In a recent article published by the New York Times, David Kirkpatrick traces John McCain’s views about foreign conflicts all the way back to 1974.  During that year, McCain submitted an essay to the National War College in which he argued that the American soldiers held captive in prison camps during the Vietnam conflict often collaborated with the North Vietnamese because of the antiwar movement in the United States.  Fidelity to one’s country, no matter how strong at the commencement of a military campaign, can quickly disintegrate when soldiers perceive that there is little or no public support for a war effort.  In McCain’s own words, detainees stuck in these camps “were easy marks for Communist propaganda” because large portions of the American public did not support the conflict in Vietnam.

McCain doesn’t seem to be saying that the antiwar movement was the sole cause of the traitorous collaboration he experienced as a P.O.W.  Rather, the antiwar movement enhanced the emotional appeal of collaboration in the minds of captured American soldiers by making the war seem pointless and immoral.  How did the antiwar movement accomplish this exactly?  Well, that’s where the fundamental premises of McCain’s argument get a bit difficult to articulate and disentangle.  It seems that the underlying logic goes like this:  Where a conflict like Vietnam comes to seem pointless and counterproductive, it becomes natural and reasonable for the soldiers captured during battle to change sides and support the social and political institutions seeking a quick end to the conflict.  And, if you can convince these soldiers that the war has no sound moral or political justification, ceteris paribus their loyalties and sympathies will naturally tend to shift as they increasingly come to identify with the enemy.  As a result they will begin to proactively collaborate with their sworn enemy, despite the fact that doing so makes them traitors.

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Last week the Supreme Court of the United States ruled for the first time in Boumediene v. Bush on whether “noncitizens detained by our Government in territory over which another country maintains de jure sovereignty have any rights under our Constitution.”

Specifically, the court ruled in a 5 to 4 split decision that unlawful enemy combatants captured overseas and transferred to the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay (GITMO) have habeas corpus rights under the U.S. Constitution.

Translation: the 270 remaining detainees held at Guantanamo can now legally challenge their detentions in a civilian court.

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How many ways can one shaft America’s veterans? Let me count the ways. 

First, when on active duty send them to fight in a war that need never have been fought. Second, after deploying them to a combat zone increase the odds of their being wounded or killed by providing inadequate or non-existent equipment such as lack of properly armored vehicles or no body armor. Third, increase the odds against them by failing to promptly recognize new threats such as improvised explosive devices. Fourth, after they have been wounded give them a lack of proper facilities in which to recover, as evidenced by the Walter Reed scandal. Fifth, be inexplicably slow to recognize or screen for, let alone treat, neurological injuries from bomb blasts, which have become the war’s signature injury. Sixth, due to an inadequate military mental health system, fail to recognize increased suicidal tendencies on the part of returning veterans. These, by the way, are not all the ways I could list. 

And, if all that isn’t enough to screw veterans who just want to get on with their life and rejoin the society they fought for, one can always screw them over by providing inadequate educational benefits. 

Which brings us to what should be a bipartisan no-brainer, but sadly, isn’t. As Henny Youngman would say, take my GI Bill, please. That venerable institution, dating back to the WWII era has been modified numerous times over the years.

When I did my undergraduate work at the end of 70s and early 80s it was very helpful, but hardly sufficient. Since then, its relative contribution, as a percentage of overall educational costs has declined.

If a veteran is lucky he or she may get enough to cover about 60% of the costs of the average four-year public college. Currently, active-duty members who have continuously served for at least two years, and who forfeit $1,200 of their pay in one year, are entitled to receive $1,101 a month as a full-time student for up to 36 months, which is equivalent to four academic years. (more…)

Congress mandated a new study of the military services’ “roles and missions” in the 2008 defense budget, and in the past few weeks, military and civilian leaders in the Pentagon have started the process. They hope to finish in time that the report might be useful to the transition team after the presidential election. According to Reps. Ike Skelton and Duncan Hunter (who sponsored the bipartisan study provision), the idea is to “identify the services’ core competencies, discover the missions going unaddressed, and examine possible duplication of effort among the branches.” As CongressDaily points out,

Critics have complained that vast sums of money are wasted due to the military operating four air forces, two land armies and overlapping intelligence and space programs.

