Walking the beat
U.S. Marine Lance Cpl. Lane Edward Morrow, of Susanville, CA, of 3rd Platoon, Kilo Company, 3/4 Marines, walks during an early morning guard shift at a vehicle checkpoint near Patrol Base 302, in Helmand province, southern Afghanistan, Thursday, Aug. 25, 2011. The Marines living in austere conditions at PB302 exchange fire regularly with Taliban who attack from multiple positions. (AP Photo/Brennan Linsley)
In: Images, Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan, US Marine Corps, War on Terror
Gold Star mom says military may be complicit in Taliban ambush
Susan Price, the mother of fallen Marine Gunnery Sergeant Aaron Kenefick, said on the Tom Bauerle radio show that military commanders may have been complicit in the ambush that killed her son and four other soldiers and Marines.
The action she describes is the infamous Battle of Ganjgal, where Marine Corporal Dakota Meyer was awarded the Medal of Honor and former Army Captain Will Swenson has reportedly been nominated for the Medal of Honor as well.
Her son was a Recon Marine and was “Marine of the Year” twice in ten years.
In: Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan, Battle of Ganjgal, War on Terror
Foreign aid workers and Afghans murdered in riots, blame falls on U.S. pastor
General David Petraeus, the top commander of both U.S. and international forces in Afghanistan, says that the recent Qur’an burning in Florida has inspired multiple deadly riots in Afghanistan. Afghan President Hamid Karzai called last month’s Qur’an burning by the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Fla. “a crime against the religion and the entire Muslim nation,” and demanded that Pastor Terry Jones be brought to justice.
This incident demonstrates that in Afghanistan, we are fighting a war against an enemy who often has few ideological differences with the population we are trying to protect. The Taliban and the Afghan people both seek the establishment of Islamic sharia law, which explains President Karzai’s demands to bring Jones to justice. Under sharia law, burning a Qur’an is considered blasphemy – anything disadvantageous to Islam can be considered blasphemous – and may be punishable by death.
While the Qur’an burning has destabilized the security situation for our troops in Afghanistan, it only provided the catalyst for those whose sensitivities are on a hair-trigger anyways. The problem isn’t burning books – it’s the ideology that inspires people to take to the streets, injuring and killing innocent Afghans (including at least one child) and aid workers in retaliation for the burning of a book.
Americans should read books instead of burn them, but when something so simple can inspire riots and murders around the world, pyrophilic “outreach centers” aren’t the ones with the problem.
In: Articles, Geopolitics, Religion · Tagged with: Afghanistan, Islam
UK paratroopers in Afghanistan
A member of 9 Parachute Squadron 23 Engineer Regiment keeps watch during the construction of the next phase of Route Trident in Helmand, Afghanistan. This particular phase of the major road building project has seen the engineers tackle a challenging piece of terrain known as the “Culvert of Doom” close to the Patrol base at Nahidullah. The road is being solidly constructed using carpet-like membranes, tough plastic neo cells and high quality aggregates and stone, which should hold together well despite heavy vehicles and harsh weather conditions. Local people themselves are being employed to carry out some of the work which brings welcome cash into the area's economy. The route itself will enable trade and commerce for many years to come. The engineers have heavily committed to an operation to build across the Loy Mandeh. In the clear phase, the combat engineers provided explosive breaching to enable 2 Scots to break into insurgent strongholds. Holding work included the reinforcing of compounds, and the construction of Sangers. Route Trident is now being extended across the Mandeh. The terrain is harsh and challenging; requiring plenty of airborne initiative. Photo by POA(Phot) Sean Clee, Crown Copyright
In: Images, Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan, UK military
Vikings in Afghanistan
A Norwegian soldier clearing mines in Meymaneh, Afghanistan. (Photo by Torbjørn Kjosvold, courtesy of MilitaryPhotos.net)
In: Images, Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan
Who is the bigger threat: the Taliban, or our own strategy?
“We are pinned down. We are running low on ammo. We have no air. We’ve lost today,” Marine Maj. Kevin Williams told his Afghan translator as Afghan soldiers repeatedly asked for helicopter support. American military trainers and the Afghan soldiers they were working with had been pinned down by intense machine gun, rocket-propelled grenade, and mortar fire for several hours, and the artillery support they had been promised was being withheld by commanders at a nearby forward operating base.
The combined force of 60 Afghan National Army (ANA) soldiers, 20 Afghan border police, and 13 U.S. trainers set out before dawn on Sept. 8, 2009 to search the rugged Afghan village of Ganjgal in eastern Kunar province for weapons and to conduct a meeting with local officials. The town had just recently rejected the Taliban’s authority in favor of the Afghan government. The village elders had requested that Afghan troops would conduct the sweep, and the embedded American trainers were present in case air or artillery support was required.
As the unit approached the village, situated in a valley encircled by craggy mountains, the town’s lights suddenly turned off – a likely sign that the mission has been compromised. Minutes later, the first shots were fired at the column, and the force was quickly enveloped with heavy machine gun and rocket-propelled grenade fire. The Americans and Afghans took cover behind rock walls, and the enemy began an attempt to flank the pinned-down unit.
As a force of about 100-150 enemy fighters maneuvered to flank the unit, the American commander called for the helicopter and artillery support that had been assured before the men set out. Although the unit was informed that helicopter support would arrive within five minutes, a reporter who had embedded with the unit stated that helicopters didn’t arrive for 80 minutes after the call – the helicopters were fighting another battle in the nearby Shuryak Valley, and two pilots had reportedly been shot.
