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Islamic State grows in Afghanistan, encroaches on Kabul as U.S. remains ‘passive observer’

October 12, 2015

Islamic State grows in Afghanistan, encroaches on Kabul as U.S. remains ‘passive observer’ Washington Times,  Rowan Scarborough, October 11, 2015

10112015_afghan8201_c0-275-5060-3224_s561x327Photo by: Massoud Hossaini  Afghan security forces and British soldiers inspect the site of a suicide attack in the heart of Kabul, Afghanistan. Loyalists of the Islamic State group are making inroads into Afghanistan, with homegrown militants claiming allegiance to the Islamic State as it controls territory in some parts of the country. (Associated Press)

Afghanistan’s 3,000-member ISIL army is about one-tenth the size of the Afghan Taliban’s forces. But NATO says the Islamic State has reached the next stage of being an emerging threat. If its growth in other regions, such as North Africa, is a gauge, its Afghan component will only expand further as young Muslims are drawn by social media to its ultraviolent ways and Sunni orthodoxy.

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The Islamic State is growing at an alarming rate in Afghanistan, within striking distance of the capital, and there does not seem to be a concerted U.S. effort to strike the terrorist army as there is in the Syria-Iraq war theater.

An independent think tank has concluded that the allies are “reacting disjointedly and ineffectively” to the group in Afghanistan and other places outside those two countries.

The Islamic State’s numbers now may reach as high as 3,000 in Afghanistan, mostly in Nangarhar province, less than 50 miles east of Kabul. The emergence presents the NATO-backed elected government there with a fifth deadly enemy in addition to the Taliban, al Qaeda, the Haqqani network and elements of the Pakistani intelligence service.

Globally, the Islamic State, also called ISIL and ISIS, has affiliates in nearly 20 countries.

“It’s like a metastasizing cancer spreading throughout certain parts of the Islamic world,” said James Russell, a former Pentagon official and an instructor at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, California. “We have to hope that the antibodies in these societies can ward off the death, misery and destruction that will come raining down upon them if ISIS takes hold in their communities.”

ISIS_s220x241

Afghanistan’s 3,000-member ISIL army is about one-tenth the size of the Afghan Taliban’s forces. But NATO says the Islamic State has reached the next stage of being an emerging threat. If its growth in other regions, such as North Africa, is a gauge, its Afghan component will only expand further as young Muslims are drawn by social media to its ultraviolent ways and Sunni orthodoxy.

Yet unlike in Syria and Iraq, where a U.S.-led coalition conducts a series of daily airstrikes against the Islamic State, there appears to be no such strategy in Afghanistan, where Afghan government forces now have the lead in all combat operations and request NATO air power on an ad hoc basis.

“What concerns me most is the fact that the United States has become a passive observer rather than the driver of the policy,” said Larry Johnson, a former counterterrorism official at the State Department, commenting on the overall U.S. effort against the Islamic State.

U.S. military spokesmen had no immediate comment on the question of American policy toward the Afghan Islamic State. Army Gen. John Campbell, the allied commander in-country, was asked at congressional hearings last week what triggers action against Islamic State. He answered that the criterion is “force protection.”

After the Syria-Iraq war theater, Islamic State’s emergence near Kabul could be the most troublesome for the U.S., whose troop levels have dropped to less than 10,000, and only a small portion of those forces are dedicated to assist in counterterrorism. The Islamic State has shown it can execute brutal attacks and deploy vehicle bombs to take territory and hold it.

Gen. Campbell said Afghanistan’s security forces lack the leadership and troop numbers to respond to every trouble spot.

Meanwhile, the Islamic State is beginning to flex its terrorism muscle in Afghanistan.

Islamic militant competition

The Institute for the Study of War (ISW) in Washington is tracking the Islamic State’s violent ways in Afghanistan and other countries. It said the Islamic State launched attacks in mid-September against a UNICEF convoy, Afghan government forces, the Afghan Taliban and Shiite civilians. In late September the Islamic State “launched coordinated attacks on multiple Afghan security positions” in Nangarhar, the think tank said.

“The group reportedly also shut down several schools in eastern Afghanistan amid other efforts to assert social control,” the institute said. “ISIS has established robust ground campaigns in Libya, Egypt and Afghanistan.”

The ISW said in the special report “ISIS Global Strategy: A Wargame,” written by counterterrorism analyst Harleen Gambhir, that the Islamic State’s expansion stems from its ability to attract local jihadis.

“The coalition is focused on Iraq and Syria, and it is reacting disjointedly and ineffectively to ISIS’s activities in Libya, Egypt, Afghanistan, and other places,” Ms. Gambhir writes. “ISW’s war game demonstrated how this failure enables ISIS to strategically outpace the U.S. and its allies.”

U.S. intelligence agencies are still trying to digest the meaning of Islamic State setting up shop in South Asia.

Nicholas Rasmussen, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, speaks of an “increasing competition between extremist actors” in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region involving al Qaeda, the Taliban and the Islamic State.

“So that’s an additional factor that we’re still trying to understand,” Mr. Rasmussen told the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point in remarks published last month. He characterized the burgeoning competition as an “interesting feature of the South Asia landscape.”

Gen. Campbell, the U.S. commander closest to Islamic State terrorism in Afghanistan, said foreign fighters are arriving to join the Islamic State as they “try to bring in some sort of funding stream to build a place in Nangarhar.”

He said the emergence of Islamic State “has further complicated the theater landscape and potentially expanded the conflict.”

Mr. Johnson, the former counterterrorism official, said the leaders of Middle East and South Asia countries “concede that the U.S. has no appetite for being engaged, especially militarily in the region.”

