Benjamin C.
Works, a lightly-decorated, enlisted Vietnam
Veteran, served as CBS Radio Network's principal
military analyst during `Desert Storm' from
16 Jan - 6 March 1991, during the `Restore
Hope' landings in Mogadishu of December 1992,
and during the January 1993 No-Fly Zone Crisis
in Iraq. Since early 1991, he has also been
a featured analyst for CBS Radio stations,
commenting in over 4,000 radio appearances
of from 3-50 minutes, covering military and
diplomatic affairs. He also appeared many
times as a guest analyst and contributor to
the CBS TV Network News program CBS-Up to
the Minute from 1991-95.
Mr. Works publishes an Internet Newsletter,
"Strategic Issues Today" and news service
through the The
Strategic Issues Research Institute (SIRIUS),
founded by Mr. Works and his associates in
1990. SIRIUS is a small, independent `Think
Tank,' located in Arlington, VA and dedicated
to the better understanding of Foreign and
Military Affairs in the interests of the American
citizen, taxpayer and small investor. He has
authored an article for and co-edited with
Henry F. Carey, PhD, an anthology of political
science essays, National Reconciliation in
Eastern Europe, published by Columbia University
in May 2003 and has published opinion columns
in the Washington Times and Wall Street Journal.
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You will be damned if you do. -And you will be damned if you don't.
- Lorenzo Dow (1777-1834); Reflections of the Love of God
In war, as in all political undertakings, you face the Calvinist Dilemma and will get "damned if you do and damned if you don't." In wartime in particular though, when you "do," you are more damned by political rivals and human rights activists, and your campaign tends to turn out well. But it's those things that you "don't" that will cause reversals, casualties and even defeats. In Iraq, we mounted a brilliant campaign with enough heavy and light forces to "do" the job of toppling Saddam right, but did not retain enough Iraqis in uniform, in order to restore security and clean up the rubble, at war's end. One thing you need after the war is what my drill sergeants called "all asses and elbows" with shovels, wheelbarrows and also on guard duty, to get things going again.
Let us look at the twin insurrections in the Sunni Triangle north and west of Baghdad, and the companion insurrection mounted, as a putsch, by the narcissistic junior Shia cleric Muktada al-Sadr.
First, why now? Well, the US was rotating troops around Falluja and the Marines were taking over the territory from the 82nd Airborne. And it was the first anniversary of the fall of Baghdad. And the Marines were coming in with not quite enough fire power which consists of armor, not light infantry.
In the south, the would-be charismatist, al-Sadr, calculated that while our forces were distracted with the Sunni rising, he could pull off a Muslim version of Hitler's "Beer Hall Putsch" and rouse the masses. And his al-Mahdi militia did achieve success in the opening hours by targeting Shiite towns in the zones of our less experienced allies - Ukranians, Poles and the Spanish.
But in Sadr City, a sprawling Shiite suburban borough of Baghdad with two million souls thought to be the seat of Muktada's power, they challenged the US directly and failed spectacularly. A single brigade of the 1st Armored Division, using its Abrams tanks and Bradley armored infantry carriers smashed the uprising before nightfall, the first day and the police never abandoned their stations in the face of the mobs and militiamen. And let us specify that there are almost seven times as many people in Sadr City as are in Falluja.
In contrast, the Marines have very few Abrams tanks and no Bradleys. They have some light armor but those vehicles are highly vulnerable to Iraqi rocket propelled grenades (RPGs). Now the Marine light infantry is turning in a fairly spectacular performance against the Sunni insurrectionists in the eleven days of fighting around Falluja and Ramadi, but if they had an armored task force at their disposal, they, too, could have broken the back of the insurrection on Day 1.
The key in both insurrections is that the rebels know the coalition forces are slow to react when police stations come under attack. Our forces as much fear ambushes laid for relief forces as anything. But to Iraqi cops, this slow reaction gives them every reason to be less than aggressive in fulfilling their duties when a crisis is on -and a Fallujah police station had been attacked a few weeks ago, leaving about 25 cops dead before US forces reacted.
