In From the Cold

Guess They Missed the Memo

2012-01-22T16:13:00.005-05:00

At a recent campaign event, Texas Congressman Ron Paul bragged that his biggest donors don't belong to labor unions or political action committees, but they are part of well-know organizations: the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force and Marine Corps. Mr. Paul was referring to service members who have given more to his presidential campaign than any other candidate.

Well, apparently the military voting bloc in South Carolina didn't get the memo. Not only did Mr. Paul finish last among the remaining candidates in yesterday's GOP primary, he also finished last among voters who identify themselves as members of the military, or veterans.

It's a key group in any Republican primary in the Palmetto State, and Mr. Paul didn't fare very well. According to exit poll data from CNN, one out of every five voters in Saturday's primary identified themselves as "veterans" (including active duty military as well). Collectively, they cast more than 126,000 votes for the various GOP candidates, and Congressman Paul collected only 12% of that bloc. By comparison, Newt Gingrich received 39% of the votes cast by South Carolina veterans, compared with 32% for Mitt Romney and 16% for Rick Santorum.

There is clear irony Congressman Paul's poor showing among military voters. Of the four remaining GOP candidates, Paul is the only one who has worn the nation's uniform (he served as an Air Force OB-GYN physician in the early 1960s). Gingrich and Romney used student deferments to avoid military service in the Vietnam era, while Santorum became eligible for the armed forces after the draft ended, and never volunteered. But their lack of service was hardly an impediment; collectively, those three candidates received over 200,000 votes from veterans in South Carolina, while Mr. Paul managed less than one-tenth of that total. Against individual candidates, Paul received less than one-third of the military votes tallied by Mr. Gingrich, and less than half of those received by Mitt Romney.

Why didn't the Congressmen fare better in South Carolina, where veterans are such an important segment of the electorate? Well, for starters, many are concerned about Mr. Paul's hopelessly naive statements on foreign policy, including his suggestion that we "accept" a nuclear-armed Iran. Among the many military veterans in South Carolina are veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. While none of those men and women relish the thought of another conflict in the Middle East, many are reluctant to cede hard-worn gains in pursuit of an isolationist national security agenda, and they realize that a complete U.S. withdrawal from the region would be disastrous. That's why so many of them pulled the lever for Newt Gingrich, Mitt Romney and even Rick Santorum.

To be fair, Congressman Paul has his supporters in the military community. But many of them are first-term, junior-enlisted personnel who have a world view similar to their civilian peers. To those voters, Paul's anti-war message has broad appeal. But among career officers and NCOs (and military retirees), there is decidedly less support for his policies, and that explains his poor showing among veterans in South Carolina.

Why does this matter? Because Florida has an even larger military population, although its a smaller segment of a huge electorate. But in the counties of Northwest Florida, the Jacksonville area, the Space Coast and the Tampa area, the military vote is a key block, one that is likely to further damage Mr. Paul's prospects on primary day in the Sunshine State.

Hold the Celebration

2012-01-19T10:48:00.003-05:00

You could almost hear the corks popping at the White House this morning, after the Labor Department released the latest, weekly numbers for unemployment claims. After an "unexpected" increase for the week of January 7th, the most recent tally for first-time unemployment claims came in at a seasonally-adjusted total of 352,000, a decrease of more than 50,000. It was the lowest level since 2008, and the biggest one-week decline in almost seven years.

Still, not everything is rosy in the new unemployment numbers. As the WSJ reports:

A Labor Department official said "volatility is fairly common this time of year," and noted that several states had their data estimated due to the Martin Luther King holiday.

[snip]

Even with the recent improvement, joblessness remains a significant worry for Americans as they head to the polls this year for the presidential election. The unemployment rate, the government's broadest snapshot of the labor market, measured 8.5% in December. The reading was the lowest level since February 2009, but still well above historic norms.

There's also the lingering problem of much-higher unemployment rates among various groups in the workforce, including veterans. In fact, the jobless rates among ex-military members who served in Iraq and Afghanistan stood at 13.1% in December 2011, a full two-percentage point increase from a year earlier. Tom Tarantino, a legislative associate for the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), believes part of the problem is "structural." As he told the Washington Times:

While many corporations nationwide are invested in hiring veterans, “this is the first generation of business leaders in this country who have never served in the military,” he said. “Prior to this generation, almost everyone had served … and the military resume was something easy to translate.

“But leadership skills, being an officer, are not understood by the current employment climate. What we had to do was go back and figure out ways to do quantitative analysis so that we can effectively transition people without losing the valuable skills they got in the military.”

To help reduce joblessness among younger veterans, various groups (including the IAVA) are holding job fairs around the country. The military is also doing more to help departing service members; the Army (for example), is revamping its transition assistance programs, offering more support and preparation assistance for soldiers returning to civilian life. There is also a wealth of on-line resources for veterans looking for work.

And, to his credit, President Obama recently signed legislation that provides a tax credit to firms that hire unemployed veterans. But, as is often the case with this administration, the positive effects of the tax legislation may be swamped by other policies that will hurt out-of-work veterans.

We refer to plans for massive cutbacks in defense spending, upwards of $1 trillion over the next 10 years. Those reductions will create a ripple effect among defense contractors and other firms that are among the leading employers of veterans. With fewer contracts for new systems and required support services, those companies will reduce their payrolls, creating fewer job opportunities for ex-service members. And did we mention that many of those positions pay salaries in the low six-figures, with outstanding benefits?

In other words, the job market for young veterans may get worse before it gets better. In a bitter and ironic twist, the men and women who defended this nation over the past decade could be among the last to benefit from a supposedly improving jobs outlook.

The Hits Keep on Comin'

2012-01-16T19:54:00.002-05:00

The London Times is claiming confirmation of what must be one of the world's worst-kept secrets: Israeli intelligence (read: the Mossad) was behind last week's assassination of an Iranian nuclear scientist:

The Mossad worked for months to stage the assassination of its latest Iranian nuclear scientist target last Wednesday, The London Timesreported Sunday.

Quoting unnamed Israeli sources, thenewspaper said that well-trained team of agents working in Iran set up the bomb attack on Mustafa Ahmadi Roshan, a scientist at the Natanz nuclear facility. He also was involved in missile development.

[snip]

It said that agents followed Roshan’s movements from a “safe house” and also staked out Iran’s intelligence headquarters in Tehran, where unusual activity the morning of the assassination almost forced an abortion of the strike.

Iran apparently took steps to protect Roshan, whose bodyguard checked his Peugeot 405 vehicle for explosives before driving.

The motorcycle used in the attack was hidden in a garage, and after Roshan and his driver entered the vehicle around 8 a.m., the Mossad agents gave the order to carry out the operation, the Times stated.

The masked motorcyclist attached the magnetic bomb to the car, and it exploded exactly nine seconds later, mortally wounding Roshan and his driver.

For what it's worth, Time is out with a similar report, claiming the Mossad has trained and paid assassins to carry out a string of hits against scientists and officials connected with Iran's WMD program. Those assassinations, coupled with last year's Stuxnet computer virus attack, have reportedly had a crippling effect on Tehran's nuclear efforts, delaying final development of an atomic weapon.

The latest operation sent chills through certain Iranian circles. Through its so-called "secret war," the Mossad has demonstrated the ability to penetrate the highest levels of Tehran's nuclear program, targeting key scientists and administrators. Indeed, the attack that eliminated Mustafa Ahmadi Roshan and his driver must be particularly disturbing for the late scientist's colleagues and Iranian security officials. Members of the Mossad team clearly had detailed knowledge of Roshan's travel habits and vulnerable points along his route. The message couldn't be more clear: if you're an important figure in Iran's nuclear program, the Israelis have the ability to locate and target you, even if you have a security detail.

Still, we haven't heard of any Iranian scientists dropping out of the program, and the Tehran regime remains determined to get a bomb. And that's the real bottom line in this scenario. While these targeted assassinations are stunning examples of the covert operational art, they cannot completely derail Iran's nuclear efforts. Roshan will be replaced, and Iran's bomb-building efforts will lurch forward. The delays brought about by killing a particular scientist or engineer may be measured in just days or weeks.

Meanwhile, there is no consensus in the west for effective, long-term solutions that might include military action. Additionally, the Obama Administration is doing all it can to dissuade Israel from launching an airstrike that might cripple or destroy key Iranian nuclear facilities. It was announced over the weekend that General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, will visit Israel in the coming days to meet with his IDF counterpart. The tone of the discussions will reportedly be "frank." In other words, we're leaning heavily on the Israelis to forego a preemptive attack, hoping that a new round of sanctions will do the trick.

General Dempsey is an able man, and the upcoming visit will affirm what he already knows: Israeli patience has it limits. In the interim, the Mossad will keep chipping away at Iran's nuclear program, eliminating key figures in an effort to buy time until the U.S. decides to act, or Israel decides to act on its own.

Back in the DPRK

2012-01-16T12:42:00.004-05:00

Guess we know why the North Korean masses recently gathered to wave their arms and shout praises to the "Great Successor," Kim Jong-un. They were trying to stay warm. DailyNK.com reports that even the elites are feeling the chill this winter:

Many of the residents of luxury apartments in Pyongyang are leaving their homes for the heated homes of relatives or other warmer locations.

An inside source who visited Pyongyang at the end of last month said in a phone interview with the Daily NK today, “People previously had no supplies of water so didn't have drinking water and could not go to the bathroom without difficulty, but now that there are heating problems too the people are inevitably leaving their homes. This year, many people are locking their homes and leaving for warmer places.”

The source said, “When I went to Pyongyang just three years ago, the people still stayed in their apartments even without heat, but now half of them are gone, they went to East Pyongyang where the pre-1980s homes are heated with charcoal briquettes.”

The source added, “Even until last year, the residents in these apartments spent the whole winter season there with cotton blankets on the floor all day long, filling pint bottles with hot water to warm their blankets when they slept; however, as the situation has gotten worse this year whole families cannot take any more and have chosen to leave their homes behind.”

Obviously, Daily NK isn't exactly regime-friendly, but reports of widespread shortages are common-place in The Worker's Paradise. More than a decade ago, we saw imagery of North Korean commuters, forced to ride atop rail cars because fuel and electricity shortages limited the daily train schedule. Other reports indicate that the average citizen of the DPRK subsists on little more than a bowl of rice each day, and if they're lucky, they get protein two times a week. No wonder the average South Korean is now 3-4 inches taller (and 30-40 pounds heavier) than his counterpart up North.

Perhaps the most telling aspect of the Daily NK report is where the latest electricity shortages are occurring. The folks abandoning those "luxury" apartments are elite of North Korea, the very constituency that Kim Jong-un must placate to consolidate and maintain his hold on power. During the last years, of his father's rule, the faintest signs of regime opposition began to emerge in North Korea, despite all the implements of a modern police state. Now, with the elites suffering some of the same deprivations as the masses, there will be renewed speculation about Kim Jong-un's ability to retain control of a decaying dictatorship, the political-military equivalent of those apartment buildings on Gwangbok Street.

One final thought: if conditions are that bad in the "upscale" neighborhoods of Pyongyang, you can only imagine what the peasants are enduring.

Haven't Verified this Claim as True...

2012-01-05T20:54:00.003-05:00

...but if it is, it's one hell of a story. From Bob Owens.com:

Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, America's deadliest sniper of all time with 255 kills, punched the truther former Governor of Minnesota in the face for being an ass in front of the family of CMOH recipient Michael Monsoor, calling the SEALs murderers and saying they deserved to die.

Kyle offered his version of the episode on the Opie and Anthony radio show. The recipient of his fist, Jesse Ventura, has not responded publicly.

On behalf of everyone who grew tired of Ventura long ago, we can only offer two words to Chief Kyle:

"Thank You."

Unasked Questions

2011-12-31T19:30:00.003-05:00

It's a good thing Richard Benedetto is retired. After publication of his recent column at Real Clear Politics, Mr. Benedetto (a former White House correspondent for USA Today) would have a hard time landing another MSM gig. Not only is Benedetto concerned about Barack Obama's lack of answers on critical issues (ranging from Afghanistan to the economy), he's also upset at his former colleagues, for refusing to pose the questions. As he writes:

Over the past five months, the Republican presidential candidates participated in 13 debates where they fielded dozens of penetrating questions on every major issue facing the nation, and some not so major.

[snip]

Yet, during all that time, the man they hope to defeat next November has rarely been asked by news reporters about many of these issues. Since August, President Obama has held only one formal White House news conference. That came on Oct. 6, nearly three months ago. It lasted 74 minutes, shorter than any single Republican debate, and the president was asked 17 questions, most of them softballs on the economy and his latest legislative proposals to create jobs.

No questions on immigration, no questions on Iran or Iraq or Afghanistan or Israel or North Korea -- global trouble spots the GOP candidates have been queried about repeatedly. Moreover, he was not asked about what spending cuts he would make to reduce the deficit, nothing about Medicare and Social Security reform or his health care law, all familiar questions for the Republicans seeking his job.

Benedetto is correct is surmising that Obama's silence is a calculated strategy. In the view of the MSM, the President seems cool and above the fray, while Republicans spar over virtually all elements of American public policy. Some analysts believe this approach was responsible for a recent bump in Mr. Obama's approval numbers, although that spike was extremely short-lived.

But there's a more disturbing aspect to this scenario, and it goes well beyond MSM reporters who are in the tank for Obama. Indeed, the fact that journalists are openly aiding the President in his re-election bid is hardly a surprise; the White House press corps, along with the majority of reporters who work inside The Beltway, are overwhelmingly liberal, and have much invested in the political fortunes of Barack Obama. So far, relatively few of the MSM crowd seem willing to jump ship, and they're quite willing to regurgitate stories that advance the campaign narrative.

From our perspective, Mr. Obama's refusal to engage on critical issues is more than a campaign strategy--it reflects an administration that clearly lacks ideas. Consider the recent change-of-leadership in North Korea. The death of Kim Jong-il clearly caught U.S. leaders by surprise, and so far, our policy towards the new regime seems to be a continuation of the engagement and appeasement approach that has failed miserably for more than a decade. Now would be a good time to re-engage China (and other regional partners) on the subject of North Korea, with a long-term goal of putting more pressure on Kim Jong-un and forcing genuine concessions from his regime, in exchange for increased humanitarian aid and economic development--once DPRK compliance has been confirmed.

Then, there's the matter of Iran. Tehran recently launched major naval exercises in the Persian Gulf and has made veiled threats about closing the Strait of Hormuz. So far, the U.S. response has been a quote from an unnamed administration official who complained about Iranian "saber-rattling." President Obama was apparently too busy with his Hawaiian vacation to offer his own comments, suggesting (once again) that the administration isn't quite sure what Iran is up to--or what to do about it.

And maybe that explains why the press corps won't press Obama on key domestic and international concerns. Not only would tough questioning put "their guy" on the spot, it might also affirm his lack of engagement and thought on these and other issues. In a recent interview, the President admitted he has a "lazy streak." So, it's more convenient for him to trot out Hillary Clinton to field questions on Iran, or let Press Secretary Jay Carney handle queries about North Korea.

In any case (as Richard Benedetto reminds us), the American public remains badly served by a press corps that refuses to do its job. Not that we'd expect anything less from the MSM at the end of 2011. And they wonder why their audience and readership numbers are in free-fall.

Words of Warning?

2011-12-29T14:00:00.008-05:00

Driving past my gas station in the Old Dominion a couple of days ago, I noticed that gas prices had jumped .20 a gallon over night. And, it didn't take an energy expert to figure out why. With Iran conducting naval exercises near the Strait of Hormuz (and making vague threats about possibly shutting down the strategic waterway), global oil markets are getting nervous.

Indeed, some oil analysts are now talking in near-apocalyptic terms. From OilPrice.com:

The pieces and policies for potential conflict in the Persian Gulf are seemingly drawing inexorably together.

Since 24 December the Iranian Navy has been holding its ten-day Velayat 90 naval exercises, covering an area in the Arabian Sea stretching from east of the Strait of Hormuz entrance to the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Aden. The day the maneuvers opened Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari told a press conference that the exercises were intended to show "Iran's military prowess and defense capabilities in international waters, convey a message of peace and friendship to regional countries, and test the newest military equipment." The exercise is Iran's first naval training drill since May 2010, when the country held its Velayat 89 naval maneuvers in the same area. Velayat 90 is the largest naval exercise the country has ever held.

[snip]

The exercises have put Iranian warships in close proximity to vessels of the United States Fifth Fleet, based in Bahrain, which patrols some of the same waters, including the Strait of Hormuz, a 21 mile-wide waterway at its narrowest point. Roughly 40 percent of the world's oil tanker shipments transit the strait daily, carrying 15.5 million barrels of Saudi, Iraqi, Iranian, Kuwaiti, Bahraini, Qatari and United Arab Emirates crude oil, leading the United States Energy Information Administration to label the Strait of Hormuz "the world's most important oil chokepoint."

As the article notes, Iran's naval exercise comes on the heels of its recent "capture" of a U.S. RQ-170 reconnaissance drone. Tehran claims it successfully hacked into the aircraft's guidance signal, forcing it to land in Iranian territory. Military spokesmen say Iran is demonstrating its full range of military capabilities during the exercise, utilizing surface vessels, submarines, aircraft, drones and other assets.

But, as we've pointed out before, care must be taken in estimating Tehran's tactical abilities. For example, Iran's naval forces look impressive enough on paper, until you consider that many naval units only rarely put to sea, including its diesel submarines. There's also the critical matter of airpower; Tehran would quickly lose air superiority over the strait in a battle with the U.S., leaving ships, subs, and land-based missile sites even vulnerable to attack.

Still, Iran doesn't need to win a protracted struggle with American forces to effectively close the Strait of Hormuz. Once the first tanker hits a mine, or is struck by a missile, insurance underwriters will stop issuing coverage for commercial traffic in the region, reducing the flow of crude to a trickle--with a corresponding (and predictable) impact on oil and gas prices. Even a brief interruption in oil traffic through the strait would send prices skyrocketing towards the $200 level mentioned into today's analysis.

Why would the mullahs choose such a path? For a variety of reasons, including retaliation for new sanctions being imposed by the United States. By closing the strait--even for a few days--Iran believes it can strike a telling blow against the west, and undercut U.S. efforts to punish Tehran. It would also serve another, key geopolitical purpose: demonstrating that Iranian power is on the ascendancy, while America slowly withdraws from the Persian Gulf region.

Late today, GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul said new sanctions against Iran were "acts of war." Go figure. So far, the Obama Administration seems willing to stay the course, and risk the consequences of further adventurism by Tehran. In reality, they have little choice. Washington has been ignoring the Iranian menace for far too long and we're facing the potentially dire consequences of our own inaction.

The Last International Crisis of 2011 (or the First of 2012)

2011-12-24T17:49:00.004-05:00

Iran has kicked off a 10-day naval exercise in international waters, near the Strait of Hormuz. From the AP:

The exercises, dubbed "Velayat 90," could bring Iranian ships into proximity with U.S. Navy vessels in the area.

The war games cover a 1,250-mile (2,000-kilometer) stretch of sea off the Strait of Hormuz, northern parts of the Indian Ocean and into the Gulf of Aden, near the entrance to the Red Sea, state TV reported.

The drill will be Iran's latest show of strength in the face of mounting international criticism over its controversial nuclear program, which the West fears is aimed at developing atomic weapons. Tehran denies those charges, insisting the program is for peaceful purposes

Those "U.S. Navy vessels in the area" are part of the John C. Stennis carrier battle group, which has been operating in the area for several weeks. In fact, an E-2C Hawkeye from the carrier's air group flew the last American mission over Iraq last weekend.

