Center for a New American Security

"The University of Chicago Press, publisher of scholarly works since 1891, just filled a rush order for a third 5,000-copy printing of 'Instructions for American Servicemen in Iraq During World War II.'"

Lt. Col. John Nagl, this blog's hero and virtual Doktorvater, wrote the preface to the new Chicago edition.

One of the pamphlet's more insightful bits of wisdom:

Of the schisms in Iraqi society, which have contributed to much of the violence since the U.S.-led invasion, the book advises, 'The Iraqis have some religious and tribal differences among themselves.'"

Which Herr Profesor Oberst Nagl described as "a stunning understatement."

(Charlie wonders if Bodleian Library has an Iran edition waiting to be reprinted.)

Fred Kaplan returns to his bread and butter of civil-military relations, with a sober assessment of the options of dissenting senior officers faced with a possible war against Iran. The broader topic of whether generals should salute smartly or fall on their swords has been discussed in nearly every corner of military echo chamber. (Charlie insists that her students read Paul Yingling's article, and you should too.) Kaplan asks,

So, if President George W. Bush starts to prepare—or actually issues the order—for an attack [on Iran], what should the generals do? Disobey? Rally resistance from within? Resign in protest? Retire quietly? Or salute and execute the mission?

Like most who have written on this subject, Charlie is understandably torn. Civilian control of the military is one of the cornerstones of Anglo-American democracy (to the point that when we discuss reform or training of foreign militaries we forget that for many their biggest fears are coups, not invasions). But what do you do when the civilians seem to be auditioning for Dr. Strangelove? (You can't fight in here! This is the War Room!)

Kaplan caveats that any of the 3R's must only be considered in the most extreme circumstances, and even then "perhaps at the behest of, civilian officials who agree with their positions—say, the secretaries of defense and state." In the end he concludes (a la HR McMaster):

They should arrange to be called before congressional committees and to be asked awkward questions, which would elicit their critical replies. At the final hour, they should threaten to retire or resign en masse and, if that didn't work, they should follow through. (Even if they quietly retired, the fact that three or four or six or eight generals did so at once would have some impact.)

This strikes Charlie as reasonable given the extraordinary circumstances. But in her more ornery moods, she wants to push Kaplan one further: if the Merkwürdigeliebe civilians are hell-bent on invasion, why shouldn't the Generals stand strong and wait to be fired? No constitutional violations (on either side), and the civilians get to put their money where their mouth is. Obviously this is a near impossibility, but so is three or four or six generals "retiring."

Unfortunately, this is no laughing matter (Charlie's alter ego is on record saying she expects the civil-military fall-out from the Iraq war to last throughout the next generation). And certainly recalcitrant generals have used "reasonable" arguments well "within their lane" to oppose operations in places like Bosnia and Kosovo (leading Charlie to be somewhat sanguine on civilians falling hook, line, and sinker for all military advice). But if the generals, because of their learned fecklessness or deep, unwavering belief in the sanctity of civilian control, aren't able to put the brakes on seriously destructive military and security policies, who will?

The New York Times links to a video op-ed by Steve Connors and Molly Bingham on the insurgency in Iraq during the early phases of the war. Abu Muqawama has met and spoken with the film-makers a few times -- no, reader, he wasn't one of the insurgents they filmed -- but disagrees with their op-ed, which he think overestimates the power of the insurgents in the first year of the war relative to the U.S. forces and perhaps romanticizes the insurgents as well. They don't address, example, the very real sectarian hatred and potential for violence within Iraq. Sure, 100% of Iraqis disapprove of attacks against Iraqis. Easy questions, easy answer. But scratch beneath the surface a bit and you get a different story. (To some Sunnis, the Shia aren't even real Iraqis.) Abu Muqawama doesn't think it helps here that neither film-maker speaks Arabic and thus relied on translators the whole time. He also doesn't think it helps they spent most of their time with the insurgents. No, they don't become partisan, per se, but they can't help but internalize the narrative of the insurgent, who sees himself as part of a legitimate, national movement against the occupation. Alas, after the fall of Saddam and the incompetence of the U.S. military in the first few months, the only thing "national" left in Iraq was the football team.*

But come up with your own opinions. You can find out more on the film here and watch a sneak preview here.

*When Abu Muqawama criticizes the performance of the U.S. military in the first few months after the invasion, it should go without saying that he includes his own performance in that criticism. Like most tactical leaders in the 2003 and 2004, he wonders what he could have done better. Unlike most tactical leaders, though, and because he is now a specialist in COIN, he knows what he could have done better.

First it was seven Army sergeants. Now it's twelve Army captains.

Today marks five years since the authorization of military force in Iraq, setting Operation Iraqi Freedom in motion. Five years on, the Iraq war is as undermanned and under-resourced as it was from the start. And, five years on, Iraq is in shambles.

As Army captains who served in Baghdad and beyond, we've seen the corruption and the sectarian division. We understand what it's like to be stretched too thin. And we know when it's time to get out.