The unit was taking heavy casualties, surrounded on three sides, their radio only working intermittently, when they learned that the artillery support they had been promised earlier was not coming. Despite assurances that the requested targets were not near the village, officers at the nearby forward operating base came back on the radio and informed the Americans that new rules of engagement prevented them from allowing any artillery near the village in order to prevent civilian casualties. When the team requested smoke rounds be fired to hide their retreat, the fire base did send white phosphorous rounds – 50 minutes later. Reports also state that commanders did not comply with repeated requests for reinforcements via the on-call quick reaction force.
In: Articles, Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan, Battle of Ganjgal, counterinsurgency, Rules of Engagement
Reading on the Battle of Ganjgal
On Sept. 8, 2009, three U.S. Marines, their Navy corpsman, and a soldier were killed as U.S. commanders withheld artillery support. As I write an article on the matter, I wanted to post my sources so others may read about this battle. If there can be a bright spot from this, the military is reportedly going through the process of determining whether former Cpl. Dakota Meyer of Kentucky is to receive the Medal of Honor. If confirmed, Meyer would be the second recipient of the nation’s highest award for valor since the Vietnam War.
Rep. wants answers on Ganjgal ambush probe
Heroism in ambush may yield top valor awards
Ambush survivor up for Medal of Honor
Report: Army denied aid to team under fire
Deadly Afghan ambush shows perils of ill-supplied deployment
‘We’re pinned down:’ 4 U.S. Marines die in Afghan ambush
In: Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan, Battle of Ganjgal, counterinsurgency, Rules of Engagement
Curahee: a miraculous recovery
On May 7, 2008, an IED exploded beneath a humvee in Afghanistan, killing three and seriously wounding Army 1st Lt. Brian Brennan of Howell, NJ and Specialist Ryan Price of California. Lt. Brennan suffered cardiac arrest, multiple fractures, the loss of both his legs, and a serious traumatic brain injury that placed him in a coma.
The story of his recovery is nothing short of miraculous. Watch the video.
Mr. Brennan’s foundation is here.
In: Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan
Major changes needed in Afghanistan
Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. Tom McInerney writes that if we are to win in Afghanistan, Gen. Stanley McChrystal isn’t the only official worthy of firing, and President Obama must abandon his denial that we are at war with “radical Islam.” (HT Kenny B.)
First to the State Department: Ambassadors Eikenberry and Holbrooke have long outlived their effectiveness. They are a drag on success in this difficult war. They must go.
Next, to the Department of Defense: This a war is not an “Overseas Contigency Operation (OCO)” as President Obama’s administration calls it. We have lost 89 ISAF soldiers and 53 US soldiers this month with 2 days left to go.Mr. President, we are in a violent war against radical Islam and your denial of this fact will ensure our defeat.
You and your administration cannot even define the ideology we are fighting against. John Brennan, your National Security adviser for counterterrorism, thinks “jihad” means “holy struggle” not a war against infidels.
Your Secretary of Defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff have accepted these ridiculous new definitions of the threat.
This means you, and your national security leadership team are clueless about how to defeat this violent threat against America.
They must all go and you must change your senseless strategy.
It is unfortunate that nearly all of the flag officers that make sense have retired.
I have seen no indications that this administration desires victory in Afghanistan. We can debate who should be sacked and who shouldn’t be, but regardless of whether McChrystal, Petraeus, or Sun Tzu is commanding ISAF, the result will look pretty much the same as they must follow the Commander-in-Chief. So rather than simply sacking commanders and ambassadors (treating the symptoms and not the disease), I would like to take things one step further: Let’s go back to the drawing board.
The president must answer these questions (truthfully):
- Who is our enemy in Afghanistan and what are their intentions?
- What are our intentions in Afghanistan?
- How do you define victory in Afghanistan?
- What are you doing to achieve victory in Afghanistan?
America deserves clear and concise answers, not lies and distractions. If his answers stink, then “We the People” must remind him that the government ultimately works for us. We must fight in Afghanistan – that’s not the debate we should have. It should be who we are fighting and how we should fight them. Worry about firing commanders and diplomats after we have a solid and just foundation.
In: Military, Politics · Tagged with: Afghanistan, Obama administration
What did McChrystal say?
Diana West wrote months ago that Gen. Stan McChrystal had several serious flaws (seven by her count), worthy of dismissing the general only weeks after taking command of all troops in Afghanistan. To me, this one was the worst:
“Preoccupied with protection of our own forces, we have operated in a manner that distances us – physically and psychologically – from the
people we seek to protect,” McChrystal wrote in a 2009 memo.
First, there is nothing that we can do to win the hearts and minds of the “people we seek to protect” whom it just so happens are religiously commanded to either kill, convert, or subjugate non-Muslims. And how on earth is putting the protection of our own forces first a negative in the eyes of a military officer? West writes:
That a general could write so disparagingly of the means to preserve his soldiers at least to fight another day is despicable. But this is what zealots do. They serve theories, not men; they see visions, not reality. And that theory, that vision is akin to the familiar Marxist notion, likely imbibed during PC school days, that denies that identity, religion, and culture matter. In the resulting tunnel vision, the so-called hearts and minds strategy looks like a winner.
This is the underlying basis of the counterinsurgency warfare now in vogue. “Hearts and minds” is not only the flawed rationale behind “nation building,” it also inspires the restrictive rules of engagement finally causing unease at home. This strategy – now framed as “the battle for the support of the [Afghan] people” — must be junked if our military is ever to be used effectively and appropriately.
McChrystal did say one thing in the memo that I agreed with: “The insurgents cannot defeat us militarily; but we can defeat ourselves.”
That is exactly what is happening. But with a new commander in Afghanistan, we can push for Congressional hearings on the Rules of Engagement. Untying the hands of our troops will go a long way towards defeating the Taliban and al Qaeda-affiliated terrorist groups. But that will not happen unless Americans unite behind our troops, and press Congress to investigate the ROE.
In: Military · Tagged with: Afghanistan, counterinsurgency, Rules of Engagement
