I’m not sure why the Republican Party so set against my ever joining common cause with them, but here goes reason number 2,345:

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele may be misremembering exactly how and when the Afghanistan war began.
At a Republican Party fundraiser in Connecticut on Thursday, Steele declared that the war in Afghanistan “was a war of Obama’s choosing” that America had not “actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in,” in a response to an attendee’s question about the resignation of Gen. Stanley McChrystal — which Steele called “very comical.”
“The McChrystal incident, to me, was very comical. And I think it’s a reflection of the frustration that a lot of our military leaders have with this Administration and their prosecution of the war in Afghanistan,” said Steele. “Keep in mind again, federal candidates, this was a war of Obama’s choosing. This is not something the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in.”
“It was one of those, one of those areas of the total board of foreign policy ["in the Middle East"? -- Note: The audio is not quite clear in this section.] that we would be in the background, sort of shaping the changes that were necessary in Afghanistan as opposed to directly engaging troops,” Steele continued. “But it was the president who was trying to be cute by half by flipping a script demonizing Iraq, while saying the battle really should be in Afghanistan. Well, if he’s such a student of history, has he not understood that you know that’s the one thing you don’t do, is engage in a land war in Afghanistan? All right, because everyone who has tried, over a thousand years of history, has failed. And there are reasons for that. There are other ways to engage in Afghanistan.”
TPM

Mike…..Mike….Have you forgotten the grammatically challenged swaggering CinC who executed the invasion and ‘land war’ in 2001…then turned away to pursue an unrelated military adventure in 2003? Have you forgotten all of the pretend patriotic bluster when anyone came close to questioning the strategies for both? Way to go in illustrating how intellectually stunted your party is to keep you on as head mouthpiece. I mean, we all expect political hacks to lie, deceive and bloviate, but you’ve taken dishonesty to a new level. Bravo….

My good friends over at the American Legion blog called The Burn Pit, have brought out the big guns and declared WAR on the stupid and American Soldier hating website called Veteran’s Today. The Burn Pit takes issue with the Veteran’s Today website on multiple fronts.

Please take a few moments and head over to

http://burnpit.legion.org/2010/04/the-four-reasons-i-never-respond-to-emails-about-veterans-today/ to read it for yourself.

The CinC made a surprise visit to the combat zone yesterday, as most CinC’s are prone to do…this time to Afghanistan. In his predictable pep rally speech to assembled US forces, he made two statements that caught my eye and made me question the truth behind the rhetoric.

“If this region slides backwards,” Obama told the troops, “if the Taliban retakes this country, al-Qaida can operate with impunity, then more American lives will be at stake, the Afghan people will lose their opportunity for progress and prosperity and the world will be significantly less secure.

“We know there’s going to be some difficult days ahead, there’s going to be setbacks. We face a determined enemy, but we also know this: the United States of America does not quit once it starts on something. We will prevail, I am absolutely confident of that.”

We won’t quit? Ever?

We will never assess a situation as not being worth the national treasure of our nation….that once we start down a path, we shall not waver….even though logic and reason may dictate otherwise?  Where is the rationale for a Taliban regime to again harbor Al Qaeda?  The Taliban and Al Qaeda share little in common strategically, but they are intelligent enough to realize that they would quickly lose power once again by hosting the terror group. Add to this the feelings of betrayal and mistrust between Afghan and the ‘foreign Arabs’.

Recently counter-terrorism analyst turned academic Leah Farrall interviewed Islamic militant Abu Walid al-Masri, a longtime jihadist close to both Mullah Omar and Osama bin Laden. From this interview Farrall writes:

In his most recent letter to me, where he responded to an article I wrote for The Australian on al-Qa’ida’s Afghanistan strategy, he dropped the loudest bomb of all. He tells me the Taliban will no longer welcome al-Qa’ida in Afghanistan. Their return would make matters more complicated for the Taliban because “the majority of the population is against al-Qa’ida”.

He believes that disassociation is required. He tells me “if the link between the Taliban and al-Qa’ida is not broken the results will be bad for the Taliban and Afghanistan”. And he thinks that the Taliban should also move away from the salafist movement so it can be liberated “from all of the restrictions that hinder its political options”. The Austrailian

A withdrawal would of course provide short term propaganda to Al Qaeda, but in hollow rhetoric. A truly fervent jihadi will be drawn to the cause no matter the situation, but for all other financing and recruitment, a compelling threat must be conveyed to potential fighters and backers. By de-legitimizing Al Qaeda as a military threat, and as the overwhelming threat to western civilization…….and removing the perceived threat to Muslims [occupations], we take away that compelling threat that motivates many jihadi’s.

