hurting some of the toughest militant groups, and buying some time before American reinforcements arrived and more Afghan security forces could be trained.

“They are extremely effective in the areas where we are focused,” said one American general in Afghanistan about the commandos, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the classified status of the missions.

Gen. David H. Petraeus, who is in charge of the military’s Central Command, mentioned the increased focus on counterterrorism operations in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Dec. 9. But he spoke more obliquely about the teams actually conducting attacks against hard-core Taliban extremists, particularly those in rural areas outside the reach of population centers that conventional forces will focus on.

“We actually will be increasing our counterterrorist component of the overall strategy,” General Petraeus told lawmakers. “There’s no question you’ve got to kill or capture those bad guys that are not reconcilable. And we are intending to do that, and we will have additional national mission force elements to do that when the spring rolls around.”

Senior military officials say it is not surprising that the commandos are playing such an important role in the fight, particularly because Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the senior American and NATO officer in Afghanistan, led the Joint Special Operations Command for five years.

In addition to the classified American commando missions, military officials say that other NATO special operations forces have teamed up with Afghan counterparts to attack Taliban bomb-making networks and other militant cells.

About six weeks ago, allied and Afghan special operations forces killed about 150 Taliban fighters in several villages near Kunduz, in northern Afghanistan, a senior NATO military official said.

Some missions have killed Taliban fighters while searching for Pfc. Bowe R. Bergdahl, who was reported missing on June 30 in eastern Afghanistan. The Taliban in July posted a video on jihadist Web sites in which the soldier identified himself and said that he had been captured when he lagged behind on a patrol. A second video was released on Friday.

“We’ve been hitting them hard, but I want to be careful not to overstate our progress,” said the NATO official, speaking on the condition of anonymity in order to describe the operations in detail. “It has not yet been decisive.”

In Helmand, more than 10,000 Marines, as well as Afghan and British forces, are gearing up for a major confrontation in Marja early next year. Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, the senior Marine commander in the south, said in a recent interview, “The overt message we’re putting out is, Marja is next.”

General Nicholson said there were both “kinetic and nonkinetic shaping operations” under way. In military parlance that means covert operations, including stealthy commando raids against specific targets, as well as an overt propaganda campaign intended to persuade some Taliban fighters to defect.

Military officials say the commandos are mindful of General McChrystal’s directive earlier this year to take additional steps to prevent civilian casualties.

In February, before General McChrystal was named to his current position, the head of the Joint Special Operations Command, Vice Adm. William H. McRaven, ordered a halt to most commando missions in Afghanistan, reflecting a growing concern that civilian deaths caused by American firepower were jeopardizing broader goals there.

The halt, which lasted about two weeks, came after a series of nighttime raids by Special Operations troops killed women and children, and after months of mounting outrage in Afghanistan about civilians killed in air and ground attacks. The order covered all commando missions except those against the top leaders of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, military officials said.

Across the border in Pakistan, where American commandos are not permitted to operate, the Central Intelligence Agency has stepped up its missile strikes by Predator and Reaper drones on groups like the Haqqani network.

But an official with Pakistan’s main spy agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, or I.S.I., said there had also been more than 60 joint operations involving the I.S.I. and the C.I.A. in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and Baluchistan in the past year.

The official said the missions included “snatch and grabs” — the abduction of important militants — as well as efforts to kill leaders. These operations were based on intelligence provided by either the United States or Pakistan to be used against the Taliban and Al Qaeda, the official said.

“We can expect to see more U.S. action against Haqqani,” a senior American diplomat in Pakistan said in a recent interview.

The increasing tempo of commando operations in Afghanistan has caused some strains with other American commanders. Many of the top Special Operations forces, as well as intelligence analysts and surveillance aircraft, are being moved to Afghanistan from Iraq, as the Iraq war begins to wind down.

“It’s caused some tensions over resources,” said Lt. Gen. Charles H. Jacoby Jr., the second-ranking commander in Iraq.

Related posts:

1. Elite U.S Forces Expand Hunt In Afghanistan
2. Elite Special Forces Operations Expanded In Afghanistan
3. You can run, and you can hide, in France’s élite fighting force, the Foreign Legion

Of note, these same arguments if proven accurate can also be used to call for the abolition of the Selective Service System and Selective Service Agency. Much as there was a call to abolish slavery in the 19th century. VT.Ed.

The following presents some of the major arguments against the draft:

1. The belief that science and technology are the panacea to all human problems

2. The belief that military service should not interrupt the unrelenting pursuit of wealth and ever-greater consumption.

3. The fragmentation of the Nation into small, “tribal nations,” each with its own set of values, ethics, and beliefs.

4. The belief that limited, asymmetric warfare, which is not in accord with the American vision of war, is not a threat that requires the attention and participation of the American people.

5. The presumed inability of drafted Soldiers to master the technologies and doctrines required to fight on the modern battlefield with sophisticated weapon systems during a single, short term of service.

6. A widespread preference for professional Sol­diers who are more consistent and reliable, who do not restrict their leader’s range of action, and who minimize the public’s involvement in the fighting.

To be sure, this list of arguments is incomplete, and these arguments are not mutually exclusive, but it is important to understand them.

[Rest assured that many more arguments can and should be made in the comments section, I know that my associates left of center can add their take in an intelligent argument and debate that does not lean on the passionate and emotional argument that military service (voluntary or not) is slavery and servitude. Note also that the arguments addressed by Dr. Lewis are intended for a military audience, so he brings up hardly none of the concerns of people left of center. Vt.Ed]

Science and technology

After World War II and the development of the heavy bomber and strategic bomb­ing doctrine, airpower became a panacea, the answer to avoid the carnage that occurs when two great armies clash in ground warfare. During World War II, some argued that air power was a war-winning technology. In 1948, after witnessing two atomic bombs bring the war against Japan to an end, Eisenhower articulated the new American vision of war:

In an instant, many of the old concepts of war were swept away. Henceforth, it would seem, the purpose of an aggressor nation would be to stock atom bombs . . . Even the bombed ruins of Germany [and Japan] . . . provide but faint warning of what future war could mean to the people of the earth. [Dwight D. Eisenhower, Crusade in Europe (New York: Doubleday, 1948), 456].

This focus on air power was evident [as recent as] 2003 in the “shock and awe” doctrine that was supposed to win the war in Iraq without the involvement of significant numbers of U.S. ground forces. The invasion was supposed to demonstrate the most recent so-called “revolution in military affairs.” The development of information technologies, stealth bombers, and precision weapons produced the stra­tegic doctrine known as “network-centric warfare” and the operational doctrine of “shock and awe” to eliminate or minimize the employment of [ground troops].

Unfortunately, the Pentagon was wrong, again. It is hard to see a revolution in military affairs in current operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. [The arrogant belief in America's technological superiority even with unmanned drones that kill innocent as well as the enemy in Afghanistan and Pakistan is a throwback to our arrogant technological superiority over the Vietnamese. Vt. Ed] The prophets of airpower and [technological superiority] have again contributed to a disaster that ground combat forces had to fix [or clean up].

Editor’s Note: And still we observe both the Air Force and Navy come back to Congress and the President year after year with palms out for increase defense funding for just such airpower and technology that our ground forces continue to have to come behind and make up for when technological superiority is neither appropriate to the low intensity war being fought or over kill. If nothing else the bulk of any defense increase must only go to the Army and Marines until they are back on their feet. The lame argument that all the services can be funded as the nation faces the worse economic crisis since the Great Depression and one political party or another jockeys for position to lower the national debt while intentionally ignoring the fiscal costs of war(s) with raising taxes to pay for them is a pipe dream, more so a FANTASY. VT.Ed.]

Wealth and consumption.

As we are in the midst of the Christmas shopping season, we are reminded of the words of Andrew Bacevich: For the United States the pursuit of freedom, as defined in an age of consumerism, has induced a condition of dependence-on imported goods, on imported oil, and on credit. The chief desire of the American people, whether they admit it or not, is that nothing should disrupt their access to those goods, that oil, and that credit. The chief aim of the U.S. government is to satisfy that desire, which it does in part through the distribution of pork at home (with Congress taking the leading role) and in part through the pursuit of imperial ambitions abroad (largely the business of the execu­tive branch).

Regardless who wants to blame our nation for being in debt, the Republicans are trying to make hay of it now despite the last administration running up the national debt while not paying for war(s), the truth is as U.S. News & World Report recently reported, “America is incredibly indebted. The debt in the financial world went from 21 percent of a $3 trillion gross domestic product in 1980 to 120 percent of a $13 trillion GDP in 2007, reflecting an astonish­ing accumulation of as much as $30 of debt for every $1 of equity in many firms.” [Mortimer B. Zuckerman, Editor-in-Chief, U.S. News & World Report, 27 October 2008, 92].

