Wounded Warriors

In appropriate settings, I have prayed for service people.  However, I don't contribute to Wounded Warriors because I think the country has an obligation to support our wounded warriors.

We should accept full responsibility for committing our troops to military operations.

Why Trump should select Ash Carter as SECDEF

Ashton B. Carter is a Democrat.  Most Administrations have considered bi-partisanship a positive attribute.

George W. Bush finally found a decent Secretary of Defense in Robert Gates.  The Obama Administration continued Bob Gates through Obama's first term.  Obama had no military experience other than as a Social Worker in south side Chicago.  Continuing Bob Gates assured the World (including NATO) that at least of of the NCAs was competent.

The Trump Administration can accomplish all of this with Ash Carter and get somebody smart that understands "the Iran Deal."

Senator Jeff Sessions has been mentioned as a candidate for AG and SECDEF.  The Republicans do not have too many senators in the Senate.  Consideration will be given to which party will gain by a Senator being elevated to the Cabinet.

I am not a fan of Big Government Newt Gingrich.  He's smart and should be utilized by Trump as appropriate.  Secretary of State might be a good fit.  I do not believe SECDEF would be.

The following is extracted from Wikipedia:

"Carter was nominated by President Obama to be the 25th United States Secretary of Defense on December 5, 2014.

"In his nomination hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee, he said he was “very much inclined” to increase U.S. military aid to Ukraine  Speaking on the Middle East, he said the U.S. must militarily ensure a “lasting defeat” of Islamic State (ISIL) forces in Iraq and Syria. He said he is not in favor of increasing the rate of prisoner releases from Guantanamo Bay.  He also opined that the threats posed by Iran were as serious as those posed by the ISIL forces.

"He was approved unanimously on February 1, 2015, by the Senate Armed Services Committee. He was confirmed by the Senate on February 12 by a vote of 93–5 and sworn in by Vice President Joe Biden on February 17.

"The United States is coordinating closely with Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Egypt, Qatar, and the other Sunni Arab allies in the Saudi Arabian-led intervention in Yemen against the Shia Houthis and forces loyal to former President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who was deposed in the 2011 uprising.

"In May 2015, Carter warned China to halt its rapid island-building in the South China Sea.

In October 2015, Carter has condemned Russian air strikes against ISIL and other rebel groups in Syria.

"On October 8, 2015, Carter, speaking at a meeting of NATO defence ministers in Brussels, said he believed Russia would soon start paying the price for its military intervention in Syria in the form of reprisal attacks and casualties.

"A controversy arose in December 2015 when it was revealed that Carter had used personal email account when conducting official business as Secretary of Defense.

"In January 2016, at Carter's direction, the Department of Defense opened all military roles to women, overriding a request by the Marine Corps to continue to exempt women from certain positions. In June 2016, Carter announced that transgender individuals would be allowed to join and openly serve in the military."

A Trump Administration would gain worldwide credibility by selecting Ashton B. Carter as its first SECDEF.  I would expect a Trump Administration to continually select the best person available.  General Flynn might be qualified in a second Trump Administration.

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel Fired

Vice President Joe Biden is the Obama Administration's Counter-Terrorism (CT) rather than Counter-Insurgency (COIN) advocate.

POTUS can't fire VPOTUS.

Secretary Hagel was the first enlisted man to serve as Secretary of Defense.  He was a far cry from Secretary Donald Rumsfelt.

Michelle Obama is the right person to replace Hagel.

She probably has more clout than Joe Biden.

Comments on Julia Pierson's Resignation

I built on a "saying" that it takes new PhDs two years to do anything useful to "observe" that it takes about 2 years to be productive in a new job.

A US Army Colonel commented once that he always did his old job for 2 years.  He served with the Weapons Systems Evaluation Group (WSEG) which was co-located with the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA) which was known as DoD's "think tank".

The US Army had the Research Analyses Corporation (RAC), the US Navy had the Center for Naval Analyses (CNA), and the US Air Force had RAND which made all the others necessary.

