About those 17 Intelligence Agencies.

On Saturday, NY Congressman Hakeem Jeffries gave the Democratic response to President Trump's weekly address.  While doing so he rolled out and repeated a tired old trope from the Hillary Campaign.  "Seventeen (17) Independent agencies determined that the Russians hacked the DNC Email Server," which led directly to the myth the "Russia Hacked the election.

Frankly, I've had it with the multiple lies that are rolled up in that statement.  There are not 17 Independent Intelligence Agencies, there were not 17 Intelligence agencies working on the question and there was not a real consensus of that many agencies.

So how did we get the constantly repeated line the '17 Independent blah blah blah...?'

The facts:

There are seventeen member of the US Intelligence Community (IC) led by (#1) The Office of The Director of National Intelligence, which coordinates the often overlapping and occasionally conflicting work of the entire community, without command, oversight, or budget authority over anyone but their own staff.  They do however chair the meetings that lead to to findings and "consensuses"

The other sixteen naturally include the most well known of the them the CIA (#2) which almost certainly had a hand in collecting and analyzing the raw intel that produced the "finding."  Also the National Security Agency (NSA) (#3) which is the largest, and sometimes the best funded, of US Intelligence Agencies.  The NSA as the agency responsible for Cyber intelligence abroad would have led the effort to collect evidence of foreign hacking, been involved in the analysis and co-developed the tools used in cyber operations.  Also surely involved was the FBI  (#4) which is in the lead for investigations involving attacks that rise to the level of national security threats and has the lead competency for domestic intelligence and counter-espionage efforts.

What about the other 13 members of the intelligence community?  Not all of whom are independent agencies (more about that in a minute).

Well for starters five of them are the intelligence branches of the five armed services(#s 5-9) , Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force and the Coast Guard.  With the exception of the Coast Guard, these agencies focus on three major (and overlapping) concerns: Threats to their parent services, the capabilities of their competitors and peers, and tactical, operational and strategic intelligence affecting ongoing military operations.  The Coast Guard's Intelligence Service focus on Intelligence Threats to the Service and on Ports and Waterways threats to homeland security.  While all of these services undoubtedly retain some cyber collection and analysis capabilities, it's unlikely that those experts were ever involved with the effort to determine who hacked John Podesta's email.

Similar arguments apply to the other Department of Defense Intelligence Community members, the National Reconnaissance Office (#10), which mainly designs, builds, and operates the reconnaissance satellites of the United States government, and provides satellite intelligence, particularly signals intelligence and imagery intelligence, to several other government agencies, and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (#11), which interprets and maps satellite imagery.

The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA)(#12),  handles national-level, long term and strategic intelligence for the military and department of defense, as such it  sometimes overlaps with other agencies but is unlikely to have provided much to the discussion of DNC hacking.

Also in the IC, are specialized contributors, the Drug Enforcement Administration's Office of National Security Intelligence (DEA)(#13), which focuses on the drug trade and associated terror networks, The Dept. of Energy's Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence (#14), focusing on Energy Issues and collection threats to US Nuclear programs. Treasury Dept's Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence (#15), is concerned with the economies of foreign states and the financing of terror networks.

Finally there are two more generalists at the table.  The State Dept's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (#16) exists mainly to provide accurate and up to date intelligence from all sources to the Secretary of State and to US Diplomats.  The Dept of Homeland Security's (DHS) Office of Intelligence and Analysis (#17) coordinates and analyzes intelligence for all the component agencies of DHS.  Both of these have some capabilities to look at intelligence information and provide analysis, of the two it is highly unlikely the State Dept. would be involved in more than a summary read of the data, while DHS was consulted.  DHS is along with the FBI the primary guardian of US Security at home.  They issued the joint statement with the FBI, finding that the Russians indeed hacked into DNC servers, back in April.

As to the Independence of these Community Members?  I'm not sure what the Hillarys and Hakeems of the world mean by that phrase.  I've made the argument, I think, that this was not a case of seventeen agencies working independently to investigate this and all reaching the same conclusion.  I think it's also clear that this was not several agencies developing raw intelligence, sharing it out to seventeen and all of them independently reaching the same conclusions.

Of the seventeen members of the IC, fully eight are part of the DOD, two part of DOJ, two DHS, only two, the CIA and the DNI answer directly to the President and are considered "Independent Agencies" ie. not part of a Cabinet Agency. So I'm not sure what "independence" reflects in the claims of Democrats, except an attempt to confuse and mislead the public.