The evidence is overwhelming that the pursuit of wealth and greater levels of consumption dominate American thinking and actions more than any other endeavors. Con­sumption influences every aspect of American life, including the Nation’s ability to produce combat Soldiers. [The focus of President Obama on the economy from the time he took office to his decision to escalate his Afghanistan War blatantly shows where his and America's focus and attention really is AND IT IS NOT AFGHANISTAN FOR NOW. Not until the media shifts from selling the war to reporting negatively on it, and they will. VT.Ed.]

UNFIT FOR DUTY

With each subsequent decade of the latter half of the twentieth-century, the American people became physically and psychologi­cally less capable of fighting wars. In the 1990s, ROTC departments around the coun­try complained that new recruits couldn’t run a half-mile. New physical training programs were initiated to get potential cadets up to the minimal physical condition required for service, a standard that was far below that required in U.S. Army infantry units. Recruiters had the same problem. This is an issue of national security that has only grown worse since the end of the Cold War. The problem, although identified during the Korean War, plagued the services throughout the Vietnam War.

In 1957, Robert Osgood wrote: Quite aside from the moral odium of war, the fear of violence and the revulsion from war­fare are bound to be strong among a people who have grown as fond of social order and material well-being as Americans. War upsets the whole scale of social priorities of an individualistic and materialistic scheme of life, so that the daily round of getting and spending is subordinate to the collective welfare of the nation in a hundred grievous ways-from taxation to death. This accounts for an emotional aversion to war, springing from essentially self-interest motives. [Robert Osgood, Limited War (IL: University of Chicago Press, 1957), 33.]

“Getting and spending” are no longer subordinate to war; they, in fact, govern the American conduct of war. The absence of a national discussion on conscription clearly indicates that national security is subordinate to the major American endeavor, the pursuit of wealth and consumption.

Fragmentation.

Some argue that the United States is no longer a cohesive cultural entity. Evi­dence of the Nation’s fragmentation: “According to the geodemographers at Claritas, American society today is composed of 62 distinct lifestyle types-a 55 percent increase over the 40 segments that defined the U.S. populace during the 1970s and 1980s.” [Michael J. Weiss, The Clustered World (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 2000), 10].

Patriotism is more rhetoric than reality.

By Patriotism Is More Rhetoric Than Reality. on 2009-12-20 15:36:59
Some believe that people would ignore any law that required national military service. Patriotism is thus more rhetoric than reality.

Evidence of fragmentation is visible in the recent American conduct of war. Private military firms have taken over many of the responsibilities that once belonged exclusively to the military. [See Peter W. Singer, Corporate Warriors: The Rise of the Privatized Military Industry (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2003); and Dina Rasor and Robert Bauman, Betraying our Troops: The Destructive Results of Privatizing War (New York: Palgrave, 2007)].

War in America has become a lucrative business, which, arguably, further diminishes the need for Americans to participate in it. The responsibilities that once belonged to the American people now belong to private military firms loyal to the dollar [MERCENARIES], not the people, the government, or the Army.

The strategic culture of limited and asym­metric war

While the Nation has fought many limited wars, the paradigm for war that occupies the thinking of most Americans is that of the Civil War and World War II, both of which required total mobilization.

President Harry Truman remarked on the American desire for peace: “Americans hate war . . . No people in history has been known to disengage themselves so quickly from the ways of war. This impatience is the expression of a deeply rooted national ideal to want to live at peace.” [Harry Truman, Memoirs of Harry S. Truman 1945, vol. 1 (New York: Da Capo, 1986), 506].

Americans have traditionally believed that:

- The United States is a unique nation-state, unbound by the rules that govern other nations.

- War is serious business, and the U.S. ought not to enter into it lightly.

- Major wars are a national endeavor involving the resources of the nation.

- We ought to conduct wars in a professional, expeditious, and unrelenting manner and bring them to a quick, decisive, and successful end.

- A war should be strategically and doctrinally offensive-and short.

- Its aim should be the destruction of the enemy’s main army followed by the occupation of its country, and its political, economic, social, and cultural transformation.

- The postwar objective is to change the defeated state to one that more closely resembles the United States-a capitalist democracy.

- War is fighting; that fighting ought to com­mence as soon as possible, and proceed continuously and aggressively until America achieves victory.

- There is nothing Americans cannot achieve when fully mobilized.

- The enemy’s identity should be unambiguous, his location certain, and his forces visible and will­ing to accept battle.

- Fighting ought to produce demonstrable prog­ress and decisive results.

- Compromise solutions are un-American and do not justify the human cost of war or achieve the Nation’s political objectives, which are absolute.

- The exigencies of battle ought to dictate the course and conduct of war and minimize the loss of life; political matters should not impede the efficient use of force and the expeditious prosecution of war.

Americans [once] believe in equality of sacrifice-the fair distribution of the war’s burdens among the adult population. They believe that the Nation’s human capital is its most precious resource, and that while Americans are fighting and dying, no other resource should be spared to bring the war to a rapid, successful conclusion. Americans like to fight highly organized, systematic, materiel- and technology-based wars. Americans believe that war is an aberration that upsets the American tenet that man is not a means to an end, and that his “pursuit of happiness” is the end.

Americans believe in acting unilaterally and aggressively and that sustained warfare is un-American and potentially damaging to American democracy. Americans do not accept defeat. They increa

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By Devil’s Advocate! on 2009-12-20 15:57:00
There are those who passionately feel that military service is slavery and servitude (despite the illusion that this is a left-wing monopoly, most Libertarians feel that involuntary military service is slavery starting with Ron Paul). There are also those who strongly feel that the same people volunteering (the lower classes as in class warfare) would be the same people unfairly drafted ala Vietnam, but the right-wing claims that the Vietnam draft was not as unfair as liberals would make it appear just as they also deny there is not socio-economic draft today as if every military recruit was the son or daughter of a lifer (careerist like me).

The only valid arguments are if our over-stretched Armed Forces needs the draft or we need to stop the wars, the survival of our All Volunteer Force can be assured once the war end. However, there needs to be a serious public debate on this issue outside of mainstream media and politicians. Like that would take a miracle, but it is Christmas time. Debate over conscription needs to be retained as strongly as troops re-enlist, and that national public debate needs to be as never ending and ongoing as the never ending deployments our gallant troops well VOLUNTEER for.

To allow our politicians, anti-war, and anti-military activists to continuously sweep the debate of who fights and dies in America’s 21st century wars under the carpet is doing a disservice to those who do volunteer and feel the rest of you are either unfit or plane unsuited for military service. I respectfully view this as a cop out to allow the children of the privileged a get out of war free card endorsed by both the right and left wing. If the son of some Senator, Congressman, or President is cut out for one day deciding to send other people’s children to war the way our politicians spend other people’s money, then they sure as hell are cut out to SERVE. The simple solution from the left of center (and moderate military families) is to END THE WARS AND BRING OUR TROOPS HOME, but frankly despite a reenergizing of the pro-Peace movement every few months, minus the draft I don’t see that happening during anyone from the Vietnam generations shorter lifetime.

Readers may note that the arguments presented by Dr. Lewis attempt not to politically exploit the issue of conscription or the draft, but to ignite intelligent debate over it within the Armed Forces.

Any Google search will show how both the Democrats and Republicans have manipulated and used the threat of the draft during both the Bush and Obama administrations. Those opposed to President Bush’s foreign policy decisions used the threat of the draft [never taken seriously by anyone] beginning with Congressman Charles Rangel’s unsuccessful attempt to ignite debate that got bogged down in scare tactics from all sides of the political spectrum, and today the pendulum has swung to the right-wing using the threat of the draft [still not taken serious by anyone] to undermine President Obama’s SURGE in Afghanistan. This also reflects splits in both the Democratic and Republican parties given that fiscal conservatives are going to increasingly turn independents as well as once hard core liberal Democrats who oppose the war(s) sitting home come election day(s).

One would be a fool to not note that there are strong arguments against the draft from both the left of center, and right of center.

Governments of both the Republican and Democrat vintage can easily get us into war(s), can even maintain a stay the course position, and the American people frankly can do nothing about it THUS FAR.

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By Barrie W. on 2009-12-22 22:25:14
some serious rationale here, along with a dollup of bs, but i could be onboard with this entire diatribe. too long, though. and who is VT.Ed.? i read just last night from tom barnes, that we use real names here or he will spank you.