Here’s the question more Americans should be asking…..why aren’t factually based analysis’ entering into the national debate? Why do we accept the meme that we are escalating in Afghanistan intent on ‘disrupting and destroying terrorist groups’…when we all know that they aren’t there? These reasons for escalation are just as intellectually corrupt as the buildup to invade Iraq.

If someone supports trying to defeat the Taliban simply because of their moral temperature when it comes to human rights, fine. Just don’t frame it as an imperative to our national security.

We’ve come full circle with Obama channeling Bush in his invocation of ‘evil’. Just another statist, mainstream, god fearing political clone. So continues a long American tradition (dating back at least to the insurgency battles in the Philippines) of the United States committing troops [or escalating in this case] against an enemy who neither attacked us nor poses a security threat to us. This decision spotlights the Obama Administration as decidedly un-liberal and bringing about little to no ‘hope’ or ‘change’.

All of this occurs at a time when there exists both the rhetoric of the gravest threat to national security and asking not an iota of tangible support from the populace at large. So can someone….anyone….explain to me the rationale for even tepid support of escalation in Afghanistan? Given that nearly all of the rhetoric provided fails to support the reality…does it simply boil down to ‘well at least we’re doing something?’ Even though that something is counter-productive?

The Pentagon Thursday said it will relax enforcement of the “don’t ask, don’t tell” law that bars homosexuals from serving openly in the U.S. Military.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced the military no longer will investigate sexual orientation of military personnel based on anonymous complaints, will restrict third-party testimony and require that all cases be reviewed by high-ranking officials. Under the new policy the threshold will be raised for determining the appropriate information required to open a “credible inquiry” into whether service men or women have engaged in homosexual behavior.

UPI

DADT repeal and open service will happen whether anyone likes it or not. If not with Obama, then with another POTUS; if not this year, then another.

It’s a natural progression for a nation that espouses equality for all of it’s citizens. That doesn’t mean it has to happen tomorrow to appease interest groups. It should be enacted in an orderly and thoughtful process.

A panel of DIV and BCT CSM’s [and sister service counterparts] should be the driving force behind when and how this will occur. They, not aides, lobbyists and counsels will ensure that the structure and morale of the force is not compromised during what will be a rocky transition.

But if it is reasonable to assume that being gay does not hamper one’s ability to serve in the Armed Forces, to have the back of a brother, and to uphold the principles in which we live by……is it not also reasonable to allow those same people to serve true to those principles?

Is it not the prevailing attitudes of some straight people that prohibits the open and honest service of gays? As opposed to an inability to meet qualifications and commitment to serve one’s country?

I don’t advocate the military becoming a social experiment where it degrades capability and denigrates the role of protecting the nation. I do advocate the military upholding a standard commensurate with what we fight for.

Recent news about the Military’s concern over the possible abuse of prescription drugs has prompted a Virginia Congressman to consider drastic yet not unprecedented action.

Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., a Vietnam veteran and former war correspondent who now chairs the Senate panel that oversees military personnel policy, seemed to endorse the idea of letting troops in war zones drink alcohol as a way to relieve combat stress.

At a hearing of his Senate Armed Services military personnel panel, Webb asked defense and service officials about mental health issues facing deployed service members and, in particular, about a recent Military Times investigation into the military’s use of anti-depressants and other drugs for treating mental health issues.

Webb said stress relief is handled differently in every culture and suggested that U.S. commanders should reconsider allowing “alcohol for stress relief.”
Army Times

Alcohol has long been known as a social lubricant, and that’s no different when applied to it’s use by military personnel. This use, while often negative [every leader is well acquainted with the blotter report], can also be positive In the right circumstances. I left Baghdad just under two years ago; 15 months of no alcohol, no escapism, no pressure valve…except for 2 weeks of R&R leave. In theater, there is often no comfortable outlet for Soldiers to parse their experiences and come to terms with what they may have witnessed or experienced. Those events quite often get pushed down deep inside you…until a trigger or some random tick of the clock sends it all pouring out.