Iran reportedly plans to use its exercise to show off military hardware that could be used to close the Strait of Hormuz, including submarines, anti-ship missiles, drones, manned aircraft and surface vessels. The drill took on added significance when an Iranian politician recently boasted that Iran might actually close off the strategic waterway during the drill. However, the Iranian foreign ministry quickly backed off that claim, although military officers have reaffirmed Tehran's ability to carry out such actions.

The real danger, of course, is what can happen when poorly disciplined Iranian air and naval crews operate in close proximity to U.S. ships and aircraft. The margin for miscalculation is large, especially when you consider that Tehran would love nothing more than provoking a major confrontation with the United States, and shift attention away from its nuclear program.

On the other hand, Iran may find it more beneficial to temper its fanatical desires. Sure, creating an incident in the strait would generate a global trade crisis and produce a major spike in global oil prices. But it would also invite an expanded American military presence in the region, at a time when our forces are completing their exit from Iraq.

Clearly, our forces in the region are operating under strict rules-of-engagement. But our personnel can also exercise their inherent right to self defense, if the Iranians threaten American military forces. With Tehran feeling its geopolitical oats right now, it's not unreasonable to expect some type of confrontation between U.S. and Iranian forces in the coming days. From Tehran's view, such an encounter would serve a useful purpose, illustrating how far the Obama Administration is (or isn't) willing to go in defending our interests--and allies--in the Gulf.

What a Guy

2011-12-20T14:36:00.005-05:00

Kim Jong-il's legacy is rather grim, befitting a modern despot.

Mass murderer? Check. Under his watch, at least one million North Korean peasants starved to death in the mid-1990s, allowing "The Dear Leader" to divert food aid to his military and continue development of nuclear weapons.

Jailer of a Nation? Ditto. Kim keep the gulags humming during his 16 years in power. By one estimate, at least 250,000 North Korean citizens are imprisoned in state jails and labor camps. That may seem rather puny by Soviet standards, but it's worth remembering that North Korea has a population of only 22 million, so roughly one out of every 100 residents of the worker's paradise is behind bars. And, Kim Jong-il made it a shared experience; family members of prisoners are routinely sent to the gulag, too.

Enjoyed a Decadent Lifestyle? Absolutely. While ordinary North Koreans eat tree bark for nourishment, Kim Jong-il enjoyed gourmet fare (the standard joke in intel circles is that Kim and his family were the only people in the DPRK with weight problems). The great dictator also boasted the world's largest private film collection (remember, this is the same guy who ordered the kidnapping of a South Korean director and his actress wife to improve the quality of North Korean movies); maintained a three story "pleasure palace in downtown Pyongyang, and vacationed a country estate with its own surface-to-air missile battery.

International Terrorist? Yep. Kim Jong-il was responsible for the deaths of dozens of South Korean military personnel, government officials and ordinary civilians. The 1968 Blue House attack (directed at the ROK Presidential mansion); the 1983 Rangoon bombing (aimed at decapitating the South Korean government), the 1987 downing of KAL Flight 858 (which killed 115 passengers and crew), and just last year, the sinking of a ROK destroyer and the shelling of a South Korean island along the maritime DMZ. All bore the personal stamp of Kim Jong-il.

Given this resume, it would be difficult to say anything good about the deceased North Korea dictator. Yet, the State Department's #3 official, Wendy Sherman, had no trouble praising Kim Jong-il, during an interview with NPR. Here's how Josh Rogin of Foreign Policy summarized her remarks:

[Ms.] Sherman, a special adviser to President Clinton on North Korea, accompanied then-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright to Pyongyang in 2001, and met Kim along with Swedish Prime Minister Goran Persson.

"We shared similar impressions of meeting him. He was smart and a quick problem-solver," Sherman says. "He is also witty and humorous. Our overall impression was very different from the way he was known to the outside world."

Sherman sat next to Kim at a stadium to watch a huge festival of synchronized dancing. She says she turned to Kim and told him she had the sense that in some other life, he was a "great director."

"He clearly took such delight in putting these performances together," she says. "And he says, yes, that he cared about this a great deal and that he owned every Academy Award movie, he had watched them all, and he also had every film of Michael Jordan's NBA basketball games and had watched them as well."

Why, that practically makes him a Jeffersonian Democrat, doesn't it? Any serious observer of North Korea would dismiss such comments as pure pap, but when you consider the source, it's down-right scary. In her current post, Ms. Sherman has considerable influence over U.S. foreign policy, particularly as it relates to North Korea. Her willingness to overlook Mr. Kim's flaws speaks volumes about our diplomatic establishment, and its recent overtures towards Pyongyang. The last three administrations (Democrat and Republican) have bent over backwards to accomodate the DPRK, in hopes of brokering some sort of agreement on North Korea's nuclear program. In return, Pyongyang has played the U.S. like a proverbial fiddle, using provocations to extract more aid, offering only vague promises in return.

The diplomatic calculus goes something like this: through engagement, the U.S. and its partners can avoid a geopolitical calamity on the Korean Peninsula, and prepare for the eventual, "soft" collapse of the Kims' dictatorial dynasty. Unfortunately, there are a couple of problems with this theory: first, China, the most important ally of the DPRK, has never brought enough pressure to affect Pyongyang's behavior, or supported genuinely tough sanctions that would achieve similar goals.

Secondly, every so-called "expert" on the subject has consistently underestimated North Korea's ability to muddle through. As a military intelligence officer two decades ago, I remember reviewing a summary of a ROK Ministry of Defense White Paper that predicted South Korea's main adversaries in 2010 would be Japan and China. By that point, analysts predicted, North Korea would have long since imploded. Obviously, the smart guys with Seoul got it wrong--as did their American counterparts. North Korea is clearly headed for the ash heap of history, but it may outlast many of those predicting its collapse. And there's always the question of whether Pyongyang goes out with a whimper--or a bang.

Further complicating the picture is Kim Jong-an's near-total lack of leadership experience. He was anointed as the "Great Successor" barely a year ago, and must rely on family members (and the military) to help him gain his footing. Recent reporting from the DPRK indicates that foreign delegations will not be allowed to attend Kim Jong-il's massive state funeral, suggesting there are already internal concerns about the succession process.

Another element of concern is our own naivete towards North Korea. Wendy Sherman's comments are indicative of our willingness to ignore reality in the DPRK, hoping vainly that a reformer will emerge or Pyongyang will simply pursue more rational policies. Our insistence on turning the other cheek only invites more North Korean mischief, as the peninsula faces one of its most dangerous periods in more than 50 years.
***
ADDENDUM: The New York Times is using the term "intelligence failure" to describe U.S. and South Korean reporting in the hours between Kim Jong-il's actual demise and the announcement of his death. Apparently, the U.S. intel community (and its ROK conterparts) failed to detect any signs of unusual activity after Kim died on his train Saturday morning:

"...South Korean and American intelligence services to have failed to pick up any clues to this momentous development — panicked phone calls between government officials, say, or soldiers massing around Mr. Kim’s train — attests to the secretive nature of North Korea, a country not only at odds with most of the world but also sealed off from it in a way that defies spies or satellites.

[snip]

“We have clear plans about what to do if North Korea attacks, but not if the North Korean regime unravels,” said Michael J. Green, a former Asia adviser in the Bush administration. “Every time you do these scenarios, one of the first objectives is trying to find out what’s going on inside North Korea.”

In many countries, that would involve intercepting phone calls between government officials or peering down from spy satellites. And indeed, American spy planes and satellites scan the country. Highly sensitive antennas along the border between South and North Korea pick up electronic signals. South Korean intelligence officials interview thousands of North Koreans who defect to the South each year.

And yet remarkably little is known about the inner workings of the North Korean government. Pyongyang, officials said, keeps sensitive information limited to a small circle of officials, who do not talk."

And there's the rub. North Korea is built on compartmentalization, where only the inner circle knows what's going on, and they don't leak to the Times. Moreover, the DPRK also benefits from technology that is outdated by western standards. Cell phones have only been recently introduced in North Korea; most calls are still made over old-fashioned land lines, which are not conducive to intercept--unless you find a way to tap into the circuit.

Additionally, the North Koreans are well-versed in denial and deception techniques. If there was any congregating around Kim's train after his demise, that crowd was dispersed when spy satellites passed overhead, or the long-range cameras from American U-2s (or other surveillance platforms) were within range.

In a hermit kingdom like North Korea, it's almost impossible to develop reliable human intelligence assets, a problem that has vexed our spymasters for more than five decades. During my time in "the game," one of our few sources of HUMINT from North Korea came from Asian businessmen who traveled to Pyongyang. Naturally, their movements were closely controlled and most had a "minder" in tow. So, their impressions of the DPRK were clearly shaped by the Pyongyang government, which only added to our knowledge gaps.

And that won't change under the "new" regime of Kim Jong-un.

The Dear Leader Assumes Room Temperature

2011-12-18T22:56:00.005-05:00

North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il is dead. According to both Reuters and the Associated Press, state media in the DPRK announced Kim's demise earlier today:

Kim Jong Il, North Korea's mercurial and enigmatic longtime leader, has died of heart failure. He was 69.

In a "special broadcast" Monday from the North Korean capital, state media said Kim died of a heart ailment on a train due to a "great mental and physical strain" on Dec. 17 during a "high intensity field inspection." It said an autopsy was done on Dec. 18 and "fully confirmed" the diagnosis.

Kim is believed to have suffered a stroke in 2008, but he had appeared relatively vigorous in photos and video from recent trips to China and Russia and in numerous trips around the country carefully documented by state media. The communist country's "Dear Leader" - reputed to have had a taste for cigars, cognac and gourmet cuisine - was believed to have had diabetes and heart disease.

Initial broadcasts from North Korean TV referred to the dead ruler in the hagiographical terms normally reserved for the younger Kim and his father, Kim il-Sung, founder of the DPRK. Kim Jong-il took power in Pyongyang 16 years ago, following the death of his father.

"It is the biggest loss for the party ... and it is our people and nation's biggest sadness," an anchorwoman clad in black Korean traditional dress said in a voice choked with tears. She said the nation must "change our sadness to strength and overcome our difficulties."

While Kim Jong-il's demise was not totally unexpected, it did come as something of a surprise. He recovered sufficiently from his 2008 stroke to retain the reigns of power and lay the groundwork for another hereditary succession, to his third son, Kim Jong-am. Believed to be in his later 20s, Kim Jong-am is two decades younger than his father when he succeeded Kim Il-Sung, and desperately lacking in leadership experience. Since anointing him as North Korea's next leader in 2010, Kim Jong-il quickly raised his son's profile and administrative portfolio. But with the sudden death of Kim Jong-il, there are legitimate questions about the new leader's ability to retain power through the upcoming transition process.

However, it might be a mistake to bet against Kim Jong-am. Similar questions were raised about Kim Jong-il but he managed to consolidate power by winning the support of his most important constituency, the DPRK military. In the years leading up to his death, Kim Jong-il elevated a number of younger officers who are considered more "accepting" of his son as the next leader; they will form the bedrock of support on which Kim Jong-am will build his regime.

Suffice it to say, the next North Korean leader faces grave challenges. The nation' economy is in the toilet, with no prospects for recovery. Pyongyang's most viable exports are ballistic missiles and WMD technology, along with illegal drugs and counterfeit currency. Millions of North Korean peasants face starvation, due to years of agricultural failures. It's a situation similar to the mid-1990s, when Kim Jong-il allowed at least one million peasants to perish, so scarce food supplies could be directed to the military and political elites. Given the same scenario, Kim Jong-am will likely follow his father's example.

But there's no assurance the populace will tolerate those tactics again. In recent years, there have been faint signs of political opposition and discontent within the DPRK. And, with more North Koreans gaining glimpses of the outside world, tolerance for the gulag state may continue to erode. If Kimg Jong-am can't consolidate power quickly--with the support of the military--North Korea's death spiral may accelerate, increasing the odds of a military and humanitarian crisis on the Korean peninsula.

That's one reason South Korea's military went on heightened alert when news of Kim's passing was announced. Seoul realizes that North Korea has adopted a much more provocative foreign policy in recent years, as evidenced by Pyongyang's first nuclear test in 2006, and more recently, the sinking of a ROK destroyer and the shelling of a South Korean island (along the maritime DMZ) in 2010. It is believed that Kim Jong-am played a role in both of those latter decisions and he would use similar tactics to gain attention (and aid) from his adversaries.

The passing of Kim Jong-il does not mean a corresponding increase in the prospects for war. If anything, the new leader will need time to secure his grip on power before embarking on specific foreign policy objectives. But having learned from the master of brinksmanship, there is no sign that Pyongyang's new leader will abandon that strategy, particularly since it has proven so effective in the past.

As for the U.S. reaction, look for Foggy Bottom to release some sort of bland statement suggesting an opportunity for improved relations with North Korea, somewhere down the road. The Obama Administration has largely ignored DPRK provocations in recent years, hoping that Pyongyang would eventually come around on the nuclear problem and other contentious issues. Don't look for that to change, either. In the mean time, the Korean Peninsula will become a much more dangerous place.

Casing the Colors

2011-12-15T16:42:00.006-05:00

For the U.S. military, the war in Iraq formally ended today, with a ceremony in Baghdad. From The Wall Street Journal:

After nearly nine years of war, tens of thousands of casualties--including 4,500 Americans dead--and more than $800 billion spent, the U.S. military on Thursday formally ended its mission in Iraq and prepared to leave the country.

For years, U.S. commanders in Iraq have handed off to their successors the top call sign, Lion 6, along with the American battle flag adorned with a Mesopotamian sphinx. But on Thursday, in a tradition-drenched ceremony with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta looking on, the current Lion 6—Army Gen. Lloyd Austin—pulled down the colors and cased them for a return to the U.S.

"No words, no ceremony, can provide full tribute to the sacrifices that brought this day to pass," Mr. Panetta said.

In the coming days, the last of the 4,000 U.S. military personnel still in Iraq will follow the flag and head home—leaving fewer than 200 to serve as part of the diplomatic mission.

There was, of course, a certain irony in today's events. As with most modern wars, there was no surrender ceremony, and there won't be any ticker-tape parades through New York City for our returning heroes. And no one used the word "victory" to describe the outcome of our nine-year stay in Iraq.

Sadly, that is also a reflection of our times. After almost a decade (and thousands of war dead), no one appears willing to call Iraq a victory, given that country's uncertain future. Iran is already moving to fill the power vacuum created by the departure of our troops, and it's easy to envision an Iraq that (at some point) will be closely aligned with Tehran.

And, perhaps future historians will note that we had the opportunity to extend our stay in Iraq, providing more training for the domestic forces now charged with keeping the peace. But we took a pass on that option, in the name of election-year politics. As a politician who long opposed the war in Iraq, President Obama will be happy to run for re-election as the man "who brought the troops home."

But before the colors fade, and Iraq becomes a chapter in our history books (or a sound bite for a campaign commercial), it is well worth remembering the sacrifice, heroism and valor of the men and women who served there. All were volunteers, and many pulled multiple tours in Iraq, enduring months and years of separation from family, friends and loved ones.

They deserve credit for not only performing their duty, but transforming Iraq in the process. After the toppling of Saddam's government, Iraq began a slide into chaos, as old sectarian divides resurfaced, with scores to be settled. Al Qaida joined the fray as well, pouring thousands of jihadis into the battle, hoping to inflict massive casualties on the U.S. and drive us from Iraq.

But those efforts failed. A U.S. military designed for large-scale maneuver warfare shifted its focus to small-unit, counter-insurgency operations. aimed at eliminating terrorist networks and protecting the Iraqi people. And, at a critical juncture in the battle, President Bush went against the counsel of so-called "wise men" (and women) in Washington, adopting a surge strategy that sent even more troops to Iraq. Our new commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, put more ground forces out in the field, based among the Iraqi citizens they were charged with defending.

There were months of bitter fighting in 2007 and American casualties actually rose, and the pace of our operations increased. But the surge worked, breaking the back of enemy resistance. Iraq became a much more peaceful place as thousands of terrorists met their end, eventually prompting Al Qaida to look at more promising operational theaters--namely Afghanistan.

The efforts of U.S. and Iraqi troops, along with the coalition partners also allowed Iraq to form a fledgling democracy. Iraqis defied terrorist threats and violence to go the polls for free and fair elections, dipping their fingers in purple ink wells that signified they had voted. It was a powerful rebuke to the terrorists and one of the earliest indicators that Iraqis were willing to do their part--if the U.S. stayed the course.

While some Iraqis are cheering the departure of our last troops, others are worried about what comes next. The U.S. spent billions of dollars training and equipping Iraq's security forces, and many of them are extremely competent. But they will face a real test in the months and years ahead, as Iran tries to exert its influence, and sectarian groups push their own agendas.

In the end, it might be written, the U.S. gave Iraq a fighting chance for a democratic future. It is now up to the sons and daughters of that country to preserve what was established in blood and treasure. In today's world, it may be the best outcome we could hope for. But on the other hand, we should also hope that historians and war college students in 2020 aren't debating about "who lost Iraq," due to a hasty pull-out.

*****

ADDENDUM: If you know someone who served in Iraq, thank them for their service. They helped introduce a genuine "Arab Spring," creating security conditions that helped foster the most democratic regime in that part of the world (with the exception of Israel). Compare that to the more recent Arab uprisings that are ushering in new authoritarian regimes. The contrast between Iraq and what is happening in Egypt could not be more clear. We can only hope that Iraq's democracy survives the tough road ahead, so the sacrifice of thousands of young Americans will not have been in vain.

Preventing Pearl Harbor

2011-12-07T09:47:00.008-05:00

Admiral J.O. Richardson prepares to testify before the first Pearl Harbor commission in early 1942. A former Commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, Richardson was fired by President Roosevelt for telling him the fleet was unprepared for war, and should be redeployed to its home port in San Diego (U.S. Archive photo)

Today marks the 70th anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. It's a particularly poignant remembrance, since it will be the last major commemoration for the dwindling band of Pearl Harbor survivors; the youngest of those men and women are now in their late 80s and many won't be with us for future anniversaries. On this day--and every day--they deserve our thanks and gratitude for their heroism and sacrifice on that horrific Sunday morning in Hawaii, so long ago.

Pearl Harbor observations also reignite a long-running historical debate: could the attack have been prevented, sparing the lives of 2,000 Americans who died on that fateful December day in 1941. While war clouds had been gathering for years before the Japanese strike, supporters of FDR claim that neither the President, nor his senior advisers, had any direct knowledge of a pending attack on Pearl Harbor, and could not provide definitive warning to Admiral Husband Kimmel and Lieutenant General Walter Short, the senior Navy and Army commanders in Hawaii.

Still, there is plenty of evidence that U.S. intelligence was aware the Japanese fleet was on the move in late 1941, and might carry out a strike against American possessions in the Pacific. In his book Day of Deceit, journalist Robert Stinnett debunked the myth that Japanese commanders maintained strict radio silence as they crossed the Pacific. In fact, American SIGINT sites intercepted scores of messages in late November and early December, linking them to Japanese carrier groups at sea. One source even claims that a location "plot" on enemy forces (maintained at ONI headquarters in Washington, D.C.) showed suspected Japanese carriers west of Hawaii on the evening of December 6th.

Additionally, radio direction finding assets on the U.S. West Coast (and in the Pacific region) placed Japanese naval formations northwest of Hawaii within 48 hours of the Pearl Harbor attack. There were similar warnings from British and Dutch cryptanalysts, who had some success in breaking Japanese military codes before the attack; they issued reports that Japanese carriers were heading towards Hawaii in late November 1941. There is also evidence that U.S. signals intelligence posts in Hawaii and on Corregidor provided similar reports in the weeks leading up to the attack.

