Why is the US military, which has an annual budget of $450 billion and 130,000 troops in Iraq, unable to?

Question

conclusively defeat 20,000 insurgents who have no budget? Doesn't this mean that all the advanced weapons systems the US buys are uselessly obscolescent in today's world? Doesn't Israel's defeat by Hizbullah mean the same? Does this mean that the emperor has no clothes, and American military theory is obsolete?

Answer 1

I have a better question. Why can't liberals accept the 2004 election and move on?

Answer 2

Historically, the US has not yet proven itself able to defeat a guerilla enemy intent on fighting a war of attrition, where we are bled of men, resources, and will until we are forced to face that the only solution is to leave. Vietnam should have taught us this, but the neocons are still smelling all those roses that the happily liberated were supposed to throw at our feet. Lost in delusion, not only can they not smell the bacon burning in the kitchen, they can't even see the house is on fire.

Some might suggest that, if we had listened to Colin Powell, and gone in with vastly larger numbers in the beginning of this illegal campaign, that all would be well by now. We will never know as this just isn't what happened. What we do know is that Soviet Union conducted one of the most brutal campaigns in recorded history for ten years in Afghanistan. The result was that the Soviet Union was bled dry, forced to capitulate, and bankrupted into extinction. The other result was victory for the Taliban, a group comparable in brutality to the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia during the 70's and 80's. Why are our leaders unable to learn the lessons of history and stop repeating them?!

Answer 3

Have ever been in a fight with one hand tied behind your back?? Ever searched for a needle in a haystack?? When doing the hard right is what is doing the right thing, it makes fighting an asymetrical battle difficult at best.

You see we actually abide by the Laws of Land Warfare and the Geneva Convention. IED's aren't landmines, which have a protocol which nations do honor. When you are fighting against insurgents, they don't follow any protocols.

I have walked the streets of Fallugah, Ah Ramadi and An Nassaryiah. I have sought out insurgents. And I have abided by the rules. Insurgents don't. Armies are easily distinguished by uniforms and standards (guidons and banners). Insurgents tend to hide and use guerrilla tactics, to include human shields, schools, hospitals and religeous sights. We don't. If we did, what would we stand for.

The American military theory is far from obsolete and calls for patience. The patience for intelligence to provide for surgical strikes. We could go in and kick open every door in very city and town. But instead, its more productive to only kick the one door that needs to be kicked.

Answer 4

The American military is the most powerfully and elite. Its citizens on the other hand are not. The liberal left is completely paralyzing use by turning use into police instead of soldiers. If there is house filled with insurgents we cant attack b/c there might be an innocent near by, when we know the insurgents are hiding in mosques we cant raid them b/c there religious buildings, we must read the enemy there rights when captured even as they hide bombs on them to blow themselves up with every one else around them, we cant keep the insurgents from getting in b/c they are afraid the world with consider them occupiers if we sent in more troops to guard them.

I can go on and on. On top of that, Israel whipped the floor with Hezbollah. There kills were for every one Israeli soldier that died there would be about 26 insurgents dead.

And the terrorists are farrrrrrr from having no budget, Iran has been supplying them with some pretty good combat skills, man power, weapons and lots and lots of money. If we left Iraq now Iran would take over doubling its power. And b/c of that the terrorists would double in power as well.

Answer 5

America’s top military theorist, Air Force Colonel John Boyd, once said, “When I was a young officer, I was taught that if you have air superiority, land superiority, and sea superiority, you win. Well, in Vietnam we had air superiority, land superiority, and sea superiority, but we lost. So I realized there is something more to it.” He also thundered, “People, Ideas, Hardware… IN THAT ORDER!”

We already have excellent people who are joining the Armed Forces and carry out their duties well, but the problem is the ideas. American military doctrines were once based on the French Grand Tactics handbook during World War I, which excelled in attrition warfare. As such, some of that thinking still survives today. And only recently in the 1980s has the Marine Corps adopted the Maneuver Warfare doctrine (which is what the Germans completed conceptually in the end of WWI and was able to fully exploit in WWII… decades before Americans officially adopted it). Unfortunately, today’s conflicts are neither attrition warfare nor maneuver warfare or states fighting states. It is states fighting non-state actors such as Al Qaeda or Hezbollah.

Hardware (ie the advanced weapons systems the US and Israel have) cannot make up for people nor ideas. Conventional warfare thinking cannot apply to our current enemies in Iraq and Afghanistan, because war has changed… but it is not new. Rather, it is the return to the way that war were fought before the rise of the modern state (1648, Peace of Westphalia, ending the Hundred Year War). In that time, many different entities (business enterprises, clans, tribes, religious organizations etc) fought for different reasons (honor, women, money, land, religion, etc), using every means possible to win. There were many sides in a conflict, with shifting alliances and a highly uncertain atmosphere. But the most important change of all in today’s warfare is this: there is not only a military but a political, social, and moral revolution… and the de-legitimization of the state. Think about it: people are transferring their primary allegiance away from the state but to other things such as gangs, religious organizations, etc. And they will fight for those other things rather than the state. For example, the insurgents (and terrorists) in Iraq and Afghanistan may be fighting for anything like honor, revenge, ideology, clan, tribe, etc. Just not for the state of Iraq.

