Information Fratricide is defined in FM 3-13: Inform and Influence Activities as:
the result of employing information-related capabilities operations 30 elements in a way that causes effects in the information environment that impede the conduct of 31 friendly operations or adversely affect friendly forces
The President made the following statement regarding Iraqi oil on Saturday:
This was during his remarks at the CIA. For those that can’t or don’t want to watch, the President said that not only should the US have kept the oil after invading Iraq in 2003, but that maybe we’ll get a second chance to do so. As you can imagine this has led to a wee bit of consternation in the US, with a number of people pointing out that this is a war crime. Buzzfeed actually sent a correspondent to talk to Iraqis fighting to remove ISIL from Iraq about it.
Abu Luay once battled US troops as a teenager in a series of ugly urban battles. Now the 27-year-old says he’s ready to sacrifice his family to fight the Americans again if the US follows through on President Donald Trump’s suggestion on Saturday to take his country’s oil.
“I participated in the attack against the Americans by attacking them with mortars and roadside bombs, and I’m ready to do it again,” said Abu Luay, an Iraqi security official who provided his nom de guerre and said he was not allowed to speak to the press. His is now fighting along the frontlines with armed Shiite groups in northwest Iraq. “We kept our ammunition and weapons from the time the Americans left for fighting ISIS. But once ISIS is gone we will save our weapons for the Americans.”
And:
“There’s no way Trump could take the oil unless he launched a new military front and it be a new world war,” said Kareem Kashekh, a photographer who works for the Popular Mobilization Units, a new branch of Iraq’s armed forces consisting of former militiamen and volunteers fighting against ISIS.
“He cannot do it. He cannot succeed,” said Dawoud Ali, a 30-year-old Baghdad resident and a member of Ansar al-Aghida, one of the Shiite militias fighting against ISIS. “Of course I would fight the Americans if they came for the oil.”
The President’s remarks at Langley, which mirror statements he made throughout the campaign and all the way back to 2011, are a prime example of Information Fratricide. Regardless of whether Americans are even paying attention, our allies, partners, competitors, and adversaries are. This type of thing has happened before during both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom and when it does it puts our personnel at risk.
Gen David Petraeus said that the plans by the evangelical Dove World Outreach Centre to destroy the Muslim holy book on its grounds on Saturday should be dropped.
“Images of the burning of a Koran would undoubtedly be used by extremists in Afghanistan – and around the world – to inflame public opinion and incite violence,” said Gen Petraeus.
“It is precisely the kind of action the Taliban uses and could cause significant problems. Not just here but everywhere in the world we are engaged with the Islamic community,” he said in a statement.
Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the Nato Secretary General, also expressed concerns about the risk to troops’ security and said that “such actions are in strong contradiction with all the values that we stand for and fight for”.
In 2005, 15 people died and scores were wounded in riots in Afghanistan sparked by a story in Newsweek magazine alleging that American interrogators at Guantánamo Bay had flushed a copy of the Koran down the lavatory to get inmates to talk.
You all may remember back during Operation Enduring Freedom that a squad of Soldiers burned approximately 100 Qurans and pieces of other Islamic documents in Afghanistan in 2012. After an investigation it was determined that this was not done maliciously and six Soldiers received administrative punishments. The incident set off several days or riots, disturbances, and attacks on US Forces in Afghanistan. And it was reported that the Soldiers did this even after being warned not to do so by Afghan Soldiers they were working with. These Soldiers didn’t get up one day and think: “hmmm, how can I create a strategic communication problem and put people’s lives at risk?” Rather, they actually thought they were doing something useful by disposing of damaged Qurans and other Islamic documents. These actions, both those of the crazy pastor from North-Central Florida that are in no way official US actions and the unintentional insult given by a squad of Soldiers in Afghanistan in 2012 both put the lives of US Forces – military and civilian – at risk. Just think about how much more risk is created when the President of the United States commits Information Fratricide. How many of our personnel are now at risk because of suspicions created by the President’s musings last Saturday? Right now the Force Protection sections for each Service and for the Joint Force are working over time, as are their equivalents at Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve, to mitigate the damage and keep US personnel safe from what is called Green (host country national) on Blue (US and Coalition Forces) violence.
weaselone
It’s OK if the President does it. Plus, if there’s enough Green on Blue activity, it would give us a justification to start a new war to take the oil. It’s a win win as far as Trump is concerned.
amk
the Q is will his bestest pal in the whole world would bless him?
Sebastian
But EMAILS!
jharp
“This type of thing has happened before during both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom and when it does it puts our personnel at risk.”
And I think Trump knows exactly what he is doing.