I worked with the Army Colonel on a project for the newly established US Army Operational Test and Evaluation Agency (OTEA) while I was employed by BDM (bought TRW except automotive part) which is now Northrop-Grumman.

My model became it takes good people about a year to notice that the new job is different and about a year to "work on" the new job.  I thought "new PhDs" could probably do this.  [All particle physicists at the time were probably "bright enough" to do it.]

Charles J. DiBona, who became (former Governor of Colorado) John Love's deputy when they created the first version of the Department of Energy.  Mr. Di Bona was of the McNamara whiz kid variety who had resigned his commission in the US Navy (as a Lieutenant Commander) to become President of the CNA while I was there.

One benefit of leaving high energy physics as a profession I expected was that things could be completed in less than 5 years.

It is very difficult to see significant change in 5 years.  The easiest changes to observe are related to related to wars or terrorist acts.

Eliot Richardson was a Republican with a fabulous resume during the Nixon era but he was never anywhere long enough to do any good (or harm).

Julia Pierson accepted a very challenging job.  A change of culture is difficult and usually takes the most time.

It is difficult (but not impossible) to get Governmental action related to meeting “urgent combat needs”.  Anything else may (and should?) take a generation or more in which to observe a change.

 

Would we really want the world to know all the recent failures that have involved the Secret Service?

 

President Obama, James Clapper, and Susan Rice should resign because of obvious inability to do their respective jobs. 

 

 

 

 

Perception is Key

Perception was more important than reality in the Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) strategic nuclear policy of the Cold War.  If a party was perceived as weak enough to be attacked, it would be of little consequence to the millions of dead that the attacking party was wrong.  On the other hand, would one expect to be able to achieve savings by focusing on perception rather than reality?

In the good old days, the US could retaliate against a terrorist country for a terrorist act against the US or a US citizen.  If we got it wrong, nobody knew except for the real perpetrator and, possibly, us.  If someone credible spoke out, we would have a new target.

While thinking about the War on Terror, I realized that, if we have a list of “bad guys/countries”, we can pick a (deserving) target and punish them.  Everybody will think that crime does not pay except for the real perpetrator.

I can see an analogy with local law enforcement.  Now, with DNA evidence, the innocent of the particular crime is being set free but no replacement is being found.

An Act of Terrorism

Leon Panetta seems to be the point person now.  The Algerian BP Hostage incident IS an act of terrorism.  The perpetrator was booted out of Al Quade (no honor among thieves) but this was an act of terrorism.

Only a few months ago, Joe Biden gave us the Bumper Sticker slogan: “General Motors is Alive and Osama Bin Laden is Dead”.

What has that intellectual guru Dick Cheney got to say about all this?  Create it and they will abuse it.

Why are Best Republican Candidates Generals?

Defense is a legitimate role of the Federal Government.

Covert Operations Should Be Covert

Why the Obama Administration Is Impotent in the Gulf 2

Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates has demonstrated the capability to make Command decisions. He replaced the Secretary of the Army and the Army Surgeon General over the Walter Reed scandal. Now, he has proposed disestablishing the US Joint Forces Command.

When commentators such as David Gergen, CNN and LTG Russell Honore, USA (ret) on CNN were suggesting that the Obama Administration needed to improve Command and Control in responding to the Gulf of Mexico Oil Incident, Secretary Gates could offer no help from the Defense Department.

The closest to a “General Operations Command” that currently exists in the Unified Command Plan (UCP) is the United States Joint Forces Command. The same day the press reports that a woman, for the first time, is appointed to head one of the nation’s 16 intelligence agencies the Secretary of Defense proposes the disestablishment of the only command with responsibility for conventional (general purpose) forces.

Strategically, eliminating one of the major organizational elements is the fastest way to cut costs. Unless our intelligence community is smart enough to accurately identify all our threats in a timely manner, we need to maintain some general purpose forces that can be deployed to counter the actual threat that materializes – be it natural or manmade.