In lieu of these new threats, US military doctrine and the hardware supporting the doctrine are in a way obsolete, but only when facing non-state actors in the field of battle. There is no doubt however, that if the US or Israel fought another state actor, they would severely beat that country’s butt to the Stone Ages. War against non-state actors requires that not only does the state win in the traditional levels of war, but also three new levels of war, physical, mental, and moral levels. This creates a 3-D chess game… or a continuously shifting blob of jello. What wins on the physical and tactical levels of war will not mean that we win morally and strategically.

US military doctrine can always be described as this: “raise the ante.” When a soldier cannot defeat a certain threat, they are taught to bring in more firepower to eliminate this threat. When dealing with non-state actors, this is detrimental to the most important levels of war: the moral and strategical levels. Think of it this way: When have you ever cheered for Goliath in the Goliath vs. David story? Our superiority in firepower provided by our advanced weapon systems cause collateral damage. We do not intentionally hurt innocent people, but the enemy knows that and hides in urban areas where there are a lot of innocent people. But when we do hurt innocent people, in the eyes of the world… are we Goliath or David? That is the moral issue that we must face… and to gain the moral high ground inspires us to fight harder and our enemies to fight lesser. Our enemy may not have the hardware, but they have two things that are more important… and that are the people and ideas. They specifically use ideas of how to defeat us while they do not have the same resources as us… these ideas are not applied only militarily, but also politically, socially, and economically. Simply bombing our enemy to hell does not help solve the problem. The solution is not purely military, but politically, socially, and economically as well.

Answer 6

In 2003 we decimated a 300,000 strong army. The men who served in this war probably never imagined that the tens of thousands of enemy's who dropped their arms and fled would come back years later to fight a partisan war. As it stands these 'insurgents' actually aren't ever even showing their faces. They bury their guns on farms and then go find an artillery shell toy with it a little and set it next to the road and let it blast chunks into our troops. Almost all our troop casualties now days are from IEDs so it's not like we're actually fighting them face to face or anything.

As I see it now Iraq will either plummet into civil war or we will let the new Iraqi government fix itself(which if left without restraint would.)

Answer 7

No conventional force can defeat a guerrilla with backing in the population without committing genocide or at least brutalities against innocent civilians. And ever since Roman times one of the maxims of any warleader worth his salt was not to leave enemy strongholds at their back. American generals seem to have forgotten.
Why do you call the resistance against occupation "insurgents"?
That would suppose a legitimate gouvernment not Bush's puppets. And don't start telling me about free elections....

Answer 8

The military could wipe out the entire middle east in a matter of hours if left to their job, but political correctness and liberals like yourself wont let them. A soldier cant so much as defend himself and some lib is trying to have him convicted of murder or torture. What are they supposed to do with both hands tied behind their backs and a liberal kicking them in the nuts.
Hezbollah didn't defeat Israel. Israel was abiding by the U.N. cease fire when Hezbollah declared victory.

Answer 9

It's bigger than 20,000 and they are not Iraqis. They are coming as far away as Africa and Europe to fight. I wouldn't be surprised if The U.S. soldiers weren't killing Iranian and Syrian soldiers like the Israelis were doing recently in Lebanon.

Israel quit because of the U.N., not because of Hezbollah. There are going to have meetings to see if that was the right course of action (to quit). Meanwhile the Hezbollah leader publicly stated he wished he didn't order the kidnapping of the Israeli soldiers. If the UN is honest, it's the beginning of the end of Hezbollah or the Israelis will be back bombing Lebanon again.

Answer 10

Yup, the emperor has no clothes.

This war, if you look it in business terms, is successful beyond the profiteers wildest dreams.

Only a fool would enlist now thinking that he/she is defending freedom or country, obviously not the case.

And, it is strategically planned to be an occupation not a war where a decisive win is possible.

So, welcome to the stuff they (neo-cons) were planning in the 89's at the University of Chicago, welcome to the wishes of Big Oil in Texas and abroad and welcome to the nightmare of military families who are the salt of the earth and deserve the rest of us to help get thier kids back... alive.

We need to protect the People from the will of the warmongers via the Government at this point. If you aren't doing that then you are no patriot thats for sure. It is a Constitutional obligation remember...

Answer 11

The United States military was designed to face an army of soldiers across a battlefield - not an group of insurgents who hide behind civilian clothes, civilian people, and attack from the safety of anonymity.

The theory is not obsolete as long as their are countries like Iran, and North Korea who are on the verge of creating acts of aggression. I do agree that we need to readjust our tactics - and have been - to fight an enemy who dare not face us on the battlefield.

If you have the answer, then why do you hide behind your keyboard. Why are you not out there in Iraq to enlighten us?