A Paradox:
It is a paradox of war that if you put on a heavy show of force, you will only have to use that force swiftly and with less collateral damage, as the 1st Armored's brigade demonstrated in Sadr City. But if you use light forces to try to put on a show of force, the enemy will perceive your vulnerability and force you into using a heavy application of violent force to achieve your aim, where your battlefield advantage in weapons and vehicles is marginal, as at Falluja.
In the Vietnam era, we used to sneer at actors and soldiers when they were "John Wayne-ing it" and taking risks for the wrong reasons. Light Infantry, such as our Airborne Infantry tend to fantasize about the John Wayne model of infantry combat. But it is the "Heavies" who can crush an insurrection before it achieves critical mass, while dismounted infantry in the open, immediately has to go on a defensive posture, when it comes up against determined resistance.
So the Heavies turned al-Sadr's ill-conceived putsch into a mere Nine Days' Wonder, while the Marines still have a serious fight on their hands. As late as today, though, Sadr's militia, around Kufa, were still trying to mix it up with coalition forces.
I have a print entitled "A Friendly Power in Egypt" showing a red-coated British Army band marching through the soukh of Cairo, putting on a show, about 1895 or so. The finesse of armed power is to put on an appropriate show of force, in order to avoid having to apply that force. Power is as much about finesse as it is about blunt force.
Hearts and Minds:
Jim Bartlett, in a recent note to an internet circle ("Milinet") reports from Baghdad, that there is a material disconnect between our ground operations, our public relations/psychological operations efforts on the military side and what the Coalition Provisional Authority is attempting as it seeks to establish an interim government on June 30. He suggests we need a more cohesive program at all levels. A source inside the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) confirms that view.
One way of working the "hearts and minds" problem is to work closely with the tribal chieftains and others in the social hierarchy. Another facet of Iraqi urban life is that each block has an official representative, a Muqtar, who acts something like a ward boss, mayor and concierge rolled into one. For instance, when the police are tracking a suspect the muqtar is obliged to lead them to the suspect, but then turns around and acts as the suspect's official witness to assure that he is not mistreated in the arrest process. The muqtars of Falluja would know exactly where foreign jihadists are hiding in their neighborhoods. Town by town, our people are learning more about how to put these mechanisms more effectively.
But ultimately to keep the hearts and minds of the Iraqis on our side, we need to be very careful and swift in our application of force against the insurrections while communicating more clearly about building a better future. In the longer term, one way to take a lot of fuel away from the fire of insurrection is to rapidly establish and roll out a system of community colleges, based on our model. Community colleges here routinely train the labor force in skills that can be applied in the market in as little as 13 weeks. Then, while already working, the student can continue through a two-year degree or move on to a four year university. One such college has been established in Hungary - a roaring success - with others opening soon. American community colleges are lining up to partner with foreign schools in order to rapidly develop skilled labor forces in other countries. Obviously, the Internet allows the course curricula to proliferate in very short order. As Iraq only has 95,000 seats for a population of 25 million and where half that population is under 25, putting community colleges to work in all the major towns would rapidly reduce the potential recruiting pool for terrorists.
Falluja
Now, the Marines aren't "John Waynes," but they have to adapt to their lack of heavy forces and accommodate that handicap. They have one of the most capable commanders in Major General Mattis, who understands about winning hearts and minds and working with tribal and community leaders. At the same time, one wonders about the 82nd Airborne brigade that was in Falluja until the Marines arrived, just as four contractors were ambushed and butchered some two weeks ago, precipitating this showdown. In April, 2003, the city was initially occupied by a brigade from the 101st Airborne, which got in trouble with the city when it occupied a school that families wanted re-opened for their children. That led to the first civilian deaths.
