Willful Blindness: Army Unprepared for Another Jihadist Attack
Having been privy to some of the internal discussions since the Ft. Hood massacre, some additional interrelated problems need to be addressed. The first is what I call “classified blindness.” Not just in military circles, but throughout law enforcement there is a widely held belief that if information isn’t classified in some manner, it isn’t worth their attention. And if the information isn’t classified as at least top secret, it certainly isn’t actionable intelligence. Even though ninety-five percent of what they need to know is available through open sources.
Admittedly, there are important snippets of information only available through classified collections. Having seen some of this “classified” material, I have to admit that I’m not impressed. The fact remains, however, that both Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad, the Little Rock killer, and Maj. Nidal Hasan, the Ft. Hood killer, were already known to law enforcement before their attacks and still nothing was done to diffuse the threat. So there must be other forces at work.
Another culprit is what I term “analysis blindness.” As I speak with military anti-terrorism and force protection officials, I’m finding that many, if not most, don’t have the subject matter proficiency to even be able to understand what they are reading.
One real world example was a discussion I had with a senior analyst for a top military anti-terrorism group. This well-paid analyst, who is no doubt dedicated to the job and trying to do it to the best of his ability, could not tell the difference between Hamas and Hezbollah. And yet this individual is daily analyzing intelligence required to keep our military forces safe and secure.
As my colleague Lt. Col. Joseph Myers has repeatedly observed, the military’s force protection staff are rarely well-read in the field of Islamic terrorism, though many have graduate degrees in national security studies and the like.
An additional problem I have identified is “bureaucratic blindness,” meaning that the military force protection leadership spends the bulk of their time engaged in paper shuffling, budget requests, and staffing issues. Not to discount the necessity of planning and stewarding scarce resources, but when our force protection leaders are required to be little more than administrators and bureaucrats we shouldn’t be surprised when the focus on protecting the troops falls to the wayside.
Finally, there is a larger systemic problem at work. At its root, our military leaders do not understand the threat they are facing. Officers who have been trained in counterinsurgency tactics and exemplified courage in the face of a lethal enemy in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere seem completely unprepared to deal with the same enemy at home.
Senior Pentagon commanders have labored to define the threat out of existence –see the Department of Defense’s Ft. Hood report. Rather than acknowledge the proliferation of jihadist ideology and the threat it poses to our U.S.-based troops, these officials describe the problem as random, and ultimately unknowable, “violent extremism” (the favored term of the Obama administration).
Pretending that the threat is random and unknowable gives them license to do nothing. The fact is that the jihadist threat can be precisely defined, studied, and identified. It is the ability to understand the ever-evolving problem and the will to do something about it that is sorely lacking.
What my first-hand experience has taught me these past few months speaking with and to our military leadership concerning the domestic jihadist threat confirms that the status quo with respect to force protection has cost soldiers their lives. By doubling-down on those failed policies, our troops are now more vulnerable than ever.
And by ignoring the need to counter the jihadists’ tactics and targeting, many more will die.
Mr. Poole, great article. Having been involved in miltary manners for several years, I second your observations. We do an average job of identifying outside threats, but buearacracy hampers real analysis and threat reduction inside the facility.
A few armed, determined people could wreak havoc even on a well-protected base. Most military facilities prohibit the carrying and storage of firearms by thier members, much less practice a useful dangerous person or attack response. Seeing how we are mostly unarmed, the usual guidance is to lock the doors and hide until “the cops” arrive.
Patrick – I’m so glad you spoke before this audience. You say nothing about their appetite for your ideas. Were they receptive? Curious? Did anyone come up to you afterward in hushed tones to say they know all about it but dare not speak it openly? Or was the audience filled with dutiful drones…? It is a sick state if affairs when one hopes for the former in these insane latter days. It’s too much to hope that our military knows the name of our existential enemy along with his ideology.