Pearl Harbor was clearly at the top of Japan's potential target list, but raids on the Philippines, Alaska, Wake Island and Guam couldn't be ruled out. So, U.S. commanders in the Pacific faced the daunting challenge of locating the Japanese fleet, across millions of miles of open seas. That task was further complicated by a long-standing directive from Washington to limit air searches north and west of Hawaii--the most likely approach corridors for an approaching Japanese fleet --and the fact that Kimmel and Short were denied access to the most sensitive intelligence information, including analysis from station HYPO in Hawaii.

These facts (and others) have fueled speculation that FDR used his Pacific fleet as bait, inviting a Japanese attack that would push American into World War II, on the side of the allies. Supporters of Mr. Roosevelt, including many historians, have dismissed such speculation as little more than conspiracy theories, despite the discover of such documents as the McCollum memo, prepared by a senior analyst in the Office of Naval Intelligence, that advocated a provocative strategy towards Japan that might lead to war. The McCollum strategy was implemented in the months leading up to Pearl Harbor, affirming that the memo was circulated--and adopted--at the highest levels of U.S. government.

While the debate over FDR's actions continues to rage, there is one incontrovertible fact: the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor could have been easily prevented, had President Roosevelt followed the advice of his previous Pacific Fleet commander, Admiral J.O. Richardson. During his tenure as CINCPAC, Richardson repeatedly warned of his fleet's vulnerability at Pearl Harbor, and requested that most of his ships return to their home port in San Diego. When FDR refused, Richardson stuck to his guns and paid a high price: he was fired as CINCPAC in early 1941 and replaced by Admiral Kimmel.

Today, few Americans remember J.O. Richardson, but he was a key player in the Pearl Harbor saga, a voice of military reason that was completely ignored. A 1902 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Richardson was considered the service's leading expert on the Japanese fleet, its strategy and tactics. After rising steadily through the ranks, Admiral Richardson was hand-picked for the CINCPAC job by FDR in late 1939, as Europe plunged into World War II.

Almost from the start, Richardson clashed with his superiors over their plans for the Pacific Fleet. In January 1940, Admiral Richardson advised the Chief of Naval Operations, Admiral Harold Stark, that existing plans for war with Japan were unrealistic; his warning to the CNO was reprinted in Richardson's memoir, On the Treadmill to Pearl Harbor, published in 1974:

" You [Stark] are the principal and only Naval Adviser to the boss and he should know that our Fleet cannot just sail away, lick Orange, and be back at home in a year or so. Also the probable cost (human and physical resources) of any war should be compared [with] the probable value of winning the war."

Richardson was also concerned about the lack of readiness in his command. Admiral Robert Carney, who served as CNO during the Eisenhower Administration, recalls a meeting with Richardson in the summer of 1940, when Carney was executive officer on the battleship California. Carney was among a group of mid-level officers summoned by the CINCPAC; Richardson knew they would play a critical leadership role in the coming war with Japan, and he wanted them to know the actual condition of their fleet. As Carney later recalled:

"Pointing out the lack of advanced bases, the the slow pace of updating the fleet's offensive and defensive characteristics, the fact there were fatal shortages in ammunition replacements and backup stocks of fuel, spare parts and essential supplies and the tenders and logistical ships needed to support an advanced-positioned fleet--he was saying, in plain and understandable language, that the Navy wasn't ready for war. Step by step, he dismantled my confident belief that the U.S. Navy could win a quick decision. Instead, proceeding from our deficiencies, he foresaw the United States hanging on for a couple of years while the country and the service built the strength necessary for an offensive campaign, then a hard fight of a year or two before victory could be won."

Admiral Richardson offered this dire prediction while members of Roosevelt's inner circle (including Navy Secretary Frank Knox) were asserting that the U.S. fleet could finish off the Japanese in only three months.

Along with his written warnings, Richardson also made two trips to Washington for meetings with President Roosevelt. During those sessions, Admiral Richardson repeated his grim assessment for the Commander-in-Chief. But FDR quickly became irritated and decided to make a command change. In October of 1940, an administration source told The Kiplinger Letter that Richardson would be replaced in the coming months. Admiral Richardson was relieved as CINCPAC in February 1941, after only one year on the job. His successor, Admiral Kimmel, proved to be more malleable, and voiced no major objections to keeping the fleet in Hawaii, setting the stage for the ensuing debacle at Pearl Harbor.

Richardson was back in Washington, serving as an adviser to the CNO, when the Japanese attacked. His retirement date had been set for 1 October 1942, but with America's entry into the war, he remained an adviser on naval affairs before finally leaving the service in 1947. Admiral Richardson passed away in 1974, fully vindicated by the events of December 1941, and by historical information that emerged after the war.

Sadly, only World War II buffs and naval historians are familiar with the courageous stand of J.O. Richardson. At the cost of his own career, Admiral Richardson stood on principle, trying to avert a military disaster that he believed could be averted, by returning the fleet to San Diego and engaging in the preparations needed to ready the Navy for war.

Richardson's integrity and candor offer an important lesson for military leaders--or anyone in a position to advise decision-makers. Even in that rarefied air, it is essential to tell "the boss" what they need to hear--not what they want to hear. Admirlal Richardson did just that, realizing his advice might fall on deaf ears and result in his dismissal. It's regrettable that so many of his peers failed to follow his shining example in the days before Pearl Harbor.

The Defendant Speaks (Again)

2011-12-04T21:53:00.005-05:00

We were a bit puzzled when disgraced former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky recently sat down for an interview with NBC's Bob Costas and tried to explain his behavior--the same conduct that has led to charges of child rape and various other crimes. The interview was cringe-worthy, particularly when Sandusky took more than 20 seconds to respond to a rather straight-forward question from Costas, who asked: are you sexually attracted to young boys?

More recently, we were puzzled again when Sandusky agreed to an extended interview with Jo Becker, a reporter from The New York Times. You can read her here, or watch video from their conversation at the paper's web site. Needless to say, Sandusky didn't exactly help his cause with some of his replies to Ms. Becker's questions. From the Times' article, which was published Saturday, just hours before the inaugural Big Ten football championship game.

He said his household in State College, Pa., over the years came to be a kind of recreation center or second home for dozens of children from the charity, a place where games were played, wrestling matches staged, sleepovers arranged, and from where trips to out-of-town sporting events were launched. Asked directly why he appeared to interact with children who were not his own without many of the typical safeguards other adults might apply — showering with them, sleeping alone with them in hotel rooms, blowing on their stomachs — he essentially said that he saw those children as his own.

“It was, you know, almost an extended family,” Mr. Sandusky said of his household’s relationship with children from the charity. He then characterized his close experiences with children he took under his wing as “precious times,” and said that the physical aspect of the relationships “just happened that way.”

Wrestling, hugging — “I think a lot of the kids really reached out for that,” he said.

It's all a bit mystifying; after all, Sandusky's comments in both interviews can be used against him in court, and the Nittany Lions' former defensive coordinator didn't exactly help himself with his responses. So why let Sandusky appear on national TV--and in the pages of the NYT--offering "answers" that actually provide more ammunition for the prosecution. Does Sandusky have an incompetent attorney, or a legal sharpie who's crazy like a fox?

Don't discount the latter possibility, particularly when you remember James Carville's famous summation of Pennsylvania. The Democratic strategist once described the Keystone State, as "Philadelphia in the east, Pittsburgh in the west, and Alabama in the middle." Of course, Mr. Carville was making a political observation; the central section of Pennsylvania is more conservative than the liberal bastions of Philly and Pittsburgh.

But middle PA also resembles Alabama in another sense: there are literally thousands of people within a two or three hour drive of State College that live (and die) with Penn State athletics, just as many Bama residents swear allegiance to the Crimson Tide or the Auburn Tigers.

For true believers in PSU's extended family, it's difficult to accept the proposition that Joe Paterno's long-time, trusted assistant was a serial child rapist. Or that members of Penn State's administration and athletic department spent years covering up Jerry Sandusky's alleged crimes, allowing a legendary football program to keep winning (and generating revenue).

These are the same "fans" and "supporters" who rioted when JoePa was fired. The same loyal base that generated a single protester at the home game that followed Paterno's dismissal. And for his trouble, that demonstrator (a Penn State alum from Pittsburgh) was greeted with indifference and derision from his fellow fans.

So what does this have to do with Sandusky's sudden "chattiness" with the media. We assume the defendant's will be tried in central Pennsylvania, home to the Nittany Lions' most loyal fans --the same group that doesn't want to believe the worst about their beloved football teams. The same group that will populate the jury pool that will, in the near future, determine Sandusky's guilt or innocence.

While many scoff or recoil at the former coach's explanations, there are those in and around State College who are willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. When Jerry Sandusky sits down with Bob Costas (or The New York Times), it's the legions of Penn State die-hards that he's speaking to. And it only takes one of them to deny a guilty verdict.

Now You See Them?

2011-12-04T20:48:00.004-05:00

One of the more interesting "developments" from the past week was the alleged sighting of Israeli Jericho missiles near Jerusalem and in the West Bank. If those reports are accurate--and there was no confirmation from the Israeli military--they would suggest that Tel Aviv is posturing rather aggressively, or dispersing one of its most capable nuclear delivery systems to field dispersal sites. The alleged sightings came as the war of words between Israel and Iran continues to intensify, and a mysterious blast rocked one of Tehran's key nuclear facilities.

According to Aaron Klein of World Net Daily, the Jericho movement was witnessed by Israeli and Palestinian observers:

Multiple eyewitnesses reported seeing Israeli military trucks in recent days transport and station large missiles at the periphery of Jerusalem and locations inside the West Bank.

The descriptions of the projectiles are consistent with the Jewish state's mid-to-long range Jericho ballistic missiles.

The missile movement, if confirmed, would be unusual.

One of the witnesses is a member of the Palestinian Authority security services. He told me that a large missile was recently stationed near Neve Yaacov, a Jewish neighborhood in northeast Jerusalem. That neighborhood is adjacent to several Palestinian-inhabited towns.

Four other eyewitnesses, Israeli and Palestinian, reported seeing similar sights during the past week--large missiles being transported by the Israeli military around Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Reached for comment, the spokesperson's of the Israel Defense Forces could not confirm the information and referred me to Israel's national police.

Mickey Rosenfeld, the national police spokesperson, told me he has no information on any such movements.

While intriguing, this narrative has a few problems. For starters, Israel's ballistic missiles are among the least-sighted weapons on earth. During my own days as a civilian analyst, I was working on an assessment that focused on denial and deception (D&D) programs in the Middle East. A colleague suggested I include the Jericho II/III program as an example of superb operational deception and security. Looking through an imagery database, I quickly discovered the reason behind his suggestion. There was virtually no imagery of field-deployed Jericho IIs and IIIs, despite the fact that both systems are a top collection priority.

In fact, one of the few field shots I found was a grainy image of rather poor quality. "We caught them early in the window," my colleague explained. "Apparently, the Israelis don't know as much about our collection capabilities as they think." But the grainy image was the exception, not the rule. Israel has an excellent satellie warning program, and schedules important military activity "around" known collection windows. By the time that satellite was in position to take a better shot, the missile was back in covered storage. On those exceptionally rare occasions when we get a high-resolution image of a Jericho in the field, it's because the Israelis want us to see it. So far, there has been no report of our spy agencies capturing an overhead shot of those Jerichos that were deployed around Jerusalem and the West Bank.

It's also worth noting the absence of hand-held images of the missiles. In an era when virtually every Israeli (and Palestinian) has a cell phone with a camera, no one apparently bothered to take a shot of this unusual activity. What are the odds of that happening?

From an operational standpoint, the deployment also makes little sense. Israel's Jericho missiles are based at Palmachin Airbase, south of Tel Aviv. Dispersal sites are believed located in less-populated areas south of the installation, as opposed to the densely-populated West Bank, or the Jerusalem area. In those locations--particularly the West Bank--missile vehicles would be potentially vulnerable to Palestinian tracking and even attack, with weapons including mortars and short-range rockets. Moving Jericho launch vehicles to Jerusalem and the West Bank would send a powerful signal, but it would improve adversary detection and surveillance--something the Israelis don't want.

The most likely scenario goes something like this: the vehicles and missiles purportedly seen last week were decoys, dispatched to populated areas to send a signal to Iran (and Israel's other enemies). Coming on the heels of a recent Jericho test launch (and successful covert attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities), the decoys were aimed at reminding Tehran that Israel has a variety of options for striking its enemies. In a worst-case scenario, the Israelis could launch nuclear-tipped Jerichos at a variety of targets in Iran, obliterating dozens of cities and military targets. By comparison, Iran's nuclear capabilities are nascent; if Tehran has the bomb, it's arsenal consists of a handful of devices, and there's no confirmation it has a warhead small enough to fit on one of its medium or intermediate-range missiles.

Finally, the Palestinians have their own reasons for hyping this story. If Israel was forced to fight its various enemies, the Palestinians would be dispatched quickly and ruthlessly, something their leaders hope to avoid. The missile story is something the PA might use in pressuring the Obama Administration to lean on Israel, hinting that the Jewish state is about to launch World War III.

Sadly, the current occupant of the White House might actually listen to such far-fetched claims--even in the absence of intelligence confirmation. After all, we know how Mr. Obama feels about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Lingering Problems?

2011-11-25T18:20:00.002-05:00

It's no secret that the U.S. Air Force's nuclear enterprise went through a rough patch a few years back.

The dark days began with the inadvertent transfer of six, nuclear-tipped cruise missiles from Minot AFB, North Dakota to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana. That mishap was followed, in relatively short order, by a series of failed inspections among the service's various nuclear-capable units and the mistaken shipment of nuclear components from an Air Force depot in Utah to Taiwan. Ultimately, the blunders led to the dismissal of the USAF Chief of Staff and the Secretary of the Air Force, followed by a prolonged rebuilding process.

By most accounts, Air Force nuclear operations are now back on track. There have been no more unauthorized shipments or transfers, and units are adapting to a new, no-notice nuclear inspection program. Additionally, the service stood up a new organization, Global Strike Command, to supervise nuclear operations, and Air Force leaders began devoting more resources to the mission, after decades of neglect.

Still, the enterprise is far from trouble-free. According to Tacoma News-Tribune, the service's prime nuclear airlift unit, stationed at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Washington, recently failed its nuclear surety inspection.

In military parlance, the mission is called Prime Nuclear Airlift Force, or PNAF.

The 62nd Airlift Wing has a motto for that mission: "PNAF... Perfect... Always!"

Not anymore.

For the first time, the wing received an overall rating of "unsatisfactory" after a weeklong inspection that concluded Monday.

The rating stems from an isolated incident involving an individual assigned to the mission, said an Air Mobility Command official with knowledge of the inspection's findings. The official declined to provide further details.

Lt. Col. Glen Roberts, an AMC spokesman, said neither nuclear weapons nor related components were used during the inspection and the public was not at risk.

"There was never any danger," he said. "The Air Force policy is we don't get into specifics on the inspections."

Roberts said the wing, which has performed the mission since 1997, can continue to do so even with the "unsatisfactory" rating.

The 62nd will undergo a mandatory re-inspection in 90 days. It was not surprising that AMC allowed the McChord wing to continue the nuclear mission, despite the failing grade. With the 62nd the only airlift wing performing those duties, suspension of the wing's certification would wreak havoc in the Air Force's nuclear enterprise.

According to the News-Tribune, the public affairs office at Lewis-McChord claimed the 62nd passed its previous NSI, but didn't specify when the evaluation occurred. Under current Air Force policy, units involved in the nuclear mission are inspected at least once every 18 months. More frequent inspections are not unheard of, under the new, "no-notice" policy.

Port Call Tartus?

2011-11-20T16:28:00.004-05:00

Russian warships are reportedly en route to the Mediterranean and will soon arrive in Syria, as Moscow exhibits its displeasure over possible western intervention in that country.

According to Haaretz, Russian naval vessels will enter Syrian territorial waters shortly, as a show of support for Syrian dictator Bashir Assad, who is mired in a bloody and protracted battle with anti-regime protesters. While thousands of demonstrators have been killed by police and security forces since the late spring, the resistance shows now sign of flagging, while Assad's position continues to weaken.

If the naval operations follows the pattern of past deployments, the vessels may dock at the Syrian port of Tartus, which has hosted Russian naval units since the early 1970s. In February of last year, Moscow announced plans to upgrade and modernize its naval supply and maintenance facility in Tartus, allowing it to accommodate "heavy" warships, including aircraft carriers.

The Tartus complex, once a symbol of the Soviet naval presence in the Middle East, fell into disrepair in the 1990s, as the Russian fleet suffered dramatic cutbacks and sent fewer vessels to sea. Reportedly, only one of the three floating piers at Tartus is now operational. That factor, along with the limited number of vessels in Russia's Black Sea fleet, would limit the scope of its naval deployment to Syria.

Still, the Russians could send a guided missile cruiser like the Pyotr Velikiy to the eastern Mediterranean. The Pyotr Velikiy, the only Kirov-class battlecruiser currently in service with the Russian fleet, paid a visit to Syria last year. Equipped with the naval version of the S-300 surface-to-air missile system (which has a maximum range of 100 NM), the Pyotr Velikiy could protect targets across much of northern Syria, if Moscow decided to press its luck in defending Assad.

But even if Russia remains neutral--as most observers expect--NATO planners would still have to respect the vessel's air defense capabilities in providing air support to Syrian rebels. Operating in coastal waters near Tartus, the Pyotr Velikiy's air defenses could provide coverage of key locations, including the city of Homs, which has been the scene of vicious battles between Assad's security forces and the opposition.

Obviously, the Russian naval deployment is largely symbolic, and there is no indication that Moscow wants to mix it up with NATO. Indeed, even a powerful platform like a Kirov cruiser would be no match for American naval forces and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev (and his puppet master, Vladimir Putin) have no desire to lose one of their most important capital ships. But with this deployment, the Russian leaders are signaling their displeasure over a prospective alliance between NATO and Syrian rebels.

From Moscow's perspective, Syria will not become another Libya, where the U.S. and its western partners operated with impunity, rescuing rebel forces and (eventually) sealing the fate of Mommar Qadhafi. Fortunately for Mr. Assad, he has more powerful friends in places like Russia and Iran, and for now, they appear determined to keep him in power.

***

ADDENDUM: We should also note that Russia's naval deployment to Syria might serve another purpose. If Assad's regime crumbles, the ships could be useful in evacuating Russian nationals from Syria. We're guessing that Moscow's contractors and advisers in Syria (symbols of long-time security ties between the two countries) wouldn't be very popular--or safe--in a post-Assad environment.

Shut It Down

2011-11-12T11:35:00.005-05:00

It's rare when we agree editorially with the Minneapolis Star Tribune, but columnist Jim Souhan got it right about shutting down Penn State's football program. As he writes:

What we know now is that key members of the Penn State football program were serial enablers of child rape and molestation.

Dismissing the university president and athletic director is not enough, not when your campus has been used as a safe haven and hunting ground by a pedophile. Firing Paterno is not enough, not when Paterno neglected to use his immense power to halt the abuse of children.

It is time for the powers that be to use their powers pointedly and appropriately.

Penn State should cancel the rest of the football season.

The NCAA should investigate the football program and consider the death penalty.

Many of the people who rioted on the Penn State campus Wednesday night in protest of Paterno's dismissal probably plan to attend the football game on campus Saturday. They should not be given any forum in which to voice their delusions, and certainly not a 106,572-seat stadium in which to hold an undeserved memorial to Paterno's tainted career.

