There seems to be a growing tide of criticism leveled toward the Bush administration that we haven't sent "enough troops" into Iraq.

That, on first glance, might seem to be true. It sure would in a "traditional" war against "traditional" armies.

But is it wise given the fact that we're fighting against insurgents?

Wouldn't sending more troops just create more US targets?

The question is:

Is sending more US troops a wise strategy or would a better plan be to dramatically cut "regular" troop levels and replace them with a shadow "special forces" team combined with unmanned weapons and surveillance systems?

This is now a peacekeeping operation, which requires that we offer protection to the Iraqi citizens, who are targets of crime and attack. We know what happens to a very well-armed population the moment guns are confiscated. The criminals keep the weapons, and crime runs rampant. That would happen here, and we are not a society with vast ethnic strife and blood feuds. Throw insurgents on top of that, and we have a mess. Yes, we need more troops. Kosovo and Bosnia were marginal successes, and the citizen to troop ratio was about 50:1. That would place us at around a 500,000 troop level. Not possible, but it answers the question to be debated.

I guess the answer isn’t more or less troops it is the election. When you think about the situation the only end will be civil war. When the election is complete and an elected body is in place the people have to choose to follow the elected majority or the lead of the terrorist. Either way the decision goes it sounds like civil war.

If you think back to the man and boy that had the East Coast living in fear with one man, one boy and a rifle in the DC area and then add the intimidation of people willing to blow themselves up you have a force capable of bringing America to it’s knees with an established police and military force. The foreign clerics of like thinking of OBL have an army of people willing to die for the cause so unless we are willing to forget borders and the PC of preemptive strike on the known enemy then they win. The guys blowing themselves up aren’t the Sunni’s minority to my estimation; they are coming from Iran, Saudi Arabia and Syria.

After the election the elected government needs to ask us to leave and decide to either follow the Sunni minority with foreign cleric backing of people bombs or to kill all of the Sunni’s to remove a base for the clerics to work from.

Rather than more troops, a better answer may be troops who have been trained to be peacekeepers. The American military is an incredibly effective force for fighting a war, but generally soldiers which have been trained to be effective fighters make ineffective peacekeepers, just as soldiers trained to be good peacekeepers can often be less effective at fighting.

I think that in my view, our country really doesn't know how many troops are required. Our military instituations are great at studying and analyzing history and forumulating strategies and tactics based on those lessons learned. As has been said in the past, our military is real good at fighting the "last" war.

But we're fighting a type of war we have never fought before. Vietnam isn't even a good example. We have never fought a war against a large-scale clandestine force, posing as civilians, in an urban environment and who are fully prepared to kill themselves.

We're learning as we go. The same would have been true if Kerry was elected and if Rumsfeld wasn't the SOD.

And you know what, the people critical of the Bush administration and who are calling for more troops don't know either.

I maintain that perhaps the right move is to fundamentally change our presence. Stop being in their face, go into the shadows where the insurgents are, and then deliver devestating blows when we find them. This could conceivably require fewer, not more troops.

shadow "special forces" team combined with unmanned weapons and surveillance systems.

The problem is where are these troops going to come from. In my military experience, the only qualified soldiers for this job would have to come from the UK. Are the British willing (or can they) to make such an undertaking?

Is sending more US troops a wise strategy or would a better plan be to dramatically cut "regular" troop levels and replace them with a shadow "special forces" team combined with unmanned weapons and surveillance systems?

I've commented on this many times before in other threads. Here are some reasons:

1. Gen. Eric Shenseki back in 2003 said that we would need several hundred thousand troops for post-war Iraq: something which Wolfowitz called "wildly off the mark". I find a top army general to be much more credible in regard to military occupation of another country than a political appointee with no military service. Note that Paul Bremer had similar thoughts to Shenseki.

2. If US troops are sufficient in number, then the immediacy of the need to [re]build Iraq's police and army would be unnecessary. US troops could wait until stability is more assured before creating such internal civil authorities. Also, problems like we've seen with suicide bombers in US mess halls would not be a concern as working so closely with Iraqi soldiers would be unnecessary.

3. Iraq's election officials resign fearing reprisals. If there is sufficient security, then why the resignations?

4. The fewer the troops, the more "big hammers" will be used: "big hammer" being artillery, bombs, missiles, gunships to make up for lack of troops on the ground. The more "big hammers" used, the more "collateral damage", aka civilian casualties and destroyed infrastructure. And just to make it clear: civilian casualties...bad.

