David Brin's Contrary Brin (RSS Feed)
09-23-2007, 09:59 PM
Part Three -
Destroying Readiness and Purging the Officer Corps
* The Danger Grows...
Our topic is the ongoing campaign (http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/2007/02/more-on-war-against-professionalism-in.html) by President George W. Bush and the Neoconservatives to undermine, discredit, suborn and crush the professionals who make up the U.S. Civil Service, the intelligence and law enforcement communities, the courts, scientists, and any others who might stand in the way of their principal program -- the unlawful usurpation of unaccountable power.
Foremost among these skilled and dedicated public servants -- who have been the Bushites’ first and worst victims -- are members of the United States Military. As I have been showing, our men and women in uniform have been harrassed, overworked and undersupported. The services are worn down and misused, apolitical traditions shredded, and careers terminated... especially whenever a brave officer or enlisted person stands up to protest.
Whether this destructive process is driven by obstinate dogmatism -- or something diabolically deliberate -- is left to opinion. (Or else, it is a matter for our harried professionals to uncover.) Nevertheless the overall outcome is unmistakable. It appears that flag-waving jingoism and noisy posturing do not guarantee genuine support for our troops. Indeed, they seem to correlate with the exact opposite.
.
In Parts 1 & 2 we covered two important aspects of the Bush War Against the Military -- the systematic demolition of two precious and useful abstractions. Our reputation for invincibility and our reputation for taking the high moral ground.
Both were powerful incentives for people and nations to try to be our allies, rather than enemies. Indeed, these were the underpinnings of a nearly-worldwide consensus, before 2003, to accept a “unipolar world.”
Today, both of these important images lie shattered. And the world -- despite so much sacrifice -- is a far more dangerous place.
.
* It gets even worse.
But enough about image and reputation. Now let’s talk about the actual, day-to-day situation in today’s U.S. military.
I have elsewhere addressed the declining state of US military readiness (http://www.davidbrin.com/readiness2.html), offering a glimpse at the horrific condition of our National Guard and Reserves, whose principal task should be preparing for emergency service at home, or (at most) overseas in some dire and temporary crisis. Not to be dashed -- at presidential whim -- into lengthy and grinding foreign adventures or political wars. The devastation of our reserves, tearing families apart, breaking solemn promises and leaving communities defenseless, should be a major scandal. It certainly is part and parcel of the overall demolition of our military.
As is the attempted purge of the U.S. Officer Corps. (http://www.mccmedia.com/pipermail/brin-l/Week-of-Mon-20051017/033719.html) A culling process that has only accelerated, eliminating men and women of stature from what had been a large pool of supremely educated, competent and apolitically dedicated professionals, replacing many of them with yes-man hacks...
...a catastrophe that can only be compared to Joseph Stalin's purge of the Red Army (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge) in 1937-1938, which is widely blamed for leaving the Russian officer corps understaffed and undertrained (http://books.google.com/books?id=oanB4q0o2vsC&pg=PA154&lpg=PA154&dq=purge+officer+corps&source=web&ots=PlJcqCSAse&sig=1P3uyjsFFIUUG zcg_v4LvNcitY#PPP1,M1) on the eve of war with Nazi Germany. True, the neocons aren’t shooting our generals and admirals, just forcing them into early retirement. But be patient. We may still be in early days
A couple of years after I first broached this matter, news articles (http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061016/whalen) began circulating about clusters of retired flag officers, speaking out against the creeping betrayal. What remains puzzling is the gaping silence from prominent democrats -- except for Wesley Clark -- about an issue that should be right out there. Treated as one of our paramount concerns.
(Let’s take a note of optimism in the rise of Navy CNO Admiral Mike Mullen to be our nation’s next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with Adm.William Fallon as Commander of US Central Command -- both of them outspoken critics of administration policy and diametrically opposite to kind of officers we are accustomed to seeing rewarded by this president. These important promotions suggest that the military professionals aren’t exactly lying down. Dedicated to silence on political matters, they may nevertheless have applied forceful back pressure of their own, behind the scenes, against the ongoing Bushite purge. If so, these people deserve honor for defending us, yet again, this time from an enemy within.)
.