He clearly is trying to provoke.
patroclus
The only way this can be stopped quickly is if the Republicans in Congress start to stand up to him. A court fight might work eventually, but otherwise, I don’t see any quick end to this sort of authoritarianism. This is actually quite frightening and if he gets away with this, more will follow.
agorabum
But saying things that anger our allies is now supposedly a good thing. At least for Republicans.
Adam L Silverman
@jharp: No, he understands everything as zero sum. There is no win-win. No best alternative to a negotiated agreement. There is one side winning everything and the other side loosing everything. Its why he doesn’t like multilateral agreements and want’s bilateral ones. He thinks he can structure those so the US wins and the state on the other side of the bilat looses. This is combined with him looking at everything as completely transactional.
gene108
I wonder how spectacularly Trump has to screw up, in order for him to lose the support of all but the 27%?
Lyrebird
I’m not a huge fan of war posters, but I certainly appreciate your point.
I wonder if the Dem swing in Northern Virginia is being amplified by folks in the military or in one a’ those agencies we’ve been talking about… Langley is IN Virginia, as is the Pentagon (maybe they draw a little line cutting into the border to give it a DC zip code, whatevs), as is Ft Belvoir, etc etc etc. Some of these folks have political leanings more like Radio Free Tom dude than like me, and a lot of them care about their sisters & fraters.
Jay S
@gene108: I suspect he’s gonna get a little help with that. A little tripping up to help him screw up.
gene108
@Adam L Silverman:
A corollary to that is everything is a competition. Either you are winning or you are losing.
If your crowd at an event is not bigger than the other guys, you lose and he wins.
And god forbid you end up losing, because only the most pathetic people lose and only the best people win.
Ian G.
@gene108:
He’s getting pretty close to that already, and we’re not a week in.
Bill Arnold
Maybe it’s already been posted, but I couldn’t believe that it was actually formally released (today) in the federal register:
National Day of Patriotic Devotion (Jan 20 2017)
While I’m at it, a CIA vet explains why the Trump visit to the CIA was so offensive to the intelligence community:
Journalist explains exactly why Trump’s speech at the CIA outraged the intelligence community. It’s bad. (Formatted text at bottom is easier to read)
BBA
It’s like we’re playing chess and he’s dunking our heads in the toilet.
Lyrebird
Also, too, in my remaining gloom about where we are and who is in the WH, I am hopeful when I read of these leaks and when former CIA folks actually speak up about Commander Trainwreck’s inappropriate behavior.
Maybe too many people in power had it in for Valerie Plame’s husband politically, but I didn’t hear this level of outrage on the news when her own cover (and career) was destroyed… no consideration of lives put at risk of collaborators, or of the risk of blinding ourselves.
weaselone
@Adam L Silverman:
That view isn’t particularly rare. Isn’t their a whole school of international relations (realpolitik?) that essentially subscribes to the view that interactions among nation states are a zero sum game?
Timurid
Iran? North Korea? Forget that. This son of a bitch just threatened to commit an act of war against one of our allies. He hasn’t even been president for a week…
cmorenc
The war against Isis in NW Iraq and Syria was well on an inexorable path to being won, albeit at a slow but steady pace rather than a showy “shock and awe” pace – in large part because the US was giving solid support to indigenous armies and militias, but keeping a relatively modest profile. Trump’s stupidly arrogant blustering could quickly set us back to where everyone hates us over there as much as ISIS. Trump is the quintessential ugly American, on steroids.
Jeffro
@BBA: Maybe we should quit trying to play chess, and just get out the tar and feathers…
…or, more practically, start beating on the McCains, Collins, and Grahams of this world with “YOU KNOW HOW THIS ENDS” messages. It’s past due time to restore ‘regular’ right-wing insanity to the White House, instead of this mentally ill wackaloons’ ratings-fantasy presidency.
Brachiator
@patroclus:
Ha! Very funny. Republicans love Trump. They are salivating and wetting themselves over the prospect that he is delivering everything they ever wanted. Stop him? Hell, they are shouting go Trump, go!
cynthia ackerman
I called this out as it was happening.
For this prick to boast about “maybe we’ll get another chance” to STEAL THE OIL in front of a wall of fallen heroes is just beyond evil.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I imagine that Mattis and Kelly were disgusted by this, and Flynn told Trump he did great.
amygdala
@Adam L Silverman: I’ve worked with and for people (and I use the term loosely) with this sort of personality pathology. Your analysis is spot-on. They also fly into a rage when they don’t get what they want, a horrible trait for the CiC of the US military.
Today he went after journalists and scientists. The other learned professions and the military can’t be far behind on his list of targets. I don’t rattle easily, but am starting to get nervous.
Also, brilliant use of war posters.
Adam L Silverman
@Lyrebird: I avoided the ones that would now, correctly, be seen as racially/ethnically insensitive. There was a great shut your trap one, but the caricature of the Japanese officer caught in the mousetrap is no longer appropriate.