5. The insurgents' effectiveness is growing.

========

This whole "shadowy special forces" proposal makes me wonder if you understand the difference between a real war and a Hollywood movie set. The war in Iraq is not a Schwarzenegger film; it isn't solved by one-liners and plot twists. If this proposal were the panacea, then it would have already been successful because basically all the shadowy special forces are deployed in that part of the world.

The insurgency is not composed of a few small groups of people in "hidey holes" planning their days' activities under fluorescent lighting and a collapsible table. The insurgency is large and getting larger; it is heterogeneous; it has divergent goals; and it is deadly. Moreover, lawlessness has not been curtailed (and I have every reason to believe it is increasing but have not found stats).

Well, I'll ignore the film remark because it adds nothing and just address the issue.......

My point is that what adding more troops is the same thing as sending in more "Redcoats" as the British did in the mid 1700's to the "colonies". A mass of troops doesn't provide more "security" against a force that blends in with the civilians. They aren't taking positions, using armor, or any of the "traditional" fighting methods that our people have been trained to fight. What is the intent of adding more troops? Put a US soldier on every corner? They'd be sitting ducks for attack in my opinion.

Our special forces, however, are trained to blend in, relatively speaking, and enjoyed success in the first gulf war as well as the effort in Afghanistan (and other places). As you said, most of them are already there.

Why wouldn't sending more troops be sending in more potential targets when the enemy has no hesitation about sending in suicide bombers in cars or in person?

The nature of the battle has changed but the tactics have apparently not. That's the frustration in this war. And I guarantee the democrats don't have any answers either outside of playing the "critic" or send in the UN (a pipe dream from day one).

Our military is in the middle of a learning curve and we'll not get on top of the situation until new tactics are developed to go after these people where they are hiding. Massing troops isn't going to accomplish that.

Frankly, I'm interested in what people with real experience in military tactics have to say on this issue. It could be I'm all wet. But, I have a feeling that when the basic situation of a war changes and our tactics don't, we're in for a heap of trouble.

If the insurgents don't have half a million targets to go after at will, their focus will be tighter, and they'll be easier to detect and destroy.

The key problem with all of this 'shadowy' special forces talk......is that are no shadows for them to hide in. Our SF A-Teams enjoyed great success in the direct action mode (which is really there secondary skill) in Desert Storm, Afghanistan and OIF 1, but they operated in primarily rural areas.
In contrast, the majority of insurgent attacks are taking place in primarily urban areas.
It doesn't matter how well trained, sneaky and arab looking they may be.....you simply can't insert a large amount of outsiders in any neighborhood, be it Iraq or America, without notice, and thus vulnerability.
This doesn't even address the equipment needed for these guys to be of any value, and military equipment gets noticed, especially when its above the quality of a Sadr City black market used AK-47.

So what you're essentially doing is taking well and expensively trained special operators, who are themselves force multipliers, and making them more vulnerable targets without the support network that our conventional forces enjoy.

I agree unquestionably that tactics have to change.....and they are, by leaps and bounds. But there's only so much new doctrine can do against a roadside bomb or an RPG.
More troops are needed and fast, if we are to crush the insurgents in time to not make our forces endure OIF 15, 20 or 25.

If there are sufficient numbers of troops in a country, then it is possible to police all of it. Policing only part of it is unworkable. The US needs to secure cities down to the individual neighborhoods (and even houses) in those cities; the US needs to secure the borders; the US needs sufficient stability to establish rule of law and a civil authority; there are simply insufficient troops to do all these tasks. And, yes, more troops create more targets, however more troops mean it is much harder for them to be targeted.


Most are already there and yet the insurgency is growing. This suggests to me that special forces are inadequate.


It's true that a motivated suicide bomber can take many folks with them. This is why you need overwhelming troop presence to stop these attacks. Right now, we're shuffling troops from one hotspot to the next. When the troop presence is "thin" enough, the insurgents attack the weak spots. But, let's face it, US soldiers will die: we broke it, we bought it. You can't fight a war without death. If the US is unwilling to do the task before it, then it should remove itself from Iraq.


The US has been trying new tactics: some have worked and some have not. The problem is not tactics but strategy. The current strategy for bring stability in an occupied Iraq is not working. It was never going to work. It will never work. This is the problem.