The struggle between two radical Sunni groups, the Taliban and the Islamic State, may be sparked in part by the Taliban’s willingness to do business with Iran, a Shiite Islamic country.

“The Taliban have always been far more pragmatic in dealing with Iran, and the religious difference is not a critical factor,” Mr. Johnson said. “Not so with the ISIS crowd. For them, theology takes precedence, and Iran is an apostate state that must be destroyed.”

Categories: Afghanistan, Department of Defense, Foreign policy, Islamic State, Obama - Middle East, Taliban, U.S. Military
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What’s Behind Carter’s Claim That Russia Will Suffer Casualties in Syria?

October 10, 2015

What’s Behind Carter’s Claim That Russia Will Suffer Casualties in Syria?

18:26 10.10.2015

(updated 18:27 10.10.2015)

Source: What’s Behind Carter’s Claim That Russia Will Suffer Casualties in Syria?

When US Defense Secretary Ash Carter said that he expects Russia will soon suffer casualties, his phrase sparked the question whether the Pentagon has a Soviet-Afghanistan redux in mind for Syria, Germany-based political scientist and analyst Phil Butler remarks.

The real life “war on ISIL” conducted by the US is completely different from what Washington’s tame media sources are telling the public: in fact it is a part of a US strategy of widespread regime change across much of the world, Germany-based American political scientist and analyst Phil Butler notes.

“Without expanding our story too far, the Arab Spring we heard so much about is not finished yet. As Barack Obama and other Western leaders have made abundantly clear, Bashar Assad’s government must be overthrown by whatever means. ISIL, or even al-Qaeda, they’re only bit players in an overall strategy to shift world affairs,” Butler pointed out in his article for New Eastern Outlook.

Russian military air group at Khmeimim airbase in Syria
© Sputnik/ Dmitriy Vinogradov
Russia’s Strikes in Syria: Hitting All Targets With Pinpoint Accuracy

The US’ large-scale project in the Middle East is supported by its partners and NATO allies, such as Australia, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, the UAE, Morocco, Canada, Turkey and the United Kingdom. Also allied with the coalition are the Kurdish administration in Northern Iraq, the so-called “Syrian opposition,” and, rather surprisingly, America’s bitter enemy al-Qaeda, along with numerous jihadist extremist groups like al-Nusra, the political scientist underscored.And here comes Russia…

“Russia is now flying support for a massive Syrian Army push to regain territory and control. The short story being, ISIL has suffered more losses in the last few days than throughout the US/Coalition campaign supposedly designed to eradicate these terrorists,” Butler emphasized.

It goes without saying that Russia has largely upset the US and Co.’s applecart in the region.

Butler quoted US investigative reporter Jeffrey Silverman, who told him that Washington has invested too much in this Middle Eastern project to allow Russia “to just fly in and sort out the terrorists once and for all.”

“We can expect that the US, its proxies, including Turkey, Jordan and Israel, will provide all necessary covert material support to try to save their joint project,” Silverman emphasized.

Russian air force strike the Islamic State in Syria
© Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation
Game-Changer: Russia’s Involvement in Syria Shifts Balance of Power

The question remains open how far Washington will go to halt the Russo-Syrian advance in the war zone.Commenting on the issue, Butler called attention to US Defense Secretary Ash Carter’s recent remarks over Russia’s involvement in Syria.

“This will have consequences for Russia itself. And I also expect that in the coming days, the Russians will begin to suffer casualties in Syria,” Carter said.

Furthermore, less than a week ago Barack Obama declared that Syria would become a “quagmire” for Russia, the US analyst highlighted.

Carter and Obama’s words were not just casual comments, according to Butler. The political scientist referred to the fact that about three decades ago the Reagan administration provided the Afghani Mujaheddin, the would-be Taliban fighters, with Stingers to inflict serious damage on the USSR’s Air Force in Afghanistan. So, is this the option Carter and Obama are hinting at?

“At this juncture, if Obama gives a green light to jihadists shooting down Russian planes, America will be exposed in the game. With millions of lives at stake in the region, and hundreds of millions more affected by the refugee crisis, sanctions, and America polarizing the world, the string pullers of Washington have few options,” the analyst pointed out.

“If I were Ash Carter, I’d make damn sure Russian pilots had an American wing man or two. Even a lucky hit on an SU-34 sends a signal — Afghanistan Redux — America is guilty of chaos again,” Phil Butler stressed.

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Obama’s UN Whoppers Exposed

October 10, 2015

Obama’s UN Whoppers Exposed Another analysis of the mind-numbing banalities and outright falsities that emanated from Barack Obama’s mouth at the United Nations

Source: Obama’s UN Whoppers Exposed

This article originally appeared at Kopp Online. Translated from the German by Boris Jaruselski

Stupidity…arrogance… or both?

Those who made the effort during US President Obama’s speech to listen without falling asleep as Secretary of State John Kerry would clearly have preferred to do would have noticed a clear contrast with the later speech of the Russian President.

Barack Obama’s emotions were discernible before he ended his first sentence. He displayed an extraordinary mix of contempt and arrogance: “We possess the largest, baddest Armed Forces; to the rest of you, we determine where they will go.”

It is scarcely possible to find an honest sentence whilst reading through the official transcription of Obama’s speech in this example of not grey, but black propaganda art. I quote some of the most egregious points where right at the beginning after the usual pious evaluation of 70 years of US history Obama says:

“The United States has worked with many nations in this Assembly to prevent a third world war — by forging alliances with old adversaries; by supporting the steady emergence of strong democracies accountable to their people instead of any foreign power.”

I am hard pressed to find a single strong democracy accountable to its citizens which has been supported by US interventions in recent years. On the contrary, since the US invasion and destruction of Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003 the US State Department under Hillary Clinton initiated the Arab Spring destabilizations, a false flag installation of “democracy” perpetuated through NGO’s and Social Media.