Brachiator
@cmorenc:
Trump don’t care. In Trump world, countries will either make a deal with us, or stay out of our way.
Adam L Silverman
@gene108: Ayep.
Lizzy L
@Adam L Silverman: This attitude explains why he has no trouble suggesting that the U.S. can and should shed old alliances, leave NATO, pull out of treaties, leave the U.N. The only place the U.S. can/should have is that of hegemon. Alliances are for pu$$ies.
Omnes Omnibus
@weaselone:
If there is, it isn’t realpolitik or the closely aligned Political Realism.
Adam L Silverman
@weaselone: Yes, but the realist/realpolitik school is much more nuanced and is really concerned with what would be called power politics.
The Thin Black Duke
I betcha Trump is thinking of bringing back the draft.
Adam L Silverman
@amygdala: Thank you, I have a collection of those images I use in briefing decks/seminar decks as appropriate. Some of them were creative as all get out.
I expect that the watchdog organization will be filing lawsuits challenging a lot of these gag orders in short order. The order not to communicate with Congress is unconstitutional on its face.
Lizzy L
From NYT Breaking News:
Adam L Silverman
@Lizzy L: Hard to be the hegemon if everyone else is aligned against you.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@gene108:
In complete seriousness, I think he could slap Melania on national TV, plant a boot in Barron’s backside, and 30% of the nation would say they had it coming.
Peale
@gene108: really, not much. He is not W. I think most allies and partners will hope to wait him out. I don’t think “boots on the ground” is any more popular than it was two months ago. He’s actually on the hook for these disasters, and if he causes them, they aren’t going to rally around him the way they did Bush.
I think I’ve said this before, but even if an event as spectacular as 9/11 happens, we aren’t rallying around him. We’re blaming him, and a lot of republicans will, too. He can stand on some ruins and shout about terrorists and demand that we round up the enemy, etc. but even people who agree with that will go “dumb ass. You are supposed to prevent these things.” He’s not going to get a lot of mileage from, say, provoking China to invading Taiwan.
amygdala
@Adam L Silverman: I have similar images for syphilis and other infectious diseases that I have used in slide presentations. They’re almost alarmingly creative.
I fear for the lawyers who will be fighting the good fight. They, like journalists and activists, are always near the front of the line for abuse in situations like this.
J R in WV
@Adam L Silverman:
“There was a great shut your trap one, but the caricature of the Japanese officer caught in the mousetrap is no longer appropriate.”
You could get Betty Cracker to do a photoshop, maybe drop Brennan’s caricature into the poster… ;-) just kidding.
A very good point Kurt E made. Trump has lost the Intelligence community with this disgraceful act and speech. He has lost the professional Civil Service experts by issuing the “gag order”. He has lost all the counties in the deep south who haven’t received any assistance from anyone after the total destruction wrought the tornadoes last weekend.
And when was the last time we had tornadoes in January? Never? Thot so.
Bush’s FEMA guy, Brownie, wasn’t great, but he sent something. Trump is NOT WILLING to send aid to those counties. Those tornadoes wouldn’t have been able to destroy all those lazy southerners’ houses, if they hadn’t deserved it. AMIRITE?
Something like that. Who can imagine the thoughts of a paranoid sociopath with a large dose of evil? Not I, not I.
WASF !!!
Gin & Tonic
@Lizzy L: There was once a time when Great Britain was the hegemon that made its own rules, and the sun never set on its empire. Except the earth kept spinning, and rotating around the sun, and now Great Britain ain’t so great.
We are now at the transition between the US and China for the role of the world’s superpower, just as the world transitioned from Great Britain to the US. It was a good run.
Peale
@Lizzy L: I’m going to laugh if they do pull out of the UN but continue to insist that we’ll stand up to China in the South China Sea. Without the global treaties, what’s our reason for being there? Territory? Some 7 dotted line that says “we want that oil?”
Jeffro
@West of the Rockies (been a while): maybe 27%?
Lyrebird
@Adam L Silverman: care in selection duly appreciated!
Odd thing about posters like that is that the art styles are so similar even on opposite sides of a conflict (Nye Boltai poster is a famous Russian one), and even if the folks being demonized (in the demonizing ones) are very different.
Once read Artist of the Floating World for a class & was glad I was pushed to read it.
Jeffro
@Peale: great point – if we’re going to withdraw from every military alliance and trade treaty in the world then why be a part of any of it? Why have any military bases anywhere or any trade pacts with anyone?