The Navy has traditionally resisted “jointness”. For the old LANTCOM to become the Joint (Forces) Command was asking a lot but we need something to fulfill the mission held by the Readiness Command while it was in existence.

One of the problems is that strategic people can’t understand a generic Joint Task Force. When I first read the definition of a JTF (in JCS Pub 1, I suppose), I think it included the word “temporary”.

The US Constitution empowers Congress to provide an Army and a Navy. The Federal Government is responsible for our common Defense. There is no need to invoke the Commerce Clause.

Doing away with the United States Joint Forces Command may be the smart thing to do. If so, I hope the administration does it “smartly”. I am not optimistic. I had already concluded that the Obama Administration is blind with respect to Military C2.

During the Cold War, "conventional" meant non-nuclear. The logical definition now for "conventional" appears to be non-special.

We need to maintain traditional (Army) Military Command and Control (MilC2) capability.

(DR)2H

Why Military C2 is being overlooked

A little over 40 years ago, my officemate, Maj. James Vincent Sullivan, USMC, informed me that he was an Officer and Gentleman by an act of Congress. “Jay” had returned from Vietnam where he had been in a Force Reconnaissance Company (I think, perhaps the commander of the unit) and was now the US Marine Corps Cost Effectiveness Analysis Officer. “Recon” was about as close to being a SEAL as a Marine could get without actually being one. Jay was ready for Happy Hour when 4:30 rolled around.

Over the years, I learned that Congress approves the commissions of all our Military and Naval Officers. I was somewhat surprised to learn that a Marine Major was commissioned as a Naval Officer and not as a Military Officer. All Military Officers should be US Army officers but Congress created the Air Force in 1947. Currently, the US Army and the US Air Force are acknowledged “military services”. Since the establishment of the Department of Homeland Security, there has been confusion with regard to naval services.

Sometimes the Navy is a military department and sometimes the Navy is a naval service. If you think things are confusing for the Navy, you should try to figure out the Coast Guard. When the Coast Guard is acting as a part of our Armed Forces, they report to the Navy. They become a part of our naval service(s).

A little less than 40 years ago, I was a part of the Systems Group of the US Army Communication-Electronics Computer Application Agency, a Class 2 activity under the Assistant Chief of Staff (Communications-Electronics) of the Department of Army. We were responsible for generating simulated deployments of C-E equipments.

In 1974, I became Program Manager of the contract to develop the Technical Interface Design Plan – Test Edition (TIDP-TE) for the Joint Interoperability Program for Tactical Command and Control Systems Used in Support of Ground and Amphibious Military Operations (Short Title: GAMO). Prior to that, I had been the lead analyst in contractor support in developing the Joint/Combined DT II/OT II Test Plan for the AN/TTC-39(V), the “TRI-TAC” switch. The GAMO and TRI-TAC programs were merged into the JINTACCS Program.

The original GAMO program described 52 “OPFACs”. An OPFAC (Operational Facility) was a generic tactical command and control node. The program goal was to design, test, and implement interoperable interfaces among these OPFACs in a generic Joint Task Force. I personally developed the description for the USAF Tactical Air Control Center (TACC). There were two other TACCs among the 52 OPFACs – a USMC Tactical Air Command Central (TACC) and a USN Tactical Air Control Center (TACC).

Within the USAF TACC, responsibilities were split between the Director of Current Operations and the Director of Current Plans. Things within the next 24 hours were under Current Operations. Things beyond 24 hours were under Current Plans.

I recently checked the current US Code Title 10 – Armed Forces to see how things are now compared to the old days. I memorized most of the current USC 10 – “Repealed.”

Poor Commander-in-Chief President Obama. His advisors are Incident Commander, Admiral Thad Allen, USCG, Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, USN, and National Security Advisor, General James L. Jones, USMC (ret). Is there a military officer anywhere in the house?

(DR)2H