* But the Great Purge Has Many Sides
Alas, our military’s professionalism and dedicated tradition of Constitutionalism are under assault from many directions, not just the ongoing effort to bully or dumb-down commanders at the top. There is also a deeply worrisome campaign to suborn and infiltrate dogmatism into the ranks, from the side and from below.
Bruce Wilson a lead researcher for the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, (http://militaryreligiousfreedom.org/) wrote to me about ongoing neocon efforts to transform the United States Military, turning it into an active force for the fundamentalist Christianization of America. (Moderate churches have always played a very different and positive role.)
Read (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/9/16/84937/8022) more about scandalous efforts to turn our apolitical and Constitutional military into an instrument of religious orthodoxy, on our way toward a theocratic state like the one forecast - in fiction - by a worried Robert A. Heinlein. (In prophetic novels he portrayed theocracy beginning, chillingly, in the year 2012.) MRRF is commendably trying to combat this trend, which some services have resisted more vigorously than others. (For a darker view, from an even more worried perspective, see http://community.livejournal.com/dark_christian)
Responding to my recent articles, Bruce Wilson wrote: “I can guarantee your concerns were not overblown. In fact, my research findings have recently demonstrated that.” Wilson acknowledged though, that none of their efforts have yet been directed at what may be the most dangerous part of this trend, an attempt by up to one hundred far-right members of Congress to stock the military academies with young men and women whose allegiance would no longer be Constitutionalist and neutral, but rather, as personal, ideological and lopsidedly political as the praetorians, janissaries, or jaguar warriors of old.
Of course, I had hoped that MRFF would already be monitoring this part of the problem. Perhaps now they will. It could take substantial dedication and research... or else, perhaps, just a simple polling of Congressfolk, under the letterhead of a quasi religious group, asking a straightforward question: “Are you using your Congressional privilege to appoint dedicated evangelical Christians to the military service academies?” One might be surprised how eagerly obliging and up-front some of the representatives are likely to be. (If any of you out there have suggestions or contacts that might be helpful, do contact MRFF (http://militaryreligiousfreedom.org/).)
I am especially interested in any confirmation of one clear impression -- that the Navy has been stalwart in resisting attempts to “stock” fanatics into Annapolis, while the Air Force has given in completely -- lock, stock and MX missile.)
.
* The Devastation of America’s Readiness for Real War.
Back when (http://www.davidbrin.com/readiness2.html) I first raised the issue of declining military readiness, I never expected That the people of America would let things get even worse. But we have. And, ultimately, the fault lies at our own feet.
Two years ago,, I spent a fascinating several days at Fort Irwin, in California’s Mojave Desert (to film an episode of my “Architechs” (http://htyp.org/The_ArchiTECHS) TV show) riding armored hummers and interviewing Special Forces sergeants. There, at the National Training Center, US Army Brigades used to assemble for large scale field exercises, practicing the art of full-force combat in order to hone the very skills that were used so effectively against Saddam’s huge military machine, both in 1991 and in 2003. These are the capabilities -- to fight large-scale land warfare -- that seemed so impressive to the rest of the world, that many potential adversaries seemed ready to admit that they would never achieve parity with such a formidable US Army.
That was then. Today, no brigades come to the National Training Center, anymore, to forge their large scale war-fighting skills in fiercely realistic exercises. Now, small units arrive weekly to blitz in and out of fake Arab villages, simulating urban counter-insurgency tactics. In essence, we have turned almost all of the US Army into one giant SWAT team. Yes, it is an important modern skill. We need to invest in 21st Century counter-insurgency tools and doctrines. But have we forgotten that the principal purpose of the Army is to defend our nation from those who would wage real war against us?
(And, again, would you not expect conservatives to be the ones making this very point? Imagine if Bill Clinton had done this to the Army. How they would have howled!)
Are there any exceptions to this near-utter turn of the US Army away from training for war? Well, one brigade of the 101st and one of the 82nd are kept on standby, at a high level of readiness. But they are light, air-mobile forces... essentially SWAT teams in their own right. So, when it comes to heavy warfare, they don’t count. No. If you look carefully, we only have a couple of brigades that are ready, at this moment, to perform a heavy war-fighting role. And those are in Korea. That’s two brigades. Maybe three. Far away from home.