Other than it satisfying Steve Bannon’s need for maximum chaos and destruction of course…
Jeffro
@Jeffro: and of course if that argument ever did manage to get thrown at Trump, I’m sure there is one country in particular he would want us to be very closely aligned with …
Lavocat
I found these comments to be bone-chilling if only because Donny Boy was so obviously oblivious to the fact that this is a war crime. He’s completely clueless. I honestly feel as though we have just elected Chauncey Gardiner as our president. Good fucking lord. For fuck’s sake, hide that damned nuclear football!
Bill Arnold
@Lizzy L:
One problem is that much of the rest of the world is just laughing at him, and at the US in general for being so decrepit that it elected him. (I hear/read this kind of talk from non-US-nationals, fwiw. “decrepit” is my paraphrasing but it’s close. )
Sure, there’s some fear (domestically and abroad) (and domestically various CEOs have figured out that he can be bribed, for very little if any cost, with good-for-Trump PR), but the reputation of the US has been/is being broken, probably permanently.
Fun pic:
Jesus helping POTUS Trump sign documents
Chet Murthy
@J R in WV: Wait, I read about how nothing’s going down there, but … I kinda wondered about that. It takes a few days to preposition materials and people. I’d have thought that Obama’s outgoing folks would have set those gears in motion, it would have required Trump’s folks to literally stop them. And there are (so I have read) s bunch of Obama’s mid-level folks still around (b/c they’ve been asked to stay temporarily, and they have pity on us all, I guess).
All of this leading up to: geez, it seems unfathomable, that a storm, -so- close after the inauguration, can ALREADY be met with *zilch* in the way of FEMA response?
Is there something I’m missing? something I’m not seeing? I mean, he’s Cheeto Bandito to me, so I get that eventually everything he touches will turn to flourescent yellow dust. But it takes more than a few days, doesn’t it?
schrodingers_cat
@Gin & Tonic: Great Britain did not commit national suicide, if I recall correctly. And this I say as no fan GB.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
Slightly OT – Sarah Kenzdior
[to her]
She notes:
Then @leahmcelrath:
G*d help us all.
Peale
@Bill Arnold: oh…I really do think there’s a big opening for liberals to drop secularism and go all in for Christian theocracy. True Christianity has been abandoned by the right and is ours for the taking.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Brachiator:
Trump is Honey Badger. Trump don’t care, he doesn’t give a shit… oh, look, the UN is chastising him. Trumpy Badger doesn’t give a fuck.
Inmourning
I remember how I felt after the Kent State shootings. I wanted to get to DC and stand outside the WH with a big “not in my name” sign. Futile for sure, but I could not help thinking of the importance of signifying that I was no longer being represented by my representatives, president on down. I feel like that now, doubled in spades. Notmypresident!
Adam L Silverman
@Peale: The other issue is where we get the boots. We are already at least one, and I’d argue two or three Army Corps too light – there should be one aligned for each Geographic Combatant Command. As a result we’re also light in terms of the Divisions and Brigades needed to make up those Corps. There’s only so many bodies to shove out the door at any one time.
BBA
@West of the Rockies (been a while): And another 20% would mutter “well, still better than Hitlery.” And it is that 20% that drives me to drink – you know what he is, you just don’t care! @$%!#$%#$%!
chris
So what happens when he tells “his” generals to go get that oil and they say no? This gets worse by the minute.
Another Scott
Another infamous example is the Innocence of Muslims which had a role in inciting protests in Egypt and (probably) then in Benghazi…
:-(
I caught that “maybe we’ll get a second chance” quip from Donnie, too.
He has no conception that anyone outside of his immediate circle has their own interests, rights, values, and political constraints. He thinks he can impose his will on the rest of the world by transparent bluster, flattery, and “deals”. He’s incompetent, dangerous, brain damaged, and a generally horrible old man*. And he’s going to get a lot of people killed if he keeps this up.
And he’s only been in office a little more than 106 hours….
Cheers,
Scott.
(* – the reaction of the woman who knows him best says it all)
Adam L Silverman
@J R in WV: I had not seen that they weren’t sending aid. I know its been requested, but its not surprising, given the lack of staffing of the Executive Branch, that it would get lost in the shuffle. Are they outright refusing to send assistance?
As for the IC, give this a watch:
https://twitter.com/nadabakos/status/824056003796668416
Renie
so O’Reilly says on his show the feds need to do something about Chicago murder rate and Trump tweets out we need to send feds there? He’s getting his policy from Fox News?
this is getting scary folk
Timurid
@Renie:
I’ll just repeat my post from the dying thread below:
Adam L Silverman
@Gin & Tonic: And it didn’t have to end this soon or in an unmanaged and chaotic way.
The Thin Black Duke
@Another Scott: Nothing will change until something very bad happens (and it will because it always does) and a lot of white people die, unfortunately. That’s the bloody tax we’re going to pay.