By Nick Velvet/ Mutt on 2009-12-20 18:27:51
Rather than reinvent the wheel, I went looking for Col. David Hackworth’s articles on the societal need for a draft.
As an aside, I enlisted in ’67. My time in Viet Nam convinced me the US was out of control, and that having a lot of people in the military who didnt want to be there kept it honest- or more honest than it would have been, by far.
We need to massivly scale back the fraud that is the National Security State, in order to do that, whats left of the Middle Class has to act responsibly, in order for THAT to happen, their children must be made hostage to US war policy.

The following article says it better, and in greater detail.

http://www.radicalmiddle.com/x_draft.htm

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By Radical Middle Class What A Concept! on 2009-12-20 19:27:51
Nick (Mutt),

I need to take a closer look at that site, but suffice it to say Bro that it is friggin RADICAL. http://www.radicalmiddle.com/x_draft.htm [www.radicalmiddle.com]

In fact the whole concept of a radical middle class is intreging.

You also mention some of the work and writings of Colonel Hackworth, I’d like to also take a closer look at that.

What really caught my attention big time is how this guy who was so anti-war, so anti-draft to include running operations in Canada that would ALMOST be impossible today did a 180 calling for the draft.

At a glance, I can see some of his rationale jives with the reasons that I said ROTC was conceived as a concept during WWII (not talkng JROTC here). ROTC was intended initially as military officer assession from Liberal Arts Colleges to balance out the officers coming in from the Military Academies.

That said, the number of strictly Liberal Arts Colleges in the United States that have ROTC units have decreased dramatically since Vietnam. Meaning colleges that entertain ROTC units today are Engineering and Science in focus not Liberal Arts.

Mind you I’m also not trying to infer that Liberal Arts colleges are the sanctuary of LIBERALS or LIBERAL thought by a long shot.

One of the points Dr. Lewis brings out is that Senior officers and DOD civilians prefer a ground force that does not question. What they fear in regards to discipline problems is getting draftees, especially intelligent draftees who will go along with the program up to the point that blatant wrong doing is being done then blow the whistle.

I found another site advocating the draft that is not right-wing also.

I’ll have to dig it out.

Bobby Hanafin
The Mustang Major

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By Didn’t The Draft End After Vietnam? on 2009-12-26 20:33:46
Most people are under the illusiion that the draft ended in the mid-1970s, but in reality the apparatus that is responsible for implementing conscription went into what is called deep standby (minimum manning, and the Selective Service Agency stopped collecting personal data on young Americans). That I believe was between 1973 and sometime in 1980.

When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan (what irony), President Carter signed an executive order that beefed up the Selective Service Agency by increased manning to include military reserve Individual Mobilization Augmentees from the Reserves of each military service, and increased budget that has been stable ever since at around 20 to 25 million.

The 21st Century Selective Service System (SSS) and the Agency that runs it is an independent federal agency operating with permanent authorization under the Military Selective Service Act (50 U.S.C. App.§451 et seq.). It is not part of the Department of Defense, but its mission is to serve the emergency manpower needs of the military by conscripting personnel when directed by Congress and the President.70

[Editor's note: though not part of the Pentagon, the Selective Service System works closely with DOD by providing military recruiters access to the personal data on young American males who register for the draft. This enables military recruiters to contact every young man who registers with military enlistment materials. Of course young men can opt out by simply throwing away the enlistments brochures and such, but the objective of military recruitment is having the largest pool of draft eligible to solitcit. That pool stands at about 12 million youngsers.]

All males’ ages 18 through 25 and living in the United States are required to register with the SSS.

The induction of men into the military via Selective Service (i.e., the draft) terminated in 1972. In January 1980, President Carter asked Congress to authorize standby draft registration of both men and women. Congress approved funds for male-only registration in June 1980.

Another point to ponder is that even if a President should call for implementing conscription, he/she does not have induction authority unless granted by Congress. Since 1972, Congress has not renewed any President’s authority to begin inducting (i.e., drafting) anyone into the armed services. Recent efforts to provide President Bush with induction authority have been rejected. See H.R. 163, October 5, 2004, failed by Yeas and Nays: (2/3 required): 2 – 402 (Roll no. 494).

Convincing arguments against the draft have encouraged a growing number of anti-draft activists, including the Libertarian Party to call for cutting funding to the Selective Service Agency or outright abolishing the agency in order to no shit END THE DRAFT – PERMANENTLY.

Ironically, those who make the most convincing arguments that we do not need the draft, volunteers make better troops than draftees, and so on the Department of the Defense is also the first to oppose any effort to abolish the apparatus to do just that END THE DRAFT!

Funding of Selective Service has remained relatively stable over the last decade. It also remains so low compared to other defense related programs that it under the radar of budget cutters, and garners no public or media attention as a waste of taxpayer dollars. For FY2008, the President [Obama] requested, and the House approved, $22 million, which is $3 million less than the FY2007 appropriation.

That $22 million could have been better spent on Obama’s national healthcare initiatives or better yet spent on the Department of Veterans Affairs to take care of our current and returning Veterans much better that it has done.

ROBERT L. HANAFIN, Major, U.S. Air Force-Retired

ABOLISH THE SELECTIVE SERVICE SYSTEM AND AGENGY!!!

By Alton on 2009-12-20 23:32:35
I would bet my life that if (like in World War 2) America is attacked and in peril of being destroyed, we would not have enough space all for the volunteers. That said, when it was finally discovered that Iraq could not and did NOT have plans to attack us (WMDs) and in 8 years we STILL don’t have a strategy to do anything worthwhile in Afghanistan, then the cost of American lives is too much. Maybe I’m getting old but I see this as a crime against America’s value system. Think I’ll go have another Beer.
I have also noticed that the Army has taken people from the other services (called Augmentees) to help them fight. They are not hurting for people like they are making out. And if I had a son now that was thinking about joining, I would do everything in my power to change his mind until this war is over. I would not want him to give his life and me have to bury him. This ‘bit of dirt’ is not worth dieing for. They did not attack us, it has no strategic value and in the final analysis, we will be using close to 300,000 combatants from around the world to find maybe 1,000. In the meantime we are the invaders, some of us act like it and we are treated accordingly.
By VT Editorial Comment on 2009-12-21 13:02:16
“I would bet my life that if (like in World War 2) America is attacked and in peril of being destroyed, we would not have enough space all for the volunteers.”

Thank you Alton that response ALMOST fits quite well with Dr. Lewis’ typical arguments against the draft number 4.

4. The belief that limited, asymmetric warfare, which is not in accord with the American vision of war, is not a threat that requires the attention and participation of the American people.

Assuming you mean that if the Continental United States including Hawaii and our territorial possessions (Guam and Puerto Rico) were attacked by a conventional force and the American people had to fight for our very survial (sort of like Israel), young men (and women if the case maybe) would come out of the woodwork to enlist or even accept conscription.

I personally believe that is a convenient cop out that was also used quite effectively by the right-wing and stil is FOR NOW. I can provide you a link to where the Military Officers Association of America (MOAA) briefly, and I mean briefly entertained the idea of the draft to deal with dwell time and our overstretched force, but settled for the position that since the U.S. in not in a war for our very survival it was OK to expect less that 1% to carry the burdens of war for the rest of us. Of course their position was just as politically motivated as any shift to supporting the draft would be today. They gave a thumbs down because it was Bush’s War and the Republicans still controlled Congress pre-2006 as if that really makes a difference today.

Unfortunately, few wars look like this in the 21st Century.

Dr. Lewis puts it in more academic terms that go over the heads of most of us with a High School GED, but simply put though there may quite possibly be conventional war threats to the United States, he even makes that argument for the draft, there will most likely not be another conventional attack on the US, American people, or U.S. Forces of the seriousness of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

That is not to say it is impossible, for it we continue to flounder our ground troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, even with an economic draft that meets our forces needs for those limited wars, the longer we are bogged down fighting guerrilla wars (insurgents, terrorists, whatever the term for the month is) there is more change that a numerically superior ground force like the Chinese could potentially challenge us for control of the seaways, territorial expansion, alliance with North Korea, attack on Taiwan to force unification, and the list goes on. But frankly, I believe that our nuclear detterent is still effective against such a possiblity.

Put another way if we can find those fanatics in our government, political parties, and even within our military smacking there lips for never ending REVENGE for September 11th regardless we view the exploitation of 911 as a fantasy or not, can you imagine what the same fanatics would do given a no shit scenario like you paint. They would push for REVENGE using Nukes.

The atomic bomb created modern, limited war. Nuclear weapons destroyed the tenet that war is a continuation of politics by other means. There is nothing of political consequence to discuss after a nuclear exchange between the great powers. American dominance in conventional forces has ended conventional warfare, at least for the near future. Thus, the American strategic war culture does not apply to the current environment.