Also, I don't know what to make of your "democrats=critics" statement. To be symmetrical, I suppose you believe "republicans=sycophants"? Anyway, the point is to recognize there's a problem, a major problem, and fix it.


The insurgents will not be able to execute their plans if they cannot hide while planning them. That's the point of having an overwhelming troop presence.

The enemy is exactly what you say it is. I differ with the thought that adding more military forces would be helpful unless the enemy agreed to wear flashing red lights on the headgear. The insurgency is based within a minority sector “hoping” to change the will of the people by drastic acts that affect all aspects of the majority’s daily lives. To an untrained eye the bad guy or gal looks exactly like a good guy or gal. Add the language and culture barrier between Americans and locals the addition of more Americans equals more possible targets. Consider yourself as a brand new Iraqi policeman surrounded by a thousand American soldiers and Joe bad guy walks up to you smiling and tells you to smile back. Then he tells you he knows where your kids and wife are at the moment and has other bad guys there. Then he tells you this is your choice are you on my side or those Americans over there as he smiles. Again I refer back to the DC shooters, if we had placed soldiers at each gas station then maybe the soldiers would have been shot instead of customers. It would be whatever the desired effect the insurgents would like to make as to choice of target.

I suggest if Senator Kerry had been selected and anti war marchers were in the street every day that Americans would be the primary targets of insurgents right now. For, the insurgents would see they have broken the will of the Americans to endure casualties so to insure positive results then kill more Americans for a quick security vacuum.

I see the country in civil war rejecting the minority taking power by the force they are using or, loss of will to the minorities desire for power, or the minority getting their butts wiped off the face of the earth by the majority having enough. Only the Iraqis can decide which faction will live on their knees.

So, what you seem to be arguing is that we have too many troops in Iraq? Are you saying that US military presence will not affect the insurgency? And if so, are you advocating a pull-out or drastic reduction in troop presence? I suppose I'm confused as to your position.


So, what are saying here? Pull-out? I guess I don't understand.


Eh....m'kay. A US election choosing a person president will have "broken the will of the Americans"? Man, I thought I was the cynical one. Not to get off-topic but with such a charitable view of the electorate why have democracy at all?


I think you're saying that civil war is inevitable in Iraq, right? If so, I agree. It wasn't inevitable until we invaded though.

The majority of US troops in Iraq have nothing to do with chasing down bad guys. For every combat soldier there are ten in support and in Iraq’s case even more in community support efforts. The only affect the US presence has at this point is giving the Iraqi people hope and a little time to choose their future. Outside of securing the interim government and keeping the lights on the force is ineffective. Only the Iraqi people can choose Boston Tea Party or kneel to the Sunni minority.


I agree I used a bad analogy. Should the American public demand immediate withdraw from Iraq and an elected official agree with the emotion in the public to cut and run as we did in Vietnam insurgents would direct efforts at the force of most resistance once the decision was made for withdraw that would secure their objective to fill the security gap.

Yes! We didn’t invade Iraq. Iraq invaded Kuwait and we moved as a member of the world body to remove them and called for a cease-fire to avoid additional casualties. Yes there would have been no war had Sadam not invaded Kuwait or lived up to his contract to avoid additional casualties. On both occasions war was the choice of Sadam not America!

Sure, the support infrastructure is large; combat troops are only the "tip of iceberg" as far as that's concerned. So, are you advocating pulling out? I'm still confused.


But, isn't this what you're advocating: reduction or removal of troops in Iraq? If not, please explain your position 'cause I guess I don't get it. As for the emotion of the public to "cut and run" like in Vietnam, that's another debate. It seems though that democracy eventually had its day in Vietnam's case whether you agree with it or not.


I see, so the US didn't invade Iraq. All those troops in Iraq are just part of the left-wing media conspiracy (or is it the right-wing military-industrial conspiracy, I get confused). And, of course, if the US didn't invade, it isn't occupying Iraq either. What are we debating then?

Yes, but as far as I can tell we didn't start this war/war on terror/project help Iraqi freedom because of Saddam and Kuwait. I believe we first started it with bad intelligence and are continuing it with poor planning. I realize that because of what Saddam did or didn't do in the past made us suspicious and thus acted pre-emptively on information that we thought was correct; and other nations agreed with us. But the fact of the matter is we initiated the invasion of Iraq a year and a half ago. I know this is off topic, and that many many other threads have covered all these ideas, I just wanted to include that it wasn't "merely Saddam bringing this on himself".