Adam L Silverman
@Peale: If the US were to pull out of the UN, there would immediately be the following effects:
1) Palestine would declare statehood and the UN would recognize it.
2) The UN would condemn the settlements and authorize their removal as a violation of Palestinian sovereignty.
3) A significant number of American leaders, civilian and military, past and present, would find themselves facing charges in the Hague.
And that’ll just be the first ten minutes.
Jeffro
@Lavocat:
They (not ‘we’) elected their senile grandpa to inflict his great ideas on us and the world.
This is why I’m not kidding about Trumpov thinking that a small nuke, “…just a small one, you know, the smallest one we have…”, would get ISIS to lay down their arms and start pumping oil straight into USA-bound barrels.
PhoenixRising
@Adam L Silverman:
Before this is over, that’s gonna be carved in stone somewhere. I only hope with metal tools.
Adam L Silverman
@Lyrebird: I almost included one of those just to be topical.
Bill Arnold
@Peale:
I’m genuinely not religious (though not an atheist) but am moderately familiar with the old testament (as Torah) and see many in the religious right as overt sinners, particularly the prosperity gospel types.
Would be interested to hear from Christian believers who have a similar view that also includes the new testament.
Gin & Tonic
@Adam L Silverman: It didn’t have to. Yet here we are. I am going to very strongly recommend to my granddaughter that she learn Mandarin.
Adam L Silverman
@Lavocat: Nope, Gardner is the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.
Jeffro
@chris:
Actually, if those were the instructions, we’d probably be looking at a 25th amendment remedy. However, if Kushner or Bannon is able to get Trump to couch it as, “I wanna sent a couple divisions to our bases in the Middle East, the better to raid *wink* ISIS *wink*”, then they’ll have a hard time saying no.
Davis X. Machina
@Adam L Silverman: Which Geographic Combatant Command is in charge of Chicago?
Jeffro
@Renie:
C’mon, it’s vastly worse than that! He’s getting his domestic policy from Breitbart and his foreign policy from Flynn.
p.a.
@Bill Arnold: Read Fred Clark at Slactivist.
amk
@Adam L Silverman: well, there is always draft – the white supremacist whasshisname fat fuck who ‘advises’ him.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman:
True dat.
I don’t understand (well, actually I do) why the Trumpistas wouldn’t see the benefit* to staying in the UN, paying .0001% of our dues (and technically staying a member), using the forum as an opportunity to push every wackaloon foreign policy and issue that matters to them (Israel is our 51st state; Russia is being treated unfairly, China sux, you Ay-rab countries sux worse).
*benefit IN THEIR VIEW…I’m not advocating for this!
I mean, I know they think they’re going one better by flat-out leaving, but they’re making it more clear to their GOP apologists that they’re only interested in Cleek’s Law Squared.
Timurid
@Davis X. Machina:
That’s brand new as of this week. It’s called something like Geheime Staatspo.. pol… polz… damnit, what’s up with these people and their fascination with unpronounceable German words?
Mike in NC
@Adam L Silverman: Back around 2004-2005 I recall one of the planners at USJFCOM tell us reservists that as far as identifying fresh units to deploy to Iraq: “We’re not just out of Schlitz, we’re out of beer”.
Another Scott
@Lavocat: On the other hand, JJ MacNab passes along this bit of cheer?:
Good news, eh?
:-/
Cheers,
Scott.
Adam L Silverman
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho: Its not clear what he means in the Chicago tweet. I’ve seen response analysis ranging from hysterics: “its bordering on unconstitutional”. To: “does he mean a DOJ team? More FBI resources? DEA?”. To: “is he threatening to declare martial law”. What’s missing is the context: he started tweeting about Chicago after watching a segment on it on the O’Reilly Factor this evening. If they’d had him watch a DVR episode of Too Cute he’d be tweeting about puppies and kittens.
Lurking Canadian
@Bill Arnold: They are definitely anti-Christian, if “Christian” is defined as having anything whatsoever to do with the moral teachings of the gospels.
But they are ALSO anti-American, if “American” has anything to do with the principles of the Constitution, or the admirable traditions of the US Armed Services, who really did save civilization from the forces of darkness between 1941-1945.
The words “Christian” and “American” have been completely divorced from their meanings by the right. They’re just badges to tell Us from Them.
Adam L Silverman
@Jeffro: We have over 10,000 American personnel, plus thousands more from our Coalition allies, on that objective/target. He drops a nuke on it, he’s going to kill a lot of Americans and our allies.
p.a.
@Adam L Silverman: How many flatscreens can fit on the walls of the Lincoln bedroom?
chris
@Jeffro: Oh goody, we’ll get to see a bunch of burning Iraqi oil wells again. Better and better.