I am often amazed by how seldom people in the press see what is right before their eyes. Take the story of the Third Infantry Division, whose pivotal role in the 2003 Iraq Invasion hurled them -- heavily outnumbered -- against the best of Saddam’s best Republican Guard. Whatever one thinks of the dismal and deceitful Bushite caste, who first nurtured Saddam Hussein, then deliberately left him in power, in 1991, to continue brutalizing his people for twelve more years, then finally toppled him but botched the aftermath... putting all of that aside... the story of the Third Division ought to have been written up, even made into an epic film. Forsaking sleep for an entire month, that one unit took on the labors of an entire armored corps. Under-reinforced and undersupplied by Donald Rumsfeld, they nevertheless showed how much skilled warriors can achieve, when their training, equipment, doctrines and morale are honed to a mighty peak.
Ask the officers of the Third now -- (or, for that matter, ask the entire United States Marine Corps) -- how they feel about being converted into an occupying constabulary, re-taking the same dusty streets, over and over again, bleeding without apparent goal, for people who (to a large degree) just want them to go away.
Ask if they feel ready to perform such miracles again, in the state they’re in today.
.
Let’s put the condition of the Army in metaphorical terms that get right to the heart of the situation. Speaking off the record, one general recently told me: “The Army that George Bush Senior fielded... or the one that Bill Clinton commanded ... could beat our present force, hands down. Even hobbled and blindfolded. Hell, I wonder if we could keep the Mexican Army out if (purely in theory) they decided to invade.”
.
That was a general. Add this to the deliberate and criminal destruction of our reserves, in a political war that is at-best “a utopian exercise in nation-building,*” and you have an issue that any democrat with sense, perspective and courage could turn into national howls of outrage, from patriots of both left and right.
But then, perhaps I am assuming way too much from today’s democrats.
Alas.
Well, at least there is the Navy.
God bless the United States Navy.
--------
(* a prize to whoever can cite who said this.”)...a collaborative contrarian product of http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/ (site feed URL: http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/atom.xml)
(Original Post) (http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/2007/09/gop-vs-us-military-part-three-readiness.html)
Destroying Readiness and Purging the Officer Corps
* The Danger Grows...
Our topic is the ongoing campaign (http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/2007/02/more-on-war-against-professionalism-in.html) by President George W. Bush and the Neoconservatives to undermine, discredit, suborn and crush the professionals who make up the U.S. Civil Service, the intelligence and law enforcement communities, the courts, scientists, and any others who might stand in the way of their principal program -- the unlawful usurpation of unaccountable power.
Foremost among these skilled and dedicated public servants -- who have been the Bushites’ first and worst victims -- are members of the United States Military. As I have been showing, our men and women in uniform have been harrassed, overworked and undersupported. The services are worn down and misused, apolitical traditions shredded, and careers terminated... especially whenever a brave officer or enlisted person stands up to protest.
Whether this destructive process is driven by obstinate dogmatism -- or something diabolically deliberate -- is left to opinion. (Or else, it is a matter for our harried professionals to uncover.) Nevertheless the overall outcome is unmistakable. It appears that flag-waving jingoism and noisy posturing do not guarantee genuine support for our troops. Indeed, they seem to correlate with the exact opposite.
.
In Parts 1 & 2 we covered two important aspects of the Bush War Against the Military -- the systematic demolition of two precious and useful abstractions. Our reputation for invincibility and our reputation for taking the high moral ground.
Both were powerful incentives for people and nations to try to be our allies, rather than enemies. Indeed, these were the underpinnings of a nearly-worldwide consensus, before 2003, to accept a “unipolar world.”
Today, both of these important images lie shattered. And the world -- despite so much sacrifice -- is a far more dangerous place.
.
* It gets even worse.
But enough about image and reputation. Now let’s talk about the actual, day-to-day situation in today’s U.S. military.
I have elsewhere addressed the declining state of US military readiness (http://www.davidbrin.com/readiness2.html), offering a glimpse at the horrific condition of our National Guard and Reserves, whose principal task should be preparing for emergency service at home, or (at most) overseas in some dire and temporary crisis. Not to be dashed -- at presidential whim -- into lengthy and grinding foreign adventures or political wars. The devastation of our reserves, tearing families apart, breaking solemn promises and leaving communities defenseless, should be a major scandal. It certainly is part and parcel of the overall demolition of our military.
