A Question of Treasure

Most discussions about the ongoing endorsement of the United States in Afghanistan are centered on the number of American troops on the ground, their projected withdrawal beginning in late 2011 and the ability of the Afghan army and national police to increase their strength and capabilities despite corruption, desertion and illiteracy.
Building and maintaining this Afghan force will take money and it will come from the United States. The United States had spent over $20 billion training Afghan forces between 2003 and 2009 and expects to spend about the same this year and next alone. From 2012 to 2015 the U.S. military plans to spend an average of $6.2 billion per year. Adding it up, by 2015 we will have spend over $60 billion training Afghan forces. By comparison the total annual gross domestic product of Afghanistan is $14 billion. The irony of all this is that we are borrowing this money from China and will be required to repay it with interest.
These facts and figures will become painfully relevant as we struggle with ongoing budget deficits and rising national debts in the United States. While Cleveland and Kalamazoo crumble we may take solace in the fact that we are securing and rebuilding Kandahar and Kabul.

The Mosque Debate: Larger Ramifications

Billions of Muslims throughout the world are not blind or deaf to the “debate” over the proposed Muslim Community Center in New York City. In my opinion, it creates the most powerful recruiting poster that Al Qaieda and the Taliban have had since Abu Ghraib. Furthermore, it creates a bigger threat to US troops on the ground trying to win hearts and minds in Iraq and Afghanistan than the release of classified documents by Wiki leaks. The politicians and pundits participating in this dysfunctional behavior need to think beyond their own election or ratings.

Careerism and Army "Mentors"

Careerism, the propensity of officers to be more concerned with promotions and the perks of their position than the well being of their troops and success in combat, has been a problem since nations have had the standing, “professional” militaries. In the United States, it peaked as a problem during the Vietnam era and was studied and identified as a contributor to our failure in that war. Today, we are metastasizing the problem through the Pentagon’s senior mentors program, which allows retired three and four-star admirals and generals to act as highly paid (with taxpayer dollars) consultants to the military while simultaneously receiving their pensions and being on the payroll of defense contractors; an invitation to conflict of interest and scandal through careerism on steroids.
While the nation comes to grips with a staggering national debt and budget deficits projected far into the future, the Pentagon budget of more than $700 billion has remained largely untouchable. Recently, many analysts have said that health care benefits earned by retirees are unsustainable, and Secretary of Defense Gates has offered several spending cuts aimed at redundant weapons programs and useless stateside commands. Nevertheless, this senior mentor program allows a participant to earn up to $230,000 per year at $440 per hour while collecting a pension of up to $220,000 per year and being on the payroll of a defense contractor. To make matters even more alarming, the Pentagon refuses to reveal the names of the participants in the program or their affiliations. USA Today has identified 158 mentors and found that 80% had defense industry ties.
Most of these “mentors” are the very architects of policies and strategies that led to problems and failures on the part of the Pentagon, but are now paid by the same Pentagon to pass on and rationalize their failed approaches to a next generation. A chilling aspect of this model is that the current cohorts of active duty -- three and four stars that support the mentors program -- can reasonably expect to have the opportunity to be mentors when they retire, thus perpetuating this scandal in waiting. Finally, the program subverts the responsibility that every officer serving actively has to mentor subordinates for whom he or she serves as rater or senior rater.
Rather than having lawyers and bureaucrats modify the rules of the program for over-the-hill war profiteers around its edges, Secretary Gates should kill the senior mentors program before the scandal occurs.

Published in USA TODAY August 5th, 2010

Leaders, rules add to Army troubles

In USA today's article about the Army's suicide crisis, Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the Army vice chief of staff, said commanders might let an arrest for drunken driving go unpunished to allow a soldier to go to war (“Leaders criticized in Army suicides,” News Friday)
Of the commanders of the 25,283 soldiers who had committed violations that could have resulted in a discharge from the Army, how many were reprimanded or relieved as a result of their choice to allow these “high-risk” soldiers to remain? Senior leaders condoned this dereliction of duty and now sanctimoniously criticize it with a wink.
The Army study about the suicide rate implies that leaders do not “know” their soldiers well enough to identify their high-risk behaviors or their propensity to commit suicide.
I find this view ironic at best and hypocritical at worst in light of the Army's “don't ask don't tell” policy. The policy specifically precludes frontline leaders from knowing something as basic as the sexual orientation of the soldiers they have the privilege of leading.
The Army has serious problems that won't be solved by poor discipline on the part of senior leaders or policies based on lies of omission.