As it stands, soldiers are offered Combat Stress counseling with a stranger, a person who has not experienced what you just did, in a semi-clinical environment. It may help some people, but cracking a cold one may certainly help others….instead of waiting until they re-deploy…..to go from zero alcohol and escape to full on drunken retard in the span of a weekend. The families and the soldiers themselves pay the price [sometimes a very heavy price] for soldiers dealing with their issues after they have simmered and stewed. It may seem trivial….how can a few beers solve complex emotional issues that can range from accidentally killing a child to seeing a brother-in-arms killed by an IED? I don’t know how. But I think it can.

There are undoubtedly many of our brothers coming back with stress that cannot hope to be cured with beer and bonding…..but when it comes to saving and helping who we can…..our comrades and our charges….a little hops, malt and water can go a long way. Make no mistake, any allowance of beer in theater will be rationed and allotted during down cycles. It would not be allowed to endanger the mission or the men.

The Army’s “Battlemind” program is well intentioned, but as a participant I found it a waste of my time. Now, if the thought of re-writing General Order No. 1 seems like a stretch for the scrambled egg population, there may be another option to bring relief and closure to stressful deployments: emulate the British and Commonwealth Forces.

The King’s Centre for Military Health Research has an excellent and in-depth article detailing “The Use of Psychological Decompression in Military Operational Environments”

Major Maree Riley, an officer who has been involved in Australian Defence Force uses of decompression, notes that there is a second definition of so-called “third location” decompression, which refers to 48 to 72 hours in a location that is neither the operational theater nor home, for rest, returning of equipment and reintegration before finally returning to home location (personal communication).

The theory behind decompression derives from the military literature on combat motivation, which holds that the morale and effectiveness of any individual is dependent on his or her membership of a tight-knit social group3 and hence it is important to ensure that reintegration takes place within this social group just as much as operational exposure/combat.
KCMHR

Between allowing every Joe a couple of brews during designated down time and setting up a three-day stopover between Theater and Home Station…..a compromise can surely be arrived at. After all, Soldiers are not expendable assets, they are the heart and soul of our force and must be maintained better than any item in the inventory. The bond of love and trust that we share demands no less.

Hello Military Pundits readers! I just wanted to pop in to let everyone know that I will resume contributing when I return from somewhere in the Middle East. While I know that it is commonplace for deployed soldiers to blog, I am unfortunately under direct orders to not blog while deployed due to the nature of my unit’s mission. On a comforting note, the order is a blanket one issued neither due to anything that I’ve written in the past nor issued by anyone in my military chain of command or the DoD. So until I get back (whenever the hell that may be) rest assured I’ll be reading here along with the rest of you.

This picture is reported to have been taken on Ft. Benning (the home of the Infantry and future home of the Armor). Based on this sign and the one next to it, I assume it is located at the Provost Marshall or Military Police office on base.

What this picture is saying is that if you don’t register your weapons, then you are a terrorists. This is disgusting. How could any part of a military organization allow this sign to be posted. I did not realize that being considered a murdering and filthy terrorist was considered such a light-hearted issue. Why don’t they just say “If you don’t register your weapons you are a unpatriotic, baby and innocent killing bastard that should die”?

This was sent to me by a good friend, fellow milblogger and warrior. Since I just wrote a post a few minutes ago that this would have went well with, I decided to throw this one up real fast too.

It speaks to a lot of the issues that the military has with the current Administration and why there is NO respect for them, or some of those around them.

http://wizbangblog.com/content/2009/11/11/help-wanted-commander-in-chief.php

Last Friday I woke up to my normally filled email inbox. However there were two emails that stuck out to me. One was from BBC and the other was from SkyNews. I have been a guest on both of their Radio and TV shows respectively, but am on BBC much more. Both media outlets wanted to talk to me about the shootings at Ft. Hood. Not so much because I was stationed there for four years or because I was there just the week before the shooting, but because of my military veteran perspective.

The BBC program is more of a roundtable with multiple guests (to include my buddy David Bellavia who was on about 15 min before I was) and people from all over the world who are calling in, emailing in and commenting on the blog for the show. I was amazed to hear what I did on that show before coming on and even more alarmed that many in the US media were hinting at the same thing.