Raymond Ibrahim has said, in his testimony before a US Congress panel, and Hugh Fitzgerald has written ad nauseam about the need for those fighting jihad/mohammedanism to understand the enemy for what it is and cease to be ignorant of the texts that are the ideological cornerstones of their actions (namely, the glory-ass quran, the hadith and the example of the genocidal, child-molesting prophet pretender Mahound, the epitome of “human” [as though such an adjective could apply to anyone committing the atrocities attributed to that inbred bedouin savage] perfection to all muslims.) In the case of the Fort Hood muslim terrorist attack, why is there still so much silence on the fact that Nidal Hassan’s alliance was never to the US Constitution or the US as a country; but, just as it is the case with all of those following his genocidal, violent and intolerant political ideology, their loyalties lie solely with their global community of “troo beeleevares™” (the umma), the glory-ass quran and submission to their prophet and his imaginary alter-ego? The explanation, plain and simple, is complete lack of knowledge of who and what the enemy is.
While those fighting communism decades ago had to learn about Marxism and read the works that served as the inspiration for the creation of the totalitarian ideology under the banner of the hammer and the sickle, those fighting islam and jihad continue, for the most part, to be apparently both willfully ignorant of islam’s tenets and naively believing in the supposedly “peaceful” nature of a political ideology masquerading as a religion (as though, as of today, the 15,234 terrorist attacks committed in the name of Mahound and his imaginary alter-ego allah since 9/11 weren’t enough to put to rest this obscene myth about how islam is to be regarded as a “religion” of “peace.”) And, when there is no ignorance on this subject, it seems that political-correctness and Buraq Hussein Obama’s Chamberlainesque policy of surrender and appeasement of 7th Century barbarism combined with the presence of jihadist agents at high levels of government will make sure anyone working hard to open people’s eyes gets silenced or receives the pink slip.
This is utterly suicidal, and the future of the whole Western World hinges on reversing such policies not only in the US, but in all other civilized nations which have seen an increase in the number of mohammedans living within their borders and, worse of all, learning Western combat tactics in their armed forces.
The Army is, apparently, a whole different outfit once you get to the CONUS rear eschelon.
The military establishment already has an official ban on active service by homosexual, which is not enforced except by the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. That means that, only if you self identify as a homosexual, the Army (any of the services) will process you out as unfit. In fact, the Army (unique in the services) will actively prosecute heterosexual behaviors, especially in its middle ranks, as being bad for disciplne. Go figure that one.
There have been several, high profile cases where muslim or muslim converts have commiitted murder against members of their own units, as well as the terror act by the muslim major at Fort Hood. It seems to me that, given the already demonstrated risk of such incidents by these people, an official ban on the islamic religion in the ranks is justified. By that, I mean that if you self identify as a convert, or if official inviestigation discovers that you are indeed a muslim, then you should be immediately separated from the service. There are also cases where the undeclared muslim should be prosecuted under the punitive articles of the UCMJ. Period.
We are at war with Islam, make no mistake about it. Notwithstanding that CAIR broadcast blather about “moderate muslims”, the religion bids them to make jihad on us and the most notable feature of the legendary moderate muslim is his absolute silence. Whether that is because he fears retribution or because he really agrees with the terrorists makes no difference in the end, the moderate is silent.
9/11 was a festival all over the Islamic world. I can still see those arab and palistinian women dancing in rapture at the news that their favorite guy has engineered the murder of three thousand Americans at the World Trade Towers. Until and unless they learn to fear what we will do if they persist, they will never stop. Unless the Military services recognize that fact and police its own ranks for these traitors, Fort Hood will be played out again.
Why haven’t the families of the murdered soldiers filed any complaints with or sued the government over their sons’ deaths? How come no heads have rolled because of Ft. Hood? Where are the pictures of these dead soldier’s caskets being laid to rest like the MSM does with those from the ME?
Jihadists are too smart to pull off another Ft. Hood. They know the result would be, “all bets are off.”
IMHO, the next attack will be a coordinated civilian attack probably on children-in school or a mall. Jihadists will want to see where we stand and our responses-if any.
“The experience at Ft. Hood demonstrated that active shooter training and prompt response by base police saved lives.”