This destruction was brought to Africa’s most stable and peaceful state namely Ghaddafi’s Libya and thereafter in 2013 to Ukraine with a US supported Maidan-coup which propelled a band of Neofascist hooligans to power for the purpose of destabilising Russia.

Every covert and overt US intervention has brought the world substantially closer to the Third World War. The most recent step in this direction is the US intention to station their most modern nuclear weapons on German soil which will represent a significant imbalance to the current status quo between NATO and Russia.

Continuing with Obama’s speech, after presenting the audience with snazzy sounding words from the wonderful principles of the UN Charter including shining examples such as “collective endeavours” and “diplomatic cooperation of the major world powers”, follows this illogical conclusion:

“I lead the strongest military that the world has ever known, and I will never hesitate to protect my country or our allies, unilaterally and by force where necessary.”

A modern cover-version of 1970’s Jim Croce songs would go something like “You don’t mess around with Barack”. So much for the UN Charter. This is the iron fist in the velvet glove which has only too often represented the core of the US’s Foreign and Military policies.

Obama then proceeds to talk about tyrants and dictators. He attempts to dismiss accusations of US involvement with NGO’s to facilitate regime change.

“It is not a conspiracy of U.S.-backed NGOs that expose corruption and raise the expectations of people around the globe; it’s technology, social media, and the irreducible desire of people everywhere to make their own choices about how they are governed.”

The reality as most amongst the UN Audience are already aware of, through personal experience with US financed NGO’s such as the National Endowment for Democracy, Freedom House and George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, is that it is exactly these “US backed NGO’s” and “weaponised democracy and human rights” methods which topple legitimate governments when they refuse to bow down to Washington’s agenda.

As revelations by Snowden and others confirmed, US Social Media networks such as Facebook, Twitter and others are connected to or cooperate with the CIA and State Department in order to facilitate slick NGO regime change. A blatant lie follows as the US President explains:

“No matter how powerful our military, how strong our economy, we understand the United States cannot solve the world’s problems alone. In Iraq, the United States learned the hard lesson that even hundreds of thousands of brave, effective troops, billions of dollars from our Treasury, cannot by itself impose stability on a foreign land.”

With all due respect, Mr President, if you’ve gained this bitter experience after seeing “Billions of Dollars” not belonging to the US Treasury but to the American Taxpayer, Chinese and others who invested in your Treasury Bonds to finance the Iraq War debacle wasted, why are you then in Syria today?

What are you doing now when you’re training the Ukrainian Armed Forces? Why go everywhere around the world in order to stir up people? Why do you build military bases around the world where you can dig a hole to plant the US Flag? You’ve admitted yourself that this has been an unmitigated disaster. It seems that nowadays Washington is becoming further detached from reality.

Finally the President addresses the real cause of his current discomfort: Russia.

“Consider Russia’s annexation of Crimea and further aggression in eastern Ukraine. America has few economic interests in Ukraine. We recognize the deep and complex history between Russia and Ukraine. But we cannot stand by when the sovereignty and territorial integrity of a nation is flagrantly violated. If that happens without consequence in Ukraine, it could happen to any nation gathered here today. That’s the basis of the sanctions that the United States and our partners impose on Russia.”

This statement skillfully ignores the reality of events in Ukraine in 2013 and 2014.

It is proven that a Washington sponsored Colour Revolution in November 2013 brought  demonstrations to the Maidan Square against the legal, elected government of the corrupt but legitimate President Viktor Yanukovych.

These Soros NGO sponsored demonstrations began literally seconds after a tweet from  US-backed and current Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk called for “Euromaidan” protests against the legitimate decision of the Yanukovych Government to accept the economically more attractive (than joining the EU) Russian proposal to join the new Eurasian Economic Union. Under this arrangement Ukraine would have received a 30 percent rebate for Russian gas and a Russian obligation to buy 15 billion dollars worth of Ukrainian government bonds.

It was left to the Neoconservative Assistant Secretary of State Department Victoria “Fuck the EU” Nuland (who says Washington forgot how to act diplomatically?) together with Vice President Joe Biden, Ambassador (to Ukraine) Geoffrey Pyatt and dozens of Ukraine based CIA agents in February 2014 to – as George Friedman, American head of Stratfor, put it – stage “the most public coup in history”.

In the coup aftermath Washington selected members of the Ukrainian Government including a US State Department veteran as Ukraine’s new Finance Minister. Joe Biden’s son was apppointed to head the board of a Ukrainian State Gas Enterprise.

The Syrian Swindle

At long last Obama addressed Syria, the issue which recently brought Russian diplomacy to world attention. Obama explained:

“Nowhere is our commitment to international order more tested than in Syria. When a dictator slaughters tens of thousands of his own people, that is not just a matter of one nation’s internal affairs — it breeds human suffering on an order of magnitude that affects us all.”

Until now it has not been proven that Assad “slaughtered tens of thousands of his own people”. Secondly, it attempts to justify the pernicious concept of “Responsibility To Protect” aka RTP which Washington used in 2011 to destroy Libya.

RTP represents a violation of the UN Charter by Washington. Washington’s “coalition” air-attacks on Syria, supposedly against ISIS, is another UN Charter violation (as drafted by the US in 1945) since this involves the bombing of a sovereign country without an official request from its government.

Moderate Syrian Opposition?

Washington insists on first expelling elected President Assad whilst simultaneously claiming to want to eradicate ISIL. (Also known as IS, ISIS and Daesh depending on which of its many names you choose to use.) Russia’s position is unambiguous: Bashar al Assad’s government, the Syrian National Army and Syria’s Secret Service are the only organised forces in Syria today capable of eliminating Salafist terrorists.