Is sending more US troops a wise strategy or would a better plan be to dramatically cut "regular" troop levels and replace them with a shadow "special forces" team combined with unmanned weapons and surveillance systems?

I'm gonna trust dontreadonme with this one. Bringing in these type of troops may work in some situations, but not this one. The insurgents we're trying to catch are very hard to pick out, and having special agents in there with their equipment wouldn't seem to allow them to blend in. I'm gonna go ahead and assume that the insurgents think that if you're 1. american 2. in Iraq then 3. you're not on vacation. Anyone whose not arab might as well be a target.

Is it possible that with more troops we could spot more activity and keep it to a minimum? Or perhaps catch more insurgents that escape? I know there have been several threads dealing with accounts of insurgents publicly killing people then "walking away". Perhaps if we had more people in the field then this type of thing wouldn't happen, or they could be caught and a few more "terrorists" could be caught.

I think anyone who believes that the US didn't invade Iraq but freed it is kidding himself.
The reasons were unjust.
The Iraqi people may be freed of Saddam Hussein but they are still captives of fear. Fear of helping the Americans and being killed as a traitor fear of being bombed by accident, fear of being mistaken as insurgents by Americans and being shot for that. As long as they remain prisoners of that fear they cannot be helped.
America needs to train its soldiers to keep the peace, not enforce the peace. Those soldiers need to understand the people and cooperate with them in a way that the Iraqi people see the American commitment to peace and freedom.
Iraq does not need more American soldiers, it needs soldiers that can provide trust and cooperation.

The question is:

Is sending more US troops a wise strategy or would a better plan be to dramatically cut "regular" troop levels and replace them with a shadow "special forces" team combined with unmanned weapons and surveillance systems?

An update. Today's NY Times is reporting that Rumsfeld is sending retired 4 start Army General, Gary E. Luck to Iraq for an open ended review of the situation there.

I'd post a link but you won't get there unless you are registered to that site.

This is good news because it's obvious that the old tactics aren't working in this new type of war. It will be interesting to see what this general recommends; more or less troops.

I think the wise strategy would have been to not invade that country, but who listens to Europeans anyhow?
Most American troops are trained in fighting, not peacekeeping. Therefore it is unimportant whether to send more troops that are only trained to fight or special forces that are only trained to fight as long as they know nothing of peace keeping. Therefore the question you are asking is moot.

I’m saying America should not pull out without a perceived victory being the mission accomplished of installing a government with peaceful ambitions to its neighbors. If the Sunni’s see America withdrawing because of loss of will of the American people and government the Iraqi people will submit to the Sunni minority also.

Once a freely elected government is in place that government should ask us to withdraw our peacekeeping troops. Then the elected government must take charge of the country and if necessary incapacitate the Sunni’s ability to overthrow the elected government. If the Sunni’s win we will be back to finish the job later guaranteed.

We are debating more or less troops in a war that started in 1990.

I understand why most like to think we invaded Iraq but to understand the way I see the situation of troop strength and strategy in resolving the situation I view the sand being fought over as a whole. I see the whole region as vulnerable to the Sunni’s and radical OBL like thinking clerics. In my opinion the UN involved itself in 1990 for that very reason. The Sunni’s apparently want the control of the entire gulf oil fields and the absence of Sadam hasn’t stopped their ambitions. You have to remember this was not the first invasion of Kuwait; the first occurred a month after GB removed the British protectorate in July 1960. GB was invited to expel Iraq and did so with the UN blessings.

I think the US- GB consensus is that if Iraq had been allowed to take Kuwait, which also has a Sunni majority it would have availability of sea control. It would be the richest nation on earth with ability to capture seaports from Iran and with the radical OBL cleric support existing in Saudi Arabia overthrow the Saudi Kingdom. Perhaps you have read of the same clerics aiding the Sunni’s with people bombs in Iraq are also involved in attacking the royal Saudi government.

A large slice of the 87 Billion went to remove the US bases from Saudi soil to appease the radical clerics at the begging of the Saudi Royal request and it didn’t work. The clerics are empowered even more as they fuel success with people bombs in Iraq.

