CDRINF

An interesting analysis from a former grad school prof of mine who now runs an open source intel web site, Strategic Forecasting http://www.stratfor.com/corporate/static_index.neo The Edge of the Razor May 11, 2004 By George Friedman Summary The strategy of the United States in its war with radical Islam is in a state of crisis. The global strategic framework is in much better shape than the tactical situation in the Iraq theater of operations -- but this is of only limited comfort to Washington because massive tactical failure in Iraq could lead to strategic collapse. The situation is balanced on the razor's edge. The United States could recover from its tactical failures, or suffer a massive defeat if it fails to do so. One thing is certain: The United States cannot remain balanced on the razor's edge indefinitely. Analysis Most wars reach a moment of crisis, when the outcome hangs in the balance and in which weakness and errors, military or political, can shape victory or put it permanently out of reach. Sometimes these moments of crisis come suddenly and are purely military, such as the Battle of Midway. Sometimes they are a long time brewing and are primarily political in nature, like the Tet Offensive in Vietnam. These are moments when planning, judgment and luck can decide victors -- and when bad planning, lack of judgment and bad luck can undermine the best and brightest. It is the moment when history balances on the razor's edge. The U.S.-Islamist war is now, it seems to us, balanced on that edge. There are some who argue that it is not reasonable to speak of the confrontation between the United States and al Qaeda as a war. It certainly does not, in any way, resemble World War II. It is nevertheless very much a war. It consists of two sides that are each making plans, using violence and attempting to shape the political future of a major region of the globe -- the Muslim world. One side masses large forces, the other side disperses much smaller forces throughout the globe. But the goals are the goals of any war: to shape the political future. And the means are the same as in any war: to kill sufficient numbers of the enemy in order to break his will to fight and resist. It might not look like wars the United States has fought in the past, but it is most certainly a war -- and it is a war whose outcome is in doubt. On a strategic level, the United States has been the victor since the Sept. 11 attacks. Yet strategic victories can be undermined by massive tactical failures, and this is what the United States is facing now. Iraq is a single campaign in a much broader war. However, as frequently occurs in wars, unintended consequences dominate the battlefield. The United States intended to occupy Iraq and move on to other campaigns -- but failures in planning, underestimation of the enemy and command failures have turned strategic victory into a tactical nightmare. That tactical nightmare is now threatening to undermine not only the Iraqi theater of operations, but also the entire American war effort. It is threatening to reverse a series of al Qaeda defeats. If the current trend continues, the tactical situation will undermine U.S. strategy in Iraq, and the collapse of U.S. strategy in Iraq could unravel the entire U.S. strategy against al Qaeda and the Islamists. The question is whether the United States has the honesty to face the fact that it is a crisis, the imagination to craft a solution to the problems in Iraq and the luck that the enemy will give it the time it needs to regroup. That is what war looks like on the razor's edge. The Strategic Situation In the midst of the noise over Iraq, it is essential to grasp the strategic balance and to understand that on that level, the United States has done relatively well. To be more precise, al Qaeda has done quite poorly. It is one of the paradoxes of American war-fighting that, having failed to articulate coherent goals, the Bush administration is incapable of pointing to its real successes. But this is an excruciatingly great failure on the part of the administration. It was Napoleon who said, "The moral is to the physical as 3-1," by which he meant that how a nation or army views its successes is more important than what its capabilities are. The failure to tend to the morale of the nation, to articulate a strategy and demonstrate progress, is not a marginal failure. It is the greatest possible failure of political leadership in wartime. Nevertheless al Qaeda has failed in its most fundamental goal. There has been no mass rising in the Islamic world, nor has a single Muslim government fallen. Nor, for that matter, has a single Islamic government shifted its position in support of al Qaeda. To the contrary, a series of Muslim governments -- the most important of which is Saudi Arabia -- have shifted their positions toward active and effective opposition to al Qaeda. The current attacks by al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia are a reflection of the shift in Saudi policy that has occurred since just before the invasion of Iraq. Saudi Arabia is far from the only country to have shifted its strategy. Iran -- for all of its bombast -- has, through