Only three IC members are likely have really been major players in the effort to determine who hacked the DNC server, through collection AND analysis, the NSA, the CIA and the FBI.  These three "agencies"  would have coordinated their findings with and through the office of the DNI.  The DNI could surely have shared those findings with representatives of the other constituent members of the IC and asked for rebuttals, objections, or evidence against the findings.  Then, unless the Dept of Energy or Marines Corps Intelligence had some weirdly relevant intelligence on the matter, they would have concurred as a matter of course.

At the end of the day somewhere between four and five constituent members of the US Intelligence Community made this call.  Two (#4 & #17) signed a joint report And ONE (#1), in the lead, with a Director who answered directly to the President Obama determined "Consenus!" Not seventeen!!

#MAYBETRUMP!

Donald Trump.  

Not a fan, never have been.  

As a conservative, I’ve never viewed him as a true conservative.  As a fellow New Yorker, I am all too familiar with his real business history to see him as a creator of value.  As a student of history I see in some of his followers (more than in other strains of the conservative movement), a tendency to populism and nationalism that is uninformed and reactionary.

WMD, It's back, It's bad, It's worse, It's ISIS.

This post was mostly written by Vince Heintz, who deserves most of the credit, both for the article, and for the positive events of our tour in Iraq. I made a few changes but it's narrative, I did spend most of the tour he describes in his Cargo Pocket.

In 2004 our battalion was stationed 10 Kilometers south of a central Iraqi Airfield known as Anaconda/Balad.  Our Operational Area extended west to a road designated Route Golden, which  included the Muthana chemical compound, as recently Identified in a NY Times Article.  All within the area known as the Sunni Triangle. None of our soldiers, to my knowledge, were burned or injured by the weapons stored there, but we knew they were there and assumed the insurgents did too, particularly after word went our in May or June 2004 about a chemical IED going off somewhere else on the battlefield (which, based on the timeline,  is the same one noted in the article as addressed by General Kimmett). 

We conducted several operations at the Muthana Site in order to capture or kill insurgents trying to dig into the bunkers to retrieve those weapons.  To my recollection, our scout snipers may have wounded some guys doing some digging, but those detainees later claimed that they were just looking for scrap metal to sell; as I recall, there was no way to confirm their intent, and I think that they were patched up and cut loose.

Enemy activity generally seemed to be picking up near the area in May and June.  There is no doubt that there was a lot of insurgent movement through that space, which formed a loose line of communication among Fallujah, Baqouba and Samarra.  In May or June, the 1st Infantry Division Commander directed our brigade to clear the area of insurgents (not chemicals), and our brigade commander directed the staffs to plan a robust operation that would have involved most of his combat power for a time.  As the sole light infantry task force in the brigade, we were designated the air assault element with the task of moving by Blackhawk Helicopters to occupy blocking positions across an arc some clicks away from those giant bunkers to disrupt enemy egress from the objective.

This would allow our brigade's main effort, a reinforced battalion task force of Bradley Fighting Vehicless and Abrams tanks, to seize the objective and begin clearing operations.  The operation would have taken days; as  the facility is huge.  Then, after final rehearsals including a full table-top combined arms rehearsal through at brigade HQ in Tikrit, the operation was called off.  We never learned specifically why.  It may have simply been more activity was occurring on MSR Tampa, the key supply route through the Sunni Triangle, and our main focus, but who knows..

We handed off our operations out in December 2004, leaving another infantry battalion from the Minnesota National Guard in our place.  I know that they continued reconnaissance and security operations around the Muthana site.  I once heard a story that they sustained casualties moving to or from the site from the FOB south of Balad.  If true -- I don't know if it is but I can find out -- this suggests that the enemy came to understand that the complex was an enduring concern for us, such that by tempting our reconnaissance assets, our forces might be baited into making the trip our there, allowing the enemy a chance at an IED ambush. 

The enemy's intent remains unknowable.  What is perfectly clear, however, is that everyone knew that there were chemical weapons out there.  That compound and the threats it housed were important both to us and to the enemy, and it all had to do with these "defunct" munitions.  And just like troop quoted in your article, after hearing about the chemical IED and visiting Muthana, many of us felt that the whole notion of Saddam not having chemical munitions (on the basis that these weapons didn't "count" because they were pre-1991) was stupid and bogus, particularly when a critical threat supposedly being mitigated by the entire operation was that Saddam or his operatives would give "terrorists" these types of munitions for use against civilians.  The chemical IED and subsequent warning put the lie to the notion that such use requires state-of-the-art delivery systems, particularly by assymetric operatives who may not have the sophistication to know (or simply may not care) how unstable that material is.