The radical OBL thinking clerics are not confined to one region and influence and opposition resources flow from Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Afghanistan and the list goes on. The radical OBL clerics smell the domination the world through the control of oil and the Sunni’s as the means.

Logically Iraq could be broken up into states based on sects and support a central government that equally divides the nations wealth and supports a national army to protect its borders from invasion from another country. The widespread OBL thinking clerics couldn’t see their ambition achieved in such an arrangement so will not allow it to happen.

Therefore I see peace for the entire region only after a new government of the majority overwhelms the Sunni’s a base to halt the agenda shared by Sunni’s and radical clerics, the domination of the entire Mid East oil.

President Jimmy Carter attempted the Department of Peace during the Iran Hostage era and proved the neighborhood understands only one thing and that being Iron Fist! It isn’t PC to take out the radical clerics so the Sunni’s must die or we must return again as they enter Kuwait the next time.

The debate question was: should we add more troops or use shadowy special forces? The whole stability question presumes that stability can be achieved and if it can be achieved, the ways in which it can be done. We can discuss the stability issue but it's really another debate. This debate assumes that stability can be achieved and that it requires US troops to do it. Do you subscribe to the "goldilocks" notion of troop strength, that is, it's just right? Or should there be fewer or greater numbers of troops? Do you think that we're using the correct tactics? The correct strategy?


Here's something to think about: the election happens, the US is asked to leave, civil war breaks out in earnest and a new theocratic dictator with pro-Al Qaeda leanings comes to power. What does it mean to "finish the job"? Will the US just reinvade every time something doesn't work in its favor? To prevent these types of scenarios, the US must remain in Iraq whether or not it is asked to leave for the foreseeable future. Thus, any government in Iraq will be "bought off" by preferential economic treatment, loan guarantees, the threat of instability, etc. -- the asking to leave will never be a serious consideration. Anyway, this is getting off-topic, so I'll stop there.


Why stop at 1990? Why not 1941 when the one month war was fought between Iraq and our allies the Brits? Or how about 1914 when the Brits invaded and occupied Iraq during WWI? Or 1534 when the Ottomans conquered Iraq? Or 1508 when Iraq was under Iranian control? I could go on.

I managed to open it up and I'm not registered: Rumsfeld Seeks Broad Review of Iraq Policy

Deploying more troops isn't the answer. It would have made a huge difference early on - Mrs. Pigpen posted the ideal troop-to-population ration for stabilization ops. Unfortunately, Rummy, Wolfowitz and crew summarily dismissed the notion that post-war stabilization would require a greater concentration of forces than would defeating the Iraqi Army militarily. This, combined with gross incompetence by certain key civilian figures at the CPA, resulted in the significant operational failures over the first year.

But in the current counter-insurgent fight, more troops may help to a certain degree, but what we need more - as I stated in the previous thread - is to make fundamental changes in the way we are conducting ops in-country. We are still too heavy-handed in the conduct of operations, and intel is not used effectively to guide operations in the manner necessary to mitigate terrorist attacks and defeat an insurgency. Far too often, weeks and months and thousands of dollars spent to aid local communities, using various funding sources available to local commanders in effects-based operations is thrown away in one stupid incident.

Yet, in the Army, we have made rapid progress in changing the way our soldiers are trained, to meet current operational needs. Training at Basic and AIT now reflect the need for IED awareness, combat convoy ops, and more and varied weapons training for every soldier, regardless of MOS. (3 brand new common tasks that every soldier will be trained and tested on this year are React to IED, Search Vehicles, and Conduct a Presence Patrol - which directly reflect operations in Iraq) Those who have been in the service any length of time, recognize the surprising rapidity with which those changes have taken place - given the massive bureaucracy that normally stifles significant change.

But the changes I am talking about go deeper than mere tactical training. Sychronization of tactical ops with intel has failed - our intel collection is broken. Tactical HUMINT is not meeting mission requirements. And in the counter-insurgency fight, HUMINT is the most critical asset to the mission commander - all the other INTs feed into HUMINT for effective collection. But this ain't happening.

We simply do not have enough tactical HUMINT assets - and those we do have are, in general, both inexperienced and poorly trained for collecting in the current operational environment. In comparison to tactical training for the Army as a whole Training of new HUMINT Collectors has failed to keep up with operational requirements. As the field has had its numbers recently increased, that translates into larger numbers of bodies available for deployment, but without the necessary capabilities. This results in a snowball effect of real significance - both in the failure to collect priority intel or in the collection of false or inaccurate intel. I don't believe I need to spell out the effect upon operations.