complex back-channel negotiations with the United States as well as a complex re-evaluation of its strategic position, changed its behavior since January 2002. Syria, while still not fully in control, has certainly become more circumspect in its behavior. Prior to the Iraq war, these governments ranged from hostile to uncooperative; they since have shifted to a spectrum ranging from minimally cooperative to fully cooperative. Since the United States could not hunt down al Qaeda, cell by cell and individual by individual, it devised an alternative strategy that is less effective in the short run but more effective in the long run -- and the only strategy available. Washington sought to change the behavior of enabling countries, particularly Saudi Arabia, by making the potential threat from the United States greater than the potential threat from al Qaeda. By occupying Iraq and surrounding Saudi Arabia with military forces, the United States compelled a reluctant and truculent Riyadh to comply with American wishes. In the long run, changes in the behavior of these governments -- and of other Muslim governments, from Islamabad to Tripoli -- represent the only way to defeat al Qaeda. To the simplistic American question of, "Are we safer today than we were a year ago?" the answer is, "Probably not." To the question of whether the United States is on a path that might make it safer in five years, the answer is "Probably yes," assuming the U.S. effort doesn't collapse under the weight of its pyramiding mistakes in Iraq. We would argue that the political shifts in the Muslim world that have helped the United States were aided significantly by the invasion of Iraq. We would certainly agree that Islamic opposition to the United States solidified -- we doubt that there was much room for intensification -- but we would also argue that opinion is significant to the extent to which it turns into war-fighting capability. The Poles despised the Germans and the Japanese were not fond of the Americans, but neither could expel the occupier simply on the strength of public opinion. It is the shifts in government policy that contained radical Islamist tendencies that should be the focal point, and the invasion of Iraq served that purpose. Tactical Failures? It is at that point that things started to go wrong -- not with the grand strategy of the United States, but with the Iraq strategy itself. A string of intelligence failures, errors in judgment and command failures have conspired to undermine the U.S. position in Iraq and reverse the strategic benefits. These failures included: „h A failure to detect that preparations were under way for a guerrilla war in the event that Baghdad fell. „h A failure to quickly recognize that a guerrilla war was under way in Iraq, and a delay of months before the reality was recognized and a strategy developed for dealing with it. „h A failure to understand that the United States did not have the resources to govern Iraq if all Baathist personnel were excluded. „h A failure to understand the nature of the people the United States was installing in the Iraqi Governing Council -- and in particular, the complex loyalties of Ahmed Chalabi and his relationship to Iraq's Shia and the Iranian government. The United States became highly dependent on individuals about whom it lacked sufficient intelligence. „h A failure to recognize that the Sunni guerrillas were regrouping in February and March 2004, after their defeat in the Ramadan offensive. „h Completely underestimating the number of forces needed for the occupation of Iraq, and cavalierly dismissing accurate Army estimates in favor of lower estimates that rapidly became unsupportable. „h Failing to step up military recruiting in order to increase the total number of U.S. ground forces available on a worldwide basis. Failing to understand that the difference between defeating an army and occupying a country had to be made up with ground forces. These are the particular failures. The general failures are a compendium of every imaginable military failing: „h Failing to focus on the objective. Rather than remembering why U.S. forces were in Iraq and focusing on that, the Bush administration wandered off into irrelevancies and impossibilities, such as building democracy and eliminating Baath party members. The administration forgot its mission. „h Underestimating the enemy and overestimating U.S. power. The enemy was intelligent, dedicated and brave. He was defending his country and his home. The United States was enormously powerful but not omnipotent. The casual dismissal of the Iraqi guerrillas led directly to the failure to anticipate and counter enemy action. „h Failure to rapidly identify errors and rectify them through changes of plans, strategies and personnel. Error is common in war. The measure of a military force is how honestly errors are addressed and rectified. When a command structure begins denying that self-evident problems are facing them, all is lost. The administration's insistence over the past year that no fundamental errors were committed in Iraq has been a cancer eating through all layers of the command structure -- from the squad to the office of the