WarSclerotic

Changing only our rules of engagement won’t help much – Updated October 6th, Dan Miller’s Blog, October 6, 2014

(The rather “defeatist” views expressed here are mine and do not necessarily reflect those of Warsclerotic. — DM)

I posted this article from Israel Hayom at Warsclerotic, of which I am an editor. The article argues that to fight the Islamic State we need to change our rules of engagement. The parenthetical comment at the top of the Warsclerotic post is mine and is reproduced below.

(Could the U.S. and her allies put effective boots on the ground, or have the boots and the nation become too multiculturally damaged to do what needs to be done? More than the rules of war needs to change.

When the U.S. responded to the Russian supplied, trained and initially led North Korean invasion on June 25, 1950, we had been at peace for only five years. We were tired and wanted peace to continue but war came to us unexpectedly; it should have been expected. Our peacetime boots were badly supplied, trained and, more often than not, led. Some but not enough officers and senior noncoms had experienced war and knew what to do. Very few in the lower enlisted ranks had or did and “bug out” became a much used phrase. The NK troops had been hardened in combat, were adequately supplied, well trained and well led. Those who did not fight were executed. They pushed us back nearly to Pusan. By mid-September, we had more better led and trained troops; they had also become very angry at the NK troops, and intense anger is a powerful force multiplier. The NK tide was reversed, for a couple of years.

Were we now to try to put green boots on the ground to do what is necessary against well trained, led and financed Islamic troops, a  majority  of the public would oppose it and it would be politically unpopular. Were we to put boots on the ground anyway, they would likely need to undergo lengthy and deadly immersion-style baptism by fire. There would be substantial casualties and the opposition would increase.

Should we do it anyway if only the rules of engagement change? Can we, or is that now a fantasy? — DM)

Can the Obama Nation field a well trained, led and supplied contingent, of adequate size, to defeat the “non-Islamic” Islamic State, its cohorts and friends? Or are we too multicultural and decadent? Is our multicultural focus more on such nonsense as, for only one example, “gender equality” in the military than on winning wars?

I have few if any concerns about real gender equality. Kurdish women fighting against the Islamic State have disabused me of most that I once had. Please watch the video embedded below. One of the commanders was asked why she joked and smiled when around her troops. She answered, “I have to in order to keep their morale high.” That is a statement one would expect from a seasoned and competent commander.

However, when politically correct gender “equality” means that military training and other standards are lowered so that young ladies can serve, it becomes gender inequality and diminishes the effectiveness of our military. It would be only slightly less absurd, and only slightly less dangerous — to them and to those around them — to send such green “boots” on the ground into combat wearing high heel shoes and carrying only their purses.

Compare the Kurdish women fighters to this specimen of our deranged, multicultural and politically correct society:

Back to the Korea “police action:” President Truman had served in World War I as an artillery battery commander and rose to colonel in the reserves. Although a far from perfect Commander in Chief, he knew more about war than Obama could ever learn. Obama has no desire to learn; the “smartest person” in any room, He commonly ignores advice from those who have learned. Truman knew about the need for good military discipline, Obama has very little discipline himself and does not.

We fared poorly during the June 25 through mid-September period in South Korea. Could we now expect green boots on the ground to do even as well if plucked from a peaceful, multicultural environment and sent to fight against the Islamic State, et al, no less brutal than were the North Korean and later Chinese forces? Is there sufficient reason to try, now, even though our “kinetic activity” can not be successful with air power alone?

Do we even know the enemy, when Obama and others continue to refer to Islam as the “Religion of Peace” and praise its contributions to American culture? From Obama’s 2014 Eid Greeting:

While Eid marks the completion of Ramadan, it also celebrates the common values that unite us in our humanity and reinforces the obligations that people of all faiths have to each other, especially those impacted by poverty, conflict, and disease.

In the United States, Eid also reminds us of the many achievements and contributions of Muslim Americans to building the very fabric of our nation and strengthening the core of our democracy. [Emphasis added.]

When the Islamic State is erroneously deemed non-Islamic? When we continue to label Islamic terrorism at home as “workplace violence?” When, shortly after the recent Oklahoma beheading by an Islamist, Obama sends a special messenger from the White House to deliver a belated note of thanks to the mosque he attended for “helping rebuild the Moore community after a destructive tornado tore through the city in 2013.” [Emphasis added.]

“Your service is a powerful example of the powerful roots of the Abrahamic faiths and how our communities can come together with shared peace with dignity and a sense of justice,” President Barack Obama said.

The Imam, the leader of the prayer service, stated during his sermon that the Muslim faith has been called a “cancer that needs to be cut off from the American society.

It seems unlikely, at best, that we — or at least too many of us — know the enemy that cannot be named.

According to the linked Israel Hayom article,

Islamic State is not an organization that can be defeated with slow, uncertain, limited action. It cannot be defeated without “boots on the ground.” It is imperative to hit them with force; with waves of growing intensity. They must be attacked continuously, without breaks, without cease-fires and with the utmost determination. [Emphasis added.]

I agree, and wish that we could field a fighting force of that caliber to move quickly and effectively, before too many get clobbered and before we have to bring them all home, many in body bags. We seem less able to do that now than we were during the opening months of the “police action” in Korea. Since we can’t defeat the Islamic State, et al, with “slow, uncertain, limited action,” can we dispatch boots in the tens of thousands to do the job effectively? For the reasons suggested above, that seems even less likely.

Unfortunately, fantasy now trumps reality; until that changes, we should not send green boots into combat; we have few others to send. We. Are. Screwed.