Worth a look:

The Developing Iraqi Insurgency: Status at End-2004

What Can the US Do in Iraq?

Multi-National Security Transition Command-Iraq

Yes, and by the same reasoning, the German 1941-45 occupation of Yugoslavia was a peacekeeping operation, which required that Germany offer protection to the Yugoslav citizens, who were targets of crime and attack (by the Chetniks). It also required ever-increasing numbers of troops and brutally punative operations similar to Falujah. We may fully expect that success comparable to that of Germany in Yugoslavia will be enjoyed by America in Iraq; which is to say that it will be a resounding disaster.

The question assumes that there is a military solution to the problem of quelling the Iraqi resistance (as if American military minds were not now racking their brains for answers)! If indeed there were, its brutality would lie so far beyond the bounds of world and Iraqi acceptance that it would be impossible to implement.

If America's national survival depended on its continued occupation of Iraq, it could probably maintain indefinitely a presence very costly in blood, treasure and world political standing. But the exigencies of domestic and international politics are such that no such longterm occupation is thinkable. While domestic politics currently require something resembling "peace with honor," nothing of the kind is in sight, and eventual ignominioius withdrawal inevitable.

Ok I thought my answer was rather direct that once the election took place the government would ask us to leave. Additional troops have already been dispatched or those there return delayed to carry through the election. I’m saying if the government asks us to leave we should so they can have their civil war. We cannot stay around and participate in a civil war and regardless of more or less soldiers victory will not be realized until the Sunni’s are incapable of being insurgents. Our rules of engagement won’t allow us to do what a sovereign nation may do to combat an insurgency, it’s their country so let the new government establish their own rules of engagement where the Sunni’s lose. Unbalanced rules are all that is stopping peace right now.

If we stay after being asked to leave we should reduce our force to the size necessary for the security of our embassy. The new nation is a sovereign nation and we should hold no right to stay. If we are asked to leave it will be because we want to leave. The standing elected government with a standing security force supplemented with vehicles and weapons left behind would allow for overwhelming victory for the majority factions over the Sunni now protected by the media and by “our rules of engagement.”


Because that is when the war started. The other events were related to other wars. We did not invade Iraq we canceled the ceasefire for cause! If you review the "congressional vote of confidence to go to war" and President Bush's speeches before the vote you will note it was a courtesy and a means of placing a commitment on lawmakers to show support for money for funding would follow. The authority for hostilities was clearly stated by the President before the vote as being the Desert Storm vote.

Im guessing our intelligence relies to much on electronic surveillance and dropping off bags of money with a tribal leader. However, in the past few months it has shown significant sign's of improvement. An intelligence net isn't something you can just throw out and it will be effective, it take's years to establish. Yes there were mistakes made that could have saved live's and it was a slow process but you seem to be overblowing it a bit -- especially in recent months. We have captured about 7-8 high level terrorist's in the past month. Just read through the recent operations.

http://www.centcom.mil/CENTCOMNews/release...16&searchTopic=

More troops will be needed to guard the polling stations. Short of that it would be throwing more bodies into the fire. We need better intelligence gathering, and from what I can see from my chair (which is nothing but news of course) it seem's to be improving, recently.

Not at all. Tac HUMINT is intensely active in Iraq - although the degree of effectiveness is hurt both by the poor-training and lack of experience that I mentioned in my previous post, and by the simple fact that most maneuver commanders haven't the slightest clue in how to use HUMINT effectively to support their operations in the urban insurgent environment.

BTW, the "bags of money with tribal leaders" method is more common in Afghanistan.


Not at all. The few relative successes are grossly outweighed by current operational problems. We are starved for real intelligence success against the bad guys in Iraq, so we trumpet the ones we do manage.

I have worked HUMINT at various levels in the region for nearly the entire two decades of my military career - with several years of that time spent in Iraq. I am intimately familiar with the Army HUMINT field - and we are at a crisis point. Yes, measures are now being taken to address the critical manning problems - but just as it takes time to establish a source net, it takes a great deal of time to train an effective HUMINT soldier. And addressing training problems lags far behind addressing the manning problems. In fact, some critical aspects of training are being compressed or cut for the simple expedient reason of getting bodies out to the field. With the inevitable operational repercussions.