Obama makes mention in his speech of US support for ‘moderate’ opposition rebels. Already in April 2013, when ISIS was still called Al-Qaeda in Syria and Iraq and led by a US-trained lieutenant of Osama Bin Laden, the New York Times citing numerous US officials documented that virtually all rebel fighters in Syria were hardline Islamic terrorists. There are currently no ‘moderate’ opposition fighters. The so-called ‘moderate’ Free Syrian Army signed a non-aggression pact with ISIS in 2014.

Two weeks before Obama’s UN Address General Lloyd Austin III, who heads of the US “War against ISIS” program, testified to an Armed Services Committee hearing in the US Senate that the program which is supposed to produce 5400 trained fighters per year only had “four or five” active fighters in Syria.

All the others defected to ISIS or the al-Nusra-Front of Al-Qaeda, the US backed “moderate opposition” to ISIL. At the same senate hearing Christine Wormuth, State Secretary for the Syrian War at the Pentagon, testified that Assad still has significant resources at his disposal and that the Syrian Government “still had the most powerful military force in the country.” According to current estimates the Syrian Government need not fear being overthrown.

In Moscow a joke is making the rounds in which Putin returns to the Kremlin after his New York excursion and talks with Obama on Syria and other issues. A close confidant asks how the talks went.

Putin reports: to soothe the nerves and relax the atmosphere prior to serious discussions such as the Syrian conflict and the situation in Ukraine he suggested they sit down for a game of chess. On the game with Obama he had the following to say: “It is like playing against a dove. First it knocks over all of the pieces, then it defecates on the board and struts about as if it had won.”

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ISIS training militants from Russia in Afghanistan, ‘US and UK citizens among instructors’

October 8, 2015

ISIS training militants from Russia in Afghanistan, ‘US and UK citizens among instructors’

Published time: 8 Oct, 2015 10:27

Edited time: 8 Oct, 2015 12:48

Source: ISIS training militants from Russia in Afghanistan, ‘US and UK citizens among instructors’ — RT News

Islamic State is training militants from Russia in Afghanistan as part of its efforts to expand into Central Asia, a senior Russian diplomat told a security conference in Moscow. He added that US and UK passport holders are among the instructors.

“There are several camps operated by [Islamic State, previously ISIS/ISIL, in Afghanistan] that train people from Central Asia and some regions of Russia. They speak Russian there,” said Zamir Kabulov, President Putin’s special representative for Afghanistan.

He added that there is a wide national variety of instructors in those camps. There are Arabs, Pakistanis and even people with US and British citizenship, he said.

Russian intelligence estimates the number of militants in Afghanistan who have pledged allegiance to the Syria- and Iraq-based Islamic State, at 3,500, Kabulov said, and the number is rising.

“The rise of [Islamic State] in Afghanistan is a high-priority threat. Just think about it: [ISIS] showed up in Afghanistan for real just a year ago, and now it has 3,500 fighters plus supporters who may be recruited into the ranks of the militants,” he said.

Overall, there are some 50,000 fighters belonging to more than 4,000 militant groups in Afghanistan, said Army General Valery Gerasimov, who heads the Russian General Staff. He was addressing the same conference in Moscow, which is discussing the security situation in Afghanistan. The Afghan Taliban is by far the strongest militant movement in the country, with some 40,000 fighters in their ranks.

But their dominant position is being challenged by Islamic State, which sees Afghanistan as a recruiting ground, a source of income and a foothold for further expansion over Central Asia, reported Colonel General Igor Sergun, the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate, Russia’s military intelligence agency.

“ISIL [a former name for Islamic State, along with ISIS] uses the worsening of the situation in Afghanistan to strengthen its position,” he said, adding that such development poses a real threat to Russia’s security.

“We estimate that ISIL gets new troops by bribing field commanders of Taliban, the Islamic movement of Uzbekistan and other radical religious organizations operating on Afghan territory,” Sergun said.

Russia believes that if Islamic State is allowed to grow in Afghanistan unchecked, the group could spread its influence north toward Russia and east to China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, the general said. There the jihadists would be recruiting people from national minorities and local terrorist organizations.

The Afghan government in Kabul is unable to turn the tables on the militants, despite having superior weapons and numbers, Sergun said. He blamed poor planning skills of Afghan commanders and bad training of their troops for it.

On the other hand, Afghan tribal society resists ISIS’s ideology, which makes the terrorist group’s effort to gain support somewhat more difficult, the general said.

“The will to fight for ISIL in most cases comes from financial interest. But at the same time, the ISIL message is spreading quickly among the educated youth who have access to the internet and other media that is spreading the radical version of Islam,” Sergun warned.

slamic State is targeting radical fighters in Afghanistan who are falling for ISIS propaganda, accusing Taliban leaders of abandoning the fight against the United States and the government in Kabul, Sergun reported. This year alone clashes between the Taliban and ISIS have claimed an estimated total of 900 lives on both sides, he added.

Russian officials accused Washington of orchestrating the deterioration of security in Afghanistan and the expansion of Islamic State there.

“It seems like someone’s hand is pushing freshly trained ISIL fighters to mass along Afghanistan’s northern border. They don’t fight foreign or Afghan government troops,” Kabulov said.

He added that on several occasions Taliban groups that refused to join Islamic State were “set up” to be targeted by airstrikes.

“The Afghan Army practically has no aircraft. Only the Americans do. These details bring some very bad thoughts and concerns. We have to take them into account and draw conclusions accordingly,” he said.

Sergun said the US has a long-term goal of preventing stabilization in Central Asian countries and surrounding Russia and China with a network of regimes loyal to America and hotspots of tension.

