I Guess If General Dempsey Says So...

Posted By Deebow

I didn't retire to insult General Officers, it seems to be a perk of the status though, and this is the dumbest thing I have EVER heard any General say:

Earlier this year, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey said the sexual assaults might be linked to the longstanding ban on women serving in combat because the disparity between the roles of men and women creates separate classes of personnel — male "warriors" versus the rest of the force.

So you think they will be sexually assaulted LESS OFTEN if we train them to be Army Rangers and Navy SEALS and forward deploy them?  FFS!  Is there no one in on his staff that has the sense or courage to tell him what an asinine thing to say that is?  Or even have the courage to tell the nation and the Administration what an asinine idea this is.

Women may be able to start training as Army Rangers by mid-2015 and as Navy SEALs a year later under plans set to be announced by the Pentagon that would slowly bring women into thousands of combat jobs, including those in elite special operations forces

If you are new to this argument, you can review what some of us think here and here, here and I spoke about it here. 

I am going to try to keep this as PG as possible, but this is what we are talking about.

Continue reading "I Guess If General Dempsey Says So..."

Defense Budget - Feathering fighter bird nests?

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

The defense budget for 2014 is starting to take shape and we are going to be taking a good look at some of the items in it. Money is obviously tight, so we need to make certain that it is spent wisely and for the right reasons. All too often politics, lobbying and factors that have nothing to do with national security push programs and spending. In an era of austerity we simply can’t afford this.

The Chairman’s mark of the Defense Authorization Act is out and there are many good things in there. Rep. Buck McKeon is a solid advocate for a strong defense and this is his chance to comment on priorities and goals for defense funding. Most of the relatively short document relates to policy and has some requirements for explanations of debacles like Benghazi. But there are also some funding items that don’t make much sense.

One of these is a requirement to buy F-18 aircraft, which is a bit of a head scratcher. We cancelled the F-22 program before we bought anywhere near as many true air superiority fighters as we should have. We have cut back severely the number of F-35s that we plan to buy, but somehow we can find the money to buy a completely different and significantly less capable bird. That smells distressingly like some corporate welfare for Boeing, who makes the F-18.

I am unaware of any purely tactical or strategic military argument for splitting the funding for our fighter aircraft. There was a time back in the day where we had the F-14, 15 & 16 birds with different mission profiles and we let Northrop, Boeing and Lockheed duke it out to see how many of each we were going to buy. But we came to the logical conclusion that too often led to a contest between retired generals to feather their own company’s nest.

Now we have gone to an up front competitive model, where the mission profiles required are determined and then the contractors compete to see who can build the best bird. You can question whether this limits the strength of our defense industrial base with a winner takes almost all approach, but it makes more sense than trying to build, field and support multiple platforms that all require separate design, manufacture and support infrastructures.

We had a competition for the Joint Strike Fighter and Boeing lost. I am sure that was a very sad day in Washington state, but that is the way the game is played. The question then is why we are buying another of their older and nowhere near as survivable aircraft, the F-18. Fielding two birds with essentially the same mission means we have to train two sets of maintenance folks, build two separate supply chains and take resources away from the aircraft we are counting on to keep us in control of the skies. Maybe Sen. Durbin can shed some light on that.

The Senate Appropriations Defense subcommittee is bringing in two service chiefs and the Pentagon’s top weapons buyer to testify on the F-35 program next week.
The panel, chaired by Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), announced the hearing on Friday.

Running a defense company is complicated and damned hard, but that doesn’t mean tax payers should be on the hook for keeping it afloat. Boeing has tens of billions of dollars in contracts and paid less than zero dollars in taxes. They actually got a $124M refund in 2010. Seriously?

 If someone can articulate an actual case for why we need these birds, I will listen. But corporate welfare for a company that seems to be able to avoid paying any taxes doesn’t seem like one to me. The Russians are sending some pretty advanced surface to air missiles to Syria and have basically told us a no fly zone is a no go for them. We can’t assume that we will have unopposed air superiority anywhere we decide to fly. That means we need to be spending our money on the most effective aircraft to achieve that mission.

Juno, and the Juno Beach Centre

Posted By Laughing_Wolf

The Juno Beach Centre

Today we arrive at Courseulles-sur-Mer and Juno Beach, and what I regard as the single best museum on all the beaches -- the Juno Beach Centre. 

 

A tank with a difference

 

Arriving under a grey sky (if you don't like the weather in Normandy, wait an hour), a tank caught my eye.  Now, there are lots of tanks on display up and down the beaches, but this one is different. 