Your argument Alton also verges on the notion that if Americans cannot fight the type of war they want to fight, they will not fight at all. That hasn’t stopped the economic draft or the one percent burdened by the war from volunteering to go back into combat over and over and over again regardless what YOU think.
“In 8 years we STILL don’t have a strategy to do anything worthwhile in Afghanistan, then the cost of American lives is too much.”

Very good point, and in 8 years the so-called Peace movement has not been able to come up with an effective strategy to end the war(s), and I frankly don’t see anyone who questions the wars or opposes them coming up with anything that works in our (Vietnam generations) lifetime.

“I have also noticed that the Army has taken people from the other services (called Augmentees) to help them fight. They are not hurting for people like they are making out.”

Another good point, and the Army has done something that it was impossible to do during Vietnam, today the Army is able to tap into the Reserves and Army Natonal Guard to also augment. In fact, without the overuse of the National Guard the ops tempo and endless deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan would also be IMPOSSIBLE to maintain minus the draft. (wink)

However, I must disagree with the effectiveness of tapping into the Air Force and Navy for ground force augmentees. Yes, there are certain Air Force AFSCs and Navy billets that fit snugly into being Soldiers and Marines, such a Medical and Security Police units, however I’m certain that both the Navy (Sailors) and Air Force (Airmen) are only on six month rotations plus get more than adequate rest time between deployments. I also believe that there are enough Airmen and Sailors to almost ensure each only one tour in combat, maybe two.

However, the overall attitude of Air Force (can’t speak to Navy) leadership has been reluctant to provide such augmentation in significant numbers that would either negatively impact the Air Force mission(s). Put another way folks do not go into the Air Force or Navy to become ground force Grunts – PERIOD.

Secretary of Defense Gates in fact fired both the Air Force Chief of Staff and Secretary of the Air Force a while back for just such a WE ARE NOT SOLDIERS attitude.

Lastly, you sound like the vast majority of Americans so no debate here on having your child serve. I would not either quite frankly, but I have no other children to sacrifice to any piece of dirt.

But if our ground forces have as much augmentation as you believe they do how come they are on their fourth or fifth deployments?

Bobby Hanafin

By Scott Kohlhaas on 2009-12-21 03:12:49
By NEVER CAN TELL! on 2009-12-24 15:02:05
Scott,

Though I seriously do not believe there will be conscription in my lifetime (Vietnam Vet), never can tell, so let me enliven your dead link.

Thank You,

ROBERT L. HANAFIN
Major, U.S. Air Force-Retired

By Marc Killam on 2009-12-21 14:32:57
Sent to Veterans Today via email:

Bobby [Hanafin] If you want one more anti-conscription arguement I’ve got one hellova big one for you. And it concerns morale and the poisonous effect, that’s inevitably inflicted upon those who have Voluntarily CHOSEN to Serve [by those who are forced to serve].

Ever since I was ten or eleven years old, being bored in public school after attending a parochial school, and as I lost interest in school, my desire and lone objective was to join and serve in the U.S. Navy as soon as I was legally able to do so.

So at sixteen I’d already signed my enlistment papers, had had my physical and secured my mother’s parental consent, and on 01 June 1973 four days after I’d turned seventeen I was in Great Lakes Naval Recruit Training Ceneter and followed by Boiler Technician A-School, at GLakes NTC Mainside.

Everything was great! UNTIL I had to spend 2 months awaiting my assigned Duty Station, the USS McCandless DE-1084, to return to the Destroyer & Submarine Piers in Norfolk, from an extended Mid-East Deployment. And then again aboard my new home and work place, I kept finding myself surrounded by a whole shit-load of those who only joined the Navy to avoid the draft and Vietnam.

Their “I Don’t want to be here and I don’t Give a Shit attitudes,” ruined the morale of everyone around them, it poisoned my own desires to make the Navy a career, and made our difficult times even more so. Ever since I still keep thinking “WHAT IF,” “What If” I’d have been surrounded by shipmates who actually WANTED TO BE THERE. Where would I be today? Would I have made the Navy a career, IF ONLY I hadn’t been surrounded by these malcontents?

One historical point: I was part of the very first wave of an all volunteer military, whose service was negatively impacted, by those who felt they’d been forced into their present situation. How many others like me were similarly affected?

Marc K.
Englewood, FL.

Mark is a long time friend of mine in the Veterans’ Activist movement since at least 2004. I promised to post even those comments that do not agree with my views on conscription. This is to say many whom I respect and work with, especially moderates to left of center do not want the draft anymore than most politicians and Generals. That said, note that Mark mentions that he was surrounded not by draftees but people who joined the Navy in order to avoid the draft, but really did not want to endure military service regardless. It should also be mentioned that just being in the Navy in no way ensured a Sailor would not be exposed to the impact of combat or war same goes for the Air Force flying out of Thailand for example. Agent Orange for example shows no discrimination between service members off shore Vietnam, stationed in nations bordering Vietnam, or flying over Vietnam. Though I disagree with the short ops tempo expected of the Air Force and Navy on the ground in Iraq or Afghanistan rest assured that being in the Air Force or Navy is no guarantee one will not see combat, or not be exposed to the impact of combat.

Bobby Hanafin
The Mustang Major

By C.V. Compton Shaw on 2009-12-22 07:27:02
Our domestic and international political,cultural, economic, and social policies, since the War in Vietnam, have clearly resulted in the fact that there are fewer men willing and able to serve in the US Military, especially the combat arms.
There is no legal relationship in the USA between electoral representation (the right to vote) and mandatory military service such that the electoral majority consists of individuals who are unable and/or unwilling to serve in the US military, especially the combat arms.
The danger of the same is that this electoral majority will use their electoral power to exploit, discriminate against, and DESTROY those who do and/or are capable of serving in the military while granting themselves social, economic, and political privilege.
Until this profound injustice is addressed, I am opposed to a military draft as the same exposes veterans, especially combat veterans, to the aforementioned exploitation and injustices.
The following is the URL of a Web Site on an article by Congressman Ron Paul in which he makes a very well thought out argument against the draft.

• Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression. In our Governments, the real power lies in the majority of the Community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of Government contrary to the sense of its constituents, but from acts in which the Government is the mere instrument of the major number of the constituents. James Madison, President of the United States
o Letter to Thomas Jefferson (1788-10-17)
By REPUBLICAN Ron Paul on 2009-12-22 09:55:11

“Until this profound injustice is addressed, I am opposed to a military draft as the same exposes veterans, especially combat veterans, to the aforementioned exploitation and injustices. The following is the URL of a Web Site on an article by Congressman Ron Paul in which he makes a very well thought out argument against the draft.” http://www.debate-central.org/2006/research/a-draft-violates-individual-liberty [www.debate-central.org]

Congressman Paul’s well thought out arguments against the draft are frankly well established views of the Libertarian Party as evidenced by their party platform on National Defense, Internal Security and Individual Rights, and ban of all foreign intervention. In fact, Ron Paul’s views are in keeping with the libertarian stand on no foreign aid what so ever.

3.1 National Defense
We support the maintenance of a sufficient military to defend the United States against aggression. The United States should both abandon its attempts to act as policeman for the world and avoid entangling alliances. We oppose any form of compulsory national service.

3.2 Internal Security and Individual Rights

The defense of the country requires that we have adequate intelligence to detect and to counter threats to domestic security. This requirement must not take priority over maintaining the civil liberties of our citizens. The Bill of Rights provides no exceptions for a time of war. Intelligence agencies that legitimately seek to preserve the security of the nation must be subject to oversight and transparency. We oppose the government’s use of secret classifications to keep from the public information that it should have, especially that which shows that the government has violated the law.

3.3 International Affairs

American foreign policy should seek an America at peace with the world and its defense against attack from abroad. We would end the current U.S. government policy of foreign intervention, including military and economic aid. We recognize the right of all people to resist tyranny and defend themselves and their rights. We condemn the use of force, and especially the use of terrorism, against the innocent, regardless of whether such acts are committed by governments or by political or revolutionary groups.
Unfortunately, Congressman Paul is not a Libertarian but a Republican. He was offered the nomination of the Libertarian Party and turned it down thinking he stood a better chance running as a Republican in a primary against John McCain. WRONG!

Frankly, I tend to lean left of center of the Libertarian Party, and endorse many or their platforms except where smaller government would mean not taking of America’s Veterans.

In fact, we require a socialized medical system for both the Department of Veterans Affairs and Military Medical system unless moderate to right of center Libertarians get their way about privatization of the VA or doing away with the VA as just another government hand out.

That said. Congressman Paul has introduced some very valuable legislation since he’s been in Congress that goes far beyond anything anyone in the anti-war (Pro-Peace) has managed. In this respect he put action behind rhetoric. I admire Ron Paul for going beyond opposing conscription to actually doing something about it though unsuccessful THUS FAR.