Really? The guy killed 13 and wounded 30 people and you think the response saved lives?
More lives would have been saved if the Army got off its ass and let soldiers and civilians arm themselves. Why is it that soldiers – fully qualified to carry arms in Iraq and Afghanistan – can’t carry weapons on base? And why can’t civilians who have CHLs carry?
The fact is that the police aren’t there to stop anything. They show up after the fact and do the paperwork.
Within four minutes of the first 911 call, Hasan was down. Had base security not responded so quickly and had they not been through active shooter training just a few weeks before, there would undoubtedly been more people killed at Ft Hood. Yes, it did save lives.
And had Army personnel been armed in the first place, Hasan wouldn’t have gotten more than a couple of shots off. Police would have shown up to a bullet-ridden corpse instead of 43 of them.
Oooops, 43 should be 13.
I don’t disagree that soldiers should be allowed to carry on base. But that’s a separate question from whether the base police responded in a timely manner (which is what you took issue with in the first place). From an objective POV, they did. And yes, if the victims inside the readiness center had been armed, the situation probably would have resolved itself much sooner. But that wasn’t the case.
Actually, if they were permitted to carry, Hasan probably wouldn’t have planned the attack in the first place, since he would have known it would be a futile act. He might have gotten off a shot or two. Just before he died.
Bill Clinton passed the regulation disallowing the Soldiers to carry on base.
In addition there is a limit on the blade length for knives.
Sad.
“No guns on base” cannot be blamed entirely on Clinton (as much as I’d like to hit him for something). We were not supposed to carry privately owned guns on base back under Johnson, and only carry issue weapons when ordered to do so by higher. As I recall, live ammo was definately not to be carried at the same time as the weapon it fit unless ordered to do so by higher. Someone else will have to comment on private weapons in barracks (verbotten?), BOQ (unknown), or on base housing for married couples (varied over the years).
Note: Private vs issue weapons, and possess vs carry.
As a former Army veteran this attitude doesn’t suprise me one bit.
September of 1990, I arrived with my Army unit in the home of the religion of peace, Saudi Arabia. I was put on guard duty to protect hundreds of soldiers near the shores of the Persian gulf.
I was given my M16 and told to watch for anything or anyone approaching from the water. There was only one small problem. I was not given any ammunition.
When I protested to my “superior” officers I was told to shut up and follow orders.
At that point I advised the officers ( West Point fools) that in the event of a terrorist attack, I would immediately run for my life and that they and the soldiers I was guarding were on their own. That response did not go over real well.
My advice to any member of the military is this. GET OUT.
Don’t forget the Fort Dix plot. Only a matter of time.
You couldn’t be more clear. Thank you for trying and doing well.
There’s something Biblical about the determination of the left, the statists, the totalitarianists, to drive us all off the cliff. The bureau-rats you speak of merely react catatonically in the glare of their imminent ruin. Poor babies.
Of course it’s too late, but it would have been nice to have fired them all and used their salaries for bullets.
I work for DoD in DC. A month ago we had a guy from Ft. Belvoir to give a lecture on terrorism awareness. Which entity was repeatedly cited as the authority of groups we DoD employees must be aware of in the DC area? The Southern Poverty Law Center!!! My God!!!
The DoD has been taken over by the pod people!!
You are correct Ray…If the base personnel did so well. why is it that Hasan was stopped AFTER the cops arrived? Back the day all base security was armed and you were well advised not to mess with them-what happened?
”Militray leaders do not understand the threat they are facing” -wrong! They know full well but willful ignorance in the guise of political correctness is the uniform of the day and their careers depend on toeing the line. By doing so, the ”perfumed princes” at the Pentagon and those presently occupying higher levels of govt. are, in effect, using our children as cannon fodder.
Are you not aware that the “police” that responded were Dept of the Army police officers?
This well-paid analyst, who is no doubt dedicated to the job and trying to do it to the best of his ability, could not tell the difference between Hamas and Hezbollah.