president. „h Failing to understand the political dimension of the war and permitting political support for the war in the United States to erode by failing to express a clear, coherent war plan on the broadest level. Because of this failure, other major failures -- ranging from the failure to find weapons of mass destruction to the treatment of Iraqi prisoners -- have filled the space that strategy should have occupied. The persistent failure of the president to explain the linkage between Iraq and the broader war has been symptomatic of this systemic failure. Remember the objective; respect the enemy; be your own worst critic; exercise leadership at all levels -- these are fundamental principles of warfare. They have all been violated during the Iraq campaign. The strategic situation, as of March 2004, was rapidly improving for the United States. There was serious, reasonable discussion of a final push into Pakistan to liquidate al Qaeda's leadership. Al Qaeda began a global counterattack -- as in Spain -- that was neither unexpected nor as effective as it might have been. However, the counterattack in Iraq was both unexpected and destabilizing -- causing military and political processes in Iraq to separate out, and forcing the United States into negotiations with the Sunni guerrillas while simultaneously trying to manage a crisis in the Shiite areas. At the same time that the United States was struggling to stabilize its position in Iraq, the prison abuse issue emerged. It was devastating not only in its own right, but also because of the timing. It generated a sense that U.S. operations in Iraq were out of control. From Al Fallujah to An Najaf to Abu Ghraib, the question was whether anyone had the slightest idea what they were trying to achieve in Iraq. Which brings us back to the razor's edge. If the United States rapidly adjusts its Iraq operations to take realities in that country into account, rather than engaging on ongoing wishful thinking, the situation in Iraq can be saved and with it the gains made in the war on al Qaeda. On the other hand, if the United States continues its unbalanced and ineffective prosecution of the war against the guerrillas and continues to allow its relations with the Shia to deteriorate, the United States will find itself in an untenable position. If it is forced to withdraw from Iraq, or to so limit its operations there as to be effectively withdrawn, the entire dynamic that the United States has worked to create since the Sept. 11 attacks will reverse itself, and the U.S. position in the Muslim world -- which was fairly strong in January 2004 -- will deteriorate, and al Qaeda's influence will increase dramatically. The Political Crisis It is not clear that the Bush administration understands the crisis it is facing. The prison abuse pictures are symptomatic -- not only of persistent command failure, but also of the administration's loss of credibility with the public. Since no one really knows what the administration is doing, it is not unreasonable to fill in the blanks with the least generous assumptions. The issue is this: Iraq has not gone as planned by any stretch of the imagination. If the failures of Iraq are not rectified quickly, the entire U.S. strategic position could unravel. Speed is of the essence. There is no longer time left. The issue is one of responsibility. Who is responsible for the failures in Iraq? The president appears to have assumed that if anyone were fired, it would be admitting that something went wrong. At this point, there is no one who doesn't know that many things have gone wrong. If the president insists on retaining all of his senior staff, Cabinet members and field commanders, no one is going to draw the conclusion that everything is under control; rather they will conclude that it is the president himself who is responsible for the failures, and they will act accordingly. The issue facing Bush is not merely the prison pictures. It is the series of failures in the Iraq campaign that have revealed serious errors of judgment and temperament among senior Cabinet-level officials. We suspect that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is finished, and with him Deputy Secretary Paul Wolfowitz. Vice President Dick Cheney said over the weekend that everyone should get off of Rumsfeld's case. What Cheney doesn't seem to grasp is that there is a war on and that at this moment, it isn't going very well. If the secretary of defense doesn't bear the burden of failures and misjudgments, who does? Or does the vice president suggest a no-fault policy when it comes to war? Or does he think that things are going well? This is not asked polemically. It is our job to identify emerging trends, and we have, frequently, been accused of everything from being owned by the Republicans to being Iraq campaign apologists. In fact, we are making a non-partisan point: The administration is painting itself into a corner that will cost Bush the presidency if it does not deal with the fact that there is no one who doesn't know that Iraq has been mismanaged. The administration's only option for survival is to start managing it effectively, if that can be done at this point.