He has been the only politician in Congress to introduce legislation to abolish the Selective Service Agency (SSA) and the Selective Service System, and he did this long before running for President.

Frankly, given the strong arguments against conscription, and the strong belief even within our government and population that should American no shit be attack (ala WWII) there would be more volunteers than our government would know what to do with thus why continue wasting taxpayer dollars on a system that continues to collect personal data on American youth, invades their privacy rights, and no one seriously intends using the personal information gathered.

In fact, some states have taken moves to separate applications for higher education from signing up for Selective Service. However, at the federal level that would mean seperating the Department of Education from the Department of Defense. The Education Department collects personal data on young American men of draft age and passes it to DOD. This needs to stop if conscription will never be needed again.

However, reality is that Libertarians or Independents if I may, do not run many state governments let alone the federal central government. It would take a lot more Ron Pauls running not as Republicans (or Democrats) but as Libertarians or an Independent Party to totally abolish conscription. As long as the Selctive Service Agency remains viable, and continues to collect date on young American men (for now), the possibility of the draft has NEVER ended.

Lastly, for all the rhetoric about no foreign intervention, no draft, and a smaller defensive military, the Libertarian Party has not been known for hitting the streets in active, and aggressive protest over the invasion and continued occupation of Iraq or the escalation of Obama’s SURGE in Afghanistan.

This to me is something that any true Libertarians should be giving as much consideration and action to as second amendment rights or anti-illegal immigration.

Just my humble views, that if the Selective Service System were abolished the issue of the draft would finally be NULL and VOID.

Bobby Hanafin
The Mustang Major

Related posts:

1. U.S. Helping Anti-Taliban Militias in Afghanistan
2. US ‘supplying anti-Taliban tribal militias with ammunition’
3. Anti-Taliban Militias awakened In Afghanistan

Despite ongoing troubles in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, 2009 was a moderately successful year for the U.S. in all three theaters of battle.

The United States spent 2009 at war again — with its own troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and as a major, indirect supporter of Pakistan in its internal counterinsurgency and counter-terrorism campaign as well. On balance, I would judge it a moderately successful year in all three places to varying degrees. But that is admittedly a subjective judgment and also obviously requires a great deal more discussion.

First, the basics: The year was one of gradual drawdown in Iraq together with intensification of operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Yet it was still Iraq that occupied the most American troops and cost the most for the year. The American uniformed presence there started the year at about 142,000 troops and will end it at around 115,000, with total budgetary costs of more than $100 billion in 2009. But Afghanistan became the clearly deadlier war; more than 300 Americans died there in the year, compared with 150 in Iraq. And of the three countries, it was Pakistan that probably constituted the greatest potential long-term threat to the United States, with its nuclear weapons arsenal the ultimate desired prize for Al Qaeda and other extremists in the region. Accordingly, U.S. expenditures there rose a good deal, to $3.3 billion or so in the form of economic and security aid — though this is obviously a far cry from the 12-figure costs of Iraq and the expected 12-figure costs of Afghanistan in 2010 as U.S. troop totals there rise to nearly 100,000.

What about life in each of these places for the local citizens? Perhaps somewhat surprisingly, civilian fatalities attributable to war violence were roughly comparable in each place.

Yearly losses in Iraq were about 3,000 (still a factor of 10 less than annual totals in the 2004-07 period). In Afghanistan, the total approached 2,500 — much more than early in the decade but only marginally worse than in 2008. In fact, the higher numbers for 2009 over 2008 may reflect our greater ability to measure accurately (due to an expanding troop presence) more than anything else. This figure of 2,500 civilian deaths, interestingly, is still less than Iraq’s tally for the year — and perhaps 20 to 50 times less than the norm during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s or during the anarchy that followed the Soviets’ departure. In addition, because of Army Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal‘s new emphasis on reducing the use of firepower in situations that could harm innocents, the number of Afghan deaths estimated as being caused by government or NATO troops declined somewhat, to about 500. In Pakistan, civilian deaths from bombings and other atrocities reached 4,000 — although that figure needs to be understood against the population, which is about six times larger than in either Iraq or Afghanistan.

Beyond the facts and figures, what was the broader story in each place — and my reason for guarded optimism about each?

In Iraq, 2009 was the year of transitions, and they turned out to be relatively smooth. Despite catastrophic attacks in August, October and December and an ongoing level of violence that still makes it a very troubled place, Iraq has done reasonably well in statistical terms. Violence has not increased even as U.S. forces have generally reduced their role. Another 10,000 “Sons of Iraq” have been hired into permanent jobs by the government, reducing the odds of a Sunni backlash against the Shiite-led government, and the economy has survived the decline in global oil prices. Iraqi elections are now scheduled for March, so 2010 needs to be another year of smooth transitions, especially as U.S. forces are scheduled to decline to 50,000 by summer’s end. Though much could still go wrong, Iraq is holding together.

In Pakistan, 2009 was the year of government action. Major government military initiatives in the Swat Valley and South Waziristan reflected a new determination against the Pakistani Taliban. Its fighters have responded brutally with more suicide attacks against innocent civilians. But momentum may be shifting to the government’s side. The Pakistani population, though fed up with its politicians (and the United States), is even more angry with extremists these days. Successful U.S. drone attacks against Baitullah Mahsud of the Pakistani Taliban and other top leaders, including a key Al Qaeda figure in December, have helped change trends as well. That said, in terms of the basic strength of its economy and society, Pakistan is still in serious condition; the global recession has hurt it badly and increased the challenge of educating and employing Pakistan’s masses of youth.

In Afghanistan, 2009 was the year of political milestones. These included momentous decisions about the war by President Obama here in the United States, of course, and by the Afghan people as they voted for Hamid Karzai in sufficient numbers to give him a second term as president. It was also a year of tougher fighting. In addition to the American losses noted above, and 200 more NATO deaths, Afghan security forces again lost more than 1,000 personnel (a number similar to the year’s toll on Pakistani security forces and about twice the combined losses of Iraq’s army and police). However, as McChrystal noted in recent congressional testimony, our clearing operations have begun to change the momentum in places. Next year, serious reform of the Afghan police must occur, and Karzai must accelerate his anti-corruption efforts. Don’t expect miracles on either front, but moderate progress would seem probable. The question is whether it will be too little too late, but there is reason for hope.

Our nation’s wars are, of course, hardly reason to get bubbly about the new year, and all three theaters could slide backward in the coming months as well. Still, the last 12 months have moved us in better directions.

Michael O’Hanlon is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, senior author of its war index projects and the author of “The Science of War.”

Related posts:

1. Let’s make 2010 our year of hope
2. Analysis: Barack Obama’s strategy not as easy in Afghanistan as Iraq
3. General optimistic despite ‘rough year’

He is one of a record number of military admissions to Selly Oak Hospital this year.

The 43-year-old dad-of-two was blown up in Afghanistan and will tomorrow be told whether he will ever recover full mobility.

Because yesterday, three weeks after his armoured vehicle was blasted near Forward Operating Base Shawqat, in Nad-e-Ali, surgeons operated to assess his chances.

And, speaking from his bed before going into theatre, the infantryman of 27 years said: “My biggest fear is my feet. Being an infanteer, I’ve spent half my career on my feet.”

He admitted: “I do have concerns. The hospital’s been very good explaining things to me – but the actual understanding of what they are saying is still a bit grey compared to the simplicity of ‘Will I still walk?’” Maj Broad, a Grenadier Guard, is most concerned about his left foot, which remains blackened and disfigured. He said: “It’s been blown up and fragged, which apparently is really bad. Then there are the other injuries.”

He added: “The right foot, which isn’t a big drama, that’s also broken. Then, going up, it’s all breaks. They stuck a plate in my right leg and sewed it up – which is fantastic.

“Chest, ribs, arms. They’re all broken but that’s not what worries me. It’s the feet – I’m an infanteer – that’s what I’m about.”

With wife Jan and daughter Amy, 16, at his side as he had physiotherapy, Maj Broad said he “remembered very little” of his journey back from battle.

150 Admitted or very from January November half times over past He explained: “From the actual incident to waking up in Birmingham, I just thought I was still there. I saw my dad and said, ‘What are you doing in Afghanistan?’ “It all happened phenomenally quickly. From injury to getting back, you are just in a different world. I was saying ‘Where’s me gun, where’s me gun’ – and that was a week and a half later.”

Maj Broad, of Manchester, had been due to return from Afghanistan on January 16 for a late Christmas with his family. But though he will instead spend tomorrow in hospital, he said: “It’s amazing here. The staff have really done their best to make things festive.