When asked, Sylvestre Reyes, Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, couldn’t tell the difference between Sunni and Shi’ite.
Perhaps he should seek another Chairmanship, the House Un-intelligence Committee.
At its root, our military leaders do not understand the threat they are facing.
My own impression formed in the aftermath of the Ft. Hood shootings was that General Casey, in particular, is so bogged down in the military’s politically correct gobbleygook that he failed completely to see Nidal for what he was.
Setting the tone in DC, the Eric Holders and Barack Obamas, always at the ready to give excuses to Islamists.
Janet Napolitano was as eager to blow off this weekend’s Times Square incident as a lone, one-timer as she was to put the Christmas day underwear bomber in that category.
What’s happening to this country is frightening! The government is composed of Far Left radicals and now the military is affected. If this goes on, we will be doomed.
The day this happened I was brought to tears. Because it meant much more than the loss of life. It means that we cannot defend our country. The ethos that once existed in the US military is gone, politicians killed it. I do not know what this means in the long run. Will we get it back in time? I hope so. But we are deep in the 4th inning of this Presidency and our surrender first ask questions tomorrow strategy is creating more jihad than we can go after. Someday we are going to have to decide if are going to fight radical muslims the same way we fought nazi germany. Unfortunately Nuclear and Thermonuclear weapons make this a very scary prospect, but, it is either us or our children who fight this fight – I choose us. Enjoy your freedom, while it lasts.
24 years and change of active service. One thing always struck me as funny; at work I was the most heavily armed, dangerous person within my maximum effective range. I routinely carried M-16′s, grenade launchers, and both light and heavy machine guns. But after the shift was over, god help me if I was caught with a personal weapon on base. Even if you have a permit, you cannot carry on base, and you can only transport weapons to or from your quarters. The most restrive policies against the second amendment are on military installations. The brass seem to be more afraid of their own people than against any external threat. These are soldiers for God’s sake. If a few of the Senior NCOs were armed, the story would have ended a a lot less tragically. When seconds count, cops are minutes away…..
The brass and the civilian chain of command, all the way up to the president fear being overthrown. This is why they will not allow private weapons and this is why they will never bring the troops home.
Conservatives, who tend to revere the military and accept it uncritically, had better get on the ball, and recognize that the armed services are among the most politically correct institutions in America. We really have two militaries – the hard-nosed, practical, “get-it-done” troops at/near the front, who still hold the best traditions of American arms; and a vast rear-echelon full of careerist brown-noses, who play bureaucratic games and suck up to the feminist, homosexual, minority lobbies, and the pols on Capitol Hill. There are exceptions in both directions, of course, but that’s the pattern.
Criticism of any the protected groups above, or Muslims, is a potential career-ender. Anyone not on board for them at all times, won’t get promoted, and risks censure or premature retirement w/o a pension. Interested readers should check into: Brian Mitchell’s “Women in the Military,” Stephanie Guttman’s “A Kinder Gentler Military,” and Kingsley Browne’s “Coed Combat.” I grew up reading about and worshiping the WWII generation, and it gives me no pleasure to be so critical of today’s armed forces, but things are in bad shape, and I would hate for us to find out the hard way, in blood, when something like a peer opponent hits us. We have some of the finest soldiers in the world in our ranks; it isn’t they who concern me; it is the others, of whom there are far too many.
Look at the compilation of recent Muslim attempts that have been thwarted here in the U.S. (see http://www.jihadwatch.org/2010/05/jihad-the-threat-just-keeps-growing.html), factor in yesterday’s unsuccessful car bomb in Times Square—already being discounted by most in power and the MSM as “amateurish,” “unsuccessful,” and a ‘one-off attack” i.e. an “isolated incident” (no doubt carried out by a senile, gray haired granny who is a racist fanatic and blood-thirsty, gun-toting, Bible-quoting Tea Party member) with the intended implication that such attempts at slaughter by bumbling terrorists who, if Muslim, were no doubt “loners” and “nut jobs,” who “snapped” due to racist oppression, are not really something to worry about–and you can see that the trend is one of escalation of Muslim Jihadi attacks against all us “unbelievers” here in America, while our so called “protectors” are held in the powerful grip and paralyzed and misdirected by willful blindness and political correctness.