Along with many of my unit I never understood why the Bush Administration never pointed out the problems that this toxic site posed, and how it verified concerns about Saddam's WMD, as there were few options to keep Saddam from using these unstable chemicals, secured as hey were by weak UNMOVIC locks. The Times and the rest of the WMD deniers know the story now.

Thanks again to Lt Col Vince Heintz, both for the article, and for the success of our tour in Iraq.

Ten Years After

18 March 2004, 0600

It’s six in the AM, and I’m sitting in my hummer, let me tell
you about my night: No shit there I was, standing completely
naked in the shower, toweling myself dry. The company XO (think
Riker on Star Trek) pokes his head round the door and says:
“Get your gear on I think there’s a raid on, you’re prob’ly goin!”
So I grab my shit and the CO confirms, we’re going out. We prep,
issue an order and roll out at midnight. We’re hunting for two
Iranians and a local sheik with RPG’s who are going to rocket the
largest US camp in our region. Finally a real mission.

It seems some E4 intel, from Baghdad weenie has a CI-snitch who can lead us
right in. So our S2(our own intel weenie, Captain type) calls us
in and w e roll down the main highway doing 100 kph, with these 3
on point. We roll right past the turn-off as described, and in
towards a different village then the one we were shown on the map.
We drive down a dirt road/dyke along side a canal, and then un-
ass our vehicles about three hundred meters up from some little
hamlet. We make a lot more noise than we should as we try to
organize our forces as we move out from the vehicles. About 100
meters along we’re finally straightened out when, SNAP Crackle and
POP!!!!!! Guys are hugging the dirt. Hey some motherf—cker down
there is shooting. More rounds. SSG Yap unloads about 20 rounds
downrange, the CO throws a few down. Some guys are paralyzed

“KEEP MOVING”
“GET DOWN”
“RETURN FIRE WITH ACCURATE FIRE MEN”
“GET BEHIND THE BERM”

And then we’re taking rounds from the flanks, so SSG Hunt
yells for everyone to get in the canal. Our S2 is so scared he’s
trying to dig through the canal and screaming something about
getting out of here. F---ing REMF! This guy tried to tell the
Col that intel guys are worth 20-40 grunts. Not in a gunfight you
ain’t! Now canal may be an exaggeration. It’s a concrete trench
about two and half feet deep. So now I’m sitting in dirty fucking
water getting shot at from three directions. So glad I just
f—cking showered for this!

“POP SMOKE! Haas move your platoon to the objective. Support by
fire. Byrnes pop an HE round out at the fire on the right flank.

"BOOM!!!!!"

Yours truly lets a 40 mm high explosive round fly from the
launcher below his weapon. The rounds stop flying from the
right. All the rounds stop flying.

“Get ready to move out men!”
“I pissed in my pants.”
“IT’S OK!”

SSG Cross and some other guys think we’re being mortared. Sgt Hallinan has
disclocated his shoulder, but popped it back in himself on the side
of the canal. Guys are crazy. It’s five minutes of total chaos.
We move up I’m standing up chasing the CO down the center of
the trench/canal, nice targets and he’s shorter. We get up on the
town. I pop another HE round, to cover movement and we’re doing
CQB, taking buildings.

In a couple of hours we clear all 7 buildings. We find some AKs and ammo a few women and children huddled in fear in the dark, and no men. SOme men, though, are watching
us from the field, with night vision goggles no less. The S2
pulls himself together (he was “a little shaken up”) and comes up
to search. The snitch and the MI weenie are long gone. The women
tell us they thought we were cattle thieves. A couple of Apache’s
fly overhead cover; after the raid! We get no Iranians, no Sheik,
no rockets! The adrenaline is wearing off and I need to get some
sleep.

Post Script, 20 March:

All concerned from civilians to Iraqi Soldiers tell us we really were
mistaken for cattle thieves. They’re very sorry!

Twelve Years After

Twelve years ago, sitting in a classroom in Manhattan, my life changed along with the world.  A female voice behind me interrupted the Professor to announce:

“A Plane just hit the World Trade Center!”

The events of the day as I witnessed them are ingrained in my mind forever.  The view, on the TV in the lobby, of the towers burning, seen as I rushed by.  The gasps from fellow students frozen there as the South Tower collapsed.  Running south on Lexington Ave and finally getting a cab to stop.  Waving my military ID at the driver and insisting he had to take me to my Armory on 25 St. before he left Manhattan. Hearing that the Pentagon had been attacked as well, and beating my fists into my locker in frustration.

I got my first chance at a sense of purpose when my commander realized he had no maps.  It was 11 AM or so and there were still only a handful of us at the Armory.  I found myself running against the human tide forced to walk north out of Lower Manhattan as I headed to the nearest Barnes and Noble on Union Square.  A man looked at me running and said:

“Now I’m really scared!”