“It’s great to know that our welfare system is working. My wife and my family have all been looked after – and that’s what you want.” But staff at Selly Oak, where all injured servicemen flown back to the UK are treated, have had to ask wellwishers not to send any more Christmas presents for patients.

troops for serious serious wounds to end of – two and a usual rate two years Major Ian Cheesman, in charge of patient support services, said the hospital had got “hundreds and hundreds” of gifts, from bottles of whisky to DVD players – adding: “We’ve asked people not to bring presents in because we have literally been inundated. We are urging people to send money to charity.”

Maj Cheesman said the 22 soldiers spending Christmas in hospital would wake up to a rumlined hot drink called “gunfire”. He said: “It’s a tradition in the Army to have it first thing in the morning. Officers take a thermos of tea with rum in it round to wake the guys up.” In the 11 months, more military amputees have been admitted to Selly Oak than any British hospital since the Second World War.

Between January and the end of November, more than 150 troops had treatment for “very serious” or “serious” wounding – two-and-ahalf times the rate of the previous two years. And staff believe 2010 will be just as busy – with senior physiotherapist Jane Mason, 32, saying: “The numbers and complexity of injuries went up massively over the summer and that stretched us. But in a way a most challenging year was also most rewarding.”

She explained: “The many more amputations we are doing have increased the survival rate.”

Her words echoed the improvements at the hospital that was criticised in 2007 over its care of the wounded returning from Iraq.

Maj Cheesman said: “There may have been a perception then that we weren’t looking after our guys too well. But as we’ve got busier we’ve added resources. Now the service we provide is pretty much Rolls-Royce.

“We are very proud of what we do for our guys – this really is the best place for them.”

150 troops Admitted for serious or very serious wounds from January to end of November – two and a half times usual rate over past two years

Related posts:

1. UK soldier killed in Afghanistan explosion
2. British soldier killed in Afghanistan explosion
3. Christmas without all the trimmings

A member of a commission investigating wartime spending says photos of private security guards in various stages of nudity at parties flowing with alcohol may be as damaging to U.S. interests in Afghanistan as images of detainee mistreatment at Abu Ghraib were in Iraq.

The Associated Press
WASHINGTON —

A member of a commission investigating wartime spending says photos of private security guards in various stages of nudity at parties flowing with alcohol may be as damaging to U.S. interests in Afghanistan as images of detainee mistreatment at Abu Ghraib were in Iraq.

Dov Zakheim, a former Pentagon comptroller, made the comment at a hearing Monday held by the Commission on Wartime Contracting on allegations of lewd behavior and sexual misconduct by employees of ArmorGroup North America, the company hired to protect the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

Zakheim said the photos are circulating heavily on the Internet, giving Muslims in Afghanistan a negative image of the United States.

Related posts:

1. Embassy guard photos evoke Abu Ghraib comparison
2. Plight of Afghan women may worsen as war effort is stepped up, warns report
3. No good reason to be in Afghanistan

Manning a machine gun on a ridge overlooking this remote Afghan village, Marine Cpl. Steven Norman tried desperately to lay down covering…

By Jonathan S. Landay
McClatchy Newspapers

Manning a machine gun on a ridge overlooking this remote Afghan village, Marine Cpl. Steven Norman tried desperately to lay down covering fire for some 90 Afghan security forces and U.S. military trainers who were trapped in an ambush in the valley below.

Each time he’d raise his head to let loose a burst, however, the insurgents in the encircling mountains and the fortresslike hamlet itself would drive Norman down, drenching his position with cascades of machine-gun and rocket-propelled-grenade fire.

“I was pinned down hard core,” recalled the slight 21-year-old from Moultrie, Ga., part of a team from the Okinawa-based 3rd Marine Division based in the nearby town of Sarkani. “I’d look where they were shooting, and I would shoot back. But I was pinned down.”

Norman and other combat veterans who were caught in the Sept. 8 ambush that killed three Marines, a Navy corpsman and nine Afghans said it was the deadliest, most intense combat they’d faced in Afghanistan or Iraq. The insurgents never ran out of ammunition, they recalled, and some even wore helmets, flak jackets and military-style magazine pouches.

“They were firing from every direction. They were well-placed. We could hardly see them,” Norman said. “They were very coordinated in their fire. When we’d suppress that fire, they’d hit us from somewhere else.”

The ambush and the nearly nine-hour battle in the rugged mountains of eastern Kunar province illustrated many of the toughest challenges inherited by the Obama administration and U.S. commanders and their soldiers, who are scrambling to regain the upper hand in an 8-year-old guerrilla war that’s growing bloodier and more unpopular in both countries by the day.

What went wrong

Intelligence was inadequate. The Afghans and their U.S. trainers expected to face no more than a dozen insurgents in Ganjgal on their mission to sweep the village for arms and meet with the elders to discuss implementing an agreement to accept the local government’s authority.

Instead, the contingent of 80 Afghan troops and border police and about a dozen U.S. military trainers walked into a three-sided storm of fire from automatic weapons, rocket-propelled grenades, mortars and at least one recoilless rifle.

The lack of timely air support — it took about 80 minutes by a reporter’s watch for helicopters to arrive, despite assurances they’d be five minutes away — was an example of the manpower and equipment shortages the Bush administration bequeathed by its failure to secure Afghanistan against a resurgence of the Taliban, al-Qaida and allied groups before turning to invade Iraq.

A limited number of U.S. helicopters are in Kunar, a stretch of craggy mountains and serpentine valleys bordering Pakistan where airpower gives a vital edge to overstretched U.S. troops fighting guerrillas who know every nook and trail of the area. Unbeknown to those trapped in the Ganjgal kill zone, however, the available aircraft were tied up in the Shiryak Valley to the north in a battle in which two pilots were wounded, U.S. commanders said. Propaganda bonanza

New rules limiting the use of artillery imposed by U.S. Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal after he took command of the U.S.-led international force in Afghanistan this summer are intended to curb civilian casualties caused, in part, by his contingent’s reliance on artillery barrages and airstrikes to compensate for their shortage of ground troops.

The rising toll has enraged ordinary Afghans, whose support is key to the U.S. goal of marginalizing the hardest-core insurgents. It’s also provided the Taliban with recruits and a propaganda bonanza and allowed Afghan President Hamid Karzai to score domestic political points by deflecting blame for the deepening crisis onto his U.S. and European patrons.

The worst single loss of U.S. military trainers of the war brought out the deep bitterness with which many soldiers view the new rules. They feel unfairly handcuffed, especially in the case of Ganjgal, where women and children were seen running ammunition and weapons to gunmen firing from inside the hilltop hamlet.

There are circumstances — and Ganjgal was one — when the rule book should be tossed out, they said.

“We basically screwed our guys over,” said Marine Cpl. Dakota Meyer, 21, of Greensburg, Ky., who braved enemy fire to retrieve the bodies of his fallen comrades from outside the village. “They expect us to bring stuff to the fight, and (U.S. commanders) didn’t give it to us.”

That anger was magnified by a realization that the insurgents in Ganjgal had somehow learned of the operation in advance and were waiting for the contingent to enter the valley as the sun rose.

“We walked right into it,” Marine Maj. Kevin Williams, of Louisville, Ky., the trainers’ commander, said ruefully as he nursed a wounded forearm.

Other problems

The failed operation drove home other problems and complexities that U.S.-led forces are grappling with as they pursue President Obama’s counterinsurgency policy of redoubling underfunded civilian aid programs and transferring greater responsibility to the Afghans for running their own affairs.

Ganjgal and villages farther into the mountains are way stations on a traditional smuggling route that insurgents use to move men and weapons into Afghanistan from Pakistan, unhindered by Pakistani security forces, according to U.S. and Afghan officers.

Insurgents also use the area around the hamlet to fire rockets and mortars into U.S. Forward Operating Base Joyce with such frequency that the stronghold where the U.S. trainers and the Afghan troops live has been christened “Rocket City.”

So when Afghan Border Police commanders developed an idea to extend the government’s writ to the area, U.S. officers jumped at it, despite the contingent’s reputation as the most corrupt of Afghanistan’s security organizations.

Afghan army officers drew up a plan for a weapons search and a meeting with the Ganjgal elders to discuss the establishment of Afghan police patrols. U.S. officers refined the plan.

Then things began to go wrong.

The operation was first set for Sept. 7. A day earlier, Marine Lt. Fabayo; Army Capt. William Swenson, of Seattle, a border police trainer; and Capt. Talib, the Afghan army officer who developed the plan, met with Lt. Mohammad Nader, the border police operations officer, to finalize his unit’s participation. A reporter sat in on the meeting.