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AN ARMY OF MCCLELLANS — The Syria Mess and the Pentagon’s Serial Failures

October 6, 2015

AN ARMY OF MCCLELLANS — The Syria Mess and the Pentagon’s Serial Failures, The American Interest, October 5, 2015

When Robert Gates was Secretary of Defense, he found that the Pentagon was ruled by a culture of bureaucratic delay and careerism. This culture affected even such vital issues as getting effective armor to military vehicles, leading to many unnecessary deaths and mutilations by IEDs. In the middle of war, that is, the Pentagon was still in a peacetime military mode, a mode in which buck-passers, bureaucrats, and time-servers push paper, and award one another certificates of merit. One hand washes the other as everybody gets trophies, medals, and promotions at the end of the year.

The pathetic failure of the Pentagon’s efforts in Syria indicate that if anything, this culture of self-congratulation and failure is getting more entrenched. An extensive autopsy of the now-infamous Syria training program in the Wall Street Journal today has plenty of damning details about the White House’s lack of decisiveness and micromanagement. But it also details numerous lapses from the military leaders tasked with carrying out the training, all of which culminated in this farce:

“We, who are directly in contact with the Pentagon, I swear to God, we have no clue what is going on. It is very complicated,” [U.S.-trained rebel commander] Abu Iskandar said in late August as his group was falling apart.

Pentagon-trained fighters said they stopped wearing military uniforms provided by the Americans, fearful of being attacked. On Sept. 19, Col. Daher withdrew from Division 30, citing a lack of American support and coordination.Col. Patrick Ryder, a U.S. Central Command spokesman, said nine of 54 members of the first class were still operating with the U.S. in Syria. Abu Iskandar said all but three fighters remain.

This isn’t the Pentagon’s only embarrassing, dangerous, and costly failure of late. Think of the collapse of the Iraqi army in the face of ISIS, or the Afghan military. After 14 years of U.S. force building efforts in Afghanistan, we seem to have created a force that is better at raping boys than at fighting the Taliban. The failures in that country show that we have a military culture in which the greatest sin is rocking the boat. It’s apparently far better to let corrupt Afghan soldiers chain slave boys to their beds than to create some kind of public disturbance. This is a strategy of “hearts and minds” that will win popular support against the Taliban?

The U.S. is running a vast, multi-country war effort that has become unhinged from any serious strategic vision, and we have a military system in which the commanders who see the futility and try to do something about it (and there are plenty) are sidelined. Go along to get along is the way things work in Obama’s Pentagon, and both the White House and the Congress are more interested in making the military look pretty on the parade ground than making it perform effectively in the combat zone.

The President and the political overseers in Congress have made their priorities clear: You can persist with strategies that don’t work for years and still get steadily promoted up the ladder as long as you jump through hoops about integrating women and gays into more military roles. There’s nothing wrong with those goals. Integrating the armed services racially was once attacked by traditionalists as a step that would destroy military cohesion, but it’s made both the U.S. and our armed services much stronger over time. But the essence of military leadership (and effective civilian oversight) is to get the combat missions done with the lowest possible cost and loss of life.

Perhaps choosing between successful military operations and reshaping the makeup of the military doesn’t have to be either/or, but under President Obama we have opted for the latter and tanked the former. The Pentagon has failed at its major military objectives in the Middle East. It has not built up the Iraqi Army into an independent force that can defend against ISIS and sectarian militias. It has not made the Afghan army the core of a state that can hold territory and retain the loyalty of its people and so prevent the Taliban’s resurgence. And it has not created an effective rebel force in Syria as a third way between Assad and ISIS. Perhaps these objectives were always unrealistic and the missions should never have been launched, or perhaps they needed more focused and proactive civilian leadership. But in any case, the brass on the Pentagon office doors has been polished to a high shine during the Obama years even as the missions in the field have serially failed.

Failures of military leadership are ultimately failures of civilian oversight. Abraham Lincoln fired General McClellan and promoted General Grant because, while McClellan dressed well, handled himself well in social situations, and polished his army to perfection on the parade ground, he didn’t win battles. General Grant was occasionally drunk, almost always slovenly, and didn’t always say the right things to the press. He did, however, win battles. Right now our political leadership seems to prefer an army of McClellans to an army of Grants, and the consequences are visible across the Middle East.

Categories: Afghanistan, Department of Defense, Foreign policy, Islamic State, Middle East, Obama - Middle East, Obama and US military, Obama's foreign failures, Obama's legacy, U.S. Congress
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No moral outrage in the military

October 6, 2015

No moral outrage in the military, Washington Times, James A. Lyons, October 5, 2015

105_2015_b3-lyon-obama-shiel8201_c0-0-2933-1710_s561x327Obama Decimates the U.S. Military Illustration by Greg Groesch/The Washington Times

[T]he degradation of our military’s core principles must be viewed in a much broader perspective. Actually, it is a key element in President Obama’s declaration to fundamentally transform America. When you want to take down a country, the first thing you do is weaken its military.

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Recent articles highlighting horrifying child abuse atrocities inflicted on defenseless children by our Afghan military and police partners are but the latest examples of how President Obama is destroying U.S. military forces.

Our military leadership’s response to these blatant acts of pedophilia by our so-called Afghan partners has been shocking. In short, the guidance provided to our Army and Marine Corps personnel was to just ignore these Muslim and Afghan seventh-century customs and traditions. They have been instructed to not interfere, even when such horrific acts are being committed on our own bases.

Those U.S. military personnel. whose moral outrage will not let them ignore these atrocities and instead act to stop these unconscionable acts against children, are either disciplined or forced to leave the service. In other words, even if you find a young boy chained to a bed so that a local police commander can sodomize him every night and you hear the screams, you are told to look the other way. This is not only un-American but an act against humanity.