To be fair, none of the Penn State players who will take the field have any connection to the scandal. But several of their coaches--including interim head coach Tom Bradley--were around, and may have been part of the conspiracy of cowardice and silence that allowed former assistant Jerry Sandusky to prey on young boys. Bradley and the rest of the staff will almost certainly be fired at the end of the season, along with other university officials. What sort of signal does it send to allow Tom Bradley to lead the Nittany Lions on the field against Nebraska?

Here's something else to consider: Penn State is currently 8-1 on the season, with an inside track to the Big Ten championship game and a slot in the Rose Bowl. Is the conference--and the NCAA--comfortable with that possibility? Barring action by the university or the NCAA, the school being labeled as "Pedophile U" could be playing in Pasadena in January. Besides, any championship won by Penn State this year will almost certainly be vacated, once the NCAA completes its investigation and levies sanctions. Why let the team compete for hardware--and victories--that will be surrendered in a matter of months?

As Mr. Souhan reminds us, the NCAA has imposed the "death penalty" on a football program only once in its history, against SMU back in the 1980s. SMU was judged guilty of paying players and had to stop playing football for two seasons. As Souhan observes, "compared with serial pedophilia [at PSU], what happened on the SMU campus is the equivalent of spitting on the sidewalk.

All the more reason, he argues, to shut down the Penn State program:

When the NCAA levies its harshest penalties, it cites a school's "lack of institutional control.'' There has never been a clearer case of university lacking institutional control over its football program than Penn State allowing Sandusky to bring children to the team's sidelines and showers.

As this post is written, the Penn State-Nebraska game is already underway, so today's spectacle in Happy Valley is proceeding as scheduled. But allowing the program to continue (until the Sandusky matter has been resolved) would be an absolute travesty, and another, needless insult to the victims of the former coach.

One final note: according to ESPN's Big Ten blog, there was exactly one protester--one--outside Beaver Stadium before today's Penn State game. Jon Matko, a Pittsburgh resident and 2000 Penn State graduate may be the only member of the university family who "gets it."

Matko thought the university should have canceled the game and the rest of the season. He knows the importance of the game to university revenue and how canceling wouldn’t be fair to the players who had nothing to do with the scandal, but felt Saturday was too soon to play.

“It’s the right thing,” he said. “It’s not about Joe. It’s about the kids.”

One of Matko’s signs featured the famous Albert Einstein quote: “The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.”

When he arrived at Beaver Stadium on Saturday morning, Matko was shocked to find himself alone. He didn’t tell his parents where he was going today, but thought he would show up at Beaver Stadium and join other protestors. But he couldn’t find any.

“It’s shocking that I’m the only one here,” he said. “It’s shocking and disturbing.”

Here's something else for the college football community to consider: would fan reaction be any different if this was happening at Florida, Texas, Alabama, USC, or any other college football power? Sadly, we think not.

Mystery Blast

2011-11-12T10:04:00.004-05:00

At least 15 Iranian military personnel died Saturday in a massive explosion at a facility described as an "arms depot" near Tehran. More from Reuters:

While there was no indication of any attack, the explosion shook Iranians for miles around at a time of mounting tensions with Israel over Iran's nuclear programme.

A spokesman for the Revolutionary Guards -- Iran's elite military force -- said the blast happened as troops were moving munitions at a base in Bidganeh, near the town of Shahriar.

"My dear colleagues in the Revolutionary Guards were moving munitions in one of the arsenals at that base when, due to an incident, an explosion happened," Ramezan Sharif told state TV news channel IRINN.

"Some of the wounded are reported to be in a critical condition," he added. The semi-official Fars news agency said 25 people had been taken to hospital.

Iran quickly denied that that the facility is connected to its nuclear program, but the sudden blast--and "official" actions after the explosion--raised suspicions. The media was kept away from the scene and the head of Iran's Red Crescent organization said only six paramedics had been allowed into the Amir Al-Momenin military base--a number that seemed insufficient for a mass casualty event.

It was the second major explosion at an Iranian arms facility in a little over a year. Last October, a similar blast killed several troops at a base near Khoramabad. Several installations in that area are connected to Iran's ballistic missile program, and there was some speculation that the explosion might have been linked to an accident involving a Shahab-3 unit. The Shahab-3 is a medium-range missile, capable of striking targets as far away as Israel.

Some believe sabotage (by Israel or Iranian opposition groups) was responsible for last year's blast, and similar rumors are making the rounds about today's blast near Tehran. Modern munitions--even those used by countries like Iran--are modular in design, reliable and safe. Generally speaking, they only blow up when they're supposed to, when all components are in place and at the end of the required fusing process.

It's hard to imagine conventional weapons simply blowing up accidentally. But if the Amir Al-Momenin base was involved in weapons experiments--perhaps related to Iran's nuclear program--then the chances for an accident are significantly higher. A connection to Tehran's WMD program would also raise the interest of Israeli intelligence, and raise prospects for some sort of covert plot against the facility.

As we noted at the time of the Khoramabad explosion, it takes a great deal of planning and skill to carry out an attack on a supposedly "secure" Iranian facility. In other words, if it was sabatoge, then Israel was the most likely culprit, and the Mossad will be among the suspects in today's blast near Tehran.

But covert missions and cyber attacks cannot deter Iran's nuclear ambitions forever. This week's alarming report from the International Atomic Energy Agency was a reminder that Iran has worked steadily towards building a bomb for years, undeterred by western diplomatic efforts and economic sanctions. In response, the Obama Administration announced plans to work with its allies to step up pressure on Tehran--essentially, the same, failed strategy that has been in place for years.

Meanwhile, there's been more talk about a possible Israeli strike against Iran, and that recent test launch of a Jericho III missile--a not-so-subtle reminder that while Tehran is still seeking a nuclear capability, Israel already has the capability to put nuclear weapons on Iranian targets.

***

ADDENDUM: There were also vague hints that the U.S. may be preparing for a worst-case scenario in the Persian Gulf. This week, the Pentagon announced the potenial sale of advanced bunker-buster munitions to the United Arab Emirates. That's the very sort of weapon that would be useful in attacking certain facilities related to Iran's nuclear program, and we're guessing that the contract comes with a certain clause--allowing the United States access to those weapons in the event of a conflict with Tehran.

The Sins of Joe Paterno

2011-11-09T20:44:00.009-05:00

Somewhere in Texas, Jackie Sherrill may be smiling.

During almost 30 years as a head college football coach, with stops at Washington State; Pitt, Texas A&M and Mississippi State, Mr. Sherrill developed a reputation as a cheater--someone who would gladly break NCAA rules to get better athletes and improve his team's won-loss record. In fact, Sherrill left both College Station and Starkville under a cloud, and the football programs at A&M and MSU were placed on probation for his transgressions.

So, it's little wonder that Sherrill became something of a pariah in college football, shunned by some of the game's most revered coaches, including Joe Paterno of Penn State. In a famous interview with Sports Illustrated, Joe Pa said he "couldn't" retire from college football and leave the game in the hands of coaches like "Jackie Sherrill and Barry Switzer." Paterno and Sherrill eventually made amends, but the comment stuck, and only reinforced Jackie's reputation as a cheater.

Almost a decade after he retired, Sherrill is still widely reviled for breaking NCAA rules, but ironically enough, he may wind up with a better legacy that Joe Paterno. The legendary Penn State coach was fired last night, the latest casualty of a sex scandal that has engulfed the Nittany Lions football program. Jerry Sandusky, Paterno's long-time defensive coordinator, has been charged with raping several young men who participated in his charity for at-risk youth.

While Sandusky retired from the PSU staff in 1999, he still had full run of the university's football complex and at least one of the rapes may have occurred in a Penn State athletic facility. When Paterno was told of Sandusky's crimes--in 2002--he reportedly informed the university's athletic director, but took no further action. Meanwhile, Sandusky continued preying on young boys for another eight years, protected by a university cover-up.

To his credit, Coach Paterno was one of the few Penn State officials who did anything. The university's current athletic director and a senior administrator lied to investigators about the matter and are now facing perjury charges. But Paterno is hardly a hero in this sordid mess; he never bothered to follow-up on his initial report, for reasons that remain unexplained. And while the Penn State community has rallied around their coach, it became clear that he could no longer retain his job, as the Sandusky scandal exploded. Federal authorities have joined the probe, along with state officials and the NCAA. Suffice it to say that Penn State faces a flood of lawsuits; more university officials may be indicted, and the football program's once-sterling reputation has been forever tarnished.

Recognizing that, Penn State's board of trustees moved quickly on Wednesday evening, dismissing Paterno and the university president during an emergency meeting. With the institution in full damage control mode, Penn State could no longer allow its legendary coach to play out the string. With revelations of more than a dozen victims--some molested in the university football complex--it was time for JoePa to go.

And that seems appropriate. A man lionized in the college football world for his character and integrity did virtually nothing to prevent the sexual abuse of young boys by a man who was once his top assistant. "I should have done more," Paterno said earlier today. Yes, he should have, but he didn't. Perhaps Coach Paterno didn't really believe the allegations against Sandusky, or trusted administrators to handle the dirty work. Besides, he had a football program to run, and a legend to protect.

Now, Paterno leaves college football as the winningest coach in the history of the game, but with a reputation permanently sullied by his own inaction. Some would say JoePa deserves better, but so did those young men, brutalized by a man who was an integral part of Paterno's football machine for so long.

Given JoePa's stunning fall from football grace, Jackie Sherrill is probably satisfied with being remembered as a mere cheater.

Greatly Exaggerated?

2011-11-08T13:05:00.004-05:00

In the aftermath of Mommar Qadhafi's death, various Middle Eastern analysts were placing bets on the imminent demise of Bashir Assad's Syrian regime. After all, anti-regime protests were still going strong after more than six months, despite repeated crack-downs by security forces. And by some accounts, Assad's sponsors in Tehran were writing him off, with Iranian diplomats consulting Saudi Arabia and Turkey on a "way ahead" once the Syrian regime collapsed.

But to borrow a phrase from Mark Twain, reports of Assad's demise may be exaggerated. From today's edition of The New York Times:

The Syrian government has launched a bloody assault to retake Homs, the country’s third-largest city, facing armed defectors who have prevented the government’s forces from seizing it as they did other restive locales this summer, in what may stand as one of the most violent episodes in an eight-month uprising.

[snip]

The specter of civil war has long hung over Homs, the most tenacious and determined of cities opposed to President Bashar al-Assad’s rule, where the city’s Sunni Muslim majority has closed ranks behind the revolt. This month, parts of the city have become an urban battlefield, with activists saying government forces have killed 111 people in just five days, opposition groups warning of dire shortages forced by the siege and residents complaining of lawlessness by marauding soldiers and paramilitary fighters.

The strife comes as mediation by the Arab League has apparently collapsed in one of the latest efforts to end what is among the most ferocious crackdowns on the revolts sweeping the Arab world this year. The government has increasingly demonstrated it will continue to try to stanch dissent by force, ignoring the relatively muted protests of the international community.

From our perspective, that latter paragraph (by Times' reporter Anthony Shadid) captures the essence of conditions in Syria. Arab League efforts to end the crisis have been half-hearted at best, and for obvious reasons. Many leaders in the Middle East are quite comfortable with Assad's regime; he's an established commodity (and an ally for some).

More importantly, there is genuine fear over what might happen if the current regime collapses --and what sort of government would replace it. As in other instances, "mediation" efforts are little more than a public relations ploy, creating the illusion of diplomatic action while Assad's security forces kill more protesters. The ruling elites in Tehran, Riyadh and elsewhere know that if the Syrian rebellion is successful, it will embolden domestic opposition at home, and there's no guarantee they can keep their respective genies in the bottle. So, while many Middle Eastern governments openly deplore the violence in places like Homs, privately they are cheering on Assad's security forces.

To be sure, the Syrian tyrant is a long way from reestablishing firm control over his country, but he does enjoy certain advantages. First, the western media has been effectively barred from covering the story; Mr. Shadid and his counterparts are filing reports from Beirut and other locations, well away from the fighting. They must rely on snippets of video provided by Syrian opposition groups and anonymous stringers working inside that country. While some of Assad's brutality has been captured on video (and smuggled outside Syria), much of the violence has not been viewed by the outside world, another reason for the muted global response.

Assad also has the benefit of a military and secret police apparatus that is competent and remains generally loyal to the regime. Unlike the Egyptian armed forces (who refused to intervene to save Hosni Mubarak), or the incompetent Libyan Army that couldn't save Qadhafi, the troops suppressing demonstrators in Syria are largely cast their lot with Mr. Assad and are doing his bidding in murderous fashion. While there have been some defections from the Army and intelligence services, they have not yet crippled Assad's ability to fight back, allowing him to continue the crackdown. Meanwhile, the protesters taking on the regime are poorly armed, and they can't call on NATO airstrikes to save the day.

To be sure, the future of Bashir Assad is far from secure. Losing entire cities to the opposition is not an encouraging sign, and the resistance seems as determined as ever, despite mounting civilian casualties. But Assad is a long way from joining the ranks of deposed dictators who are forced to flee, or find themselves lying in a ditch, with a bullet in their head.

Back to the Blog

2011-11-08T13:03:00.002-05:00

...It's been an extraordinarily busy time for the past 10 days or so, thanks to the demands of my "day job." Now that things are settling down, I will be a bit more active on the blog. Many pardons for the interruption, and I appreciate your patience.

The Marines Change Course

2011-10-30T16:04:00.003-04:00

Marines don't retreat, the old axiom goes, they simply attack in a new direction. Hmm...maybe they'll trot out that explanation (again) to justify last week's dramatic reversal on its tuition assistance (TA) policy for the Corps.

Just days after implementing a major cut in tuition assistance funding, the Marines shifted course last Wednesday, announcing that TA funding would be restored to previous levels. That means Marines will again receive $4500 a year for college tuition, paid at a maximum rate of $750 per course. Under the reduced rates, the yearly cap was cut to $3500 a year, but most Marines would receive only $825, based on data that most program participants took only 5-7 credit hours per year.

Why the sudden change? We're guessing that senior leadership got an earful from unit commanders and senior NCOs, who understand that TA is a very effective retention tool. If the tuition assistance program is gutted (or eliminated entirely, as some in the Pentagon prefer), it will wreak havoc with experience levels, particularly at the platoon and company levels.

The reason, as we've explained in previous posts, is simple. Without access to TA (or limited education funds under that program), Marines will use GI Bill benefits to fund their education. And, the highest payments under that program go to veterans who have left the military and receive their full housing allowance, along with education benefits.

Under proposed defense cuts, the Marine Corps will undergo a 10% reduction by 2015, a move that will eliminate 20,000 personnel. So, the TA reduction was aimed (in part) at convincing more Marines to leave the service, so the Corps can meet its new manning totals. But there was clear concern that a lot of experienced E-4s and E-5s--Marines who should be senior NCOs and officers down the road--will exit the Corps as well. That realization is what prompted the Marines to reverse course on the TA program.

Still, tuition assistance for the military is facing an uncertain future. As the Marines were modifying their position, the Air Force was unveiling changes for its personnel. Beginning in November, airmen can only apply for TA within 30 days of a course start date. Currently, they can apply for financial aid two months in advance, giving them more flexibility in planning their studies.

With a shorter timeline for signing up, the Air Force believes it can achieve savings in its TA program, since some airmen won't have enough time to complete the process. The USAF spends more than $200 million a year on TA; at the DoD level, the total bill for tuition assistance is about $600 million annually.

As we've noted in previous posts, the TA program has been under fire in recent months--and targeted for major reductions. According to various critics, tuition assistance isn't very cost effective, and does little to keep troops in uniform.

But the facts tell a different story. Thousands of military members earn their associate's, bachelor's or master's through the TA program each year. Payment caps within the program encourage participating schools to keep costs low, and the armed forces recoup money from service members who fail a course.

By comparison, the new Post 9-11 GI Bill is shaping up as a multi-billion dollar boondoggle. Two years into the program, costs are running three times higher than projected ($15 billion a year), and vets attending school under the program have an 88% dropout rate and only 3% remain in school long enough to earn their degree. But so far, no one is talking about "reforming" the latest version of the GI Bill.

Today's Reading Assignment

2011-10-22T19:22:00.005-04:00

Max Boot, in Commentary magazine, on President Obama's decision to remove all U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of this year:

Far from being cause for celebration, Obama’s announcement that we will keep only 150 U.S. troops in Iraq after the end of the year–down from nearly 50,000 today–represents a shameful failure of American foreign policy that risks undoing all the gains that so many Americans, Iraqis, and other allies have sacrificed so much to achieve. The risks of a catastrophic failure in Iraq now rise appreciably. The Iranian Quds Force must be licking its chops because we are now leaving Iraq essentially defenseless against its machinations. Conversely the broad majority of Iraqis who fear Iranian influence and who want their country to become a democracy will come to rue this day, however big a victory it might appear in the short term for the cause of Iraqi nationalism.

Ostensibly this pull-out was dictated by the unwillingness of Iraqi lawmakers to grant U.S. troops immunity from prosecution. But Iraqi leaders of all parties, save the Sadrists, also clearly signaled their desire to have a sizable American troop contingent post-2011. The issue of immunity could have been finessed if administration lawyers from the Departments of State and Defense had not insisted that Iraq’s parliament would have to vote to grant our troops protections from Iraqi laws. Surely some face-saving formula that would not have needed parliamentary approval could have been negotiated that would have assuaged Iraqi sovereignty concerns while making it unlikely in the extreme that any U.S. soldier would ever go before an Iraqi court for actions taken in the line of duty.

Clearly, we can't stay in Iraq forever, but the Obama plan runs counter to the security interests of both the United States and our Iraqi allies. As Mr. Boot notes, both the U.S. military and much of the Iraqi government favored a continuing American presence, for counter-terrorism operations; as a deterrent against Iranian meddling, and to ensure adequate training for Iraqi security forces.

Boot argues that the U.S. should re-open negotiations on our military presence as soon as the current withdrawal is complete. He believes we need at least 10, 000 troops in Iraq to handle the security and training mission--about half the number recommended by senior American military commanders earlier this year.

Unfortunately, prospects for a short-term U.S. return are virtually nil. Mr. Obama saw an opportunity to appease his base and fulfill a campaign promise, with little regard for the long-term security consequences. That raises another issue: will President Obama (or a Republican successor) be willing to send even larger numbers of U.S. troops back to Iraq in two or three years, when the security situation becomes untenable? Or will the Commander-in-Chief sit idly by and allow Iraq to become a puppet of Tehran?

It's a question worth posing at the next White House press conference (fat chance of that happening), and at the next GOP presidential candidates' debate.

***

ADDENDUM: Similar warnings from Professor Frederick Kagan (the intellectual father of the Iraq surge strategy) at the Weekly Standard.

The Death of Tuition Assistance

2011-10-19T20:55:00.004-04:00

The end of the U.S. military's tuition assistance program may be at hand. Yesterday, the Marine Corps announced that annual benefits will be cut, from a maximum of $4500 a year, to $3500.

Additionally, the Corps is reducing payments per credit hour to $175 for undergraduate courses and $225 for graduate programs. However, the "real" TA cap for the majority of Marines will be only $875 per year, based on "analysis" that shows most participants take only 5-6 credit hours annually.

Changes in the Marine Corps TA program were made retroactive to 1 October. While the other services have not announced similar cuts, all are watching the USMC experiment and may unveil their own reductions in the coming months.

Currently, the Pentagon spends over $600 million a year on tuition assistance, which provides money for active-duty military members (along with guardsmen and reservists) to attend off-duty college classes. The program's price tag has more than doubled over the past decade, after the military raised the payment rate from 75% for each class, to 100%, with a cap of $750 per course.

