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William Sturgiss Lind,
Director of the Center for Cultural Conservatism
at the Free Congress Foundation, is a native
of Cleveland, Ohio, born July 9, 1947. He
graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa
from Dartmouth College in 1969 and received
a Master's Degree in History from Princeton
University in 1971. He worked as a legislative
aide for armed services for Senator Robert
Taft, Jr., of Ohio from 1973 through 1976
and held a similar position with Senator Gary
Hart of Colorado from 1977 through 1986. He
joined Free Congress Foundation in 1987.
Mr.
Lind is author of the Maneuver Warfare Handbook
(Westview Press, 1985); co-author, with Gary
Hart, of America Can Win: The Case for Military
Reform (Adler & Adler, 1986); and co-author,
with William H. Marshner, of Cultural Conservatism:
Toward a New National Agenda (Free Congress
Foundation, 1987). He has written extensively
for both popular media, including The Washington
Post, The New York Times, and Harper's, and
professional military journals, including
The Marine Corps Gazette, U.S. Naval Institute
Proceedings and Military Review.
Mr. Lind
co-authored the prescient article, "The Changing
Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation,"
which was published in The Marine Corps Gazette
in October, 1989 and which first propounded
the concept of "Fourth Generation War." Mr.
Lind and his co-authors predicted that states
would increasingly face threats not from other
states, but from non-state forces whose primary
allegiance was to their religion, ethnic group
or ideology. Following the events of September
11, 2001, the article has been credited for
its foresight by The New York Times Magazine
and The Atlantic Monthly.
Mr. Lind is co-author
with Paul M. Weyrich of the monograph: "Why
Islam is a Threat to America and The West."
He is the author of "George W. Bush's `War
on Terrorism': Faulty Strategy and Bad Tactics?"
Both were published in 2002 by the Free Congress
Foundation.
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May 12, 2004
[Have an opinion on a William Lind column? Sound off in the Discussion Boards.]
In 1914, Kaiser Wilhelm II, whom history has underrated, told his
Chief of the General Staff, von Moltke the Less, that he wanted to
remain on the defensive in the West and take the offensive in the
East, against Russia. Such a reversal of the Schlieffen Plan would
probably have won the war for Germany. France would have bled to death
throwing bodies against bullets in Elsass and Lothringen, England
would have remained neutral, at least for a while, and Russia would
have gone under in a couple years. Unfortunately for Germany and for
history, von Moltke Jr. collapsed in a fit of nerves and said it couldn't
be done.
In fact, the plans for just such a campaign were in the file. They were
there because it was the job of the General Staff to make plans for every
contingency.
The disastrous course of America's war in Iraq
has created a new task for the Great General Staff, in the form
of more contingency planning. America needs to make sure it has a
plan in the file for a fighting withdrawal from Iraq.
It is still possible the end may not come this way. We may still manage
a shaky hand-off to a U.N.-designated Iraqi government, and that government
might last long enough for us to withdraw with some shreds of dignity.
George W. might awake some morning a new man, announce he was swindled,
sack the neo-cons and bring in someone like Marine
Corps General Tony Zinni, who opposed the war all along, to handle
our disengagement. The Archangel Michael might appear over Mecca and
convert all the Mohammedans to Christianity.
But the growing probability is that we will be driven out of Iraq
by a general uprising, an intifada in which every American will be
the target of every Iraqi and our boys (and, in America's Neo-Model
Army, girls) will have to fight their way out in a scene like that
which faced Gordon in the Sudan. It is not a pleasant prospect. It
means thousands, perhaps tens of thousands, of American and "coalition"
casualties, many times more Iraqi casualties, and one of history's
more memorable defeats, right up there with Syracuse, Waterloo and
Stalingrad. The after-shocks will be severe, as regimes tumble from
Pakistan through the Persian Gulf and Egypt to Britian and America
itself. You can look forward to seeing the Dow at 3000, if not 300.
Facing such a contingency, we can have only one priority: the lives of our
troops. Their chances of making it out alive will be far greater if we have
done some planning beforehand. Our great vulnerability is that our lines of
supply, communication and retreat are long, and they almost all run through
hostile territory. Most lead through southern Iraq to Kuwait, and that is
not likely to be a comfortable way out. North through the Kurds to Turkey
may be the best bet, although as Xenophon can attest, retreating with a
beaten army through Kurd country is no picnic. West lies Syria, no friend,
and Jordan, which may itself be convulsed.
One great snare and delusion lies in our path: the notion that we
can always go by air. Already the Air
Force is saying that if the southern supply lines are cut, as
they were in the first half of April, air transport can fill the gap.
Right, just as Goering promised the troops in Stalingrad. Not only
does that assume American and coalition troops can hold the airports,
is assumes they can get to the airports, which at the moment is problematic
just between Baghdad and its airport. Worse, coups in places such
as Saudi Arabia could see Islamic-flown F-15s
and F-16s
shooting down American C-5s
and C-17s.
A Second Generation military such as America's does not improvise
well under time pressure, at least at the higher levels, where vast
staffs drilled to Kadavergehorsamkeit in the sacred "staff planning
process" are slaves to procedure. The neo-cons in the Bush administration
and their toadies in the Pentagon will no doubt howl if the military
starts contingency planning for a forced withdrawal. Listen up,
guys: do it anyway. You don't have to tell them. Just make sure
the plan is in the file.
This time, the military may have to play the Kaiser when the Bush
administration falls prostrate on the couch.
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© 2004 William S. Lind. William S. Lind
is Director for the Center for Cultural Conservatism for the Free
Congress Foundation. All opinions expressed in this article are
the author's and do not necessarily reflect those of Military.com.
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