Even the Taliban outlawed such practices and freed a number of children, thereby earning the gratitude of village elders. Does the Taliban with its seventh-century mentality have a higher moral code than the U.S. military leadership? It should be clear to any thinking person that when our honorable military personnel are forced to ignore these crimes against humanity, they are viewed as being complicit.

To those who have followed our involvement in Afghanistan, the current policy to ignore acts of pedophilia should come as no surprise. When “green on blue” attacks gained national attention, our military leadership tried to explain it away by claiming the friction that developed between the two forces was because our military personnel were not sensitive enough to Afghan culture and traditions. In other words, if our Afghan partners conduct violence or kill U.S. military personnel, it is our fault. What nonsense.

Other Afghan cultural idiosyncrasies our military personnel are forced to accept without reservation include wife-beating, rape, drug use, thievery, dog torture, desertion and collusion with the enemy, the Taliban. Furthermore, under no circumstances can our military discuss Islam in any form. The genesis for this goes back to the purging of all our training manuals and instructors who presented Islam in an unfavorable light or linked it to terrorism. It is totally against our core principles and everything we stand for as Americans. It clearly has an adverse impact on individual and unit morale, which affects the ultimate goal of the “will to win.” The bottom line is that we are forcing our great military to submit to Islam and its governing Shariah law, or possibly die.

This is exactly the choice offered to infidels who have been vanquished by Islamic jihad. Our military’s silence and acquiescence, particularly by the leadership, is the humiliating price for our coexistence with our Afghan partners. This is unacceptable.

However, the degradation of our military’s core principles must be viewed in a much broader perspective. Actually, it is a key element in President Obama’s declaration to fundamentally transform America. When you want to take down a country, the first thing you do is weaken its military. We cannot ignore the fact that with or without sequestration, the Obama administration has unilaterally disarmed our military forces and, consequently, our capabilities. Further, the social engineering imposed on our military forces — to include the acceptance of gay, lesbian and soon transgender personnel — further undermines the moral fiber of our military and constitutes a further degradation of our military effectiveness. Forcing women into combat roles only further degrades the situation. The restricted rules of engagement imposed on our forces has reduced our military’s effectiveness and caused unnecessary loss of life and debilitating injuries.

Likewise, the pin-prick attacks on the Islamic State cast a shadow over what a dedicated air campaign could accomplish. It projects an image of weakness and ineffectiveness of our true capabilities. It has taken the “awe” of our invincibility and overwhelming force capabilities out of the equation. The net result is that our enemies no longer fear us, and our allies can no longer trust us.

The imposed limit on the application and capability our military force is not limited to the Middle East. For example, in the Western Pacific, to challenge China’s illegal actions in the South China Sea, the Obama administration has restricted the U.S. Navy from enforcing its freedom of seas concept that has been a fundamental principle of the U.S. Navy for more than 238 years. Our Asian allies in the Western Pacific watch carefully how we respond to China’s aggressive actions. Our directed restraint clearly will not raise their confidence level.

Our national security is being deliberately jeopardized. President Obama’s bloviating to Vladimir Putin at the recent U.N. session that he leads the most powerful military in the world was only true on the day he took office. Since then, Obama has systematically degraded our capabilities. The chairmen of the House and Senate Armed Services Committee must take forceful action now to prevent further emasculation of our military capabilities.

Categories: Afghanistan, Arab culture, Combat troops, Department of Defense, Dishonor, Foreign policy, Free world, Human rights, Islamic culture, Middle East, Multiculturalism, Obama - Middle East, Obama and morality, Obama and US military, Obama's America, Obama's legacy, Progressives, Rules of war, U.S. Military
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After Blasting Israel, State Department Doesn’t Immediately Condemn Afghan Hospital Bombing

October 6, 2015

After Blasting Israel, State Department Doesn’t Immediately Condemn Afghan Hospital Bombing, Washington Free Beacon via You Tube, October 5, 2015

 

Categories: Afghanistan, DIferent strokes for different folks, Gaza, Hamas, Hospital targeted, Israel, Obama - Middle East, Obama and Israel, Obama's America, Obama's foreign failures, Obama's legacy, Palestinian heroes, Palestinians, Rocket attack, Rules of war, U.S. airstrikes
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Unnecessary loss of life – The deadly price of politically correct rules of engagement.

September 30, 2015

Unnecessary loss of life – The deadly price of politically correct rules of engagement.

afghanistan_-_american_soldiers_fob_baylough

War is nasty, brutal and costly. In our latest wars, many of the casualties suffered by American troops are a direct result of their having to obey rules of engagement created by politicians who have never set foot on — or even seen — a battlefield. Today’s battlefield commanders must be alert to the media and do-gooders who are all too ready to demonize troops involved in a battle that produces noncombatant deaths, so-called collateral damage.

According to a Western Journalism article by Leigh H Bravo, “Insanity: The Rules of Engagement” (http://tinyurl.com/p59nlqs), our troops fighting in Afghanistan cannot do night or surprise searches. Also, villagers must be warned prior to searches. Troops may not fire at the enemy unless fired upon. U.S. forces cannot engage the enemy if civilians are present. And only women can search women. Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Thomas McInerney said: “We handcuffed our troops in combat needlessly. This was very harmful to our men and has never been done in U.S combat operations that I know of.” Collateral damage and the unintentional killing of civilians are a consequence of war. But the question we should ask is: Are our troops’ lives less important than the inevitable collateral damage?