Sounds like a reasonable point. And most of the (limited) commentary that I have seen about the study worries that the rapid timetable or entrenched political interests will prevent the study from doing its job and saving money “left on the table” in the defense budget (for example, here). The presumption is that a more centralized military organization — more “jointness” in military parlance — is a good idea. The danger, in this view, is that the military services each want to preserve “parochial stovepipes;” the implied solution is that Defense Department civilians rather than the service staffs should drive the study project.

Sometimes it’s a good thing that few studies or even “blue-ribbon panels” have any effect on the real policy environment. I would be upset if this study were likely to narrow America’s strategic options and capabilities. Or maybe I should take solace in the Congressional direction to eliminate “unnecessary” duplication, perhaps implying that Congress understands that not all duplication is bad. But I’m afraid that “jointness” is so ingrained in the modern military (and among civilian DoD leaders) that the baseline assumptions are that all competition and interservice rivalry should be stamped out.

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I’m going to do something not a lot of people outside the Clinton campaign have been willing to do: I’m going to defend Hillary Clinton’s threat to “obliterate” Iran if it should attack Israel. I’d take issue with Senator Obama’s dismissive response, too: Hillary’s clear, tough message is exactly the language that’s needed right now, and as for sounding like George W. Bush, who cares? The Bush Iran policy is defunct and dysfunctional, and what matters now is what the next President is going to do about it.

Here’s what Hillary actually said:

“Well, the question was, if Iran were to launch a nuclear attack on Israel, what would our response be. And I want the Iranians to know that if I’m the president, we will attack Iran. And I want them to understand that, because it does mean that they have to look very carefully at their society, because at whatever stage of development they might be in their nuclear weapons program, in the next 10 years during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel we would be able to totally obliterate them. That’s a terrible thing to say, but those people who run Iran need to understand that, because that perhaps will deter them from doing something that would be reckless, foolish and tragic.” (more…)

We hosted a dinner for Andy Worthington, the author of Guantánamo files, a few weeks ago and something he said struck a cord with everyone in attendance. During a back and forth pertaining to the positive statements made by Senator McCain, Senator Obama and Senator Clinton vis-à-vis Guantánamo – all seem keen to close it - Andy asked us to consider the end game for the U.S. Specifically he asked what would happen to the prisoners.

Of course the first reaction of most of the individuals in attendance was predictable – these prisoners would be repatriated back to their home countries. However, as Andy prodded us to consider that assumption we all stumbled upon the problem that he was grappling with. It became clear that there would be many countries that would refuse to take back their citizens. After all, the U.S. has been stating since the first prisoner transfer to Guantánamo that it is holding the worst of the worst. With that statement on the record it seems fair to assume that some countries will choose to wash their hands of the matter. Why risk internal strife by bringing back someone who is a radical, has become radicalized or is likely to embarrass his home government by questioning why they did not do more to seek the release of an innocent national. What will the U.S. do if it ends up with a group of prisoners who have no where to go and are not deemed to have committed acts that warrant a trial?

The three candidates for President seem to understand that Guantánamo is a blot on the U.S. image in the world and I am convinced that all of them would like to close it. However, in an incredible irony, it seems possible that the next U.S. President may find that closing Guantánamo proves to be harder than it was for the Bush Administration to open it.

I am going to start making a few calls on this issue to see what the latest thinking is within Defense department circles and will report back in the days ahead.

I don’t know whether to laugh or to cry. That was my reaction to reading yesterday’s New York Times article on the use of retired military officers to help generate favorable spin for the Bush administration’s performance. Evidently, the administration believes that with enough retired brass one can turn a lemon into lemonade.

The New York Times considered this issue to be important, as evidenced by the fact that the front page, above the fold, article ran over 7500 words. And it is, though not necessarily for the reason it thinks. In fact, the article is both less and more than one might think.

It is less because the fact is that retired generals and admirals have long been available for rent as ideological water boys. It has long been one of Washington’s worst kept secrets. Retired flag rank officers are like professional athletes. Once they are no longer fit for the playing field it is not as if they are fit for many other professions.

Aside from opening restaurants or bars a retired athlete generally gets a job somewhere in the sports industry. And once an officer is retired his or her career choices are similarly limited. Generally they find work somewhere within the expanses of the military industrial complex, which nowadays, goes far beyond industry. It also includes large parts of academia, and the think tank world. In the past they normally went to work for the normal hardware contractors, Lockheed, Raytheon, Northrop Grumman and the like. But with the rise of an always on media universe such officers have increasingly been used as the demand for so called ‘experts” has risen exponentially. If the Blackwaters and Dyncorps of the world can be considered Private Military Companies available for hire, such officers can be considered a different PMC; Private Media Contractors. (more…)

Hmm, flowers are blooming, cherry blossoms emerged; it can only mean one thing. Yes, that’s right, it’s time once again for the semi-annual Congressional circus show, also known as putting lipstick on the pig, starring Gen. David Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker. This morning these gentlemen will testify before Congress on the state of affairs in Iraq and what the chances of success are for the U.S. there. Of course, nobody knows what constitutes “success” but even so it is a daunting prospect.

As Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies wrote yesterday, “the risks in Iraq remain high enough so that no one can yet say whether the odds of any kind of US success are better than even.” Of course Cordesman is hardly a proponent of withdrawing U.S. forces any time soon, which is why his next sentence was so revealing. “The fact remains, however, that there is still a marginally better case for staying than for leaving.” When respected analysts like Cordesman state that the case for staying is only “marginally better” than leaving you know that the United States has problems.

Of course, nobody expects this carefully scripted event to have serious questions or sincere answers if, for not other reason, than the hearing will be attended by Sens. Clinton, Obama, and McCain. Republicans will seek to defend the Bush Administration’s stay the course policy. As senators Joe Lieberman and Lindsey Graham wrote in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, “No one can deny the dramatic improvements in security in Iraq achieved by Gen. Petraeus, the brave troops under his command, and the Iraqi Security Forces.” Well, actually I could, but that would take another article. Democrats will just as fervently use it to make the case for withdrawing troops. (more…)

It is always somewhat artificial, frequently absurd, and sometimes outright grotesque, whenever the media commemorates, however briefly, an anniversary of something. Some things can be more or less justified, i.e., Armistice Day, end of World War II, 911 attacks, etcetera.

But the 4000^th American to die in Iraq? Give us a break. First, why is number 4000 more important than 3999 or 4001?

More importantly if we are talking about Americans why not include those who worked for private military and security contractors. They may not have been soldiers but they served their country. Bear in mind that the military deliberately involved the private sector in its logistics support via its Logistics Civil Augmentation (LOGCAP) program so KBR truck drivers are as much a part of the war effort as an Army quartermaster. If we include them we reached 4000 at least a year ago.

And if the measure of the Iraq War is casualties why do we not include Iraqis? Doubtlessly Iraqis wish that the sum total of fatalities they suffered since the U.S. invaded in 2003 was only 4000. When you figure in direct and indirect deaths, resulting from violence, disease, destroyed infrastructure their total is far beyond ten times that figure. It may even approach one hundred times that.

Let’s also not forget the military forces of other coalition nations in Iraq whose soldiers have died in Iraq. (more…)

Admiral Fallon’s resignation as CENTCOM commander is pretty fresh news, and I’m sure we’ll learn more with time. For now, Fallon apparently resigned because of the appearance of disagreement with the president over the appropriate level of belligerence in U.S. policy towards Iran — or at least in his statement issued at CENTCOM headquarters in Tampa, he blamed it on the appearance rather than an actual conflict over Iran policy (reported widely, including here).

The appearance of policy conflict is nothing new for ADM Fallon. Rumors have been flying more or less since the admiral moved from his billet as commander of Pacific Command (where his policy views were controversial, too, but perhaps more quietly controversial because they were over longer-range China policy rather than an ongoing war). When Fallon took his current position at the head of U.S. Central Command, people began to talk about his sharp disagreements with Gen. David Petraeus, the U.S. Commander in Iraq, over both substance (on the surge) and style (Gen. Petraeus’ high-profile comments that sometimes seem to defend the Bush administration in political battles). Of course, Gen. Petraeus is extremely popular with ADM Fallon’s boss and with many other politicians. And that disagreement has been compounded, in the rumors, with an ongoing disagreement over Iran policy (perhaps principally with Vice President Chenney, if the rumors are to be believed). The Iran disagreement perhaps came to a head with the publication of a story in last week’s Esquire.

On Iran, ADM Fallon’s statement says, “I don’t believe there have ever been any differences about the objectives of our policy in the Central Command area of responsibility….” It’s easy to see through this comment: even people who think “we can live with an Iranian nuclear bomb” agree that the U.S. should prefer a non-nuclear Iran to a nuclear-armed one. So we all agree on the objectives of our policy. That statement, though, can certainly cover up intense disagreement about the means of trying to achieve that objective and about whether we’re likely to succeed.

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