They say that “a fish rots from the head,” and unless the President truly understands the threat and has the guts to clearly state the fact that our enemy is Islam and Muslims, lays out their motivation and what their methods and goals are (and to his eternal discredit ex-President Bush did not do this), these attacks will increase in number and violence, and sometime in the future Jihadi terrorists will “hit the jackpot,” and will pull off an attack that will produce mass casualties, and then the “forest of fingers” will be pointing in all directions, except at those who have failed us so badly.
To our eternal discredit for electing him, this President, Barack Hussein Obama—raised as a Muslim in his childhood in Indonesia from ages 6 through 10–is, at the least, overly sympathetic to Muslims and Islam and, at the worst, a crypto-Muslim, so there is no hope of reform of our willful blindness there.
Even if the 2012 election were to sweep Obama and his whole repellent crew from office, I do not see the absolutely necessary complete revision of our entire understanding about such attacks, their source and motivation, and of our policy for combating them, in our future.
It has often been opined that it will take a new and successful Muslim mass casualty attack on U.S. soil to shake things up enough to force such a complete revolution in our understanding, thinking and policies to take place (but then again, that was supposed to be what happened as a result of 9/11, and didn’t), but with this totally PC crew in place and the example of how Maj. Hasan’s recent Jihadi attack has been handled, I am not sure that even a possible new and horrible bloodbath would be sufficient catalyst for such revolutionary changes.
The problem with the army is that they all want to fight World War II all over again. They are in to Big Army tactics and strategies. You can see it in how they operate and how they think. You can see it in their opposition to killing the Crusader program and other outdated Cold War relics. I was at a conference at West Point when a well regard Colonel refered to counterinsurgency operations as a flash in the pan fad which would soon pass away. He had no response when I pointed out that almost all of our major wars since the establishment of colonies on North American have contained elements of counterinsurgency and guerrilla warfare.
So far the military establishment has failed to adapt to the current environment. There are a few notable exceptions – General Petraus and others – but the establishment itself is the same. They wish the current situation to simple go away so they can get back to the business of keeping us safe from the enemy they want to fight in the way they want to fight it. As long as this mindset continues, we are all in danger.
The war that the internationalist subversives have always waged against America aims at making America weaker.
Any aspect of the situation must be exploited by the subversives to that goal, increasing the risks and lowering the defenses.
And that is all.
You will decide by yourself which policies are in agreement with that battle-plan and which are not.
POST SCRIPTUM
I read only now that the president has said that using a strong language can incite extremists to violence, therefore I will add:
if you are of the opinion that the power in America is in the hands of a gang of socialist-commies-nihilist-subversives YOU MUST peacefully work at rolling them back: organize meetings, speak with all your friends and co-workers, write to your Congressman, prepare for the elections, be sure you vote against the party you don’t like next November.
Subversives DO LIKE violence, they dislike Freedom and dissent, act accordingly.
Just imagine the day in which Freedom will win the elections.
Not tough enough for you ?
Found a newspaper, make it popular.
Become a teacher, roll back the subversion from the schools.
Become a university professor, fight dogmatism with knowledge.
And pray a lot. Then more.
5.blotto says, “Jihadists are too smart to pull off another Ft. Hood. They know the result would be, ‘all bets are off.’” Really? I would have thought they would have been “too smart” to try to pull the first Ft. Hood…but that thought would have to include an expectation of military readiness on the part of our military trainers, and there actually is no serious evidence of military readiness for this type of event, either before or after Ft. Hood.
Unfortunately, it’s very simple to extrapolate our expectations: on the day the thug-in-chief repeated the oath of office (please don’t ask me to believe he “took the oath of office”) I knew that our national sovereignty was not a priority for him. So a simple extension of that concept on a straight continuum takes us straight through many Ft. Hoods with no difficult issues of logic.