This is from a fatalities website which I believe refers to the same veterans group. Note the complete lack of skydiving experience. I do not know any of them personally, but they have had a couple of high profile fatalities at commemorative demo jumps. There are some great, experienced, WWII Airborne veteran skydivers out there, like Tom Morrison who I was privileged to jump with on a 101st Airborne combat vets demo jump a few years ago (I was the Desert Storm jumper). However, I am not sure how many of this particular group are even licensed skydivers. So, I think it is not so much a question of age, as currency. CDR

If you want a historical analogy, the comparison of Iraq with the Spanish-American War in 1898 and subsequent Philipine Insurrection is probably more accurate than the somewhat contrived comparisons (like or unlike) to Vietnam. In 1898 we started a war based primarily on government and media hype over revenge against the suspected perpetrators of a terrorist act (suspected Spanish bombing of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor) which the government used as justification to invade the Spanish Colonies of Cuba and the Philipines. This also gave us a convenient excuse to eliminate Spanish influence in the Western hemisphere which we had wanted to do for some time. The aptly named, "Splendid Little War" lead to U.S. seizure of these colonies in a relatively quick military campaign. The locals were initially grateful to be rid of the hated Spanish, but a large segment of the Philipine population came to resent continued U.S. presence and dominance of their country. This eventually gave rise to a Muslim extremist insurgency (does any of this sound familiar yet?) that lead to a very brutal guerilla war in the Philipines in the early 1900s. The Army eventualy defeated the guerrillas, but U.S. miitary presence in the Philipines continued through most of the 20th century with the country not given full independence until 1945 and the U.S. maintaining bases there until almost the end of the century. There is even still a residual U.S. military presence. .....and oh by the way... the remnants of the muslim guerrilla movement are still there. CDR

Damn, if your profile is correct and you have over 300 jumps with only a year in the sport, I don't think you have anything to worry about! I have been an off again, on again jumper, with a family and mostly lived near Cessna DZ's where 3 jumps is a good day. I have D and S/L JM, so you can progress a lot with 3-6 jumps on a weekend. To answer your question directly though, no, you don't need more than an A license to be an occasional recreational jumper. If you want to do night jumps, coach, instruct, or compete, however, you will need higher ratings. Check the USPA SIM for the exact details. CDR

No argument there, what I am talking about is: I agree that to get to championship level takes a heavy investment. What bothers me is that the costs to just get into the sport, own your own gear, and be an active recreational jumper have become prohibitively high for the average young person. CDR

Good article, I love Eloy, but I found the following the saddest comment on the current state of our sport: Certainly not a new development, but what started as a sport done by young soldiers, ex-soldiers, poor college students, and a few rugged individualist thrill seekers has become a rich man's sport. If you can't afford to buy your way into it you either have to sell everything you own or get a job at the dropzone to afford it. I know a lot of enthusiastic young people who would love to skydive but as the sport has evolved they have been priced out of it. That's a shame. Wish we as a community could figure out a way to bring costs down. CDR

Chris Needles is a retired U.S. Army Colonel and served as a military assistant on the National Securtiy Council during the 1st Bush administration if memory serves me correctly. Is that good enough for you? CDR

I would like to see us have a memorial page for our fellow jumpers who have died in the sport or jump plane crashes. I was just out in Hawaii and behind the DZ at Dillingham Field is a large rock with a plaque memorializing 11 jumpers who died 5 December 1981. I was curious and did an internet search. I found only two references to the incident and found nothing that told these skydivers' story. I found it sad that their story is apparantly being forgotten. At another club DZ, I once found a dusty plaque in a box and discovered that it memorialized the club's one fatality in 40 years. No one could remember the person or the incident since it had happened 25 years ago. I have seen several such memorials at DZs, and over time, it just becomes a list of names with no one to tell the story. I would like to see something along the lines of a eulogy page, broken down by year with the jumper's name, date and location of death as a minimum, and then a way for friends to post thoughts about the person. Just a thought. CDR

The increasing reliance on packers is a part of the yuppiefication of our sport. In a sport that puts the ultimate premium on self reliance (If you don't act, you die) I don't know why some people chose to rely on others to pack other than they can't be bothered to learn about their equipment (in itself a big confidence builder) and have money to burn. There is another sport where the participants rely on others to do the hard work for them. Those helpers are called caddies. Our sport ain't golf, and we shouldn't try to make it resemble it. CDR

