know your enemy
I know, we "won" WWII. Because we stopped a world wide march towards a very bad thing.
agreed on that point, but this situation doesn't compare to WWII in any way that I can see, and not much with the Gulf War either. I understand the Good vs. Evil but that's an abstract level and I want to explore the realities. I would like to try to gain insight toward the road ahead and some of the tactical considerations:
-this "war" has no definitive end point - must clarify objective state
-no geographical boundries - political and tactical considerations
-the enemy is among us - they and their sympathizers have infiltrated our borders and our allies borders
-rules of war from the enemy perspective are incomprehensible - much like Japanese WWII
-no defined limit to who is considered a "fair game" enemy - religious, social, and political quagmires - very difficult w/o turning additional populace militant
- no specific "head of state" - multi-factional, multi-headed - who could represent "surrender acceptance"
- there is no surrender/treaty option - full annihilation loses world support
-We do not know our enemy
their values system
why do they fight/their conditions for peace
the goals of their support base (gen pop.) vs. their leaders agendas
they have little to live for, much to die for - can we change this?
experienced, battle hardened
extremely dedicated - brass balls
low support requirements
low cost
used to much lower "comfort level"
independent "guerilla" style vs. more static Soviet style
we greatly underestimate them and their determination - they've defeated the British, Russia undermanned and outgunned.
U.S. Military
Hi-tech advantages
Well equiped
Costly, operationally speaking
professional army, not as hardened/experienced
high support requirements
used to higher comfort level
individual soldier has much more to live for - less desperate
non-fanatical
How do they fight
- Afghanistan as a fighting environment - US has no experience
- current weapons systems?
- ground to air capabilities?
- mountain terrain = highly defensible, special vulnerabilities to attackers
- heavily mined
- special tactics - Choppers extremely vulnerable, unique mountain tactics
- low-tech advantages
- our reliance on high tech can fail us
- nearly bomb-proof fortifications
- Stingers from above Chopper ceiling
- suicide bomber/sabatuer
- acts of terror
- intel thru torture
How do we fight this enemy?
- deny supply?
- mine routes?
- compartmentalize
- sattelite imagery/spc ops
- black ops/psyops?
- choose fights carefully - stage/wait for advantageous opportunities
- is armor effective?
- what lessons can we take from the Russians
What goals can we reasonably attain in what time frame?
What strengths can we employ?
- muti-national ops - get other countries involved so they won't abandon
support for your goals
- split factions to turn against each other?
- Hearts & Minds - any concievable angles?
What weakness will impede our goals: impatience, arrogance, friendly body count, ineffective policy.
That's just off the top of my head and is only a military perspective centered around Afghanistan. In the end, if we ever want this to end, we need to understand them. To get in their collective head, we could look at our Foreign Policy over the last 30 years from the Palestinian perspective and try to realize why we're so hated and what we have to do to address that. Perhaps part of our end goal should be to get back on higher moral ground.
When we deployed to the Gulf, you may recall a lot of people who weren't giving us too good of odds being that the Iraqi Army was so much more battle hardened and experienced (The elite Republican Guard) - fighting in their backyard, etc. I laughed at that idea and told them "no, I can guarantee you we're gonna rip them a new one." I understood the type of battle we were going into, our advantages, and our superior capabilities. I almost let other people talk me into thinking I was underestimating the enemy. But I knew most these people didn't want to fight us - they were scared, starving, and put there under threat of death. I felt sorry for them. They were trapped b/w a rock and an a-hole - and no one wanted to die for him. This is a much different situation and a much different enemy.
The good news is that right now we have the world behind us - which we need to exploit and lock into a physical commitment - a powerful alliance. This is our base of strength.
The bad news is that I don't believe there's any way we're going to waltz thru Afghanistan like we did Iraq - if that's what it comes to.
Now what do you think?