For anyone to suggest that Maj Hasan was “pushed” over the edge and not properly cared for by the Army healthcare system because his PTSD was not cared for and he was neglected is full of shit. The guy had never deployed and he was part of the “system” that the Army provides to help soldiers with issues after coming from combat. As my good friend Toby Nunn and CJ Grisham said here, http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2009-11-08/how-to-help-the-shell-shocked/ PTSD is not contagious. I mean if it was then do we need to be wary of every clergyman who hears the sins of their congregation? Will these clergymen snap and start performing the sins of those that they counsel? No, we would never consider that.

Hasan was trained on the Army and taxpayer dime to be a Dr. and to be the mental health professional that helps soldiers. He rode the Army gravy train to get a free education. If he was that opposed to the Army and to the War on Terror, he could have resigned his commission at any time. He did not have to stay in to get the free ride, but Lord knows he did. He had many, many chances since 9/11/01 to call it quits, leave the Army and pursue his education on this own dime. But instead he stayed in and get a free education and then turned on his own country, on his fellow soldiers, and many that worked at the same hospital that he did and mowed them down.

Some may say to have compassion for him and to give him a benefit of the doubt, or to not forget that he is a soldier too. So what!!! Just because he raised his hand and said the same oath as thousands of other patriotic Americans does not excuse what he did or give him special treatment. Tim McVeigh was a soldier too, but he was still a murdering asshole. Guess what, I don’t need a court of law to tell me this guy is guilty. There are too many witnesses that said he was the shooter….case closed. He is a piece of shit that used the Army and the taxpayer for a free education and then turned on his own country. I don’t care that he was born in Virginia, he is a murderer. He needs the death penalty and the Army needs to execute the death sentence with speed. In fact, I really hope that he can hang in there long enough to spill his guts and tell the authorities all they need and then he can die right there in the hospital. Once he gives all the answers that we need, then there is no more need for him to hang around to steal oxygen. He can punch out right then.

We have a sacred bond and trust among all service-members. It is something that cannot be readily explained. He violated that bond and as far as I am concerned, he is no longer part of the circle of trust.

I’ve been hearing about this all day.  I’ve had people call, text, email, and post on Facebook about it.  MOS 31E – Internment/Resettlement Specialist.  For some reason, advertisements for this MOS on various job boards, like Monster.com, have brought out more crazies than the Birthers could hope to generate.  It didn’t help that these ads were posted by National Guard recruiting.  I have otherwise perfectly sane friends flipping their lids over this thing.  As bad as I think the current administration is, I don’t think they’ve quite reached the level that this guy thinks they have:

I commented on this topic over at This Ain’t Hell , but I thought I might put my theory out here as well.

MOS 31E used to be “Corrections Specialist”.  Now, put yourself in the flip-flops of an 18-year-old kid sitting at the recruiter’s office.  Everyone knows that “Corrections Specialist” means “Prison Guard”.  Most young men seeking to enlist in the Army would view that job title to be about as exciting as MOS 92G – Food Service Specialist (note: I am NOT disparaging cooks by any means!  I have rarely ever had reason to complain about military chow, and actually worked as a line cook as a civilian for a time, so I know what a hard job it is).  The fact is, most of these kids want to do something in the Army that involves ACTION!  “Corrections Specialist” conjures up the image of sitting around dealing with criminals at Leavenworth or walking around on eggshells at Gitmo.  So here’s my theory:  some well-meaning Chairborne Ranger in USAREC got the idea that in order to gin up more interest in recruits for 31E the name needed to be made more appealing.  “Internment/ Resettlement Specialist” to me fires up an image of rounding up Taliban on the battlefield or moving refugees out of the line of fire.  I think it was probably a nice try at fixing a recruiting issue, but with people being on edge about the intentions of the government, it’s raised an irrational specter.

Look folks, I just don’t see the military rounding up U.S. citizens and putting them into concentration camps.  We simply wouldn’t do it.  I realize that a large portion of the populace still sees the military as being comprised of people not smart enough to tie their own boots without a Technical Manual and an order, but those people would be very shocked if they ever took the time to find out just how intelligent and educated the Armed Forces are…officers and enlisted (are you listening John Kerry?).  Believe me, we, as a group, are probably more familiar with the contents of the United States Constitution than the average member of say, SEIU.  There will be no Krystallnacht in America with the National Guard beating down your door.  We wouldn’t let that happen.