It is not just the military. Bosses EVERYWHERE feel that if they grit their teeth hard enough, and force their people to say what they want to hear and NOT say what they don’t want to hear, that is the way it is. Magical thinking at its worst.
The concern the author voiced is felt all through the law enforcement community as well. It is all about bosses trying to protect their positions. They aren’t going to learn new tricks but don’t want to be exposed as useless in the new fight. I dealt with this all my career. Trouble is that mindset is contagious as young officers and soldier learn how to game the system by saying and doing what is accepted.
In addition, in my last year on the job I spent time in intel and my biggest concern coming out of that is the “swarm” theory the author puts forth. Why it hasn’t happened yet is a mystery to me. We are a far too open society to protect malls and schools and bus stops and churches. Read the book Tom Clancy wrote called “Teeth of the Tiger.” It has to happen sooner or later here. It is too effective across the globe not to be on the table. I think the only reason it hasn’t happened yet was GWB was in office and his harsh and crushing response to the WTC attacks stunned the terrorists a little, especially the state sponsors of their efforts. Saddam dead, the one eyed Taliban leader hauling butt on his motorcycle being chased by a carpet bombing B52 and Bin Laden having to change locations every few hours because of incoming missiles.
Now we have unqualified lawyer who like Islam as a president, if that’s not a green light I don’t know what is.
If we are at war, I’d expect all officers and NCOs to be armed at all times while on base, throughout the world. How many wake-up calls are needed? We have Major Hassan, the FT Dix gang, the guy who was apprehended with weapons and the map for Ft Drum…
The first World Trade Center bombing was followed, later, by the second. The pattern seems to be fairly obvious.
Romans 1:18-32 includes the line, “Professing themselves to be wose, they became fools.”
Those who try to ignore the OBVIOUS AS A B-52 problems with service members of certain religious and ethnic backgrounds are GUARANTEEING a repeat performance.
Only the next time it won’t be one guy who couldn’t shoot straight with a faulty weapon, it’ll likely be much, much worse.
And the blood of the dead and wounded will be on the current chain of command that is afraid of telling the truth.
One seemingly minor point that I think is actually a security nightmare wiating to happen is the ongoing requirement to have a sticker on the window identifying DoD employees. This sticker is a joke as a security measure, yet it is a perpetual beacon to terrorists that the occupant is a Servicemember. This is just one more in the long list of ways the Services are not simply unprepared, but actually prepared in dysfunctional ways.
The biggest joke back when I was in was the instruction to turn in the base bumper sticker when we sold the car or got transfered. No one knew how to get the darn thing off !
I don’t suppose the window sticker is any easier to remove?
Not only that, but reserved parking spaces and staff cars, as well, even overseas.
There is only one thing we have going for us -
The Jihades are the most inept and ignorant people posible.
From all accounts the bomber in NY was just plain ignorant and dumb.
The Ft Hood shooter didn’t do badly but come on! Any Marine on a bad day would have done much better.
The #1 priority with most military members that I see is not to do their daily job to the utmost of their ability.
It is to get promoted.
Everything is geared to that, now, even in the NCO ranks.
Saying or doing something outside the norm harms your chances to get promoted, and therefore, is Unclean, never to be considered. Allowing soldiers to defend themselves while on post by carrying personal or issued loaded weapons? Why, one of them might have an accident, and thereby negatively effect my chances for General’s stars! Permission denied!
That military installations are wide open to attack is not news, I noticed it almost immediately upon reporting to my first command in 1994, and things have not changed that much since. A car or truck bomb would have a hard time running the gate, like in Beruit, but when was the last time that was attempted on a prepared target?
There is only one thing we have going for us -
The Jihades are the most inept and ignorant people posible.
From all accounts the bomber in NY was just plain ignorant and dumb.
The Ft Hood shooter didn’t do badly but come on! Any Marine on a bad day would have done much better.
If the Jihades had a clue we would be in real trouble. As it is the US ‘MAY’ muddle through. Not that the politicans have a clue. Especially those who seem to be activly helping the Jihades.