As is the attempted purge of the U.S. Officer Corps. (http://www.mccmedia.com/pipermail/brin-l/Week-of-Mon-20051017/033719.html) A culling process that has only accelerated, eliminating men and women of stature from what had been a large pool of supremely educated, competent and apolitically dedicated professionals, replacing many of them with yes-man hacks...
...a catastrophe that can only be compared to Joseph Stalin's purge of the Red Army (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Purge) in 1937-1938, which is widely blamed for leaving the Russian officer corps understaffed and undertrained (http://books.google.com/books?id=oanB4q0o2vsC&pg=PA154&lpg=PA154&dq=purge+officer+corps&source=web&ots=PlJcqCSAse&sig=1P3uyjsFFIUUG zcg_v4LvNcitY#PPP1,M1) on the eve of war with Nazi Germany. True, the neocons aren’t shooting our generals and admirals, just forcing them into early retirement. But be patient. We may still be in early days
A couple of years after I first broached this matter, news articles (http://www.thenation.com/doc/20061016/whalen) began circulating about clusters of retired flag officers, speaking out against the creeping betrayal. What remains puzzling is the gaping silence from prominent democrats -- except for Wesley Clark -- about an issue that should be right out there. Treated as one of our paramount concerns.
(Let’s take a note of optimism in the rise of Navy CNO Admiral Mike Mullen to be our nation’s next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with Adm.William Fallon as Commander of US Central Command -- both of them outspoken critics of administration policy and diametrically opposite to kind of officers we are accustomed to seeing rewarded by this president. These important promotions suggest that the military professionals aren’t exactly lying down. Dedicated to silence on political matters, they may nevertheless have applied forceful back pressure of their own, behind the scenes, against the ongoing Bushite purge. If so, these people deserve honor for defending us, yet again, this time from an enemy within.)
.
* But the Great Purge Has Many Sides
Alas, our military’s professionalism and dedicated tradition of Constitutionalism are under assault from many directions, not just the ongoing effort to bully or dumb-down commanders at the top. There is also a deeply worrisome campaign to suborn and infiltrate dogmatism into the ranks, from the side and from below.
Bruce Wilson a lead researcher for the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, (http://militaryreligiousfreedom.org/) wrote to me about ongoing neocon efforts to transform the United States Military, turning it into an active force for the fundamentalist Christianization of America. (Moderate churches have always played a very different and positive role.)
Read (http://www.dailykos.com/story/2007/9/16/84937/8022) more about scandalous efforts to turn our apolitical and Constitutional military into an instrument of religious orthodoxy, on our way toward a theocratic state like the one forecast - in fiction - by a worried Robert A. Heinlein. (In prophetic novels he portrayed theocracy beginning, chillingly, in the year 2012.) MRRF is commendably trying to combat this trend, which some services have resisted more vigorously than others. (For a darker view, from an even more worried perspective, see http://community.livejournal.com/dark_christian)
Responding to my recent articles, Bruce Wilson wrote: “I can guarantee your concerns were not overblown. In fact, my research findings have recently demonstrated that.” Wilson acknowledged though, that none of their efforts have yet been directed at what may be the most dangerous part of this trend, an attempt by up to one hundred far-right members of Congress to stock the military academies with young men and women whose allegiance would no longer be Constitutionalist and neutral, but rather, as personal, ideological and lopsidedly political as the praetorians, janissaries, or jaguar warriors of old.
Of course, I had hoped that MRFF would already be monitoring this part of the problem. Perhaps now they will. It could take substantial dedication and research... or else, perhaps, just a simple polling of Congressfolk, under the letterhead of a quasi religious group, asking a straightforward question: “Are you using your Congressional privilege to appoint dedicated evangelical Christians to the military service academies?” One might be surprised how eagerly obliging and up-front some of the representatives are likely to be. (If any of you out there have suggestions or contacts that might be helpful, do contact MRFF (http://militaryreligiousfreedom.org/).)
I am especially interested in any confirmation of one clear impression -- that the Navy has been stalwart in resisting attempts to “stock” fanatics into Annapolis, while the Air Force has given in completely -- lock, stock and MX missile.)