Ultimately the situation was calmed after an armored force from our 3rd Division took over from the 101st and negotiated an end to the impasse while putting on a show of what the Heavies can do. But when they returned to the US late last year, they were replaced by a brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division, who reverted to John Wayne-like behavior and stirred the town up again, setting the stage for the slaughter of the four contractors and the arrival of the Marines.
Do our light forces understand that the successful application of martial power involves more than mannered swagger? Some units do - I've met real leaders from the 101st and 82nd - but some apparently do not.
The British have a legacy from the days of Empire, where they can demonstrate that by perfecting the image of martial power, they have to apply less violent physical power, and Americans can profit from this perception. We do not need to raze Falluja to its foundations and salt its earth in a Roman-like devastation of Carthage, we need to understand how to "walk the walk" of reassuring, present power on the ground. And, perhaps, we need a more perceptive class of pundits on our cable news channels. Too many teeth-gnashing tough guys advocate overreactions, while our force commanders, who better know the facts on the ground and the community leaders' attitudes, are trying to apply a bit of finesse. Sir Charles Gwynn's 1934 classic "Imperial Policing," (Macmillan) is a useful textbook for how the military can restore order in constabulary situations and is one of several books that can help hone our skills in finesse.
Enough US Troops?
The twin crises in Iraq are both worse than optimists would let us believe, and better than the pessimists assert. But because of the importance of returning Iraq to a resemblance of self-rule and "democracy" on June 30th, the Army has been forced to require some 20,000 US troops from the 1st Armored Division (Heavies), the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment (Lights) and support troops in Kuwait (mostly National Guard) to serve 15 months, rather than the promised 12-months in country. The soldiers will grumble, as they always do - and we soldiers are very creative at grumbling-but they'll perform their duties well, and when they get home, will get back to normal life again.
This raises the question of whether the Army and Marines have enough troops in uniform, or should we enlist more? The real answer in April 2003 was "we need more Iraqi troops" and the real answer in April 2005 will be, "though we need more Iraqi troops, for now, yes we need those extra troops to remain into July because there are no Iraqi troops and there is a crisis;" while we see whether further reinforcements are needed for the next year and prepare those units.
In the long term, we have too few infantry (Heavy and Light) and too much Artillery and certain other combat and support troops. These imbalances are the result of maintaining a Cold War armed force posture for 15 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Why?
As with all bureaucracies, the Armed Forces fear change: "Better the Devil you know..." Yet, the real issue is, are the troops we do have in the right jobs? The answer to that is too many are not in the right slots and if we re-work those allocations, we will be much more efficient. The Army Chief of Staff has directed that 33 surplus artillery battalions, each with about 500 troops, be converted into infantry and military police companies, and additional Civil affairs teams as an initial stopgap measure.
Another early step to increase our combat strength would be to restore a fourth platoon in every company and a fourth company in every battalion. This would raise Army strengths from about 500 men per battalion to 700 and raise Marine battalion strengths to about 900-1000 from 750.
The real trick is to move to a balanced force where our basic units of deployment are put on a three year cycle of training-deployment-recovery from deployment so that we can sustain ourselves for the time needed to protect our investments in Afghanistan, Iraq and any future adventures in nation building. The Navy, Marines and Air Force run on this cycle of readiness and the Army needs to adopt it, as well.
Late in 2003 Colonel Douglas A Macgregor published a useful book mapping out a logical way to modernize our Army, "Transformation Under Fire" (Praeger: 2003). His good advice will probably never be entirely adopted, but he has helped propel our consideration of expeditionary warfare in this new era of low-intensity conflicts in struggling Third World countries.
* * *
In the final essence, we are in a less secure situation in Iraq because of what we have not done or provided for, as much as for what we did in toppling Saddam's regime. Our leaders are learning as they go and doing their best to learn how to transform a society while under fire, but even after a year, we still do not know how to mount a consistent public relations/psychological operations message.