“I’m not ready for this mission,” Nader said. “The group that you are trying to get for this mission is (committed to) escorting a supply convoy.”

The others were stunned. They worried that a delay would give the insurgents time to take revenge on the elders or force them to renege. Swenson asked to speak to Nader’s superior. He was resting and refused to leave his room.

“Let’s do the mission concept at least,” Swenson told Nader. “We can do the timeline and the concept, but just not what day we will do this. We can let this slip to another day.”

“All’s I’m saying is that I have to get ready for the escort mission,” Nader replied. “We will be talking about a plan without the approval of the commanders.”

The effort to hammer out a compromise was further hampered by the need to translate between English and Nader’s Pashtu, one of Afghanistan’s two main languages, and also by translations between Nader and Talib, who speaks only Dari, the country’s other major tongue.

Meeting later with staff officers from the 10th Mountain Division’s “Task Force Chosin,” Fabayo and Swenson discussed alternatives to delaying the operation, including using ordinary Afghan police to replace the border unit. They rejected the idea, reasoning that ordinary cops were no substitute for border officers, who’re trained and equipped as light infantry.

Moreover, the pair worried that they’d compromise their goal of building trust and cooperation between the border police and the army.

The meeting ended with a decision to delay the operation by a day while the border police commander, who was on leave in Kabul, was contacted and persuaded to order his unit to participate, even though that meant losing the helicopter cover that had been reserved for the operation on Sept. 7.

It was then that the “Task Force Chosin” delegation assured Fabayo and Swenson that if they were needed, helicopters would “be five minutes away.”

At the same meeting, a warning that Nader sounded to mission planners became the epitaph of the mission.

“The Ganjgal people have an expression,” he said: “It’s up to you to come into the valley, but it’s up to us to let you out.”

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You may wonder how Thomas Gukeisen made it to lieutenant colonel, and by age 39 at that. He breaks Army rules and operates by his own rendition of counterinsurgency warfare whose arsenal includes Afghan poetry, chaos theory and the thoughts of a 17th-century English philosopher.

By DENIS D. GRAY

Associated Press Writer
ALTIMUR, Afghanistan —

You may wonder how Thomas Gukeisen made it to lieutenant colonel, and by age 39 at that. He breaks Army rules and operates by his own rendition of counterinsurgency warfare whose arsenal includes Afghan poetry, chaos theory and the thoughts of a 17th-century English philosopher.

A towering, rough-and-ready 205-pounder, the officer from Carthage, New York peppers his sentences with unprintables and reads Karl von Clausewitz‘s classic on war in the original German.

But the high-ups seem to like what they see. Gen. David H. Petraeus, who commands U.S. forces in both Afghanistan and Iraq, has visited his sector, as have Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, and U.S. Ambassador Karl W. Eikenberry.

Substantial resources have flowed into Gukeisen’s hands, including $850,000 in small bills for such jobs as building schools and putting carpets in the mosques of Afghans who turn against the Taliban.

Col. David B. Haight, Gukeisen’s superior, calls him one of the brightest officers he has met.

Gukeisen wages his war across 620 restive, rugged square miles (1,000 kilometers) of Logar, a strategically important province bordering Kabul where he has implemented what he calls an “extreme makeover.”

Rather than rigidly applying the current mantra – Clear, Hold, Build – he has held back from trying to clear large, Taliban-influenced swaths of territory, focusing instead on areas he believes are ripe for change, and then injecting aid where it counts most. Combat, he says, is driven by reliable intelligence and limited to eradicating Taliban fighters.

The goal was to create “security bubbles” where life could improve, so that “the rest of the districts would want to join the club,” Gukeisen said in an interview at his headquarters in the village of Altimur.

Six months later, he says, nearly half the 400,000 people of Baraki-Barak, Charkh and Kherwar districts, along with half of Puli-a-Alam, are within the bubble. He says roadside bombs, attacks and other violent incidents have dropped by 60 percent while intelligence from locals about the insurgents has soared by 80 percent.

Gukeisen believes rules sometimes have to be broken to get past the bureaucrats. He says he had to browbeat the purse-holders for the $850,000 and the authority to distribute it through his junior officers. “If you go outside the box, you have to be cognizant of the risk. I’ve often been questioned about my moves, about being a maverick,” he says.

But he sees a much-changed Army that is, in his sardonic wording, “beginning to gain a semblance of intelligence.”

“It’s no longer party-like thinking. COIN (counterinsurgency) is graduate-level warfare. You need those collegiate thinkers,” he says. “I think the Army is coming back to the soldier as scholar and statesman.” “When I began my career, the image of the high school jock, football player, pickup truck, NRA (National Rifle Association) was very trendy,” he recalls. “Of course, generals were never dumb, but you’d hear them saying, `Shucks, I’m just a good ole’ boy.’”

Haight, in an interview, confirmed Gukeisen’s intellectual side with an anecdote. When he asked Gukeisen about the components of a mineral mined in Logar, “I thought he would tell me, `I will look that up, sir, and let you know.’ Instead he came right out and gave me a detailed description including exact names and positions on the chemical periodic table of elements.’”

Some credit Petraeus with having helped to foster the new breed of officers to tackle counterinsurgency, surrounding himself with innovative thinkers and encouraging them to play devil’s advocate.

Military historian Douglas B. Cubbison admires the work Gukeisen has done during 30 months in Afghanistan, but he sees limits and pitfalls.

Innovation is always critical to success, especially in a counterinsurgency, he says. “Unfortunately, one inhibiting factor is that defense organizations tend to be conservative and traditional. Officers who think `outside of the box’ often find themselves to not only be unpopular, but are the subject of vehement attacks.”

So they need supportive, thinking commanders, one of whom he says is Haight, Gukeisen’s superior, who commands a task force in Logar and neighboring Wardak province.

Gukeisen, now commanding 600 soldiers of the 3rd Squadron, 71st Cavalry, says his fascination with non-conventional warfare began when growing up in Europe with his German mother and U.S. Air Force father, and hearing the stories of Dutch, Belgian and French resisters in World War II.

“As I grew up I realized the military does not operate in a singular world so I started reading outside that world,” he says.

His personal list of “Most Influential COIN Items” includes a collection of Afghan poetry, a study of chaos theory, and Hollywood films such as “Red Dawn,” a fantasy about American guerrillas fighting a Soviet invasion of the U.S. From John Maynard Keynes, the visionary British economist, he drew the idea that by “jump-starting the economy via an initial stimulus you create a cascade.”

His approach to pacifying the Logar districts, Gukeisen said, was also influenced by the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes, author of “Leviathan,” who explored man’s fear of death and his quest for security in a violent world.

“You take the theory of COIN, you take history, understand the people, make a philosophic inquiry and then you act,” he says. “But you still have to be rooted in the fundamentals of military operations.”

Gukeisen says U.S. Army doctrine provides only “a guide for commanders, a basis to begin, to provoke thought.” He says “Clear, Hold, Build” needs to be nuanced, and he doesn’t know whether it can be a model for the rest of Afghanistan. “Each area of Afghanistan is different,” he cautions.

Winding up his second tour here, Gukeisen says he looks forward to being back with his wife and 7-year-old son but is reluctant to leave things uncompleted.

“It’s like giving your child up for adoption, and having no control about how the new parent will bring up your child,” he says. “I’d like to be here another year.”

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Veterans of Iraq recall rolling to war along asphalted highways, sweltering in flat scrublands and chatting with city-wise university graduates connected to the wider world.

By DENIS D. GRAY

Associated Press Writer
FORWARD OPERATING BASE SHANK, Afghanistan —

Veterans of Iraq recall rolling to war along asphalted highways, sweltering in flat scrublands and chatting with city-wise university graduates connected to the wider world.

Now fighting in Afghanistan, U.S. soldiers invariably encounter illiterate farmers who may never have talked to an American as they slog into remote villages on dirt tracks through bitterly cold, snow-streaked mountains.

“Before deploying here we were given training on language, culture, everything. I thought that since I was an Iraq combat veteran, I didn’t need any of that stuff. I was wrong. Both countries may be Muslim but this is a totally different place,” says Sgt. Michael McCann, returning from a patrol in the east-central province of Logar.

While their experiences in the two war zones vary, for many soldiers in the field – if not policy makers – the conflict in Afghanistan is one they think may prove harder and longer to win.

Soldiers and officers involved in combat operations all cite the more punishing geography and climate, those focused on development the bare-bones infrastructure, and intelligence specialists the even greater difficulties in identifying the insurgents as among the many sharp contrasts between Afghanistan and Iraq.