The unnecessary loss of life and casualties that result from politically correct rules of engagement are about to be magnified in future conflicts by mindless efforts to put women in combat units. In 2013, then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta officially lifted the ban on women serving in ground combat roles. On Jan. 1, 2016, all branches of the military must either open all positions to women or request exceptions. That boils down to having women serve in combat roles, because any commander requesting exceptions would risk having his career terminated in the wake of the screeching and accusations of sexism that would surely ensue.

The U.S. Army has announced that for the first time, two female officers graduated from the exceptionally tough three-phase Ranger course.

Their “success” will serve as grist for the mills of those who argue for women in combat. Unlike most of their fellow soldiers, these two women had to recycle because they had failed certain phases of the course.

A recent Marine Corps force integration study concluded that combat teams were less effective when they included women. Overall, the report says, all-male teams and crews outperformed mixed-gender ones on 93 out of 134 tasks evaluated. All-male teams were universally faster “in each tactical movement.” The report also says that female Marines had higher rates of injury throughout the experiment.

Should anyone be surprised by the findings of male combat superiority? Young men are overloaded with testosterone, which produces hostility, aggression and competitiveness. Such a physical characteristic produces sometimes-poor behavior in civilian society, occasionally leading to imprisonment, but the same characteristics are ideal for ground combat situations.

You may bet the rent money that the current effort to integrate combat jobs will not end with simply a few extraordinary women. Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus told the Navy Times that once women start attending SEAL training, it would make sense to examine the standards. He said, “First we’re going to make sure there are standards” and “they’re gender-neutral.” Only after that will the Navy make sure the standards “have something to do with the job.” We’ve heard that before in matters of race. It’s called disparate impact. That is, if the Navy SEALs cannot prove that staying up for 18 hours with no rest or sleep, sitting and shivering in the cold Pacific Ocean, running with a huge log on your shoulder, and being spoken to like a dog are necessary, then those parts of SEAL training will be eliminated so that women can pass.

The most disgusting, perhaps traitorous, aspect of all this is the overall timidity of military commanders, most of whom, despite knowing better, will only publicly criticize the idea of putting women in combat after they retire from service.

Categories: Afghanistan, Combat troops, Department of Defense, Foreign policy, Ideology, Obama's America, Obama's legacy, Political correctness, U.S. combat troops, U.S. Military, U.S. politics
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Satire | Pentagon Downplays Significance Of Taliban Taking Over All Of Afghanistan Last Night

September 30, 2015

Pentagon Downplays Significance Of Taliban Taking Over All Of Afghanistan Last Night, Duffel Blog, September 30, 2015

150929-D-NI589-068-750x400Photo Credit: Glenn Fawcett with the U.S. Department of Defense

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Following the Taliban’s complete takeover of Afghanistan late last night, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook noted in an early morning press briefing that the Pentagon remains “generally positive” about the war effort and that “there is minimal cause for concern.”

“That’s how things go in a protracted counterinsurgency,” Cook told reporters. “You face some minor setbacks regardless of how many troops lose their lives or how many billions of taxpayer dollars are spent equipping local defense forces incapable of defending their own country.”

After the Taliban overran Afghan forces in Helmand earlier this year and took over the city of Kunduz this week, sources say the Obama Administration and many senior defense officials seemed surprised that major media outlets expressed even the slightest bit of interest in a war over a decade old.

At Central Command in Tampa, Fla., Gen. Lloyd Austin — who oversees forces in the region — assured reporters there was little cause for concern.

“We’ve seen this time and time again,” Austin said. “This modest spike in Taliban attacks shows that our strategy is working. These massive coordinated attacks are merely the death throes of an insurgent movement.”

Austin cited a range of historical and contemporary intelligence analyses to support his claim, adding: “Don’t believe me? Just look at the history of insurgencies. The Tet Offensive, Saigon in ’75, Iraq in 2006, every summer in Afghanistan since 2001.”

Sources at the White House say the president has not been too concerned with the situation for at least a few months, especially after he declared a successful end to the war in 2014 and placed forces there at Defense Condition (DEFCON) “Chill.”

Duffel Blog attempted to reach the commander of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan at his Kabul office but were ultimately unsuccessful. His new spokesman, Mullah Akhtar Mansour, stated that Gen. John Campbell and the U.S. Ambassador were unavailable for comment as they had departed Kabul via C-5 transport just a few hours earlier.

 

Categories: Afghanistan, Combat troops, Department of Defense, Foreign policy, Humor, Obama - Middle East, Rules of war, Satire, U.S. Military
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At the U.N., Obama refuses to see the chaotic world he has made,

September 29, 2015

At the U.N., Obama refuses to see the chaotic world he has made, Breitbart, John Hayward, September 28, 2015

ISIS-beheading-Christians-Libya-ap-640x480

President Obama’s address to the U.N. General Assembly on Monday morning was a rambling journey through a fantasy world where his foreign policy hasn’t been an unmitigated disaster.

Perhaps the most bizarre moment came when he tried to tout his Libyan adventure as a success.

There was plenty of tough-guy posturing that intimidated absolutely no one.  The Russian and Iranian delegations were especially good at looking bored and unimpressed when he called upon them to do this-or-that because The World supposedly demanded it. Obama hasn’t figured out he’s the only leader at the U.N. eager to sacrifice his nation’s interests to please The World.

Obama made the weird decision to vaguely threaten Russia over its invasion of Ukraine by claiming that The World would not stand idly by and allow it… when that’s exactly what The World, and especially First Citizen of the World Barack Obama, has been doing.  He essentially pleaded with Iran to stop supporting terrorist proxies and pursuing its aggressive regional ambitions, and focus on their economy instead.  (Of course, in Obama’s vigorous imagination, the U.S. has been enjoying an economic boom under his stewardship, instead of an endless grinding non-recovery and limp, sporadic growth, after Obama’s spending doubled the national debt in a single presidency.)