Dennis Laich
Major General, US Army retired
Powell, Ohio

ENDS = WAYS + MEANS

Recently there has been a lot of talk by pundits, politicians, analysts, and the general public about our involvement in Afghanistan. It has been energized by the downsizing of our Iraq footprint, the change of command there (Patraeus over McCrystal) and the realization that we have been there nine years with rising casualty rates and significant dollar outlays with little positive impact after the first of those nine years. I believe that this talk is generally unstructured and would suggest that using the same analysis model used by the military and civilian national security community at the strategic level would be helpful.
The model is known as “ends, ways, and means,” where ENDS = WAYS + MEANS. Ends are defined as the strategic outcomes or end states desired. Ways are defined as the methods, tactics, and procedures, practices, and strategies to achieve the ends. Means are defined as the resources required to achieve the ends, such as troops, weapons systems, money, political will, and time. The model is really an equation that balances what you want with what you are wiling and able to pay for it or what you can get for what you are willing and able to pay.
Regarding Afghanistan, if you solve the equation from left to right, stating specifically the end “your desire, you then must identify what ways and means would be required to achieve that end. (One basic question in addressing the ends is whether we are conducting counter terrorism or counter insurgency operations.) You would have to identify how many U.S. casualties you are willing to suffer (to date 1064 KIA), how much money you are willing to spend (now at $7 billion per month), how reliable the Karzai government is as a partner, and what role the Taliban, Pakistan, India, and our allies are willing and able to play and for how long. Solving the equation from right to left, you would identify the ways and means you are willing and able to generate and thus establish the “end” they are able to achieve.
I would submit that a rigorous, intellectually honest exercise of this model explains the frustration we now feel with Afghanistan. If we state unambiguously a worthy “end,” we may be unable or unwilling to generate the ways and means to achieve it. If we honestly state the ways and means we are willing and able to generate, the end they deliver may be suboptimal at best and an outright loss at worst. Two questions then may emerge. One, do we want to lose sooner or do we want to lose later? Two, do we want to lose big or do we want to lose small? Referencing Alexander the Great, Britain, and Russia, Afghanistan has never provided happy endings.

Last week ,our nation’s capital, the news media, and most of our allies were captivated by the sacking of a four-star Army general commanding thousands of troops in the Afghan war. The Commander in Chief did the right thing in sacking him and Gen. Stanley McChrystal did the right thing in acknowledging his mistakes and exiting quietly. This was a positive example of leadership, accountability and transparency. Unfortunately, these same attributes were not apparent in a much less publicized decision by senior Army leaders dealing with their own subordinates. On July 13, 2008, as many as 200 insurgents attacked a virtually indefensible position without even minimum logistical or tactical support by its higher commands at company, battalion, or brigade levels. The attack at the village of Wanat near the Pakistan border left nine U.S. soldiers dead and 27 wounded. Comprehensive investigations into the incident found that the three commanders at the company, battalion and brigade were guilty of “dereliction of duty” and negligence. Shockingly, Gen. Charles Campbell cleared the three officers of all charges and told the families of the nine dead soldiers that “punishing the three would have a chilling effect on other battlefield commanders who have to make crucial decisions.” No reprimand, no court martial, no discharge from the Army for these three “leaders.” This decision’s chilling effect will be on soldiers, their families, and all Americans who are aware of this institutional dereliction of duty.

The Korea Situation

Recent events on the Korean Peninsula present several challenges for the United States on several levels: strategic, operational and tactical. South Korea’s foreign minister said on May 19 that it was “obvious” that North Korea fired a torpedo that sank one of the South’s warships, the Cheonan, in March, killing 46 sailors. His statement was based on the findings of a multinational investigation lasting several months in which the United States was an active participant. The conclusions are based on both physical evidence and intelligence on the movement of North Korean submersibles and analysis of intercepted North Korean communications. To date, the U.S response, as expressed by State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley, is that North Korea must “cease provocative acts, cease acts of aggression that destabilize the region” and the United States urged the North to follow through on past commitments to abandon its nuclear program. There is also considerable diplomatic chatter about taking the issue to the UN Security Council. North Korea has stated that any military action against North Korea in response to the sinking of the Cheonan will result in “all-out war.”

The strategic reality is that the key player in any U.S.-initiated or supported effort to seriously sanction North Korea diplomatically or economically is China. China and the United States have diametrically opposed national interests relative to the Korean Peninsula. China wants a stable North Korea, and a divided peninsula. The U.S. wants a destabilized peninsula. This could ultimately result in millions of North Korean refugees flooding into China and the possibility (although remote) of a desperate North Korean regime pointing nuclear armed missiles at China. Such missiles would be difficult to intercept due to the short flight distance and would ultimately bring a unified democratic Korea on its border, a major U.S. aspiration. The irony of this is that since China is the United States’ biggest creditor, it would be loaning the United States the money to finance these problems for itself. The U.S. problem is the fact that one of its closest allies had one of its warships sunk in an unprovoked, surprise attack in international waters and it can do little about it. The limits of U.S. power and influence are showcased to its allies and enemies.

At the operational and tactical levels, the picture is equally bleak. If “all-out war” were to resume on the peninsula, it would be devastating because the North Korean regime knows it would be fighting in an “end game.” The largest population center in South Korea, Seoul, is within range of North Korean conventional artillery. Unless Seoul was essentially evacuated prior to the start of hostilities, civilian casualties would be devastating. The 28,500 U.S. service members currently in South Korea would be a primary target for a numerically overwhelming North Korean army that could quickly move south with little logistical support and no airlift required. How much combat power can a U.S. military generate that is already strained fighting two wars for seven to nine years, 7,000 miles to its east, and now fight another one 7,000 miles to its west? The logistics of such a scenario are staggering.

At the tactical level, fighting would be bloody and intense and could range from bayonets to nuclear armed ballistic missiles. The North Korean regime would be fighting for its life and would not be inclined toward early peace negations or half measures. This mindset leads to protracted conflicts, which in this case leads to significant civilian casualties in a densely populated South Korea, while the North Korean regime does not care about civilian casualties in the North or the South. Conversely, high civilian casualties do create a problem for the United States, as it would attempt to maintain its position on a moral high ground and maintain worldwide support for its actions and their consequences.

I am not advocating or discouraging any U.S. option. This is a situation that we should all monitor closely as it presents a range of problems for the United States and a relatively small array of bad options in response, with meaningful medium and long-range consequences.