 

Land or sea drive

 

This was one of the few surviving amphibious tanks from the landing.  The idea was to add in a propeller propulsion system, an inflatable skirt, and have the tanks sail in to the landing on their own.  Once they hit sand, the propellers could be disengaged, and the skirts cast off as they moved forward.  It was a great idea -- on paper.  In practice, the sad truth is that many (if not most) sank on the way in. 

Continue reading "Juno, and the Juno Beach Centre"

Russia resets on Syria

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

Our dear friends the Russians are pushing the reset button on plans to help out the rebels in Syria. I guess someone missed the fact that they happen to be very good friends w/ Mr. Assad.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia, a veto-wielding member of the U.N. Security Council, will not permit no-fly zones to be imposed over Syria, Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said on Monday.

"I think we fundamentally will not allow this scenario," Lukashevich told a news briefing, adding that calls for a no-fly zone showed disrespect for international law.

I wonder how they will feel when we are arming the folks fighting their allies? My guess is they will not be tickled.

Continuing Along Sword Beach

Posted By Laughing_Wolf

A restored Churchill on display

As you travel along the D-Day beaches, particularly along Sword, there really are monuments and memorials every few hundred meters, if not closer.  Part of this has to do with the large number of small towns and villages that line what is now Sword Beach, and part to do with the intense fighting that took place that day. 

 

Military and civilian casualties

 

The fighting took a toll on troops, buildings, and civilians in the area.  Many of these memorials list all those killed in battle, which is a good thing in my book.  Note the bunker just behind and to the right. 

Continue reading "Continuing Along Sword Beach"

Father's Day- Vietnam version

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

Posted this last year and it seems appropriate again. Thanks for all of it Dad.

A couple of pics of my Dad from his days in uniform.

Vietnam 1st tour w/ the Big Red One

And 2nd tour w/ 11th ACR

Happy Father's Day and thanks for everything.

Happy 238th U.S. Army

Posted By Laughing_Wolf

At the American Cemetery, 6 June 2013

Today marks the 238th birthday of the U.S. Army.  It is also Flag Day, and I would ask you to proudly fly our flag this day, to honor both occasions.  For many, they will celebrate by wearing the green they stood up and volunteered for.  To all who serve and have served wearing the green, my thanks.

LW

Next, Central America

Posted By Laughing_Wolf

Even as I work on the video and some 2,500 photos from Normandy, I'm also preparing for a short embed to Central America.  A very kind gentleman has gotten me my ticket down, is there anyone with some American Airlines miles who would be willing to get me a ticket back?  Meantime, funds are needed to cover expenses.  If you can help, please hit my GoFundMe page. Thanks!

LW

Along Sword And Gold Beaches

Posted By Laughing_Wolf

 

Memorial to Royal, Merchant, and Allied Navies

 

At times it seemed you could not walk or drive 100 meters without coming across a monumnet of some sort.  In some stretches, walking was the only way you didn't miss any.  They are well worth seeking out, because each can unlock stories not well known. 

Some really don't need much in the way of translation, or explanation.  Walking down the beach one evening, a memorial caught my eye. 

 

5th Battalion Remembered

 

I realized that there was a larger group there, and went to explore. 

The entire group can be seen below

This was where a major push had come ashore, and the monuments tell the tale.  Being that this was in the Sword/Gold area, it is no surprise that there were several memorials to British units.

And the centerpiece is fairly plain

But one part told a bit more, a different tale, and a bit of history that I would venture is not well known to many Americans. 

An anchor lost, now found

 

I don't think many Americans understand just how large D-Day truly was, and how many nations took part.  It wasn't just the Americans and British, Canadian and Free French.  It was troops from Poland, Greece, and even Norway.  The fight for the beaches took place not only on land, but at sea as well.  The bombers may not have come, nor was there a major fleet action, but those at sea fought too and control of the sea area was not guaranteed. 

 

A tribute to the sailors and ships of Norway

 

The Germans sent in torpedo boats, their equivalent of PT boats, and they did much more damage than most know.  One bit of that damage was the Norwegian destroyer Svenner.  It was sunk by torpedo attack that day. The anchor was found and recovered in 2003.

Just a bit of history to be found walking down the beach in Normandy 

LW

This trip and other embeds sponsored by MilitaryLuggage.Com and B.N. Shape Clothing.  Normandy coverage also made possible by Enterprise Rent A Car Caen Railway Office.   My thanks to them and to everyone who has contributed to make this and other trips possible. 

A variety of advertising sponsorships are available, and you can contribute to this trip and other embeds at GoFundMe. 

Obama plays wag the dog w/ Syria

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

Un-Freakin'-Believable.

The Obama administration has concluded that Syrian President Bashar Assad's government used chemical weapons against the rebels seeking to overthrow him and, in a major policy shift, President Obama has decided to supply military support to the rebels, the White House announced Thursday.

