Secretary of Defense

Rockets Hit Kabul Airport as Insurgents Target Defense Secretary Mattis

Insurgents fired a barrage of rockets at the Kabul International Airport on Wednesday that they claimed was targeting the plane of US Defense Secretary James Mattis. Both the Taliban and the Islamic State (ISIS) rushed to claim responsibility for the attack.

The US then responded with an airstrike at the suspected launch sites. One of the missiles fired by the US apparently malfunctioned and hit a civilian area. There were civilian casualties, however, the extent wasn’t immediately known.

In the attack by the Taliban, one civilian Afghan woman was killed and 11 others wounded before Afghan Special Forces drove them off, killing four insurgents in the resulting battle.

Speaking on the brazen attack by the insurgents, a statement by the US military admitted the missile response and the malfunction that followed.

“Tragically, one of the missiles malfunctioned, causing several casualties,” the U.S. command said. It expressed regret for having harmed civilians but did not say whether any of the casualties were killed.
“We take every precaution to avoid civilian casualties, even as the enemies of Afghanistan continue to operate in locations that deliberately put civilians at very high risk,” it added. The statement said the original Taliban attackers had fired several rounds of “high-explosive ammunition, including mortars, in the vicinity of” the Kabul airport.
Zabihullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, claimed responsibility for the attack on his official Twitter account. The Islamic State of Syria and Iraq (ISIS) also claimed responsibility for the attack.
The U.S. statement said the insurgents also detonated suicide vests, “endangering a great number of civilians.”

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg in a press interview stated, that the “attack on the airport is a sign of weakness, not the sign of strength” and added that to “attack a civilian airport is a criminal act, it is terrorist act and it just shows the importance of fighting these kinds of organizations in Afghanistan.”

To read the entire article from CBS News click here:

Photo courtesy Wikipedia

Contractors Taking Over in Afghanistan: The Story That Refuses to Die

Opinion – The administration of President Trump, when not engaging in a 7th grade Twitter War with King Jong Un from North Korea, has invested long-term in Afghanistan. Right or wrong isn’t the topic here but the manner in which the United States decides to prosecute the war.

A couple of the President’s advisers, including his son-in-law, wanted the President to listen to Erik Prince, the former owner of Blackwater whose idea was to turn the war over to contractors. Prince’s plan was to keep a small force of American Special Operations and support troops (around 2,000) and a force of 6,000 contractors. He claims that this will allow the support of the Afghans and allow all of the conventional U.S. troops to go home.

Prince calls for the use of Special Operations veterans to live, train and operate alongside their Afghan counterparts at the company and battalion level, much like they are used now. He calls for supplemental Afghan air power, with Afghan markings to fly with Afghan pilots and only a contractor (safety officer) on board. All contractors would be subject to the Uniformed Code of Military Justice, as American troops are now.

Prince’s idea is to combine all of the US efforts under an “American Viceroy” and base the private army directly under the Viceroy’s control. He previously used the example of Douglas MacArthur in Japan. He also characterized it along the lines of the East India Company, however, as being under Afghan command and control and following Afghan rules of engagement. One can’t fault Prince with his faith in his idea and in his contractors. After all, they’ve made him millions of dollars in both Iraq and Africa and this proposal, had it come to fruition would have made him even more. But would it work? Most of the President’s advisors wisely thought no.

The faction of the Trump White House behind this plan got Prince an audience with Secretary of Defense Mattis where he pitched his idea. Reports said, Mattis listened politely and then ended the meeting without asking any questions. That pretty much sums up how they felt about his plan.

The turning over the war or outsourcing to private contractors is fraught with several problems. The first is how can the US influence the conduct of the war when the Viceroy doesn’t answer to the Congress or the Pentagon but only to the President himself? And to a lesser degree, is the company beholden to the United States? What if problems arise (as they are bound to do), and a third-party government offers to “take over” the contract. As far-fetched as this sounds it could conceivably happen and then what?

Second, the Afghans have stated clearly that they do not want a “Viceroy” by this or any other name on their turf. And if they’re clearly not going to support this idea, then it would be ultimately doomed to failure.

Certain parts of his plan have merit, although they merely echo what US Special Operations forces have been trying to do there for several years. The deep embed of the local contractor/troops with the local military/security forces and the ability to create long-term expertise in the operational area. These are things that our SOF try to do but are limited by tour lengths in-country.

Another problem is that by basing the contractors with local security forces and using local private language and support patrons will give the rise to local warlords, not decrease their existence. The private contractor actually degrades the integration between military and political goals, which is a must in a counterinsurgency. This was a problem that the East India Company ran into in India. And despite their private army fielded in India, the country was only pacified due to massive influxes of regular British military troops.

A further issue is over liability. Prince claims that the contractors will fall under the UCMJ. Of whose military? The US or Afghanistan? Contractors must be liable for their actions, no different than US troops are now. And the Afghans would have to agree to whatever policy is put into effect. And if Prince were to hire contractors from a myriad of countries, who is the authority that the company employees must answer to?

Prince’s Blackwater troops were involved in one of the worst diplomatic disasters for the US in Iraq when they killed 17 civilians and wounded about 20 more in Baghdad. Several of the contractors were tried and convicted of manslaughter. A fourth was convicted of murder. An appeals court threw out the sentences and rest assured, the Afghans are watching the developments of that closely.