.
* The Devastation of America’s Readiness for Real War.
Back when (http://www.davidbrin.com/readiness2.html) I first raised the issue of declining military readiness, I never expected That the people of America would let things get even worse. But we have. And, ultimately, the fault lies at our own feet.
Two years ago,, I spent a fascinating several days at Fort Irwin, in California’s Mojave Desert (to film an episode of my “Architechs” (http://htyp.org/The_ArchiTECHS) TV show) riding armored hummers and interviewing Special Forces sergeants. There, at the National Training Center, US Army Brigades used to assemble for large scale field exercises, practicing the art of full-force combat in order to hone the very skills that were used so effectively against Saddam’s huge military machine, both in 1991 and in 2003. These are the capabilities -- to fight large-scale land warfare -- that seemed so impressive to the rest of the world, that many potential adversaries seemed ready to admit that they would never achieve parity with such a formidable US Army.
That was then. Today, no brigades come to the National Training Center, anymore, to forge their large scale war-fighting skills in fiercely realistic exercises. Now, small units arrive weekly to blitz in and out of fake Arab villages, simulating urban counter-insurgency tactics. In essence, we have turned almost all of the US Army into one giant SWAT team. Yes, it is an important modern skill. We need to invest in 21st Century counter-insurgency tools and doctrines. But have we forgotten that the principal purpose of the Army is to defend our nation from those who would wage real war against us?
(And, again, would you not expect conservatives to be the ones making this very point? Imagine if Bill Clinton had done this to the Army. How they would have howled!)
Are there any exceptions to this near-utter turn of the US Army away from training for war? Well, one brigade of the 101st and one of the 82nd are kept on standby, at a high level of readiness. But they are light, air-mobile forces... essentially SWAT teams in their own right. So, when it comes to heavy warfare, they don’t count. No. If you look carefully, we only have a couple of brigades that are ready, at this moment, to perform a heavy war-fighting role. And those are in Korea. That’s two brigades. Maybe three. Far away from home.
I am often amazed by how seldom people in the press see what is right before their eyes. Take the story of the Third Infantry Division, whose pivotal role in the 2003 Iraq Invasion hurled them -- heavily outnumbered -- against the best of Saddam’s best Republican Guard. Whatever one thinks of the dismal and deceitful Bushite caste, who first nurtured Saddam Hussein, then deliberately left him in power, in 1991, to continue brutalizing his people for twelve more years, then finally toppled him but botched the aftermath... putting all of that aside... the story of the Third Division ought to have been written up, even made into an epic film. Forsaking sleep for an entire month, that one unit took on the labors of an entire armored corps. Under-reinforced and undersupplied by Donald Rumsfeld, they nevertheless showed how much skilled warriors can achieve, when their training, equipment, doctrines and morale are honed to a mighty peak.
Ask the officers of the Third now -- (or, for that matter, ask the entire United States Marine Corps) -- how they feel about being converted into an occupying constabulary, re-taking the same dusty streets, over and over again, bleeding without apparent goal, for people who (to a large degree) just want them to go away.
Ask if they feel ready to perform such miracles again, in the state they’re in today.
.
Let’s put the condition of the Army in metaphorical terms that get right to the heart of the situation. Speaking off the record, one general recently told me: “The Army that George Bush Senior fielded... or the one that Bill Clinton commanded ... could beat our present force, hands down. Even hobbled and blindfolded. Hell, I wonder if we could keep the Mexican Army out if (purely in theory) they decided to invade.”
.
That was a general. Add this to the deliberate and criminal destruction of our reserves, in a political war that is at-best “a utopian exercise in nation-building,*” and you have an issue that any democrat with sense, perspective and courage could turn into national howls of outrage, from patriots of both left and right.
But then, perhaps I am assuming way too much from today’s democrats.
Alas.
Well, at least there is the Navy.
God bless the United States Navy.
--------
(* a prize to whoever can cite who said this.”)...a collaborative contrarian product of http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/ (site feed URL: http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/atom.xml)
(Original Post) (http://davidbrin.blogspot.com/2007/09/gop-vs-us-military-part-three-readiness.html)