Recently, the commander in Iraq issued a memorandum that female soldiers who became pregnant would face military discipline. Of course that sent about a tempest in a teapot in the Beltway and among the PC crowd. For thousands of years of military history, soldiers who engaged in activity that resulted in self inflicted wounds to avoid hardship or combat were subject to severe military discipline. Not now. Because it’s not PC to address the issue. In 1970, if a female service member got pregnant, she was discharged from the service whether she wanted to or not. Now there are ‘support’ systems in place it ‘make it happen’. It’s been an issue for literally decades now. The middle grade officers and NCOs have had to put up with direction that directly effects the combat effectiveness of both line and support units. Looking the other way caught up with the commander in Iraq and it wouldn’t go away. He became the first and only General Officer to take the heat because reality bite him in the proverbial ass. There have been literally hundreds of thousands of good female soldiers who have served well and honorably. Unfortunately, there have also been tens of thousands of those who did not, who rode the system, who forced others to carry their weight, but the managers in charge do not want to address the problem for PC reasons. ‘Make it work’ is the standing order. And you expect them to address the issue of Islamic extremists in their midst any different?
The General Officer Corps is a political animal. It is bereft of actually making the system work on the ground, in the units, and in the maintenance bays. It simply issues policy and demands obedience. It’s those rare creatures that actually venture into the belly of the beast to see what really is going on. Peacetime personnel policies promote managers because the system can not differentiate in peacetime between managers and leaders. Unfortunately, the system does not shift over to during wartime to promote and select leaders over managers when it can tell the difference. Its an systemic organizational problem.
And that is a warning to those who expect their military to remain faithful to their oaths to the Constitution. Do not count on the General Officer Corps to do anything but to ‘manage’ the issue. Your best hope resides with the middle grades.
Is there a timidity on display anywhere that is greater than what we see in the military bureaucracy? The left’s political correctness tied it in knots a generation ago and they tighten it with each passing year. If you want to rise in rank you have to not only internalize this madness you have to become a strong advocate of its policies. An ostrich with head in sand has a better field of vision. A Yale study recently concluded that diversity training is a total waste of time. But if you want to see our institutions react to that bald truth you have a long wait ahead of you.
Today the press secretary actually used the T word.
The NYC attempted car bombing was carried out by a member of a “terrorist organization.”
My goodness!
Could there have been a ‘terrorists’ in NYC?
I thought these people were “overseas contingency operators.”
I am so frightened.
As a civilian I was shocked at three things about the Ft Hood attack.
1: The troops were unarmed. It never occurred to me that such a thing would be possible on a military base.
2: There were apparently not even any guards on base who could respond… instead having to wait for off-site police (that is correct is it not?)
3: No one organized the troops and had them rush the assailant or gather arms.
None of these things are excusable and the people responsible for disarming the troops and not teaching them to respond properly need to be punished. Hell, the shooter would have been at greater risk if he had chosen a shopping mall in Texas for his little adventure.
The fact that there was an attack was not surprising at all.
Oh, and any seminars or lectures about how to prevent these things should take a back seat to seeing the above problems are corrected first. This sort of laxity and stupidity sets the tone for everything else.
Wait a minute. You mean the Ft. Hood shooting was a jihadist attack? Like a sucessful terrorist attack on US soild while Obi One is presentdent?
If the Brass won’t trust the trops with deadly weapons,
how about the the sort which stun, paralyze, or blind
(temporarily) ?
We didn’t have Force Protection in Uncle Ronnie’s Army. We had the Principles of War one of which was
Security–Never permit the enemy to acquire an unexpected advantage.
and another was
Economy of Force–Allocate minimum essential combat power to secondary efforts.
Guarding the REMF’s didn’t use to be a high priority. They used to be expected to defend themselves and resist enemy assaults upon their work and living spaces. The Military Police were expected to be the primary reaction force available for the Rear Area Battle because the Infantry, Armor and Field Artillery were going to be busy fending off the Soviet Horde at the front.