And as a footnote to whom Prince plans to hire, he claimed that only ex-Special Operations veterans would be hired. However, none of the four contractors that were convicted as Blackwater operatives were Special Operations veterans. And most only served an initial tour of duty in the military. So, who is going to vet these contractors? The vetting would have to be done to find the right people and Prince’s prior job of doing that fell far short.

And by using MacArthur and the East India Company has its own questions. The history books I grew up with said the MacArthur was fired by President Truman for abusing those viceroy powers. And here in Boston, the East India Company isn’t fondly remembered. The company with its monopoly on tea being brought into Britain tried to gouge the colonists in America by putting a large tax on the tea being brought to the Colonies and deigned to sell a shipload of tea that had already begun to mildew and go bad to the people of Boston. The result was the Boston Tea Party, which lit a powder keg that began the American Revolution.

Thankfully the President’s other advisers have convinced him that Prince’s way wasn’t the way to go and in the long run, the cost, which would’ve been less under Prince’s plan would have been too steep for the US to absorb.

But something tells me that we still haven’t seen the last of this proposal. War is always an opportunity for some people to make large sums of money and this one has had people coming out of the woodwork. One security contractor, New Century Consulting racked up costs that included the luxury vehicles, $42,000 for automatic weapons and salaries of $420,000 to the significant others of the company CEO and CFO as executive assistants. Why did contractors in Afghanistan require Bentleys, Porsches, Alfa Romeos and an Aston Martin (perhaps 007?) to fulfill their contract?

Photo Courtesy: Wikipedia

Mattis: Get Rid of Senseless Exercises, Get Back to Warfighting

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis wants the military to get back to the art of fighting wars and do realistic training and stop wasting time on what he termed “senseless exercises.” Mattis came to this conclusion after hearing complaints of thousands of service members.

Many service members said that too much of their time is spent covering mandatory training that has nothing to do with their warfighting capabilities.

The training that is the subject of complaints covers everything from alcohol use to active shooters to sexual harassment to stress management.
Addressing the service secretaries and chiefs of the Armed Forces, Mattis has ordered the formation of a new working group to “determine changes to military personnel policies” to “equip more ready and lethal forces.” The working group will include the second in command of each branch of the U.S. military and report to the deputy secretary of defense and vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
The secretary wants each service to examine its military education to “regain a concentration on the art and science of warfighting” and look into the hours of “mandatory force training that does not directly support core tasks” such as flying jets, jumping out of planes, and hundreds of other U.S. military missions essential to defending the United States and its allies.
One official with knowledge of the discussions surrounding the memo told Fox News, “servicemembers spending too much time on senseless training that is really a waste of time.” One U.S. military officer said there is “too much sexual harassment training” and not enough time spent at places like the shooting range, for example.
Last year, Fox News traveled to Ellsworth Air Force Base where numerous B-1B bomber pilots said that in addition to planning and flying training missions that can take over 12 hours at a time, they spend “countless hours” on mandatory training they view as unnecessary.
Currently, only about half the Air Force’s fleet of long-range B-1B bombers are fully mission capable.
Mattis also wants the working group to look into “hiring practices for the [DoD] civilian workforce,” which some senior military officers have complained has become too large in recent years despite Obama-era cuts involving tens of thousands of uniformed servicemembers.
“There are more civilians working for the Pentagon than there are uniformed troops in the Navy and Air Force combined,” Katherine McIntire Peters, deputy editor of Government Executive Media Group, wrote in a recent op-ed. Peters put the Defense Department’s civilian work force at 770,000.

Mattis also wants to overhaul and improve the counter-intelligence capability of the military as well. He has given a deadline for recommendations no later than December 1.

To read the entire article from Fox News click here:

Photo courtesy DOD

US May Increase Troop Levels in Yemen But Not Special Operations

In a surprising move, the Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis has asked the White House to reverse the Obama Administration policy on restrictions on U.S. military support for Persian Gulf states engaged in a prolonged war against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels in Yemen.

Mattis sent a memo to National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster and spelled out that the “limited support” for a combined Saudi Arabian, United Arab Emirates offensive geared at retaking a key Red Sea port will help defeat “a common threat”. But Mattis does not foresee adding more Special Operations Forces to the mix.

The administration is in the midst of a larger review of overall Yemen policy that is not expected to be completed until next month.
But the immediate question, addressed by Mattis’ memo and tentatively slated to come before the principal’s committee of senior national security aides this week, is whether to provide support for a proposed UAE-led operation to push the Houthis from the port of Hodeida, through which humanitarian aid and rebel supplies pass.
The Pentagon memo does not recommend agreeing to every element of the Emirati request. A proposal to provide American Special Operations forces on the ground on the Red Sea coast “was not part of the request [Mattis] is making,” said a senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss planning and the review.

Yemen’s population centers have been hit hard during the conflict with an estimated 10,000 civilians killed in the fighting. Worse, the surviving population is close to starvation.

Yves Daccord, Director General of the International Committee of the Red Cross, warned that an extended battle for the port city would “put even more pressure on the population” and could tip the country into greater humanitarian crisis.

The Saudis and other have been withholding aid for the area around Hodeida which has further made a bad situation worse. The Gulf States were critical of the Obama Administration’s reluctance to aid in the Yemen conflict seeing it as a weakness toward Iran. Now President Trump, who was critical of the Obama policy may change it.

To read the entire article from The Chicago Tribune, click here:

Photo courtesy DOD