It was bad enough that the President talked about American troops coming home from Iraq and Afghanistan as the triumphant conclusion of an effective policy, rather than the hideous blunder that allowed ISIS to create a terror state, al-Qaeda to rise from the ashes, and the Taliban to begin planning its return to power.  At the same moment Obama was speaking, the Taliban was conducting a major offensive in Afghanistan, on par with the importance of ISIS taking Mosul in Iraq.  Obama’s pitifully small “New Syrian Force” of U.S.-backed rebels just handed a good deal of its American equipment over to al-Qaeda, and no one really knows what became of the unit itself.  Their predecessors were destroyed by al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front in Syria, with less than half a dozen survivors still on the field.

When Obama boasted of the Libyan operation as the successful removal of a tyrant, jaws must have hit the floor around the room.  Libya is an unholy disaster, a wasteland of warlords fighting to keep ISIS off their turf.  It’s a key gateway for the incredible migratory tide blasting out of Africa and the Middle East and now surging across Europe.  And yet, Obama portrays it as [a] laudable example of tyrant removal… while modestly admitting that “our coalition could have, and should have, done more to fill a vacuum left behind.”

Of course he blamed everyone else in the “coalition” for the disaster in Libya. He’s Barack Obama.  The day may come when he takes responsibility for something, but today is not that day, and tomorrow isn’t looking good either.

The scary thing about Obama is that he believes so completely in the power of his own rhetoric.

He thinks he can reshape reality with his words.  When he scolds the Iranians for their “Death to America!” rhetoric by saying bloodthirsty chants don’t create jobs, he’s asking Iran to live up to the silly talking points he foisted off on the American people to cover the Iranian nuclear deal.  He’s commanding Iran to act like the enlightened, responsible nation-state he gambled the future of Israel, America, and much of the Western world on.

The Iranians, on the other hand, see no reason to knock off the “Death to America!” chants, disband their theocracy, and begin spending their days arguing about stimulus bills.  Belligerence has gotten them everything so far.  They’ve been rewarded for it… by Barack Obama.  They’ve got $150 billion in sanctions relief coming their way.  They can afford to send a few guys to sit in the U.N. General Assembly with pissy expressions on their faces while Obama rambles on about how geo-political crime does not pay.  They know for a fact it pays, quite handsomely.  The Iranians are already using their Obama loot to reinforce terror proxies like Hamas and Hezbollah, and secure Bashar Assad in power.

Ah, yes, Bashar Assad… the dictator Obama still blathers on about removing from power, even as his own diplomatic apparatus gets used to the idea Assad is not going anywhere.  The only really good part of Obama’s speech was when he spent five seconds glaring at the Syrian ambassador before launching into his denunciation of barrel bombs and chemical weapons.  But you know what?  That Syrian ambassador gets paid enough to take a few seconds of hairy eyeball from the ineffectual American president.  The Russians are smoothly replacing American influence across the Middle East, in partnership with Iran.  The new order is taking shape.  Obama isn’t going to reverse that process by telling aggressive, bare-knuckle conquerors they should be ashamed of themselves.

The other dangerous thing about this delusional President is his belief in the “judgment of history.”

He’s constantly hitting on the idea that all of the world’s villains are on the wrong side of history, and will find themselves buried in the sands of time any day now.  It’s a dodge, a way of Obama evading responsibility.  Bashar Assad is going to remerge from the Wrong Side of History in pretty good shape.  ISIS is very comfortable there, as is Iran.  Qaddafi didn’t assume room temperature because History caught up with him. Vladimir Putin has a lovely view of Crimea from the wrong side of history.  The history of Europe is being reshaped by the tramping of a million “refugee” feet.

In every example, Obama clings to the idea that he can change the world by talking and scoring debate points, while his adversaries seize territory and control the course of events.  It’s not as though Obama has some deep-seated reluctance to use deadly force – there have been a lot of deaths by drone strike since he won that Nobel Peace Prize.  What Obama lacks is commitment.  His foreign policy is all about gestures and distractions.  He cooks up half-baked plans that will blow up a terrorist here and there, so he can’t be accused of doing “nothing,” but he won’t do anything that could cost him political capital at home.  Even Libya was half-hearted and calculated for minimum risk, which is why the place went to an even deeper Hell after Qaddafi was overthrown.

Obama talks as if he’s taken action against numerous crises, but all he ever did was talk about them.  The men of action are stacking up bodies, and raising flags over conquered cities, while this President is writing speeches and trying to win applause from editorial boards.  The men of action know that Obama’s promises all have expiration dates, his vows of action always have escape clauses, and no matter how he loves to boast that he heads up the most powerful military the world has ever seen, he’s done everything he can to make it weaker.

President Obama is still clinging to a romantic vision of the “Arab Spring” as a flourishing of democracy, despite all evidence to the contrary.  He’s giving the same foreign policy speeches he gave in 2009 because he can’t bear to live in the world he made.  He talks about filling vacuums and voids… but those voids are already filled, by hard characters with plans to make the most of the extraordinary opportunity Barack Obama afforded them.

(Video of Obama’s UN address — DM):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaJkTsy2SsQ

 

Categories: Afghanistan, Arab Spring, Assad, Christians, Copts, Death to America, Denial, Diplomacy, Dishonor, Foreign policy, Freedom, Human rights, Ideology, Iran, Iran - Iraq war, Iran - Syria war, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Iranian proxies, Iraq, Iraq war, Islamic nations, Islamic State, Libya, Middle East, Obama - Middle East, Obama - rogue president, Obama's America, Obama's foreign failures, Obama's legacy, P5+1, Right and wrong sides of history
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