Go with the option that gives the least chance of different ways to die: Peas: Only one way to die - impact - and with a good PLF and deep peas you might survive. I actually saw a double mal dead center the peas and survive once. Pond: Two ways to die - 1) impact with water at high speed or if water is shallow and bottom is hard; 2) Drowning. Given you probably landed fast and not well, you probably aren't set up for a water landing. It would suck to survive the impact only to drown afterwards. Trees: Three ways to die: 1) Impact if you go all the way through to the ground; 2) impalement on a branch; 3) Decapitation or other blunt trauma from a trunk or branch hit at high speed. Had a student once panic and steer for the trees because "they looked fluffy." They aren't! CDR

The Air Force awards Astronaut wings to anyone who has made a flight above 50 miles. That is how several X-15 pilots, who were never NASA astronauts, came to be called astronauts. I guess they consider that the practical definition of space since at that altitude there is almost no trace of atmosphere and aircraft control surfaces have no aerodynamic effect. CDR

I concur with a lot of the above. Based on my 18 yrs of time in the Army I would advise: 1.) Beware the unwritten regs quouted by "experts". There are many "urban legend" regs people will swear are true, yet cannot back up in writing. Tell the alleged expert to show you where the specific prohibition against skydiving is spelled out in regs, or a local policy letter. 2) That said, in a training environment, many military schools have local policies putting restrictions on high risk activities. They are making an investment in you, and don't want the merchandise damaged. So, in your case, such a policy might exsist. If it does, I'm sure you will get formally briefed on it. 3) Once your training is through and you are in normal (if there is such a thing) day to day garrison life, however, your leadership is really on shakey ground if they try to restrict your off duty activities without cause. I know of one Brigade commander who tried to decree that no officers in his brigade were allowed to own or ride motor cycles. That one did not last too long once the IG got wind of it. Your commander cannot forbid you from skydiving anymore than he can forbid you from skiing or golfing. 4) Now, given all of the above, I have learned to not discuss skydiving too much around work. It's hard for most of us to believe when jumping is such a big part of our lives, but no one outside of skydiving takes it seriously. There are just some dinks out there who think people shouldn't be jumping out of airplanes. Also, as Colin Powell once said, "In every organization, if you ask for permission from enough people, you will eventually run into the person who thinks it is his job to tell you 'no'." Personally, I would never have even asked if the policy included skydiving. If you don't want your actions restricted, don't ask! Interestingly, when I was a young LT, I had a commander who thought my life was too wrapped up in the Army. He once said he was worried about me and wanted to know if I had any hobbies outside of work. When I told him I skydived (we had a club on the post), he responded "Well, that's a military activity." I sat there trying to keep a straight face while thinking "You have obviously never been to a dropzone!" Good luck and have fun! LTC Chris Reed D-15996

I take the counter-intuitive approach. It is my observation that number of posts often seems to be inversely proportional to number of jumps. Not a hard, fast rule, but it does seem like those that do the most posting often seem to be the least experienced jumpers. Any ideas on why that is? CDR

Ha Ha. What a small world if people are talking about "Jack's All You Need" on DZ.com! Fill your gas tank, get a bushel of crawfish, pick up some flowers for the wife, eat a Po Boy and get your oil changed all at one stop. I left Polk in 98 and helped start the parachute club there. The Fort Rucker Club had just closed and we were able to get their gear. We were jumping Huey's on Honor Field. A year or two after I left they lost their military aircraft support, and ended up trying to operate off post in concert with a commercial DZ like the 82nd and GB clubs do at Raeford. I think they were jumping in Beaumont, TX. I am not sure if the gear is still there. I would contact the Fort Polk MWR office at Aligator Lake. Check out http://fortpolkmwr.com/ I was at Polk for 2-1/2 years with JRTC and you have to resign yourself to traveling 2-4 hours for any decent entertainment, nightlife, shopping, etc. Alexandria is an hour away and it's not much. Shreveport is about 2-1/2 hrs away and its okay, not great. It used to have a DZ but it closed. My destination of choice was Houston. It was closer than New Orleans and there are several DZs in striking distance. Closest to Polk is probably Beaumont, TX if the DZ is still there. CDR