There are signs that more cuts may be in the offing. Earlier this year, the Pentagon's chief of voluntary education, Carolyn Baker, said the current TA program is "unsustainable." Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has described TA as a "poor recruiting and retention tool," advocating a 90% reduction in the program. More recently, a Colorado Congressman asked DoD to consider a return to the 75% payment rate, which was in effect for decades. There is growing consensus in Congress (and the Pentagon) that TA must be cut, as the military faces hundreds of billions in budget cuts.

But the rush to gut TA may be premature--and short-sighted. Reducing (or eliminating) tuition assistance will force most military members to rely on their other education benefits program, notably the Post 9-11 GI Bill. That program is aimed at veterans who have left the service, paying full rates for tuition and a housing allowance, among other benefits.

Still, any shift to the GI Bill won't be cheap or cost-effective. Consider these numbers, announced at last week's meeting of the Colorado Advisory Council on Military Education:

- When it was signed into law three years ago, the Post 9-11 GI Bill was budgeted at $5 billion a year. But so many vets have entered the program, it is currently costing taxpayers $15 billion a year, and that tab is growing.

- Some participants see the program as little more than a benefit check. According to the Department of Veterans Affairs, one in five departing service members become full-time students under the GI Bill. But only 3% of those students stick around long enough to earn their degree. Grad rates for GI Bill participants are ten times lower than their civilian counter-parts.

- VA statistics show that 88% of GI Bill students drop out of school within their first year.

Based on those figures, the GI Bill is shaping up as a $15 billion a year boondoggle. Indeed, the program actually pays for "Fs." Students can flunk classes and still receive full benefits, although schools are now required to more closely monitor--and report--student performance.

As for that supposedly "inefficient" TA program::

- Thousands of military members receive their degree each year, using TA benefits.

- A typical bachelor's degree earned with TA benefits costs taxpayers about $40,000; the same four-year diploma, funded with the GI Bill, runs $100,000 (or more).

- Students using TA who fail a class must reimburse the military--a powerful incentive for military members to do well in class.

- TA participants remain on active-duty, providing valuable contributions to national defense. By comparison, most GI bill students have left active service, and the military will receive no direct benefit of their advanced education.

To be fair, both programs have their problems; you'll find fraud and waste in each. But it's rather interesting that TA is being cut, in favor of a "new" GI Bill that is shaping up as an educational and fiscal disaster. In light of skyrocketing costs and low graduation rates, the public and lawmakers should ask: just how much bang are we getting for that $15 billion a year?

***

Disclosure: Your humble correspondent is employed by a private, non-profit university that participates in both the tuition assistance and GI Bill programs. :

Thanks, John

2011-10-18T16:20:00.002-04:00

According to the Military Advantage Blog at Military.com, Senator John McCain of Arizona has indicated support for a proposal to cut military benefits:

The AP reports that McCain supports President Obama’s proposal to start charging older military retirees a $200 annual enrollment fee for TRICARE for Life. In addition, McCain urged the supercommittee to consider restricting working-age military retirees and their dependents from enrolling in TRICARE Prime. McCain pointed out that the Congressional Budget Office has estimated that such a move would save $111 billion over 10 years.

McCain also said he supports the administration’s proposal for a commission to review possible changes to the 20 year military retirement system and the current military pay and compensation model.

Not that we're surprised; look up "Rino" in the dictionary, and you'll find McCain's picture in the margin. But it's also worth remembering that Mr. McCain is also a retired Naval officer who spent more than two decades on active duty, including five-and-a-half years as a POW in the Hanoi Hilton.

Given his background, you'd think McCain would appreciate the sacrifice made by military members and their families. You'd also think that Senator McCain would understand that most military retirees get by on a pension of $1600 a month (after taxes) and increases in Tricare fees (and other expenses) put a big dent in their budget.

But then again, John McCain lost touch with the military rank-and-file a long time ago. He became intoxicated with power during his tour as a Navy legislative liasion on Capitol Hill and quickly segued into the ruling class after retiring--and marrying the richest woman in Arizona. Between his Senate health care plan and family fortune, Mr. McCain isn't too worried about changes to the military retirement system, or higher medical expenses for military retirees.

If you ask Senator McCain to explain his position, he'd probably say he's putting "Country First," to help resolve the nation's fiscal crisis. Gee...whatever happened to the mantra of "Leave No Man (or Woman) Behind," something McCain learned from his earliest days at Annapolis. By endorsing the Obama "reform" plan, Mr. McCain is leaving a lot of military members behind.

Thanks again, John.

Curious, but Sloppy

2011-10-12T18:37:00.005-04:00

We're still scratching our heads over the alleged Iranian plot to assassinate Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the United States. Not that the scheme isn't credible; Tehran has a long list of scores to settle with Riyadh, ranging from the kingdom's backing of Saddam Hussein during the 1980s Iran-Iraq War, to its more recent support of Bahrain, during that nation's crackdown against anti-regime protesters, who were aided by elements of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps.

Eliminating the Saudi ambassador in Washington promised other rewards as well. A successful assassination would create a greater divide between the United States and one of its most important allies in the Arab world. Additionally, the assassination would be viewed as a direct warning to the Saudi monarchy, since the kingdom's current Ambassador to the United States, Adel al-Jubeir, is a key advisor to the king on national security matters. So, Iran has no shortage of reasons for wanting to kill the senior Saudi diplomat in America.

But if that was the case, why was the "plot" conceived is such ham-handed fashion? According to court papers (and the comments of various U.S. officials), the key figure in the operation was Manssor Arbabsiar, a 56-year-old Iranian-American used car salesman from Texas. Arbabsiar reportedly attempted to enlist assistance from Mexico's infamous Zetas drug cartel in acquiring explosives and carrying out the attack. The plan reportedly involved detonating a bomb inside one of the ambassador's favorite D.C. restaurants while he ate.

Arbabsiar is now in custody; a second man named in the indictment, Gholam Shakuri, is said to be in Iran. Sources indicate the assassination plot involved high-level officials in the Qods force, the clandestine arm of the IRGC. Turk al-Faisal, a former Saudi ambassador to the U.S. told reporters this afternoon that "the burden of proof and amount of evidence in the case is overwhelming, and clearly shows official Iranian responsibility for this...someone in Iran will have to pay the price." In response, Iran described the terror plot as a "fabrication" and a "diversion," aimed at shifting domestic attention away from U.S. economic problems."

According to the U.K. Guardian, some western diplomats have expressed skepticism about the plot, saying it was highly unlikely that senior Iranian officials would sign off on such a plan. And they have a point; if Tehran wanted to kill Ambassador al-Jubeir, why entrust the enterprise to someone who hardly fits the profile of a professional Qods force operative.

The U.S. military has spent years battling Qods force agents in Iraq and Afghanistan; intelligence officers will tell you they represent the most capable elements in the IRGC. Put another way, there are plenty of Qods force operatives who could easily enter the United States, carry out the plot and make a clean get-away. Why involve a used car salesman and drug cartels?

Several possibilities come to mind. First, the assassination plot may have been a deliberate ruse, aimed at shifting intelligence and law enforcement resources away from other teams preparing to carry out separate attacks. You'd better believe the folks at FBI Headquarters, Langley and Fort Meade are double-checking their information, looking for clues that might lead to other (and perhaps more menacing) Iranian plots while Arbabsiar spins his tale for investigators.

There's also a chance the assassination scheme was launched by rogue elements within the IRGC and Iranian political circles (yes, we realize that is an oxymoron). Angered by the lack of progress in "getting even" with Riyadh, members of the Qods Force, in concert with political elements, might have decided to do a little free-lancing and hatched a plan to blow up the Saudi ambassador in Washington.

However, you can't rule out the option that senior Iranian officials endorsed (and participated in) the hare-brained scheme. Intelligence and covert ops organizations have a long history of launching plots that are breathtakingly dumb. Readers will recall that the CIA engaged in a series of operations aimed at killing Fidel Castro, involving such diverse elements as an exploding cigar and the U.S. mafia. None of those plots came close to succeeding, but the boys at Langley kept trying, anyway. The men running the Qods Force are not immune to bad ideas, either.

Perhaps the most fascinating element of this story is how quickly talk of military action entered the picture. Mr. al-Faisal's remarks will be interpreted (in some circles) as a green light for U.S. attacks against Iranian targets. And late this afternoon, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry said military action against Tehran "could not be ruled out." There are also unconfirmed reports that the Obama Administration will provide a briefing this evening on the plot to key members of the Senate Intelligence, Foreign Affairs and Armed Services Committees.

Predictably, such talk has raised a "wag the dog" scenario, with the Obama Administration using the Iranian plot to divert attention away from a host of domestic woes. We're not prepared to go down that road, but stoking sentiment against Iran could serve another purpose. As we've noted in previous posts this year, Tehran is on the cusp of acquiring nuclear weapons--a development which could occur before the end of the year. If public (and political) sentiment is already aligned against Iran, it would make it that much easier to launch military strikes against Iran. By launching a clumsy effort to kill a senior Saudi official, Iran may have given the U.S. an opportunity to rally international opposition against the Tehran regime.

***

ADDENDUM: Thomas Joscelyn at The Long War Journal reminds us that some of the Iranians implicated in the assassination plot are quite capable of carrying out deadly operations. Abdul Reza Shahlai, identified as "coordinator" of the planned attack, was the mastermind of a 2007 strike against U.S. troops in Karbala. Shahlai, who was previously identified as a Deputy Commander of the IRGC-QF, is the cousin of Manssor Arbabsiar; Gholam Shakuri, who served as an intermediary, is Shahlai's deputy. Family ties between Shahlai and Arbabsiar made the Iranian-American a convenient tool for the operation, but it still doesn't explain why the IRGC-QF was interested in farming out the enterprise to less-skilled personnel.

Infected

2011-10-07T19:08:00.004-04:00

Noah Shachtman at the Danger Room has this disturbing exclusive: the U.S. Air Force drone fleet has been hit by a computer virus.

The virus, first detected nearly two weeks ago by the military’s Host-Based Security System, has not prevented pilots at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada from flying their missions overseas. Nor have there been any confirmed incidents of classified information being lost or sent to an outside source. But the virus has resisted multiple efforts to remove it from Creech’s computers, network security specialists say. And the infection underscores the ongoing security risks in what has become the U.S. military’s most important weapons system.

“We keep wiping it off, and it keeps coming back,” says a source familiar with the network infection, one of three that told Danger Room about the virus. “We think it’s benign. But we just don’t know.”

Military network security specialists aren’t sure whether the virus and its so-called “keylogger” payload were introduced intentionally or by accident; it may be a common piece of malware that just happened to make its way into these sensitive networks. The specialists don’t know exactly how far the virus has spread. But they’re sure that the infection has hit both classified and unclassified machines at Creech. That raises the possibility, at least, that secret data may have been captured by the keylogger, and then transmitted over the public internet to someone outside the military chain of command.

It's no secret that UAVs have become a weapon-of-choice in the War on Terror; our expanding fleet of drones (most of them operated and maintained by the USAF) allow intelligence specialists to monitor large stretches of territory for and strike high-value targets. Just last week, a CIA-operated UAV took out Al Qaida bigwig Anwar Awlaki; all told, American UAVs have killed more than 2,000 suspected terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan since President Obama took office, according to the Washington Post.

So far, the infection appears limited to Creech, while pilots and sensor operators control dozens of UAVs operating around the world. There is no evidence the virus has spread to the Distributed Common Ground Station (DCGS) facilities which analyze intelligence collected by the drones. While drone operations have received lots of media attention, many Americans are unaware of the huge intel network required to support UAV operations. At places like Langley AFB, VA; Hickam AFB, Hawaii, Beale AFB, California (and others), hundreds of intel specialists monitor, record and decipher data from the drone's on-board sensor suite.

The Air Force hasn't said how the virus found its way into the Ground Control Stations that direct UAV missions. But the most likely culprit is an external drive or some other type of external device that was plugged into A GCS computer, providing an entry point into the network. If information captured by the keylogger program was transmitted to individuals outside DoD, it could provide valuable insights regarding drone operations and the command-and-control network that control them.

As you might expect, this sort of thing isn't supposed to happen. Computers that direct UAV flights (and the intel systems that support them) are part of intranets, separate from the internet. But they remain vulnerable to external viruses and other hazards, through something as simple as a flash drive.

Was it a deliberate attack? The jury's still out on that one, but recent trends are not encouraging. Adversaries are quite aware of U.S. reliance on UAVs, and they're looking for ways to cripple our capabilities in that area. There have been several "infections" of secure networks in recent years, raising concerns about our susceptibility to outside attacks. Coincidence? You decide.

Today's Reading Assignment

2011-10-05T19:22:00.005-04:00

...from Jim Lacey, Professor of Strategic Studies at the Marine Corps War College, writing at National Review on-line. Professor Lacey shares our outrage at a recent article in The New York Times, which described the armed forces retirement program as "another big social welfare system." Recounting the long list of military operations over the past two decades, Lacey reminds us that a soldier who enlisted in 1990 had more than "earned" his pension by the time he retired last year. A few evocative paragraphs:

"..Fresh out of boot camp, our typical infantry soldier was sent to the 24th Infantry Division, and was soon on his way to the Middle East as part of the force sent to evict the Iraqi army from Kuwait. Living under the most primitive conditions for months, our young private spends most of his time training. What free time he has is for writing home, repeatedly telling his folks to ignore the numerous predictions that at least 10,000 Americans will die if fighting erupts. Later, while lying under the stars and trying to ward off the desert chill, he wonders if he will be one of the 10,000, for he really has no reason to doubt the predictions. Finally, the assault begins, and our young private finds himself in one of the spearhead formations living through the fear and thrill of shredding several of Saddam’s much-vaunted Republican Guard divisions.

[snip]

At the end of his first hitch, he reenlists and is promoted to sergeant, and is sent to Germany to join the 1st Armored Division. Our infantryman knows he is going to have to work and train hard. But, as the Cold War is over, he is also expecting a bit of downtime and a chance to see some of Europe. What he did not expect was to be ordered into the Balkans.

In late December 1995, the 1st Armored is sent to Bosnia to bring the long-running Yugoslavian violence to an end. For the troops to get to their destination, a pontoon bridge had to be thrown across the Sava River, which was experiencing its worst flooding in 70 years. Weather conditions were terrible all through the days of the bridge’s construction, and no better when the 1st Armored Division began its crossing. As our young sergeant led his armored vehicles across the makeshift bridge, a journalist asked a bystander, “What does this mean to you?” The reply: “It means peace. It is as simple as that.”

[snip]

The second half of our typical infantryman’s career saw him promoted to Sergeant First Class, where he cared for and trained a few dozen soldiers, and eventually to First Sergeant, where he was responsible for an entire company of close to 150 soldiers. Still with the 3rd Infantry Division, he spent most of 2002 in Kuwait preparing for the invasion of Iraq. And then, early the following year, he again was part of a spearhead unit, the one that conducted the 21-day blitz from Kuwait that culminated in the thunder runs into the center of Baghdad.

Unfortunately, capturing Baghdad was not the end of our soldier’s involvement in Iraq. Over the remaining seven years of his Army career he would spend half of that time in Iraq, while many of his brothers had alternate tours in Iraq and Afghanistan. Throughout this period he never much concerned himself with the politics of our involvement. His focus was always much more narrow and visceral: What do I have to do today to help destroy a violent extremist insurgency and to take as many of my men as possible home safely?

[snip]

This nation asks a lot of its military, and they have given in full measure. One soldier captured it all when he said to me after finishing 20 years of service: “I have given the Army, my country, and my brothers everything I had. If there is anything left in me it is going to go to my family.” When he departed the service he took with him a retirement paycheck of less than $25,000 a year. It was promised to him. He earned it.

As Jim Lacey observes, this story of this solider isn't remarkable. In fact, it captures the shared experiences of thousands of soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who have served during these tumultuous times. Not all served in front-line combat, but all endured the rigors and sacrifices that come with a career in uniform. And all of them were volunteers.

Social welfare, indeed.

***

ADDENDUM: Lacey's column is yet another reminder of the escalating battle over military benefits. Last week, Army Times (a Gannett publication that can hardly be described as an organ of the vast, right-wing conspiracy) ran a cover story entitled "Obama's War on Your Benefits." While the article isn't available on the paper's website, it does capture the growing frustration of many military members, who believe promises made to them are being broken while entitlement programs for the great unwashed go untouched.

Meanwhile, that deafening silence you hear is from the Republican presidential field. When President Obama chided them for not "standing up" for a gay soldier who booed (by about four people) during a recent GOP debate, not one of the Republican contenders provided the obvious rejoinder: why is the Commander-in-Chief so concerned about the plight of one soldier, while benefits promised to thousands of military members are eroding under his watch?

The most obvious reasons? First, only two of the Republican candidates have actually served in the military. Secondly, it appears that none of the GOP hopefuls want to paint themselves in a box on the issue, giving them the flexibility to make further cuts (as required) if they are elected president.

Sounds like a "lose-lose" for hundreds of thousands of career military members (and retirees) who gave so much for that $25,000 a year pension. We should also note that Professor Lacey's prototypical retiree was something of a fast burner. The average non-commissioned officer who leaves active duty after 20 years is an E-6, with an average annual pension of less than $20,000 a year.

The Shopping Trip

2011-09-30T18:42:00.006-04:00

It may be the worst piece of political stagecraft since George H.W. Bush visited a grocery store 20 years ago and expressed amazement at a checkout scanner--a device that was long-since familiar to "ordinary" Americans.

But this time, it wasn't a commander-in-chief who looked out of place; it was First Lady Michelle Obama, during Thursday's trip to a Target store in Alexandria, Virginia. After Mrs. Obama was repeatedly criticized for her lavish vacations, designer clothes and general taste for the good life, someone in the White House decided she needed a little image work, making her seem less like Marie Antoinette, and more like the common folk who are trying to stretch a buck.

“One thing she loves to do is shop at Target,” President Barack Obama said of his wife Friday in an interview with Philadelphia radio personality Michael Smerconish. Mr. Obama's comments were eagerly reprinted in the Politico, ready to advance the narrative that the FLOTUS simply needed to get out of the White House "bubble" for a little while.

Give me a break. Does anyone outside the Politico staff (and the rest of the White House press corps) really believe that? As is often the case with this administration, the "official" version of events doesn't quite square with reality.

For starters, there's no such thing as an "impulse" trip by the POTUA or his spouse. Even for a short jaunt to Target, security must be coordinated--in advance--by the various agencies involved, including the Secret Service; the Washington, D.C. police force; the Virginia State Police and the local department in Alexandria.

And of course, the First Lady simply doesn't stroll into a store that hasn't been carefully searched (and re-checked) before she enters. It's a given that Target's corporate headquarters was contacted days in advance and preparations at the store began long before Mrs. Obama showed up. We're also guessing there was a heavy security presence around that store hours before the visit began; after all, it takes time--and effort--to deploy snipers, undercover officers, canine teams and the other precautions that accompany that type of visit.

There's also the little matter of the press coverage generated by the Target run. What a coincidence--an Associated Press photographer just happened to arrive in time to snap pictures of Mrs. Obama in the checkout line. And this wasn't some stringer or general assignment shutter jockey; the AP photog who got the exclusive was Charles Dharapak, who's been assigned to the White House beat for years. Gee...what are the odds that Mr. Dharapak shows up at the same store Michelle Obama is shopping at without a tip from the White House Press Office? Approximately zero.

El Rushbo deserves credit for doing what the MSM wouldn't dare, describing the "event" in more realistic terms: "“What a phony-baloney plastic banana good-time rock-and-roll optic photo-op that was,” he said on his Friday radio show.