Lizzy L
@Bill Arnold: Jesus was pretty scathing about people who spent their lives getting rich while ignoring the poor and the destitute. There’s a parable in the Gospel of Luke about Lazarus the beggar and the rich man whose doorstep he died on. (Not the Lazarus whom Jesus raised from the dead — this was a different guy.) And Jesus, and the apostles after him, were pretty clear about sharing your wealth with those less fortunate, and helping widows and orphans. Jesus was an observant Jew, after all, and an itinerant Rabbi who knew the Torah. I’m pretty sure that the historical Jesus would have very little patience with the prosperity gospel folks. I’m an observant Catholic and I think they — the leadership — are mostly scammers, and their “flock” are the scammed.
Adam L Silverman
@Davis X. Machina: None, Posse Comitatus Act prohibits the use of the US Military within the continental US with the exception of the National Guard and then, only for certain purposes.
Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho
@Adam L Silverman:
Can’t they just put parental controls on his television streaming?
I don’t actually care what the context is, or whether he meant DOJ or Kellyanne Conway to annoy the bad guys into leaving Chicago. It’s the reflexive aggression to control that’s disturbing. We’re not even a week in, FFS.
Some news outlets reported that FBI said “no big deal” w/r/t LTG Flynn’s calls to Russians. Might that sucker some of team chaos into believing it’s all cool?
Davis X. Machina
@Adam L Silverman: No revolution without martyrs. Trump lo vult.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: Eggs for omelettes, old boy.
Bill Arnold
@p.a.:
Thanks! Just read a few fierce rants at slactivist; will read more.
Adam L Silverman
@Mike in NC: The ARFORGEN cycle is badly degraded. Despite their respective sizes, there is no good that comes from keeping FORSCOM and TRADOC separate at a time of war (declared or not). And that’s before I get to the discussion of TRADOC having one deck to many, to use the Navy term. We have 2 stars as Combine Joint Force Land Component Commanders right now. The good news is the current one is a sharp dude. His backfill is also a sharp dude (I know both of them – have served with them when they were colonels). But that’s because we don’t have enough Corps.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman:
Yup. You know that and I know that, and he’ll be apprised of that…and say, “Ok, so what’s the next closest target that will get their attention and not kill our guys? This is genius, right? Pop a small one off, just a small one, and BAM, war’s over and they’re pumping oil for us LIKE THEY SHOULD HAVE BEEN ALL ALONG…”
etc etc
It’s not hard to imagine. The question is, who has the guts to grab the needle off the record?
Davis X. Machina
@Adam L Silverman: It’s only a law… and an old one.
Millard Filmore
@Gin & Tonic:
In the same way that the industrial revolution started next to the world’s superpower, but not IN that superpower … I will go to Thailand instead of China. It will be under China’s shadow or umbrella but is not a part of China, giving it more flexibility.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman:
There you go. Certain purposes.
-Wikipedia, because of course
“…400 shooting deaths is a local, sate, and national emergency, you have to call in the Guard at that point, how come they didn’t do it sooner, I had mothers thanking me on Twitter…”
“…since this has been so effective in curbing the carnage, I’ve decided to extend this to the following additional cities that are currently UNDER SIEGE by thugs…”
etc etc
Jay S
@Another Scott: I have no confidence that the Militias have any IFF competency. They will be just as likely to take out non-threatening local LEOs as they would be the martial law enforcers.
ETA Not that you were suggesting otherwise.
Omnes Omnibus
@Millard Filmore:
I am not following. Aren’t the answers Britain and Britain?
elm
@Jeffro: I am sure Bannon the Nazi has planned it all out.
Anne Laurie
@The Thin Black Duke:
… but not for winners, of course.
Bet you a store-bought cookie he’d try to revive the old custom of buying one’s way out of the draft — none of this ‘exemption for those who (can afford to) pursue higher education’, but a straightforward sliding-scale, hire-a-peon-to-stand-in-for-you buy-out for those with money. Because even the aging pro-Trump spite voters remember ‘draft riots’ as ‘cops got to beat up the hippies’, not ‘angry mobs nearly burned down NYC‘.
The earliest of my indigent Irish ancestors to emigrate was supposed to have been one of those paid recruits. This time around, no doubt, it’ll be Middle Eastern refugees shipped in from European camps to sub in for Jared Kushner’s kids and Max Boot’s grandkids. (After all, we’re already handing out papers to Central American refugees desperate enough to put in their time in the military.)
Jay S
@Anne Laurie: I suspect Trump would go for privatising his armies. Private sector solutions are always cheaper, right?
Adam L Silverman
@Alternative Fax, a hip hop artist from Idaho: There was an anonymous leak to WaPo on the Flynn stuff. It appears to have been intended to push back the Times, CNN, and WSJ reporting.
amk
@Jay S: erik effing prince is all teed up and ready to go.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m pretty sure that Mosul is not in Malaya.