Scandalabra has been kicking his regime's butt and dragging him down, but hey nothing a good war can't cure. I mean Syria-ously what has changed since this was well known months and months ago. If there was ever a time to support the rebels, it was a year and about 100,000 dead Syrians ago. Now the Islamists have firm control of the rebel groups and so we are trading a bad guy for equally bad guys.

Just out of curiousity, what do we get out of a proxy war with Putin's client state? That is quite a reset.

Doing HuffPost Live now

Posted By Uncle Jimbo Doing HuffPost Live about defense contractors spying on us for pay at 6:35 http://live.huffingtonpost.com/r/segment/defense-department-contractors/51b5eaebfe34441e8c000436

What To Do With A Few Thousand Used Bunkers?

Posted By Laughing_Wolf

Okay, the Germans built a few thousand bunkers as part of the Atlantic Wall.  Some were log and sandbag; some were reinforced concrete; some were rock and brick; and, a few others made good use of available resources.  However, they lost and the French were left with thousands that were built such that taking them out could/would take out whole neighborhoods.  So, what to do? 

 

Secure Apartment

 

In this case, someone built a home/apartments into the bunker.  A storm might flood them, but otherwise it is unlikely to take out the core.  Just one of the imaginative uses to which I saw used bunkers put. 

There is more to come, but I apparently shot some 2,500 photos that now need to be processed.  I also shot video, and in addition to needing to upgrade software ($$) I need to learn new software to process it since a computer upgrade took out the easy options (no longer supported, of course).  So, there is more to come, and I will be flooding here and over at LaughingWolf.net in the days ahead.  In fact, if you would like to see some photos of Montmartre, Paris in the early morning, click here.  Also, a tribute to a good man who left us about the time I returned, go here. 

I can't wait to share more of Normandy with you, and hope you will enjoy it.

LW

This trip and other embeds sponsored by MilitaryLuggage.Com and B.N. Shape Clothing.  Normandy coverage also made possible by Enterprise Rent A Car Caen Railway Office.   My thanks to them and to everyone who has contributed to make this and other trips possible. 

A variety of advertising sponsorships are available, and you can contribute to this trip and other embeds at GoFundMe. 

The IRS has a SWAT team?

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

Sadly yes.

 Rep. Jeff Duncan wants to know why IRS law enforcement agents are training  with AR-15 rifles.

As chairman of the House Homeland Security oversight subcommittee, Duncan  (R-S.C.) toured a federal law enforcement facility in late May and noticed  agents training with the semi-automatic weapons at a firing range. They  identified themselves as IRS, he said.

“When I left there, it’s been bugging me for weeks now, why IRS agents are  training with a semi-automatic rifle AR-15, which has stand-off capability,”  Duncan told POLITICO. “Are Americans that much of a target that you need that  kind of capability?”

I have known about this for many years. One of the low lights of my career came when I gave some door-kicking training to one of the IRS SWAT teams. They had all the gear and none of the skills necessary. This is another symptom of the militarization of law enforcement in this country, and even worse the empowerment of bureaucracy with the ultimate tools of the state. Comply or we will kill you.

I can say that I didn't do anywhere near as good a job training the IRS folks as I could have. Mainly it involved trying to get them to stop forming the semi-circle of death and shooting each other. Plus stopping all of them from yelling conflicting instructions at the same time to the people they were trying to arrest. I also audited their gear and levied a tax on several items I had a better use for than they did. Fair is fair.

First verified lie from Ed Snowden

Posted By Uncle Jimbo

NSA leaker Ed Snowden claimed to have broken both of his legs while training for Special Forces.

In 2003, he enlisted in the US army and began a training program to join the Special Forces. Invoking the same principles that he now cites to justify his leaks, he said: "I wanted to fight in the Iraq war because I felt like I had an obligation as a human being to help free people from oppression".

 That is simply not true as the statement from the Special Warfare Center & School below clearly points out.

Snowden was never a student at SWCS. He broke his legs while at Fort Benning. His intent was to enter the X-ray program – but that never happened and would not have  happened because he only had a GED. Hope this helps.

 Janice Burton

Deputy

Office of Strategic Communications

The 18 X-ray program is a way to go directly from the street to the Special Forces course. You first would attend basic and advanced individual training and then airborne school. Upon successful conclusion of those you head to Bragg for some prep training and the Special Forces Assessment and Selection course. If you pass all of those, then and only then do you start Special Forces training.