Mr. Limbaugh was also one of the few observers who bothered to look in the First Lady's shopping basket, casting further doubts about the motive behind the shopping expedition. Among the items purchased? A bottle of Lysol cleaner. That's a rather odd choice, considering that Mrs. Obama and her family live in a government mansion (with a professional house-keeping staff) that buys cleaning supplies by the truckload through the General Services Administration.

Too bad Mr. Smerconish didn't ask the President what his wife was going to clean with that Lysol. As one wag observed, the last First Lady who actually cleaned the White House was Dolly Madison, after the Brits torched the place during the War of 1812. Since then, all the dusting, scrubbing and other chores have been handled by the White House staff. So, what's the probability that Mrs. Obama will personally use that bottle of Lysol to disinfect the White House living quarters?

You'd think that even the "journos" at Politico would be able to figure that one out.
***
ADDENDUM: To be fair, all administrations create photo ops on a daily basis. But few have been as transparent or clumsily constructed as the Target visit. Could you imagine the reaction if a Republican First Lady, say, Laura Bush, conducted a similar shopping trip? The same reporters who fret over Michelle Obama's tough life in the bubble would be in high dungeon over an obvious political stunt and efforts at "media manipulation."

We should also note one other curious element to this story--one that even the Politico scribes have picked up on. Since Mrs. Obama's visit on Thursday, the staff at the Alexandria target have been on virtual lock down, with only the manager authorized to speak with the press--and only by telephone.

And just how much did the photo-op cost the taxpayers? A former member of the White House presidential advance team (which performs similar services for the First Lady) put the tab (conservatively) in the "tens of thousands of dollars." The source notes that, along with security, there was also a requirement to establish secure comms at the site (through the White House Communications Agency); determine the location of the nearest medical facilities and coordinate treatment planning, in the event of an emergency. Those tasks--and others--are part and parcel of any trip by the president or the first lady, and they require time, money and personnel to complete.

Put another way, that was a very expensive bottle of Lysol.

MANPADs for the NYPD?

2011-09-25T21:10:00.007-04:00

On the streets of New York? In an interview with CBS News, NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly stated his department has the ability to "take down" aircraft which threaten the city--without assistance from the federal government. Kelly's comments have raised speculation the NYPD has acquired a system like the Boeing Avenger, shown here during a 2003 deployment in Washington, D.C. The Avenger has Stinger missiles mounted on a HUMVEE (UPI photo).

Tonight's edition of 60 Minutes featured a segment on one of the world's most sophisticated anti-terrorism units--the New York City Police Department. Over the past decade, NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly (and the city) have spent $3 billion on measures designed to prevent or mitigate future attacks.

According to Kelly, more than 1,000 NYPD officers are assigned to the counter-terrorism unit, which was essentially created after the 9-11 attacks. In his interview with Scott Pelley, outlined the obvious strategy behind this organization, and one of its very surprising capabilities:

Ray Kelly: We're the number one target in this country. That's the consensus of the intelligence community. We're the communications capital. We're the financial capital. We're a city that's been attacked twice successfully. We've had 13 terrorist plots against the city since September 11. No other city has had that.

[snip]

We were with him, in his hi-tech command truck last Wednesday when he headed to the east side as New York hosted the United Nations General Assembly. He wanted to be there when President Obama arrived. To prepare for those 137 heads of State, Kelly has to understand the threats that all of those foreign leaders have at home so their local troubles don't play out here.

Kelly: We have to look abroad. We do that with the Secret Service, to see what the issues are in another country. Does that raise the threat level here?

The threat level in New York was already high. Intelligence said that there could be a car bomb attack on the tenth anniversary of 9/11 and that worry had still not been resolved.

Extra: Kelly on 1993 WTC attack

Vinny Giordano [nat sound]: All our interior and exterior checkpoints are up and running. Bomb squad's completed all its sweeps and their Ops are up.

Kelly had the tower of the U.N. Secretariat building surrounded. Snipers on the roof tops, divers in the river, helicopters above. Mr. Obama slipped into the U.N. with the Secret Service, under the blanket of the NYPD. All of this came just ten days after Kelly's team had secured the most sensitive event in the nation.

It was the 9/11 National Memorial on the tenth anniversary of the attack on America. Osama bin Laden had written about attacking again on this very day. And Kelly had more than 8 million New Yorkers to protect.

As the names of the fallen were being read, Kelly was watching from his brand new Joint Operations Center.

From here he can see everything. All in one cavernous room Kelly has representatives from the military, the FBI, Federal Emergency Management, state and local first responders. The center is a symbol of the 10 years and three billion dollars that he has spent to prepare for every kind of threat.

Pelley: Are you satisfied that you've dealt with threats from aircraft, even light planes, model planes, that kind of thing?

Kelly: Well, it's something that's on our radar screen. I mean in an extreme situation, you would have some means to take down a plane.

Pelley: Do you mean to say that the NYPD has the means to take down an aircraft?

Kelly: Yes, I prefer not to get into the details but obviously this would be in a very extreme situation.

Pelley: You have the equipment and the training.

Kelly: Yes.

Obviously, there are only a certain number of ways to bring down an aircraft, namely jet fighters, anti-aircraft guns and surface-to-air missiles. Since we haven't seen any F-15s or F-16s with NYPD markings (or AAA guns deployed around New York), it seems rather obvious that the New York police force has been equipped with shoulder-fired SAMs, most likely a Stinger variant.

While we understand the reasoning behind this capability, it does raise some pertinent questions, namely, what are the ROE for downing a suspect aircraft, and what coordination--if any--would occur before an NYPD aims his MANPAD, uncages the seeker and pulls the trigger. Under most scenarios, we assume there would be some warning from NORAD, alerting the police to the situation and giving them time to deploy MANPAD teams.

But we're also reminded of the confusion that might exist under such circumstances. For well over an hour on the morning of September 11, 2001, no one was really sure how many planes had been hijacked, and when United Flight 93 crashed in rural Pennsylvania, senior government officials assumed it had been shot down by U.S. Air Force F-16s. Only later did they learn that heroic passengers had thwarted the terrorists' plans by storming the cockpit and forcing them to crash the jetliner into the ground.

More than a decade later, coordination between NORAD and other government agencies has improved dramatically. But there can't be any hesitation (or uncertainty) when a police MANPAD team is dispatched to intercept a plane that appears to threaten New York City. Under those conditions, the NYPD (and its partners in the anti-terror mission) have only one chance to get it right--or horribly wrong.

****

While Mr. Kelly won't provide specifics on his department's "air defense" system(s), one likely candidate is the Boeing Avenger system, which consists of pedestal-mounted Stinger missiles on a HUMVEE chassis. The Avenger has been deployed around the nation's capital on several occasions, in response to increased terror threats. Still, if the NYPD has this system, it's rather amazing that the distinctive vehicles have never been seen in New York.

Another option would be Stingers carried in ordinary police vehicles, manned by officers trained in MANPAD operations. However, that employment method would have a major drawback--limited communications. An Avenger vehicle has the ability to link into air defense network, giving gunners a complete air picture, making it easier to track and engage threat aircraft.

***

ADDENDUM: Sources tell the New York Post the police department's "anti-air" capabilities consist of a .50 caliber sniper rifle which could--theoretically--be used to target vital components on a threatening aircraft (talk about a one-in-a-million shot). And Mayor Michael Bloomberg told reporters that the NYPD's air defense weaponry "could not" have prevented the 9-11 attacks, suggesting the department's capabilities are less robust that originally believed. However, the mayor refused to discuss specifics, suggesting (again) that the NYPD may have more in its anti-air arsenal than a sniper rifle.

Not Exactly Shovel Ready

2011-09-23T19:17:00.002-04:00

Andrew Malcolm of the Los Angeles Times is (apparently) the only media figure that caught President Obama in another embarrassing gaffe the other day.

It came during his heavily-publicized speech next to the Brent Spence Bridge, spanning the Ohio River between Covington, Kentucky and Cincinnati, Ohio. The "optics" (as the political class describes them) were aimed at generating support for Mr. Obama's new jobs bill. Never mind that the bridge he used as a backdrop isn't falling down; it's merely congested and much of that problem will be alleviated by the planned construction of a new bridge across the Ohio, about five miles downstream. Unfortunately, the project won't get underway until 2015, so construction workers hoping to build the new span won't be hired for another 48 months or so.

Of course, Mr. Obama didn't mention any of those inconvenient facts in his speech. But he did make one rather astonishing claim, as Mr. Malcolm reminds us:

Now, we used to have the best infrastructure in the world here in America. We’re the country that built the Intercontinental Railroad, the Interstate Highway System. (Applause.) We built the Hoover Dam. We built the Grand Central Station. (Applause.)

So how can we now sit back and let China build the best railroads? And let Europe build the best highways? And have Singapore build a nicer airport? At a time when we've got millions of unemployed construction workers out there just ready to get on the job, ready to do the work to rebuilding America.

The Intercontinental Railroad? Is that the one that connects San Francisco and Tokyo, or New York and London. Obviously, they don't exist. We assume President Obama was referring to the transcontinental railroad, completed in 1869. It remains a marvel of engineering and speed, largely because immigrant work crews didn't have an OSHA inspector demanding hearing protection for everyone, or the EPA trying to protect every bug, bird and snake that lived along the railroad's right-of-way.

Which leads us to another element missing from Mr. Obama's address: The legal and regulatory difficulties associated with many of his beloved infrastructure projects. Securing authorization for a new airport serving a major city would be a nightmare, complete with scores of lawsuits and endless red tape, ensuring that the project complies with thousands of federal, state and local rules (assuming it ever gets off the ground). That's a big reason that most localities are content to expand or improve existing facilities, avoiding the 20 years (and billions of dollars) required to build a major airport from scratch.

It's also worth noting that some of the overseas projects touted by President Obama are being described as failures. China's high-speed rail network, often touted as a "model" for the U.S., has run up close to $300 billion in debt, and most travelers still prefer slower (but much cheaper) buses. In fact, it's hard to find a bullet train line anywhere that's making money.

Clearly, Mr. Obama isn't going to sweat those details. He's desperately trying to sell his jobs bill and paint Republicans as obstructionists who want Americans to remain unemployed. Besides, if most Americans actually read the jobs plan, they'd see it for what it is: Stimulus II (or is it III), aimed at benefiting the president's friends in big labor and the public employee unions. Never let the ugly truth get in the way of a good political narrative.

An Inauspicious Debut

2011-09-14T23:19:00.003-04:00

This is the time of year when TV stations roll out their new syndicated offerings--those programs (mostly talk shows) that air in the morning and late afternoon, and provide lead-in audiences for local news shows. Since news is a critical revenue source, it's important to have a lead-in program that actually delivers an audience.

The latest crop of syndicated shows are making their debut this week, and at least one high-profile project is stumbling out of the gate. We refer to the daytime talk fest hosted by CNN star Anderson Cooper. Its debut on Monday drew the second-lowest rating of any daytime talk show (only Wendy Williams had a smaller audience). Meanwhile, some of Cooper's competitors (most notably, Dr. Oz) posted significant audience gains.

Obviously, one day does not make an entire season, and there's still time for the audience to "discover" Mr. Cooper's program, as TV execs like to say. But it's clearly not what Warner Bros. television had in mind when they approved this project and signed Cooper to a lucrative contract.

Still, the early results aren't exactly surprising, considering the host's track record at CNN. Mr. Cooper has anchored an evening news program at the cable network for years, and his broadcast runs far behind the competition on Fox News Channel and is occasionally bested by MSNBC as well. In other words, Cooper hasn't exactly been an audience magnet in cable news; so why did the folks at Warner Bros. think he'd fare any better in the cutthroat world of syndicated TV?

But in the parallel universe of the MSM, performance is sometimes secondary to your connections. Mr. Cooper became a household name at CNN, a network synonymous with the kind of news coverage that turns off millions of viewers. But since TV executives run in the same circles as media personalities (and hold the same world view), giving Anderson Cooper at daytime show was a perfectly logical step. The real surprise (from their perspective) is why most Americans are ignoring it.

This much is certain: local stations that bought the Cooper program won't wait indefinitely for ratings to improve. If audience levels remain low, look for local stations to move the show to a graveyard time slot (1 am or later), before bailing on the project entirely. With millions of dollars of revenue at stake, particularly in the larger markets, local affiliates can't afford to stick with a turkey.

Cooper's slow start also offers a cautionary tale for other programmers already working on the next generation of celebrity talk shows. Katie Couric's daytime program will start airing next September and it's already being touted as a sure-fire winner. After all, Ms. Couric was the Queen of Morning TV for more than a decade, and the viewers who watched her on "Today" are bound to flock to her talk show. Never mind that she was a total flop as anchor of the "CBS Evening News," and she has the same type of media pedigree as Anderson Cooper. Sounds like a can't-miss ratings bonanza to us.

Today's Reading Assignment

2011-09-14T18:22:00.003-04:00

...from Newt Gingrich, on the rapidly escalating crisis in the Middle East--and no discernible response from Washington (what a surprise).

The former Speaker of the House is not alone. Various outlets (including our little blog) have voiced similar concerns in recent months. However, it is rather surprising that Mr. Gingrich puts Iran's imminent entry into the nuclear club at #5 on his list. In our estimation, that should be our #1 concern.

The entire piece is well worth the read at Human Events.

How Did Barksdale Pass?

2011-09-13T20:44:00.004-04:00

Newly-Released Report Raises Questions About Unit's Nuclear Readiness After the 2007 "Minot Incident"

by Nate Hale

Four years ago this month, an evaluation team from Air Combat Command arrived at Barksdale AFB, Louisiana, to conduct a Limited Nuclear Surety Inspection of the 2nd Bomb Wing, the Air Force's largest B-52 unit.

But it was anything but a routine inspection. Events that unfolded just days earlier gave a new urgency to the evaluation, making it a bellwether for the Air Force's troubled nuclear enterprise.

Less than three weeks before the inspection team arrived at Barksdale, the 2nd Bomb Wing had been involved in one of the most serious nuclear incidents in the nation's history. On 29 August, one of the unit's B-52s began a 1,200 mile flight from Minot AFB, North Dakota to the Louisiana installation. The giant, eight-engine bomber was carrying six cruise missiles scheduled for deactivation. It was supposed to be a normal ferry mission, part of the planned retirement of early-model AGM-129 air-launched cruise missiles. Once at Barksdale, the missiles would be downloaded from the giant bomber, demilitarized and destroyed, in accordance with arms control protocols.

But unknown to crews at Barksdale, their counterparts at Minot had committed a grave error. The missiles slated for transfer to Louisiana had their nuclear warheads removed, a mandatory procedure before a ferry mission. But personnel at the North Dakota base mistakenly loaded six nuclear-tipped missiles onto the bomber. Amazingly, the mistake was never detected by teams at Minot that loaded the weapons; the 2nd BW crew that flew the B-52, or personnel at Barksdale that greeted the jet.

In fact, the nuclear warheads were not "discovered" until almost 12 hours later, when a Barksdale load crew arrived to remove the cruise missiles. By that time, the warheads had been officially "missing" for more than 36 hours, a period that included the previous evening at Minot, where the bomber sat, without required security measures, before the flight to Barksdale.

The incident was reportedly classified as Bent Spear, a term used to describe serious nuclear mishaps which may include breaches or violations of security and handling regulations. News of the incident was immediately briefed to senior Air Force officials; the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and President George W. Bush.

The military quickly launched a full-scale investigation of the mistaken transfer, and began punishing those deemed responsible for the incident. Within days of the mishap, rumors about firings and dismissals began to make the rounds.

And those rumors were not unfounded; as the official inquiry began to gather steam, the Air Force fired Colonel Bruce Emig (Commander of the 5th BW at Minot); Colonel Cynthia Lundell, commander of Minot's maintenance group, and Colonel Todd Westhauser, leader of the 2nd Operations Group at Barksdale. In that capacity, Westhauser "owned" the B-52 and crew that brought the nuclear warheads to the Louisiana base. Eventually, the discovery of other problems in the USAF's nuclear enterprise would result in the dismissal of the Air Force Secretary and the service's Chief of Staff, along with sanctions for dozens of lower-ranking personnel.

Against that backdrop, the 2nd BW faced the most critical LNSI in its history. For nine days (18-27 September), evaluators from ACC, shadowed by experts from Air Force Space Command and other federal agencies, inspected every element of the bomb wing's nuclear mission. Records were carefully screened; equipment was inspected and wing personnel demonstrated key elements of their unit's nuclear capabilities.

When it was over, the 2nd BW received an overall rating of "Satisfactory," and Air Force officials breathed a sign of relief. Had the Barksdale unit failed its LNSI, the nation's bomber leg of its nuclear triad would have been seriously crippled. Without Barksdale and Minot, America's nuclear bomber force would have been reduced to a handful of B-2 stealth bombers, based at Whiteman AFB, Missouri. But with Barksdale earning a passing grade, that unit could continue its nuclear mission and perform key tasks for the 5th BW as well, while the Minot unit worked to regain its nuclear certification.

But new questions are being raised about the results of the 2007 inspection at Barksdale. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request filed almost four years ago by "In From the Cold," the Air Force recently released a lightly-redacted version of the LNSI report. According to experts who reviewed the document at the request of this blog, the report details discrepancies that typically result in a failing grade for a unit.

In particular, they point to the 2nd BW's inability to properly load weapons and generate simulated nuclear sorties during the inspection. Section III of the 36-page report details prolonged efforts by 2nd BW crews to perform essential tasks, including an air-launched cruise missile (ALCM) pylon upload; preparation of a ferry aircraft with one ALCM pylon and one advanced cruise missile pylon, and one complete aircraft generation, from weapons transfer through aircrew acceptance.

As noted in the inspection report, Barksdale personnel struggled mightily to complete their assigned duties. According to evaluators, the first attempt at aircraft generation was terminated after 14 hours, due to problems with weapons handling trailers and generators.

A second try at aircraft generations also failed. The exercise was initially delayed (due to uneven pavement under the B-52 weapons bay), prompting a relocation of the aircraft. As the exercise continued, crews experienced more equipment problems. The second attempt was finally halted at the 15-hour point, when "critical faults" were discovered during post-load checks.

During the next attempt, the 2nd BW attempted to generate two aircraft. The third B-52 was rejected due to a critical fault during post-load checks. Ground crews managed to generate the fourth bomber, but not before another equipment problem (with a lift arm) required a weapons demate/mate.

All told, Barksdale personnel spent more than 30 hours generating a single nuclear-capable aircraft. Yet despite the reported difficulties, the 2nd BW still received a "Satisfactory" grade for the Loading and Mating portion of the evaluation, a rating that left some nuclear experts stunned.

"Tell me this is a joke," said one retired Air Force weapons expert, with more than 20 years of nuclear experience. Pages 9 and 10 [of the report] are enough to result in automatic "Unsats" (unsatisfactory ratings). No pass, go to jail or whatever. If you can't load, you can't be inspected, and if you can't be inspected, you are UNSAT, he continued. "Don't waste the gas to send the team. Where the hell is the leadership?"

The weapons expert who reviewed the Barksdale report spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Another former expert was equally blunt in his criticism of the unit and the evaluation. "It's very, very difficult to believe they could receive a passing grade on any kind of inspection when they were unable to generate a single successful nuclear sortie until the fourth attempt," he said.

The retired Air Force official also observed that evaluators seemed to put most of the blame on faulty equipment--and not the crews that maintained it

"Members of the inspection team (and I'm sure the 2nd Bomb Wing) seem to want to attribute their inability to generate a sorties on equipment failures. However, the sheer amount of failure makes this very hard to accept," he said. "In theory, all of the vehicle inspection and checklist compliance pieces are supposed to ensure that equipment is in good working order. Clearly, in practice, that wasn't the case. It appears they were given a set of mulligans to account for equipment failures and ensure they were able to (eventually" generate a sortie."