At first, Charlie thought this shot across the bow was the most startling statement in this op-ed today. But then she saw:

U.S. forces, responsible for too many objectives and too much "battle space," are vulnerable targets. The sad inevitability of a protracted draw-down is further escalation of attacks -- on U.S. troops, civilian leaders and advisory teams. They would also no doubt get caught in the crossfire of the imminent Iraqi civil war.

So what they're saying is our exit strategy (such as it is) will only make things worse for Americans on the ground (to say nothing of that imminent civil war)? Why didn't they say anything while they were still in uniform?

This is Operation Iraqi Freedom and the reality we experienced. This is what we tried to communicate up the chain of command. This is either what did not get passed on to our civilian leadership or what our civilian leaders chose to ignore. While our generals pursue a strategy dependent on peace breaking out, the Iraqis prepare for their war -- and our servicemen and women, and their families, continue to suffer.

Oh, snap! They did! (We'll leave for another day the question of if and how this information was willfully disregarded.) Well, are there any options left on the table?

There is one way we might be able to succeed in Iraq. To continue an operation of this intensity and duration, we would have to abandon our volunteer military for compulsory service. Short of that, our best option is to leave Iraq immediately. A scaled withdrawal will not prevent a civil war, and it will spend more blood and treasure on a losing proposition.

America, it has been five years. It's time to make a choice.

To many this will seem simplistic. And it is. (Charlie, for one, is reluctant to fetishize the tactical observations of boots on the ground) . But that doesn't mean it's wrong. Fellow traveler Phil Carter has been beating the draft drum for some time. And Steve Biddle has highlighted similar problems with a Goldilocks-like desire to chart a middle course of advisors and phased draw-down. We can either fight a proper counter-insurgency campaign, or we can come home.

Any chance we could get 17 generals to agree?

It's hard to think of a more effective weapon than the IED (Improvised Explosive Device). Thought it can take the form of a roadside bomb or jury-rigged land mine, the U.S. military uses the acronym IED to describe all the bombs, little and large, manufactured by amateurs for use against the U.S. military and its partners in Iraq.

The IED is effective for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it's a cheap, easy way to inflict casualties on a fighting force whose home front and officer corps is casualty-averse. Second, it's a great way -- when placed in a populated area -- to draw a disproportionate response from the targeted patrol. (Example: remember when that Marine special operations unit was hit with an IED in Afghanistan in the spring and they proceeded to shoot their machine guns into a crowd of civilians, killing over a dozen?) And third, it's a low-tech weapon that frustrates a military that wants technical, high-tech solutions.

"Americans want technical solutions. They want the silver bullet," said Rear Adm. Arch Macy, commander of the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Washington, which now oversees several counter-IED technologies. "The solution to IEDs is the whole range of national power --political-military affairs, strategy, operations, intelligence."

If you have some time today, read Rick Atkinson's profile of the IED -- and the U.S. military's efforts to counter its use -- in today's Washington Post. Abu Muqawama especially enjoyed the criticism of the way in which America's military culture -- and military industry -- has failed to adapt to the COIN era:

The IED struggle has become a test of national agility for a lumbering military-industrial complex fashioned during the Cold War to confront an even more lumbering Soviet system. "If we ever want to kneecap al-Qaeda, just get them to adopt our procurement system. It will bring them to their knees within a week," a former Pentagon official said.

"We all drank the Kool-Aid," said a retired Army officer who worked on counter-IED issues for three years. "We believed, and Congress was guilty as well, that because the United States was the technology powerhouse, the solution to this problem would come from science. That attitude was 'All we have to do is throw technology at it and the problem will go away.' . . . The day we lose a war it will be to guys with spears and loincloths, because they're not tied to technology. And we're kind of close to being there."

Or, as an officer writing in Marine Corps Gazette recently put it, "The Flintstones are adapting faster than the Jetsons."

One sentence this blog took (minor) issue with was this sentence:

Insurgents often post video clips of their attacks on the Internet, the equivalent of taking scalps.

Well, it's slightly more complicated than that. Conventional thinking says the damage done by the IED was the objective of the operation. Abu Muqawama, though, believes the videotape is the real objective in many cases. Yes, it's nice to kill a few Americans. But even if you don't kill any Americans, you can post your video on the internet anyway (claiming that you killed two, or a dozen, or twenty) and radicalize and inspire others. It's viral warfare, and the most important thing you will have gotten out of your operations is not the enemy BDA (Battle Damage Assessment) but the image of the destruction.

Roland Barthes would have a had a field day with this war, wouldn't he?

Speaking of Phil Carter, he sent along this article by Damien Cave from Iraq, knowing the unit profiled -- the most deployed unit in the U.S. Army since 9/11 -- was the first unit with which Abu Muqawama went to combat, in Afghanistan. His advice was to take a stuff drink before reading this article, and though it's the Lord's Day, Abu Muqawama has to pass on that advice to you as well. This is depressing stuff:

Specialist Herb, a member of the unit searching for nitric acid, said that when he moved into his trailer in July, his trailer’s blinds were still spotted with dried blood from the lieutenant who killed himself. After cleaning the mess, he said, he now sleeps just fine. “Me and my roommate flipped for who was going to live on that side,” he said, sitting behind the wheel of a grumbling Humvee. “I lost.”