Adam L Silverman
@Jeffro: This is why Mattis agreed to be SecDef.
Jay S
@efgoldman: Or they could make it too radioactive to extract. Oil stolen, price increased.
Jeffro
@elm: Btw for what it’s worth, news of Trumpov’s intentions re: Chicago also notes that he intends to “go after” sanctuary cities…you know, those wretched hives of scum and villainy?
It’s…it’s almost like a 70-year-old exclusively Fox/Breitbart watcher with anger management and attention issues suddenly had the power to act on every dumb thing Bill O’Reilly had every beat into his head.
Going to be a hard slog, trying to show that ‘sanctuary cities’ don’t have any more crime that other cities, that 5M illegal aliens didn’t vote in 2008 and 2012 and 2016, that the economy was doing just fine on November 8th, 2016.
Jeffro
@Adam L Silverman: Agreed. I hope he can hang in there.
Lurking Canadian
@Anne Laurie: I wouldn’t expect the crowd around Trump to be entirely comfortable with the melanin content of the US armed forces (esp Army) as currently constituted. I don’t think a draft gets them the troops with the right complexion for the mission.
Disbanding the Army and outsourcing the security of the US to the brother of the new Sec. of Education, though, sounds right up Trump’s alley.
Lurking Canadian
@Jay S: Blackfinger!
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: You know it and I know it. Does Trump?
Adam L Silverman
@amk: Erik Prince is currently being funded and run by the People’s Republic of China. And is under an ongoing CI investigation as a result.
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: I’m pretty sure he’s never heard of Malaya.
Omnes Omnibus
@Lurking Canadian: Mercs tend to be from SF or “elite” units. Most fighting is done by line units.
Davis X. Machina
Create two, three, many Groznys!
Jay S
@Adam L Silverman: Not a problem that a Soldier of Fortune ad can’t fix.
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam L Silverman: I think he knows who his wife is.
Millard Filmore
@Omnes Omnibus:
Perhaps I have been too long out of school. I am under the impression that Scotland is where the industrial age started.
Jay S
@Omnes Omnibus: You think Trump knows that? Or anything else about war?
Adam L Silverman
@Omnes Omnibus: Well played, well played indeed!
Peale
@Omnes Omnibus: I read SF as San Francisco and was thinking that I was learning something new on this here blog.
Peale
@Adam L Silverman: now I did learn something new. Do these people have any shame whatsoever?
Omnes Omnibus
@Millard Filmore: Scotland is part of Britain. Act of Union and all that. Scotland is not part of England. I said Britain.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jay S: My point was that they won’t get the numbers they want.
@Adam L Silverman: ::bows::
Jay S
@Omnes Omnibus: You think he cares about numbers? He doesn’t want numbers. He just wants to say “Make it so!”.
ETA I will admit he does have a size matters problem. But he can make up any number he wants.
Millard Filmore
@Omnes Omnibus: Yup, very close but not equal to.
Adam L Silverman
@Peale: no
Omnes Omnibus
@Jay S: And generals can say, “I can’t do that without X number of soldiers. And if you order me to do that, I will resign.”
Millard Filmore
@Omnes Omnibus: Oddly, I have visions of our very own Tiananmen Square slithering through my head.
Peale
@efgoldman: I doubt it. Seriously. Mr. ADHD probably has never sat through an entire movie. John Wayne or otherwise.
Jay S
@Omnes Omnibus: You and I probably both remember Nixon’s Saturday night massacre. Trump would see it as a necessary purge.
Cheryl Rofer
Showing up late as usual, but I really, really would like to see a reporter or interviewer ask Trump what he means by “take the oil”. The only way to do it is to militarily occupy the oilfields and fight the pipeline and truck bombers until the oilfields are depleted. And yes, that seems to be a war crime.
My sense is that he somehow thinks that we could just suck all the oil out of the ground in no time at all and bring it home. That would be a war crime, too, if geology and engineering permitted it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jay S: I was a kid then. Just 10, when Nixon resigned. Do you not think that a parade of resignations would send a message?
Anne Laurie
@Lurking Canadian:
Boy, are they gonna be disappointed with Erik Prince. Can’t be arsed to Google, but his last few public ventures have run into problems because at the rates Prince wants to pay, he’s only been able to ‘recruit’ non-white helots from Third-World hellholes. And then he doesn’t want to pay for their training — or to pay them at all — which means all the classical problems of a mercenary force: angry, desperate, ignorant outcasts from their own societies armed & set loose in an alien land.
Omnes Omnibus
@Anne Laurie: Jeebus, he isn’t even using good mercs? The Special Forces and Paras? They never want gunners or engineers. Merc firms aren’t very bright.