The second expert--who also requested anonymity--expressed amazement at another apparent trend in the report. He said the document repeatedly "spins" the lack of a negative finding into a positive one, and offered several examples:

"On page 11, paragraph 2 of the report, 'the weapons loading community overcame numerous equipment malfunctions,' instead of being held accountable for poorly-maintained equipment, they are lauded for how they dealt with failures," he commented.

The expert also chuckled at a paragraph praising Barksdale personnel for following required communications security (COMSEC) practices. "This is ridiculous," he said, "They just described compliance. You can't comply "exceptionally."

As a third example of "spin," the nuclear expert cited a paragraph on page 14 of the report, noting that Barksdale had only one "incident" of a close-in sentry abandoning his post. "Having a sentry leave his position is a huge issue," the former official observed. "They frame his 'one failure' as 'well, it was just one failure and categorize it as a [unit] strength."

The inspection report also highlighted problems that may have contributed to nuclear incident that occurred in late August of 2007. Evaluators found that 2nd BW personnel "did not ensure that markings for ferry payloads and Type 3 trainers were applied or legible prior to use for payload mate to missile." It is unknown what markings--if any--were applied to the nuclear missiles mistakenly transferred from Minot to Barksdale, or if crews at the Louisiana base failed to recognize payload markings when the B-52 arrived.

Overall, the 2007 LNSI at Barksdale evaluated management and performance in 17 different areas related to the unit's nuclear mission. The 2nd BW earned "Excellent" ratings in 10 categories, five were judged as "Satisfactory," and only two were rated "Marginal." Those areas, Program Management and Administration and Unit Administration, received low marks for a critical finding, the certification of non-qualified aircrew members as mission ready. Inspectors found that the unit failed to ensure proficiency in all nuclear-related events before declaring initially-qualified aircrew and "combat mission ready."

The report lists more than 30 findings during the Barksdale inspection, including those serious issues in weapons loading/aircraft generation and aircrew certification. That raised concerns about pressure on the evaluators to generate a satisfactory score, and prevent de-certification of the 2nd Bomb Wing. The former Air Force official believes "external pressures were driving inspectors to deliver a passing grade."

"While there is no way I can say with certainty that the pressure affected the outcome," he continued," It's" very difficult to imagine a situation where an inspection team would be willing to deliver the message if there was any possible way it could be avoided."

After passing the 2007 inspection, the 2nd BW continued its nuclear mission and performed critical duties at Minot as well, while the 5th Bomb Wing struggled to regain its certification. Personnel from the Louisiana base remained at Minot through the first half of 2008, until the 5th Wing was re-certified to perform its nuclear mission. Had Barksdale failed its evaluation in the fall of 2007, the re-qualification process would have been much longer and more complex, crippling the bomber leg of the nuclear triad for months, and limiting options for strategic planners.

Observers note that the Barksdale evaluation was the first "no-notice" inspection conducted in the wake of the Minot incident. The 2007 event ushered in an era of more rigorous nuclear standards and evaluations, as well as a reorganization of the USAF's nuclear enterprise. Almost two years later, Global Strike Command became operational and took charge of the Air Force's nuclear mission from its headquarters at Barksdale.

Creation of the new command was one of the recommendations from a task force (chaired by former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger, who chaired a task force that investigated the Minot incident. The Schlesinger panel discovered that nuclear expertise in the Air Force had been badly eroded by a variety of factors, ranging from decreased emphasis on the mission, to the use of technicians in other capacities (such as guarding prisoners in Iraq).

Over the past two years, there have been fewer reported problems in the Air Force nuclear enterprise, but there were clear growing pains. After the Minot incident, four more USAF wings failed their nuclear surety inspections in 2008 and 2009, leading (in some cases) to more personnel changes. The 5th Wing also failed its initial NSI in May 2008, though it regained its nuclear certification, and passed a make-up evaluation three months later.

The service was also embarrassed by the mis-shipment of nuclear components to Taiwan in early 2008, an event that led to more calls for greater accountability, and changes in Air Force nuclear operations. At least six USAF generals were disciplined over that matter, along with a larger number of lower-ranking officers. The sanctions were announced just weeks after the Air Force Chief of Staff, General Michael Moseley and the Air Force Secretary, Michael Wynne, were asked to resign because of continuing problems in the nuclear enterprise.

Air Force public affairs officials did not respond to e-mail requests for comment on the 2007 report.

No explanation was given as to why it took so long to release the report. Only two paragraphs in the report were redacted, included a brief section describing the "health" of Barksdale's nuclear stockpile at the time of the evaluation. The report was originally classified "For Official Use Only/DoD Unclassified Controlled Nuclear Information." Release of the 2007 report was authorized by Major General Harold Mitchell, the Air Force's Deputy Inspector General.

Some of the personnel connected with the original Minot episode have remained in the service. Colonel Emig, the 5th Bomb Wing commander who was fired in the weeks after the incident, now runs the Irregular Warfare Division at Air Combat Command Headquarters, and has played a major role in shaping Air Force UAV operations. Colonel Westhauser, the former commander of the 2nd Operations Group at Barksdale, is now assigned at Maxwell AFB, AL, where he is Director of Doctrine Development at the Curtis LeMay Center.

The Al Qaida Jobs Plan?

2011-09-09T11:39:00.005-04:00

President Obama unveiled his latest jobs plan for America last night. There were no real surprises, and critics said Mr Obama's proposal--outlined before a joint session of Congress--was little more than a rehash of policies that have already been tried, but with no appreciable success.

Meanwhile, the administration may be (inadvertently) implementing a jobs program overseas. We refer to this week's announcement for deep troop cuts in Iraq, which could undermine security gains, and put more terrorists back to work. As Fox News reported:

The Obama administration has decided to drop the number of U.S. troops in Iraq at the end of the year down to 3,000, marking a major downgrade in force strength, multiple sources familiar with the inner workings and decisions on U.S. troop movements in Iraq told Fox News..

Senior commanders are said to be livid at the decision, which has already been signed off by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta.

There are currently about 45,00 U.S. troops in Iraq. Commanders requested a reduction by year's end, but according to Fox, it wasn't enough for the White House. When they suggested a reduction to 10,000 the administration decided the final number would be just 3,000. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta has already signed off on the plan, over the objections of senior military officials, who complain the dramatic cutback will leave them unable to meet mission requirements:

"We can't secure everybody with only 3,000 on the ground nor can we do what we need to with the Iraqis," one source said. Another source said the actual total could be as high as 5,000 when additional support personnel are included.

A senior military official said by reducing the number of troops to 3,000, the White House has effectively reduced the mission to training only.

"There is almost no room for security operations in that number; it will be almost purely a training mission," this official said. The official added that a very small number of troops within that 3,000 will be dedicated to counter-terrorism efforts, but that's not nearly what Gen. Lloyd Austin, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, wanted.

It doesn't take a strategist to figure this move is about saving money (and politics), rather than military realities on the ground. Obviously, U.S. forces can't stay in Iraq forever, but commanders clearly want a more gradual withdrawal, to avoid compromising hard-won security gains. Meanwhile, the White House was worried about election-year "optics," and decided to press ahead with the larger reduction.

Which brings us to the jihadi "jobs" factor. Recent reports indicate that Al Qaida in Iraq is down, but certainly not out. But with fewer American troops involved in security operations, the terrorists may have new opportunities to replenish their ranks and increase attacks against U.S. personnel and our Iraqi allies. Iran will reap similar benefits, and will likely ramp up its own terror efforts inside Iraq. So, our "hurry up" plan to exit that country will have the unintended consequence of putting more terrorists back to work.

It's worth noting that August was the first month when the U.S. did not record a single military death in Iraq. That's rather remarkable, and it was a long time coming. Barely five years ago, upwards of 100 U.S. troops were being killed each month in Iraq, as the "surge" took the fight to the terrorists, a move that (ultimately) broke the back of the terrorist network and brought stability to that war-torn country.

It would be nothing sort of tragic to surrender those gains--and give new life to terrorist networks in Iraq--simply for short-term political expediency. But that possibility is quite real, given the administration's haste to get out of Iraq.

Jammed

2011-09-09T10:56:00.004-04:00

South Korean political sources say a U.S. reconnaissance aircraft was forced to make an emergency landing on the peninsula earlier this year, after extensive jamming from North Korea.

An unnamed official told AFP that the incident occurred on the afternoon of 4 March, about 45 minutes into its mission. The U.S. aircraft received jamming at five to 10 minute intervals which interferred with its GPS system, forcing it to return to base.

[An] aide [to the ROK Parliament Defense Committee] aid the plane suffered disturbance to its GPS system due to jamming signals from the North's southwestern cities of Haeju and Kaesong as it was taking part in the annual US-South Korea drill, Key Resolve.

The incident was disclosed in a report that Seoul's defense ministry submitted to Ahn Kyu-baek of parliament's defense committee, the aide to Ahn said.

Spokesmen for the defense ministry and US Forces Korea declined to comment..

The jamming also reportedly affected South Korean patrol boats in the Yellow Sea and civilian air traffic operating from Kimpo Airport near Seoul.

This incident is significant for a couple of reasons; first, jamming is considered an act of war, and could have resulted in an armed response by the U.S. or South Korea, if either country was so inclined. But, given the collective willingness of Washington and Seoul to ignore such provocations as last year's sinking of a ROK corvette, and the shelling of a South Korean island near the DPRK coast, Pyongyang figured they had nothing to lose, and once again, they were right.

The jamming also suggests that North Korea has upgraded its modest electronic warfare capabilities. While GPS jammers have been on the arms market for a number of years, Pyongyang's capabilities in this area were limited. If the report is accurate, the DPRK may have acquired a more powerful GPS jammer, capable of affecting navigation systems over a wider area, (potentially) impacting a host of activities, from intelligence collection to precision weapons applications.

Note the use of the term "potential." That's because we have some counter-measures for GPS jamming that can lessen its impact on the battlefield. Needless to say, we weren't going to demonstrate those capabilities during Key Resolve or any other routine exercise. So, North Korea can keep guessing about the effectiveness (and survivability) of its GPS jammers in a combat environment.

While the type of aircraft involved in the incident was not disclosed, it was probably an RC-12 Guardrail; an RC-7 ARL (Airborne Reconnaissance Low), or a U-2. All three aircraft can collect various forms of intelligence, and none have an on-board navigator. Relying on GPS data for everything from flight navigation to sensor slewing, the presence of heavy jamming would be enough to force the pilot or aircrew to abort the mission. Not only would the interference make some intel collection more difficult, it would also increase flight safety risks.

By comparison, other intel platforms (notably the Air Force RC-135 and Navy EP-3) have on-board navigators, allowing them to continue operations in the face of GPS jamming. However, the electronic noise would have some impact on intel collection by those aircraft as well--but probably not enough to force mission termination.

Still, the AFP report should be taken with a grain of salt, since it came from political sources. "Jamming" might be something of a cover term for something more sinister, like the illumination of a U.S. recce aircraft by a North Korean SA-5 site. The long-range SAM system poses virtually no threat to fighter aircraft, but it is capable of engaging reconnaissance, battle management and other support platforms at long range. Being "painted" by an SA-5 radar for an extended period would be sufficient grounds to terminate a recce mission, given the platform's potential vulnerability to that system.

On the other hand, if it was GPS jamming, such activity might be considered the prelude to an attack by some sort of air defense system, including the SA-5. That scenario provided even more reasons to end that March mission

However, activity from North Korea's two SA-5 complexes is extremely rare, and there has been some debate about their operational status. Without more details, analysts can only speculate about the time of interference that forced our recce platform to cut short its flight.

Today's Reading Assignment

2011-09-04T21:28:00.004-04:00

...from Sallai Meridor, former Israeli Ambassador to the United States. Writing in today's Washington Post, he poses a question we've raised in the past, namely, who's watching Iran while Tehran (and everyone else) are watching the so-called Arab Spring. A few paragraphs of note:

Above all, the mullahs must prioritize the future of their regime and the Islamist revolution. What will happen to Iran if the rage sweeping the Arab world inspires Iranians to take to the streets again, aiming, together with mounting international pressure, to oust the mullahs? Will they follow in Gaddafi’s footsteps? Will they be better prepared than Assad?

While the world might be looking elsewhere, the Iranians have boosted the production of enriched uranium, upgraded the level of enrichment closer to weapons-grade and are reportedly moving essential production aspects to a well-protected underground facility. To the mullahs, who face growing uncertainties and are trying to draw their own lessons from events around them, what could better protect them and enhance their clout than the possession of a nuclear bomb?

Depending on which intel estimate you believe, Iran may be anywhere from a few weeks to a few months from acquiring that insurance policy. What happens then is any one's guess, but one thing seems certain. The odds of the western community forging a comprehensive response (beyond the usual diplomatic protests) is approximately zero. Remember, this is the same bunch that couldn't get together on a strategy from deterring Iran's nuclear ambitions. Expecting western leaders to craft cogent response to a nuclear-armed Iran is simply too much to hope for.

In related news, the Israeli Defense Forces will hold a special drill this week, simulating an enemy strike on the Dimona Nuclear Complex. The Dimona facility, located in the Megev Desert, is believed to be on the target list for Iranian medium and intermediate range missiles, capable of striking Israel and (in short order) delivering a nuclear warhead. Clearly, the Israelis are preparing for a worst case scenario, affirming that they have no confidence in the ability of the U.S. (or its European allies) to prevent Iran from getting the bomb.

On the Way to Camp David

2011-09-02T17:20:00.004-04:00

Marine One lifts off from the White House. A presidential helicopter, with President Obama on-board, made an emergency landing en route to Camp David today. A White House spokesman said that "bad weather" forced the president to switch to a motorcade, but there were no reports of threatening conditions in the Washington, D.C. area at the time (Wikipedia photo).

With today's grim jobs report, President Obama decided a little more R&R was in order, so he boarded Marine One for a weekend a Camp David.

But not even the helicopter flight went right, capping a particularly bad week in a presidency that has been filled with them.

According to ABC News, Marine One was forced to land due to "bad weather" before reaching the Presidential retreat in the Maryland mountains.

In a highly unusual maneuver, President Obama’s 30 minute flight to the Presidential mountain retreat at Camp David this afternoon was diverted to an undisclosed landing somewhere in the Washington area and a motorcade assembled to drive him to the Maryland site. White House press secretary Jay Carney tells ABC News a “bad weather call” was made before the President and his younger daughter Sasha even boarded the aircraft.

Carney says they have now arrived safely at Camp David. It remains unexplained why the President would be allowed to board Marine One knowing that the landing site on the mountain was experiencing weather making a landing difficult.

Quite predictably, the "transparent" administration didn't inform the White House press corps about the change in travel plans. The media first because aware of the motorcade from military officers at Camp David, which is actually a U.S. Navy installation.

More puzzling are the weather conditions that prompted Mr. Obama's switch to a motorcade. At the time Marine One departed for Camp David, there was no precipitation across the region. Temperatures in Washington were in the mid-70s at the time, with a southeasterly wind at 10 mph, according to Accu-Weather.com

Call it a hunch, but there is the possibility that the forced landing was the result of mechanical problems and not mechanical issues. While Presidential aircraft are among the best-maintained on earth, they are not immune to the problems that plague "ordinary" helicopters and jet. If there were any sort of technical issue developed during the flight to Camp David, Marine pilots would be under orders to get their chopper--and the Commander-in-Chief--on the ground, as quickly and as safely as possible. It's a given that the Secret Service (along with the military) have identified emergency landing sites along the various routes to Camp David.

But there is one problem with that scenario. When Marine One lifts off from the White House, it is joined by other choppers from HMX-1, the USMC squadron which provides rotary lift for the President and other VIPs. Why didn't Mr. Obama simply switch to another helicopter, which offered the same capabilities as the one transporting him to Camp David? So far, the White House has remained silent on that question. However, we should note that if there were concerns about the same problem surfacing in other presidential choppers, the entire fleet would be grounded.

Another--albeit remote--possibility is some sort of threat (perceived or actual) along the flight route. All helicopters that operate as Marine One have advanced self-defense equipment, but even those systems don't provide complete coverage against advanced man-portable SAMs like the Russian SA-24 "Igla S." That sort of threat would definitely put Marine One on the ground. But there have been no recent threats of that type inside the United States, only general concerns about MANPADS fron Qadaffi's arsenal winding up on the arms black market.

Which bring us back to the question: if it wasn't the weather, then why did Marine One make that unscheduled landing today?

Doing the Right Thing

2011-08-29T20:47:00.004-04:00

We're still undecided on Rick Perry as a presidential candidate, but he gets our vote for standing up for a former airman who's been wronged by the system.

The airmen in question is Colton Read, who served as an imagery analyst at Beale AFB, California. On 9 July 2009, he underwent "routine" surgery for the removal of his gall bladder at David Grant Medical Center at Travis AFB. While under the knife, an Air Force surgeon accidentally nicked Airman Read's aortic artery. After the mistake, clots formed and cut off blood flow to his legs. Read was finally transferred to a civilian hospital but it was too late; doctors had to amputate both legs, leaving him permanently disabled.

Since then, Airman Read has undergone more than a dozen additional surgeries to remove dead tissue from the remnants of his lower limbs, and remove the diseased gall bladder that sent him to the hospital in the first place. And, as you might expect, the operating room debacle ended Read's military career. Facing a medical retirement board that will end his military career, Read is now battling the bureaucracy over his benefits.

To help defray living expenses, Airman Read and his wife sought $100,000 from the Servicemembers' Group Life Insurance (SGLI) Traumatic Injury Program, claiming his situation was the result of injuries inflicted by military doctors. Governor Perry wrote a letter in support of his fellow Texan, asking the Air Force to approve Read's claim.

Predictably, the Air Force denied Airman Read's request, claiming the SGLI benefit does not cover injuries resulting from surgical complications or the treatment of illnesses. Read and his supporters contend that his injuries stemmed from medical mistakes--not the treatment of his gall bladder condition.

A spokeswoman for Perry said the governor is disappointed in the Air Force's decision. Perry served as a USAF C-130 pilot in the 1970s before entering politics.

Airman Read's situation is further complicated by federal laws that limit his ability to sue the doctors that almost killed him. As an Air Force member, Read cannot file a malpractice suit against military physicians, and his wife's potential recovery is capped at $250,000.

Sadly, Colton Read isn't the only armed forces member killed or maimed by incompetent physicians. During your humble correspondent's brief stint as an Air Force medic (30 years ago), I witnessed at least three examples of chronic malpractice (over a 12-month period), resulting in at least one death. As far as I know, none of the doctors involved were sanctioned for their actions.

Four decades later, it looks like some things haven't changed. To be fair, the vast majority of military physicians are skilled practitioners, saving the lives of badly wounded troops on a daily basis. But unfortunately, the armed services still attract their share of medical duds, doctors that (in some cases) have been unable to continue civilian careers because of malpractice issues. So, they continue their practice in the military, shielded by the Feres Doctrine.

At his blog, Airman Read encourages readers to contact their congressmen and ask them to end special legal protections for military physicians. It's a cause worth supporting. The great doctors in uniform have nothing to fear, and the termination of Feres would force middling performers to shape up--or face the consequences.

Colton Read--and the rest of our military--deserve nothing less. It's nice to see Governor Perry support one of his constituents. Too bad other politicians seem to be taking a pass.

The Never-Ending Vigil

2011-08-27T22:20:00.004-04:00

As it churns up the eastern seaboard, Hurricane Irene has produced a number of "firsts," or near-firsts.

On Saturday afternoon, for example, New York's mass transit system shut down for the first time in history. Subways, buses, ferries and other transportation systems--used by millions of passengers each day--ceased operations until the storm passes, leaving New Yorkers stranded at home, or looking for other ways to get around.