Then we went to Bosnia and Kosovo, neither one of which are worth the life of a single Pomeranian Grenadier. Sending troops to places where they might be killed that nobody believes are worth dying for generates huge Cover Your Ass bureaucracies to insulate commanders from personal responsibility for the casualties their troops suffer. The Brits used to call our troops Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles because they never left camp except in full battle rattle. Once individual body armor became general issue, woe be upon the commander who allowed his soldiers to take some of that heavy stuff off and one of them gets shot. Better to suffer heat casualties and reduced mobility than have to explain why Little Johnny wasn’t wearing his IBA.
Then came Khobar Towers and Force Protection/Antiterrorism became a discipline, a career field, a rice bowl and a self-licking ice cream cone.
“Then we went to Bosnia and Kosovo, neither one of which are worth the life of a single Pomeranian Grenadier.” ….. ….
The actual quotation is “the Balkans are not worth the balls of a single Pomeranian Grenadier.”
…. Otto von Bismark.
It was true 150 years ago, and it still is true. Expend resources on objective that have real value.
Yes, the army is unprepared for all the reasons elucidated.
No, there is no willingness to call a jihadi a jihadi. Hassan was after all a medical doctor and a shrink at that. How could he ‘go mad’?
People refuse to understand that within the context of Islam a ‘jihadi outburst’ is not madness at all but acting on the calling. Being faithful to the mission and carrying it out.
I would be willing to bet that the Major ‘sold’ his Palestinianism to other officers, who believed his BS about how Israel ‘oppresses’ them.
And, without a shred of originality, I declare also that Obama can’t see the jihad for what he is because it is at the heart and soul of the programming he received. He truly believes that the ugliness is beautiful. He doesn’t have a problem with spreading Sharia – witness support for Rael Odinga.
If he had met Major Hassan before the attack, there would be instant synchronicity. After all, a ‘Palestinian.’
In Obama the third worldie-ness merges with the covert Muslim. There is no line between, and it is left to street vendors to save dozens of fellow citizens.
In Israel there is somewhat more awareness of physical dangers and readiness to act, but the PC is nearly as bad.
Another issue is that Force Protection OIC slots are often the elephants’ graveyard. This is where the O4 or O5 who is unpromotable and would make a hash of a slot in the G3, G5 or FSCORD offices (not to mention a command or critical staff slot at a BCT or BN)is stashed.
They’ve lost thousands in Iraq and Aghanistan you idiot; I think a dozen or so non combat deaths every now and again at the hands of a psycho is really far from any sane person’s idea of a threat. But keep writing about fantasy minutia and insignificant details. Its about all your readers can handle.
Ah, the moral equivalents fallacy, gotta love false logic. So if a “psycho” is on a murderous rampage, he is not a threat to a sane person? I would contend that a few non-combatant death is not a good thing, if so, no need for police or training.
Camo in Turkey. Ask yourself sometime why you don’t care about the dozen or so rampages by non-muslims that occurred since then. The American murder rampage is an almost weekly phenomenon. It doesn’t hit your radar until you can get your bigoted jollies on it. Obvious.
Ah, ad hominem, good shot oscar. I guess the last sentence of my last reply didn’t sink in, oh well. I have been living amungst more Muslims in the past few years than most Americans have ever seen (even on TV) and do care about their welfare. Murder is not acceptable regardless if sane or psycho. Peace.
LOL. Camo, you have no idea what ad hominem is. Like a monkey copying its master, you ape the dishonest argumentation that you see here, trying desperately to convince others that there’s at least one lobe rolling around your roomy skull. Do you realize that none of these insults are ad hominem? If I call you an idiot or a monkey, and then make an argument as to why, then that’s simply part of my argument. Noting you’re stupid is in no way off-limits, as much as you’d like it to be. You’re also way off base calling my original statement “moral equivalence”. Its pretty clear you have no idea what that means, or how to use the term, too. All this to say, you’re an idiot. Now go look up ad hominem and read it carefully.
Guess I’ll climb back into my tree and eat a banana (yawn).