We used to have the necessary capability - but in the first half of the '90s Army HUMINT was cut by more than half. Experienced, professional mid-career NCOs were offered cash bonuses to get out. The Balkans operations were also HUMINT-intensive - but they were small-scale enough that the Big Army could ignore the real need that was demonstrated. As a result, many more solid HUMINT NCOs were burnt out by back-to-back deployments into the Balkans, and left the Army the first chance they had. It took the burgeoning insurgency in Iraq and the maneuver commanders' continual demand for more HUMINT assets to bring about DA approval for a massive increase in allotted numbers. But that brings us back to the time needed to enlist and train these soldiers. We won't have the real tactical HUMINT capability we need for nearly two more years. So we make do with what we have - meaning that many of our best are approaching burn-out - and hope for the best.

Vladimir
The difference between the war you speak of and this one is the US has no agenda to hold the country. We want out and only want the Iraqi’s in peace with neighbors and not trying to take over the majority of the world’s oil supply to blackmail the world.
The key to victory is “rules of engagement” below seems to be a more viable method.

Just before World War I, there were a number of terrorist attacks against the United States and it's interests by, you guessed it, Muslim extremists.
So General Pershing captured 50 of the terrorists and had them tied to posts execution style. He then had his men bring in two pigs and slaughter them in front of the, now horrified, terrorists.
The soldiers then soaked their bullets in pig’s blood, and proceeded to execute 49 of the terrorists by firing squad.
The soldiers then dug a big hole, dumped in the terrorist's bodies and covered them in pig blood, entrails, etc.
They let the 50th man go. And for about the next 42 years, there was not a single attack by a Muslim fanatic anywhere in the world. http://urbanlegends.about.com/library/bl_black_jack_pershing.htm


Pershing was a colorful figure who served in cavalry campaigns against Geronimo, commanded U.S. troops on an expedition across the Mexican border in search of Poncho Villa, commanded all U.S. troops in Europe in WWI and went on to be promoted to the five-star rank of "General of the Armies of the United States", the highest rank ever held, before or since, by any U.S. Army officer.

Is sending more US troops a wise strategy or would a better plan be to dramatically cut "regular" troop levels and replace them with a shadow "special forces" team combined with unmanned weapons and surveillance systems?


I answer from this article:



With elections on its way, the acknowledgement that no WMDs remain in Iraq, and the Iraqi people taking control of their own country, it is easy to see that the need for more troops is no longer there. Though this does not mean that the US will not establish a base to maintain control over the region, it does mean that the US will at some point no longer be involved in the day to day policing of Iraq.

The bolded potion is my problem. I'm as optimistic on the prospects in Iraq as anyone, but the fact is the Iraqi Army simply is not ready to take control of the country. They are far behind on the enlistment projection, I don't believe we should leave until the job of securing the country and training its military is complete.

I believe Powell is being optimistic that enlistment in the Iraqi National Guard will reach its numbers, and that an Iraqi elected government will change the outlook of many in Iraq. But yes the US will never be completely out of Iraq, just look at Germany and Japan.

Interesting story there, Ol Sarge. It's very likely not true if you look down the site reference a little more:



It made me suspicious right away due to the principle that violence begets violence. Terrorism should have increased. But, this is just an "apocryphal" (i.e., doubtful) tale, a "kind of thing would have run completely against his [John J. Pershing's] character," according to Pershing's biographer.

Think I'll go with Vandiver's take.

Actually, snopes.com cannot determine the Pershing story to be true. It more along the lines of folklore attibuted to more than one person. But no instances of this happening can be substantiated.

That story is false, what actually happened is Pershing spoke to the head cleric and advised him he would depose him and decorate his house and mosque with pig guts in blood unless he drew his people in line. He did execute some people but they were involved directly in attacking Americans and he did not wrap them in pigskins or dip the bullets in pig blood, wich is another common "story" that is circulating.

Thanks for all the research guys!

In an article titled “Terrorism and Antiterrorism” on link http://hammorabi.blogspot.com/ speaks of the “rules of engagement I was reffering to.

I knew the link I provided was of questionable record but the point is we can’t do the job with the press and our “rules of engagement.”

If true could be the start of a Boston Tea Party.