Cheryl Rofer
Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is WITH ME!
Adria McDowell (formerly LurkerExtraordinaire)
@Omnes Omnibus:
For now. ;-)
Omnes Omnibus
@Adria McDowell (formerly LurkerExtraordinaire): Since, is it 1707?
Larkspur
@Anne Laurie: Well, if Erik’s mercenary activities get boring or unprofitable, he could always come home and get a job working for his sister Betsy DeVos at her brand new Edumacation gig. What a fine all-American family.
joel hanes
And if you order me to do that, I will resign.
The Donald : Resign? No. You’re fired.
You, there … soldier. Want to be a general? Can YOU follow a direct order?
fuckwit
@BBA: That’s exactly right.
Anne Laurie
@Omnes Omnibus:
Good mercs cost too much money!
IIRC, that’s why he got tangled up with the People’s Republic — they had cannon fodder from the hinterlands available cheaply, so he tried to rent a bunch of ‘surplus rural population’ to use against the revolting natives in various Gulf Coast protectorates. Problem with trying to cut deals with people who can use force as a substitute for money, though, turns out they can probably afford enough force to take your money, if they decide you’re not meeting their standards…
Omnes Omnibus
@joel hanes: It can’t can’t work that way. It just can’t. Believe me or not. I am going to bed now.
joel hanes
@Omnes Omnibus:
It can’t can’t work that way. It just can’t.
I sincerly and fervently pray that you’re correct.
But I would have said exactly that about several important things that have, in fact, actually come to pass just recently.
ETA: I’m remembering the General who tried to tell W’s misadministration that Iraq was going to cost more than $100 B.
The Donald ain’t no W. He lacks all restraint, internal and, it seems, external.
Dark days.
fuckwit
@Timurid: I see this coming from several angles.
First of all, provocations like this.
Secondly, shit like the Rethugs wanting to take every issue and make it a “state’s rights” issue: health care being a major one, but just about every other issue too. This will lead very quickly to “two Americas”: living in California will be even more like a different country that Alabama than it is already.
The inevitable conflict will come when the Feds remember that the issue of State’s Rights was decided already in 1865 at Appomatox. But this time around it’ll be the Blue states that will be more or less (and more or less unwillingly) in open defiance or conflict against the Federal gov.
It could be over any issue– immigration, weed, healthcare, civil liberties, gay rights, even environmental regulation– but at some point Troll will get his panties in a snitch and willfully violate Posse Comitatus.
I’m happy to be safely ensconced in the bluest area of the bluest state, but I don’t think we’ll be immune here from the chaos that is coming.
fuckwit
@joel hanes: That’s the only way it can work.
Unless, someone fairly high up decides to instigate a military coup, and take the shitgibbon as prisoner.
At which point, Democracy is just as dead as if he had followed the order.
Heads we lose, tails Putin and Bannon win.
Brachiator
@joel hanes:
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name, oh yeah
But what’s confusing you
Is just the nature of my game
(Woo woo, who who)
Just as every cop is a criminal
And all the sinners saints
As heads is tails
Just call me Lucifer
‘Cause I’m in need of some restraint
JustRuss
This. Taking the oil would require a huge, very expensive, long-term occupation, and we wouldn’t even have the WMD fig leaf to legitimize it. It would be a huge loser for everyone involved, except Exxon.
jmw
Homonym error?
Shalimar
@Omnes Omnibus: Scotland was part of the U.K. from 1707-2018, my future history says.
J R in WV
@Chet Murthy:
The pont here is that Trump’s people deliberately stopped federal aid from going to the county because the county went 60-40 for Hillary Clinton in the election. Trump’s people who have already taken over reached out to harm Democratic voting Americans, deliberately, because of how they voted.
New Republican FEMA plan, Democratic voters have storm damage, suffer from it, or die quickly. I wonder if the Feds will even try to fight wild fires in California? I guess not, it kept Trump from winning the popular vote.
Seth Owen
@PhoenixRising: This.
Many Americans seem to think our hegemony is some law of nature. In fact, it is quite the opposite. Every other would-be hegemony faced a coalition of the other great powers to resist it.
In our case, not only did most of the other great powers acquiesce in our status. They became allies. We somehow convinced everybody to help us keep the second-place power down. I think this was because we created a world order that prized security and made everybody a stakeholder. Worked well for 70 years.
But should the United States just become another rapacious imperial power, just exploiting the world for its own benefit, then that worm will turn. I am sure China would be happy to lead the effort.
Seth Owen
@amk: No, there isn’t the draft.
Don’t forget the evolving demographics of this country. One of the side effects is that the draft age population is far less white than I’m sure Trump would be comfortable with. I don’t think arming them involuntarily would provide him with the loyal lackeys he wants.