Mr. Snowden wasn't even eligible for this program as he didn't even graduate from High School. So the claim that he broke his legs in Special Forces training is BS and that makes him a poseur. Well actually not even a poseur, he claimed to be training to be SF, so that makes him a poseur wannabe, or a wannabe poseur. I'm not real sure how the semantics of that work out. But either way, not really a great way to build credibility. He also made this claim that never rang true when I first read it.

 He recounted how his beliefs about the war's purpose were quickly dispelled. "Most of the people training us seemed pumped up about killing Arabs, not helping anyone," he said.

Right, so the people who weren't training you for Special Forces also happened to be knuckle-dragging troglodytes who were simply looking for a chance to go smoke some A-Rabs. Well I'm not buying it Eddie. I ran into plenty of your types in the military, disaffected losers who never actually finish anything but always have a bucket-load of excuses and who were always whining about how the system sucks. They were never responsible for their own failures, it was always oppression by the man. They were just too smart for the fools running things to recognize their brilliance. Sound familiar? They were also all varying flavors of bats**t as well. Check out Ed's spymaster tradecraft.

WASHINGTON — The source had instructed his media contacts to come to Hong Kong, visit a particular out-of-the-way corner of a certain hotel, and ask — loudly — for directions to another part of the hotel. If all seemed well, the source would walk past holding a Rubik’s Cube.

A Rubik's Cube, now there is a really good way to remain nondescript. Or this bit of counter-surveillance wizardry.

He is deeply worried about being spied on. He lines the door of his hotel room with pillows to prevent eavesdropping. He puts a large red hood over his head and laptop when entering his passwords to prevent any hidden cameras from detecting them.

A red hood? Even the writer who is taking in all of this BS and peddling it to the public is making fun of you dude. Why do I get the feeling Ed also had a ninja outfit and throwing stars?

Whether or not Ed has any information that the government was doing illegal or even improper things is a completely separate discussion. The fact that Ed is a BS-peddling wannabe poseur is now established and ought to be taken into account when judging his words and actions.

UPDATE: Jonn Lilyea at This Aint Hell is also looking at the other things about Snowden that seem to have an air of barnyard ordure about them and had a pretty good idea the PNG wasn't in the Q course earlier this week.

Silent Warriors vs. the Warrior Princess

Posted By Froggy

This is the absurd culmination of an extravaganza of ridiculousness that the NSW community may never recover from.  When I started blogging in 2004 as a SEAL, it was not to tell you about the things SEALs were doing and how cool we are.  It was to show you how we thought about or approached certain issues from politics to policy.  And when it became my turn to go down range, I shut it down, because you didn’t need to know, and you still don’t. 

Here’s another thing you don’t need to know: Why Chris Beck wants to live the rest of his life as a woman.  I know Chris, and I will never question his qualifications as a frogman and an operator.  From all of my experiences with him, he was a solid guy and I had no complaints.  He may feel now that suppressing his inner desires about who he was constituted a major sacrifice for him.  And I’m sure it did.  But so fucking what?  We ALL sacrificed something to the Teams, to the Navy, to the Nation. 

Chris, you are not special brother.  Not any more than any of us.  When you joined the military, you joined a culture.  If that culture made you feel as if you couldn’t be who you really wanted to be, well, that’s the fucking idea.  Once you are in the service, you are there to SERVE the country and not yourself.  We all had to set aside things that we wanted to do or to be if we wanted to remain in the service.  But nobody was forcing you to remain.  Instead of cramming it down for twenty years, you could have got out.  Instead of building up 20 years worth of pity party that you just shat onto your Teammates, you could have been the woman you always wanted to be.  But you chose to stay with us, and we were glad you did.  Until now.  

If you are happy being who you are right now, then Chris, I’m happy for you.  But you need to come to grips with one simple fact.  Nobody on this planet would give a damn about your journey of personal discovery if it weren’t for the Teams.  And the only reason you are getting the attention that you are is because of the Teams, not because of who you are.  You are not special, not any more than any of us.  The Teams are what people are paying attention to, not you.  

In all honesty, we did this to ourselves as a community.  From Dick Couch to Brandon Webb to Matt Bissonette to Chris Kyle and many others we were sold out bit by bit at first.  But once the bin Laden hit went down and Act of Valor hit the theatres it was all over.  As a community, we must have enjoyed the attention more than we hated the spotlight.  And so we failed to police our own.  In the manic absurdity of it all, we got Warrior Princess, which is media catnip and a slap in every one of our faces.  Maybe this is our wake up call.  Maybe it doesn’t matter anymore.

You knew you were denigrating us all, but you just became too important to yourself.  You forgot that we all sacrificed too.  Or maybe your never realized it being lost in your own self absorption.

Please remember this.  Without all of us, there is no you, Chris.