And Times Square, often referred to as the "crossroads of the world," was nearly a ghost town. In the words of Fox anchor Shepard Smith only "European tourists" were venturing out, while residents hunkered down for the approaching storm.

Yet, amid the flurry of cancellations and closings, one American institution soldiered on, quite literally. We refer to the sentries who stand vigil over the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C. Not even a Category 1 hurricane, with high winds, torrential rains and flooding, is enough to keep the men (and women) of the Army's 3rd Infantry Regiment from their assigned duties. As the Daily Beast reports:

“The tomb has been guarded continuously since 1948,” said Maj. John Miller, a spokesman for the Old Guard, the Army unit that patrols the place. “There’s been severe in the past. There will be severe weather in the future. We have contingency plans

[snip]

Tradition has dictated that the tomb remain guarded at all times. There has been at least one soldier watching over the tomb since the Army’s 3^rd Infantry Regiment took over the mission a few years after the end of World War II. A sentinel is present 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, including holidays.

When it rains, the guard stands under a green nylon tent that’s used for wreath-laying ceremonies to shield him from the inclement weather. As the winds start to pick up Saturday afternoon and into Sunday, he will then, if necessary, move into what’s known as the “Memorial Display Room,” essentially a marble enclosure that holds plaques and other honoraria dedicated to the unknown soldiers. From there, the guard will have “a continual line of sight on the tomb,” Miller said.

As of this posting (just before 11 pm EST Saturday night), there is heavy wind and rain at Arlington, so the sentry is, presumably, inside the Display Room, out of the elements, but maintaining his vigil. Once the weather passes, the sentinel will return to his outdoors post, and

resume his precise ritual before the tomb.

Just as it has been, every hour of every day since 1937.

Raptors Stay Put?

2011-08-25T23:01:00.005-04:00

UPDATE//26 Aug 1:13 PM EDT// Deciding that Irene poses a significant threat to Langley AFB, the Air Force has decided to evacuate its F-22 squadrons from the base. A spokesman tells the Newport News (VA) Daily Press that the USAF has authorized a "one-time" flight of three Langley-based F-22 squadrons to Grissom Air Reserve Base in Indiana. The Air Force's entire Raptor fleet has been grounded since early May, due to concerns about the jet's onboard oxygen system and potential toxins in the cockpit. Conditions permitting, the stealth fighters are expected to return to Langley early next week.

****

It's a standard military drill as a hurricane approaches coastal bases: Navy ships head out to sea, and aircraft are flown to inland bases.

And, as you might expect, military assets in the Mid-Atlantic Region have begun evacuating as Hurricane Irene churns towards the U.S. mainland. Earlier today, elements of the Navy's Second Fleet left port in Norfolk, Virginia for the open waters of the Atlantic. At sea, the vessels avoid damage that might result if they remained at their berths during the storm. As many as 27 surface vessels and submarines left Norfolk on Thursday; they are expected to remain at sea for 3-4 days.

As the Second Fleet sailed into the Atlantic, the Air Force was making plans to send some of its aircraft to installations well outside the hurricane's path. At Seymour Johnson AFB, North Carolina, about 60 F-15E Strike Eagle fighters and 7 KC-135 Stratotankers left the installation on Thursday, heading for Barksdale AFB, Louisiana.

Farther north, transport and tanker aircraft at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, New Jersey were preparing to deploy to Grand Forks AFB, North Dakota. Additionally, KC-135s assigned to the New Jersey Air National Guard are heading to McConnell AFB, Kansas, home of an active-duty air refueling wing.

But perhaps the biggest military story of Hurricane Irene is the Air Force assets that are staying put, namely the F-22 Raptor stealth fighters at Langley AFB, VA. The service's entire F-22 fleet has been grounded since early May, due to problems with the aircraft's on-board oxygen system. Making matters worse, the Air Force later found toxins in the blood of Raptor pilots after flights where they reported cognitive problems.

Until the source of the problem can be determined, the Air Force believes its wise to keep all F-22s on the ground. But Irene poses a particular threat to Langley, which lies along a branch of the Back River, only 11 feet above sea level. During Hurricane Isabel in 2003, the base suffered more than $200 million in damage, mostly from flooding. Isabel was a minimum Category 1 hurricane; some models suggest Irene may be a Category 2 when it passes near Langley Saturday night.

Officially, the USAF has not made a decision regarding an F-22 "hurri-vac" from Langley. But sources close to the program suggest that the Raptors assigned to the base's 1st Fighter Wing will stay put. Some aircraft are being moved into maintenance hangers; others will remain under covered parking along the base flight line, and a few are being housed in a hangar belonging to NASA, which operates a research facility at the base.

Collectively, these facilities provide shelter for many of the F-22s at Langley. But leaving the $150 million jets at the base--during the hurricane--entails certain risks. Irene's projected path will push tremendous amounts of water into the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries, including the Back River. Flooding from the storm surge, coupled with heavy rain, will overwhelm the base's drainage system, leaving the flight line vulnerable, along with parked aircraft.

Irene has the potential to deal another blow to the F-22 fleet. While extensive preparations have been made to protect the aircraft, damage from flooding, wind and rain could cause millions of dollars in damage, and further delay the return of Langley's Raptors to the air.

There is an outside chance that the Air Force might approve some sort of waiver--and authorize some sort of last-minute evacuation of the F-22s--that possibility seems increasingly remote. Apparently, the service believes the risk to pilots is too high. There's also the problem of preparing aircraft that haven't flown in more than three months (for a hurri-evac mission), in a matter of just two days. Consequently, the Raptors of the 1st Fighter Wing will (apparently) ride out the hurricane at home station.

NATO's Narrow Escape

2011-08-22T18:07:00.004-04:00

With word of Muammar Qadhafi's imminent demise--both politically and literally--there was a collective sigh of relief at NATO Headquarters and throughout the alliance. The Libyan rebels who are about to depose the long-time dictator may not realize it, but their push into Tripoli may have saved NATO from a major military embarrassment.

As Con Coughlin of the U.K. Telegraph noted last week, NATO was on the verge of a tactical stalemate (read: strategic defeat) when insurgent forces began their push into the Libyan capital:

Their success is a welcome boost for a campaign that only a few weeks ago looked to be running into the sand, with Admiral Mike Mullen, America’s most senior military officer, warning that the conflict was “in a stalemate”. The rebels’ new-found enthusiasm for the fray will certainly come as a great relief for Nato, whose aerial assault on Gaddafi’s regime was fast approaching breaking point.

The withdrawal of the alliance’s only aircraft carrier, the French navy’s Charles de Gaulle, which has limped back to its base at Toulon with a faulty engine, means that the alliance is increasingly having to rely on the RAF’s ageing fleet of Tornado bombers. Meanwhile, the premature retirement of Britain’s Nimrod surveillance aircraft, as part of the Government’s ill-considered defence cuts, has punched a gaping hole in our intelligence-gathering capabilities.

As a number of senior British officers warned earlier in the summer, there is a limit to how long the cash-strapped RAF, which is undertaking a significant proportion of Nato’s combat missions, can sustain the current tempo of operations.

Now, with Gaddafi on the verge of final defeat, the alliance can claim a victory. Indeed, CBS News reported today that NATO conducted at least 68 airstrikes during the final push towards Tripoli, with special forces (most likely, British SAS) calling in support missions from the ground. That filled a critical shortfall for NATO, which relied on a patchwork system of phone calls and e-mails from rebel forces to request air missions earlier in the conflict. Sources also tell CBS that U.S. Predator and Reaper missions were also ramped up in recent days, with the UAVs providing real-time intelligence on movements by Gaddafi's forces; timely bomb damage assessment and precision strikes from armed drones.

It wasn't the first time that NATO snatched victory from the jaws of near-defeat. In the spring of 1999, the alliance pounded Serbian targets in the Balkans for more than two months, with stunning accuracy, but only modest strategic effects. As winter turned to spring, the Serb Army and air defense system were largely intact enemy forces had the apparent means to continue their resistance for months, and NATO was looking at the very real prospect of a bloody ground incursion into Kosovo.

Thankfully, that operation never came to pass. After 88 days, Serb leader Slobodan Milosevic suddenly caved, and the conflict came to an end. Eleven years later, there is still some debate over why Milosevic decided to give up, but one key reason was crumbling support at the highest levels of his regime. A few weeks before Milosevic capitulated, one of his oldest (and closest) political allies was arrested while getting off a plane in Malta, carrying a large quantity of gold coins and a phony passport. That marked another moment when NATO uttered that proverbial sigh of relief; you didn't need to be a Serbian political analyst to understand that Milosevic's days were numbered if his key supporters were fleeing the country.

The loss of top allies may also explain why Gaddafi's regime has suddenly come crashing down. Every dictator needs supporters to maintain his grip on power; when they begin to bolt, word quickly spreads throughout the ranks and even low-level personnel began fading into the woodwork. At that point, the dictator's power inevitably collapses; that is apparently what happened in Libya over the weekend.

In hockey terms, NATO gets an assist for the (apparent) toppling of Gaddafi, but the alliance did not score the winning goal. In fact, NATO owes a tremendous debt to the rebels who marched into Tripoli and the Gaddafi supporters who abandoned the Libyan regime and set the stage for its implosion. Without them, NATO would still be waging a diminishing air war that, in Mr. Coughlin's words, was "running into the sand."

***

And the hardest part is yet to come. With Gaddafi out of the picture, Libya could easily slip into a civil war, pitting tribe against tribe, faction against faction. At this point, no one has offered anything approaching a plan for preventing that scenario.

Those Who Dare

2011-08-21T17:31:00.008-04:00

Air show pilots in Kansas City perform the missing man formation in honor of Bryan Jensen, an aerobatic pilot who died during a performance on Saturday (KCTV photo)

It's been a tough weekend on the air show circuit; since Friday, two demonstration pilots--including a member of the RAF Red Arrows--have died in crashes, and wing walker Todd Green fell to his death this afternoon at the Selfridge Air Show in Michigan.

Witnesses told WXYZ-TV that Greenplunged more than 200 feet while trying to transfer from an aircraft to a helicopter. Green was a second-generation air show performer, known for daring mid-air transfers between aircraft--without a parachute. At the time of the accident, Green was standing on the upper wing of a Stearman bi-plane, attempting to grab the runner of a helicopter flying just above him. It was a stunt that Green had performed hundreds of times before.

"He was reaching for the spar underneath the helicopter and just fell." [spectator] Arnold Sese told Action News. "It looked like a dummy falling to the ground. But when the emergency crews started rushing to the runway everyone knew it wasn't part of the stunt."

Sese says about a dozen spectators jumped the fence and rushed to the midfield area to help, but were quickly pushed back by the first responders. After that a stunned hush fell over the crowd as they waited for updates

Green's accident came only one day after aerobatic pilot Bryan Jensen died in a crash at the Kansas City (Mo) Air Show. Jensen, another air show veteran, was performing a routine in his custom-built biplane, nicknamed "The Beast," when he failed to pull out of a dive. The plane slammed into the ground in front of thousands of spectators, killing Jensen instantly.

Meanwhile, British authorities are investigating Friday's crash that claimed the life of a member of the Red Arrows precision flying team. Flight Lieutenant Jon Egging, 33, died Friday near Bournemouth, just moments after the Arrows had completed a demonstration for a local flight festival. More from the U.K. Telegraph:

Flying under the call sign RED 4 he had suddenly peeled away from the other eight Red Arrows as they headed back to Bournemouth international airport after performing at the town's air festival.

The jet flew low over houses and other buildings before crashing into a field near the village of Throop, Dorset, bouncing several times and splitting into two mangled pieces.

Group Captain Simon Blake, the Commandant of the RAF’s Central Flying School, said paid tribute to the pilot. He said: “Flight Lieutenant Jon Egging, known as 'Eggman’, joined the Team as Red 4 in the autumn of 2010.

“A gifted aviator, he was chosen to fly in the Red 4 slot, on the right hand outside of the famous Diamond Nine formation - an accolade in itself being the most demanding position allocated to a first year pilot.

“Throughout his winter training and the display season to date, his professionalism, skill and humility have shone through."

Egging, who joined the RAF in 2000, flew Harriers before being selected to join the Red Arrows last year. He is the first Red Arrows pilot to die in a crash in more than 30 years. Residents near the crash site said Flight Lieutenant Egging appeared steer his aircraft away from houses before attempting to eject.

With these most recent mishaps, there have been a total of seven air show accidents during 2011, resulting in four deaths (the other fatality, stunt performer Amanda Walker, passed away in late May from injuries she received in a March crash at Brownsville, Texas).

Over the past decade, there have been at least 52 major accidents at air shows around the world, resulting in 127 fatalities. However, that death toll is somewhat misleading, since 99 of the deaths occurred in two crashes from 2002, one in India, the other in the Ukraine. That latter incident, the Sknyliv Air Show Disaster, was caused when two pilots lost control of a Ukrainian Air Force SU-27 and ejected. The jet hit the ground and bounced off the nose of a parked transport aircraft before exploding, killing 77 spectators on the ground.

While there's an element of danger in air show flying, it's amazing that more accidents don't occur. And the reason they don't is very simple: the flight routines and other aerial stunts that we marvel at are performed by professionals who train constantly, using the best equipment in the aviation industry.

They put their lives on the line because flying and performing are passions, one often shared across generational lines. Amanda Walker, the wing walker who died earlier this year, was performing with her husband Kyle at the time of their crash. Their fathers, Jimmy Franklin and Bobby Younkin, died in 2005, when their biplanes collided during an airshow performance in Canada. It's not much consolation to the families and friends of the pilots and performers who have passed in recent years, but all died doing something they loved, challenging fate (and physics) until that final moment.

So, the next time you watch an airshow routine, remember that person in the cockpit, or the daring individual on the wing of that airplane. Their performances are truly extraordinary, and their margin for error is very, very small. All the more reason to cheer and marvel.

Today's Reading Assignment

2011-08-18T20:31:00.002-04:00

...why the Tea Party should resist budget deals that produce massive cuts in federal spending, but gut defense programs in the process. Words of caution from former UN Ambassador John Bolton.

Incidentally, no one is saying the Pentagon should be immune to budget reductions. But wholesale cuts--made with little regard for national security--will do more harm than good, and inevitably cost even more. Lest we forget, one reason that Ronald Reagan had to spend so much on the military is because predecessors, Gerald Ford and (especially) Jimmy Carter, created the "hollow force" of the 1970s.

Thankfully, that era was over by the time I signed up, but I heard plenty of horror stories from those who served in the post-Viet Nam military. In some instances, crews had to cannibalize multiple aircraft just to get one jet in the air. Multiply those logistical problems (and training issues) across DoD, and you've got some idea of the Carter-era military.

While we can't afford massive increases in defense spending (at least right now), we can't afford a return to the hollow force, either. Balancing resources against security priorities will be a major challenge in the years ahead. Unfortunately, neither the Obama Administration--or Congress--has articulated any sort of strategy that could drive this process.

Smaller and Weaker

2011-08-16T17:40:00.002-04:00

DoD's new austerity campaign doesn't bode well for Air Force modernization efforts. Retired Lieutenant General Dave Deptula, the service's former intelligence chief, says planned budget cuts leaves the Air Force facing three unpalatable choices:

“Without adequate funding, we are destined to go down one of three paths: We get smaller, we get weaker, or we get smaller and weaker,” said the former Air Force intelligence chief.

The Air Force is operating a geriatric force, Deptula said, with bombers and tankers more than 50 years old, and fighters and helicopters more than 30.

The average age of a U.S. airliner, normally subjected to far fewer stresses, is 10 years, he said, adding that an F-15C Eagle fighter he flew in 1979 was flown by his son in 2008. The Air Force buys about 118 aircraft per year, which works out to replacing the fleet every 48 years.

Deptula made his comments in an interview with Air Force Times. His remarks came less than a month after the USAF's Vice Chief of Staff, General Philip Breedlove, warned Congress that projected budget reductions will diminish the service's capabilities.

Analysts have offered several suggestions for saving defense dollars, ranging from redefining the Air Force mission, to merging the acquisition departments of the various services.

Retired General Howie Chandler, a former Vice Chief of Staff, believes the Air Force should close more bases. "We've got too much infrastructure across the force," he told the Times. But he also noted that Congress is reluctant to shutter military facilities and retire aircraft based in their districts.

Ultimately, most experts agree that the Air Force will have to choose among its various aircraft. Buying more F-35s, for example, could mean a reduction in unmanned systems. Mark Gunzinger, a former B-52 pilot who is now a policy analyst in Washington, D.C., says the service needs to divest itself of UAVs that can't operate in high-threat areas and focus on stealthier systems.

Unfortunately, all of the proposed "fixes" have problems of their own. Merging the acquisition functions of the armed services would produce genuine savings, but it would trigger the biggest budgetary food fight in U.S. history, as the various branches--and their supporters--battle over scarce budget dollars for pet programs.

The proposed UAV divestiture would be equally difficult. Since the other services have made only token investments in the ISR support element for drone operations, the Air Force would be compelled to surrender thousands of intel billets (and support architecture) to the Army, Navy and Marine Corps. There is no indication the service is prepared to do that. There's also the issue of funding new UAV systems against more pressing needs, such as a new bomber.

And, without real leadership on the issue, future reductions are likely to be made piecemeal, as they were during the "procurement holiday" of the 1990s. Air Force vets of that era remember the sudden announcement that the service would eliminate 10,000 airmen billets, to provide more money for the F-22 program. Expect similar juggling acts in the years ahead, and longer service careers for aging platforms like the F-15 and F-16.

From our perspective, the idea of closing more bases makes sense, but there's an even larger pot of money that deserves scrutiny as well. We refer to the $200 billion that DoD spends annually on "services." That category includes everything from the "rent-a-cops" that augment base security forces, to firms that run dining halls at overseas locations, and even specialized intel analysis performed by defense contractors.

There is a potential for enormous savings in this area. The armed services made a big jump into outsourcing about 15 years ago, with the promise of better services, at lower prices. But the savings have often been illusory; the private security officer who checked your ID at the gate is certainly competent (most are retired military), but they're at least twice as expensive as a new airmen fresh out of the security forces academy at Lackland. The same holds true for civilian mechanics who perform aircraft maintenance at pilot training bases.

And don't forget the biggest out-sourcing boondoggle of them all: TriCare. One reason DoD spends upwards of $60 billion a year on health care and pension benefits is that we made a conscious decision to send dependents, retirees and some active-duty members to civilian doctors, with a corresponding increase in costs.

So far, no one appears willing to touch the services portion of the Pentagon budget--and for lots of reasons. First, the contracting firms hire battalions of lobbyists and make donations to the politicians who approve their contracts. The same companies also hire lots of former military members and DoD civilians, so there's a certain reluctance among the brass (and their SES counterparts) to undercut a potential employer. The contractors are also pay lots of money in state and local taxes, so politicians at that level are anxious to see the firms hold onto their government jobs.

But the hour of reckoning may be at hand. While the Pentagon is planning on at least $400 billion in defense cuts, the real total may be closer to $1 trillion--or even higher. That sort of budgetary environment will force major reductions across the board, even in the "services" arena.

Unfortunately, that "slash-and-burn" mentality usually generates bad decisions. Before he retired in June, outgoing Defense Secretary Robert Gates warned that virtually all the "fat" had been trimmed from the Pentagon budget. Future cuts will come from bone and muscle, which translates into diminished capabilities.

What does that mean for the Air Force? Something along the lines of Dave Deptula's prediction: a force that is smaller, weaker, or smaller and weaker, relying heavily on "legacy" aircraft that should have been retired years ago, and with little money for new platforms.