I've seen several others mention liking "Courage Under Fire." Am I the only one who noticed the major blooper that Meg Ryan is awarded the Medal of Honor for technically commiting a war crime? i.e. she uses an aircraft cleary marked with a Red Cross as a field expedient gunship for something a bit more than self defense. Just wondering. CDR

I got to agree on "Bridges of Toko-Ri." I love the final line: "Where do we get such men?" Probably natural that the more recent movies would get the most votes, but I say "the Dirty Dozen." It's one of the all time great "guy" movies. ...and it's okay to cry when Jim Brown gets killed. A few other classics not mentioned: Guns of Navarone Battleground Pork Chop Hill Sergeant York Merrill's Marauders (probably one of the least remembered but most realistic) ...and of course the one with the all time best blooper: "The Green Berets" where John Wayne walks along the beach with the little Vietnamese kid while the sun sinks slowly .... in the East CDR

His son, Major Thor Sadler, is a serving Military intelligence officer. He was S2 for 1-9 Infantry "Manchus" in Korea in 2003. CDR

...And here is an external shot. Talk about a kick in the pants exit! CDR

Traveled from KC to Phoenix and back with my rig as a carry on flying on the 27th and 1st. My wife's tote bag got more attention than my rig. CDR

Flew out of KCI to Phoenix on Saturday on America West. Zero problems! My wife's totebag got more attention than my rig. CDR

Yes, ask any chaplain in an airborne unit and he will give you a Saint Michael's medal with Saint Michael on the front side and the unit insignia on the back side. Around the engraving it says "Saint Michael, Patron of Paratroopers, Protect Us. A card I got with mine had a prayer as follows: "Angelic Michael hear my call As through the sky I now will fall. Satan you wants cast from here, Aid me now to conquer fear. My static line have hooked to hold, and then my chute to make unfold. Suspension lines untangeled be, and opened up my canopy. From other jumpers float me clear as safely down I persevere. On angels wings I hit the ground, My father's favor I have found. In thanks Saint Michael I do pray, For God has helped me, All the Way! CDR

I noticed in the recent issue of "Parachutist" that USPA is again holding the BOD and General Membership meetings at a hotel in the Northern Virginia area. I was wondering why the meetings are not held at a large boogie and what folks think about that? It seems that would certainly help boost attendance at the General Membership meeting, which has been very low in recent years. I recall looking at old issues of "Parachutist" years ago before I entered the sport in 1988 that the big event every year used to be the Nationals held in Muscogee, OK. There was a boogie in conjunction with the competition and the BOD and membership meetings were held there as part of the program. Anyone have any insight as to why that practice stopped? (beyond guesses that several hundred drunks could not get any coherent membership business done ) CDR

***1-327 Infantry, 101st Airborne Div(AASLT)*** 2-7 Infantry, 24th Infantry Division 1st Bde, 24th Infantry Division HHC, 101st Abn Div (AASLT) 2-502 Infantry, 101st Abn Div (AASLT) HHC, 1st Bde, 101st Abn Div (AASLT) HHC, 2nd Bde, 2nd Infantry Division CDR

We in the U.S. Army are soldiers, not merely killers or thugs like the dirt bags we are fighting. As a soldier, and more importantly as an officer and a leader, you are expected to exhibit a high degree of discipline and self control. Otherwise an Army becomes an undisciplined mob. Commanders are expected to remain calm, cool and collected under stress, and to maintain the moral high ground. It is not about political correctness, it is about DISCIPLINE. I have been in combat, but I wasn't there. I am sure that the published accounts do not contain all of the facts. It is clear that there is more to this story since the unit in question is being investigated due to command climate issues. Investigations of this sort are not undertaken lightly. This may merely be the most sensational of several incidents that could point to leadership problems within the unit. On the surface, it seems that the officer in question lost his cool and acted rashly. He came down off the moral high ground. No one should make excuses for him. If the initial published accounts are true, I am not sure I want him leading our soldiers. What is he going to do when life starts getting really stressful and he's facing an enemy who can fight back as opposed to an unarmed detainee? CDR

"There is no such thing as a 'perfectly' good airplane." CDR