“The sheer terrain of Afghanistan is much more challenging: the mountains, the altitudes, severity of weather, the distances. That wears on an army,” says Maj. Joseph Matthews, a battalion operations officer in the 10th Mountain Division. “You can flood Baghdad with soldiers but if you want to flood the mountains you are going to need huge numbers and logistics.”

McCann, a military policeman from Enterprise, Ala., says that the highest he ever got during his Iraq tour was a five-story building. In Afghanistan, troops routinely cross passes 10,000 feet (3,000 meters) and higher, descending into valleys where they say villagers “hibernate like bears” for up to five winter months, cut off from the outside world by the snows.

This almost medieval isolation makes it far more difficult for the Afghan government and coalition forces to spread the aid and information needed to counter the Taliban push while the villagers – mostly illiterate and with little access to radios, never mind television – rely on religious leaders at Friday mosque prayers, or the insurgents, to shape their world view.

“When you have a society that can’t read for itself and religious leaders are trusted, they can say whatever they like and people will believe them. It’s hard for the U.S. to penetrate and influence this. In Iraq there are other ways to get the message across,” says Chief Warrant Officer Daniel Weiermann, Jr., an intelligence specialist.

The U.S. effort in Logar has stressed bridging the chasms between villages, districts, the provincial capital and a central government in Kabul which has had little control over the country for the past 30 years of warfare. It hasn’t been easy.

“This is not an interconnected society. There is a complete separation of ideas from Pul-i-Alam and Kharwar,” notes Matthews, of Vero Beach, Fla., of the provincial capital and a district just 23 miles (37 kilometers) away. “The difference between a village and a city in this country is about 200 years,” says the officer, who served for more than three years in Iraq and is on his second Afghanistan tour.

Although tribalism plays a major role in Iraq, U.S. troops find it even stronger in the predominantly rural Afghan society, making the forging of vital bonds between people and government harder. Loyalty is given first and foremost to the tribe, the government coming at best a distant second. While counterinsurgency in Iraq had its unique complexities, Weiermann said that in Iraq – about 70 percent urbanized as opposed to 25 percent in Afghanistan – “you can meet and hopefully influence a lot of people in one day. In Afghanistan with its great distances, sparsely populated areas and rugged terrain you can do far less in the same amount of time.” Hence, one reason for the prognosis that Afghanistan will be a longer haul.

Development – which absorbs the U.S. military more than combat and is regarded as key to victory – is also far tougher than in Iraq, which already possessed a solid infrastructure and once almost produced the atomic bomb. In Afghanistan at best a quarter of the population can read, compared to more than 75 percent in Iraq, which had functioning banking, medical and other systems, however imperfect, through which aid could be channeled.

“Iraq already had the foundation. They just needed the governance piece that would support not just the elite few. In Afghanistan, you are starting at the very beginning. It’s like trying to take the American Indians in their purest form and put them into today’s New York City. It’s not going to happen,” says Weiermann, of Ft. Hood, Texas.

“I worked with folks who had been to Oxford and been on projects in multiple other countries. There were homegrown NGOs and highly qualified women – all lacking in Afghanistan,” says Les Garrison, a retired U.S. Marine officer from Arlington, Va., who serves as Logar’s U.S. State Department adviser.

Col. David B. Haight, commander of U.S. forces in Logar and neighboring Wardak province, half jokes that some frustrated Afghans come to him and say: “‘You can put a man on the moon so can’t we get a road here?’ and I have to tell them, `You know, it’s a lot harder to build a road in Afghanistan than put a man on the moon. That skill is not in abundance here.’”

Pinpointing the insurgents has been devilishly difficult in both countries, the U.S. military says.

“Osama bin Laden could walk right up to me and I wouldn’t have a clue to who he was. The enemy cannot be identified at first sight. The enemy blends in easily with the population. That is the same for both places but drastically harder in Afghanistan,” Weiermann says.

The Baghdad government has managed polls and censuses, compiling a data base on the populace which includes fingerprints and domiciles down to apartment numbers. In Afghanistan, such information often exists only at the tribal level, tracking the movement of individuals and entire communities like the migratory Kuchi next to impossible, Weiermann says.

Militarily, veterans of both conflicts see both disparities and a mirroring.

Thus far, the level of intense combat and violence has proved lower in Afghanistan. In Iraq, soldiers say it was a 24/7, 365-day war while most insurgents in Afghanistan take a break during the winters and are so far less skilled in mounting complex operations against U.S. and coalition troops.

Roadside bombs are the insurgents’ weapons of choice in both countries, and ominously are proving more sophisticated and deadlier in Afghanistan as they did over time in Iraq. U.S. forces in Iraq largely pursued a war of mechanized movement. Afghanistan is a foot soldier’s war.

Haight, who served three Iraq tours in Special Forces-type operations, says the core counterinsurgency creed – boiled down to “Going into a village and making friends” – applies squarely to both countries. The devil is in the details.

“We as leaders here have to realize that we cannot simply superimpose some of the things that may have worked in Iraq on Afghanistan,” Matthews cautions.

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Washington (CNN) — I recently attended the White House Christmas tree lighting and congressional holiday party. Christmas is traditionally a time of peace and love, quite a juxtaposition for a nation fighting three wars, one in Iraq, one in Afghanistan, and a global war on terror.

We went into Afghanistan eight years ago to oust the Taliban and capture their guest Osama bin Laden and his al Qaeda associates. Eight years later, al Qaeda has largely been driven out of Afghanistan.

When should our nation go to war? Only as a last resort.

That’s why I opposed the completely unnecessary invasion of Iraq, and why I now oppose an ongoing occupation of Afghanistan.

In meeting after meeting, I have been shown by generals and statesmen what we are doing in Afghanistan, how it could take decades, might not work, and is fraught with risks. In response, I ask the same repeated question: Why?

With all the ambiguity clouding the outcome, the case has not been conclusively made that the possibilities are more favorable with an increase of 30,000 troops.

The very real war on terror must be fought, not just in Iraq or Afghanistan, but across the globe. The terrorists, most notably al Qaeda and their associates, are a stateless menace.

With the manpower and financial resources we are putting into occupying the nation of Afghanistan, we could improve our port security, increase our intelligence gathering to locate and infiltrate terrorist cells, and increase our special operation capacity.

Three areas of focus — homeland security, intelligence, and special operations — are the three best tools in our toolbox to fight the war on terror. Focusing our resources on occupying a small mountainous Asian nation is peripheral at best and a lethal distraction at worst.

On military matters, I frequently turn to my colleagues who have more experience in the area, just as I hope they turn to me as it relates to education or small business issues.

My colleague Eric Massa from New York, one of the highest ranking retired officers now serving in Congress, stated my position far more eloquently and with more credibility than I ever could on a radio show last week: “If our security is at stake to the extent that we must rebuild a nation because there are 100 terrorists in Afghanistan, then we better be willing to occupy every single nation on the face of this planet and do the same.

“Our mission is to identify, locate, kill or capture, with malice of forethought, any terrorist anywhere. That does not call for a standing army of 100,000 people executing an occupational strategy in a foreign nation,” Massa continued.

“We have tried this over and over and over again and it has never once worked. You cannot achieve this militarily. Period.”

Before we send troops, we should truly know why we are doing it, and what their mission is.

Sending troops to capture bin Laden made sense. Had the intelligence reports indicating that he was acquiring nuclear weapons been accurate, going after Saddam Hussein could even have been justified.

Why are we bogging ourselves down in a country that is not a significant al Qaeda host at such great financial and human cost?

If Afghanistan were to become host to terrorist organizations, the answer would be targeted special operations to seek and destroy the terrorists, not embroiling the entire country in an interminable civil war and occupation.

In addition, our ongoing occupation increases the sympathy among some locals for the very terrorism we are there to fight.

The inevitable innocent casualties can turn neutral families into terrorist collaborators and America-haters.

The people that our soldiers are fighting day-in and day-out in Afghanistan are not terrorists.

It is unclear to me how spending $4 billion per month and putting tens of thousands of American lives at risk in Afghanistan is the best way to keep America safe from terrorist attack.

National security is neither partisan nor ideological. I am confident in saying that there isn’t a Democrat or Republican in Congress today who doesn’t want to protect our country from terrorists.

There is no conservative way to fight terrorists or liberal way to fight terrorists. Regardless of our party and ideology, every member of Congress needs to use the information we are privileged to receive to reach a conclusion as to the best way to protect our great nation from attack.

It is always difficult to oppose our commander in chief on such a vital national security issue, but I owe it to those who put me in office to use my best judgment using the best information I have.

I have done my due diligence, visited Iraq and Afghanistan, met with officers and statesmen, read the reports, and I cannot support sending a single additional American soldier to Afghanistan, much less 30,000.

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Rep. Jared Polis.

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