The bookstore was closed, but the Soldier banging on the glass got some attention, and the manager promptly handed over every local map they had. No money was exchanged.  I ran the half mile back, moving this time with the crowds.

 At the Armory soldiers were beginning to filter in.  We formed up multiple times under various leader’s instructions.  I remember an active duty Special Forces soldier, home in NY on leave showed up in his Green Beret, because it was all he could think to do.  At one point they called for all trained medics and combat lifesavers (me) to grab our aid bags.  We did.  Then we “stood by.”  Eventually we all realized that most of the survivors were already hospitalized, and the dead were beyond our help.

“Let’s give Blood!”

“We called the hospital and they have donors lined up."

Hurry up and wait.  Finally as night set in we got a mission.  We moved out in buses, headed downtown.  We waited at the City’s Command Post while our commander got our mission.  We posted in four man teams along Canal Street.  We took turns walking down the last mile or so to Ground Zero.  I had been to a war zone before, when I had deployed to Somalia.  Now a war zone had come to my home.

In the morning we went back to the Armory and tried to sleep.

Again the next day was long and frustrating as we once again stood by for instructions.  That night we got a new mission, one we were to keep for almost two weeks.  We deployed shortly before midnight.  This time we were posted as site security right on the ground zero perimeter.  It seems that the FDNY Chief, who was the official incident commander could not keep every Tom, Dick and Harry with a badge or a government ID form just wandering onto a living fire and working rescue/recovery site.

Our job was simple deny access to any and all.  Direct them to sign in at the FDNY tent before accessing the site.  Junior soldiers, unarmed turning away the FBI, CIA, State Police you name it.  The only argument we lost was with the NYPD’s Emergency Service Unit, who were working the site trying to rescue or recover their own.

         

The memories blur over the next two weeks.  That second night it rained.

          

“God Hates Me!”  My CO muttered as the down pour began.

“No!” I rebutted “Allah hates you, God loves you.”

Later that night I turned to my closest mates and said:

“We’re going to spend more time than we thought in Uniform in the coming years!”

I remember writing a poem.  I remember going home one night and getting some real sleep.  I remember getting relieved from our midnight to noon shift and having to direct traffic for an hour.  I remember when Sean G, a fireman and one of our Squad Leaders, finally showed up, in his bunker gear, and the relief we all felt.  And Chris Engledrum, also FDNY dropped by to let us know he had made it.  Chris died, three years later, just North of Baghdad.

I remember the smiling young ladies passing out sandwiches, from the Salvation Army, from the Red Cross, from their own kitchens and their own hearts.  I saw NYC Public advocate and recently defeated mayoral candidate Mark Green at an Outback Steakhouse tent giving out food to 1^st   responders.

I remember Rudolph Guliani’s inspiring leadership.

I remember crying my eyes out at the funeral for Lt. Mike’s sister who died that day.

I remember the FEMA team from San Francisco, their recovery dogs were spent.  The handler told me fourteen days on the job was their limit after that they got to depressed.   I told her I understood.

I remember the Army Psychologist staring out a window, at Jersey City across the Hudson River and asking me what to do next.  I didn't have an answer for him.

I remember being cheered one day as we marched up Hudson St.

I remember how we all came together.

In twelve years much has changed in America.

Memorial Day Remarks 2013

The content below was delivered as a speech at the city of High Point, North Carolina's 10th Annual memorial day ceremony.  This year the ceremony was dedicated to a new plaque for the African American soldiers who died in defense of our nation during WWII.

Today is Memorial Day. An old tradition that as an official American holiday began to be first celebrated in 1868.  Begun so that communities could commemorate their OWN fallen, among the hundreds of thousands of young Americans who gave their lives during our bloodiest war. Over time those local memorial services at the end of May grew into a great national tradition.

After over a hundred years of community memorials, the US congress finally acted. In 1967 they federalized the holiday, and one year later it legislated the now familiar ‘last Monday in May’ calendar placement. By the early seventies, all US states recognized the federal holiday.

Somewhere on the order of one million American soldiers have died in the nearly two and a half centuries of our national history. These men and women, define diversity. African Americans whose contribution to the Great Struggle against Fascism abroad during WWII we especially honor today have actually served in all our wars.

Immigrants from all four corners of the globe have served and died in our armed forces. Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard, have all sacrificed their members, Active, Reserve, National Guard and Militia. Christian, Jew, Atheist, Buddhist, and Muslim; Gay and Straight; Democrat, Republican, Whig and Socialist; liberal, conservative, moderate. There have been restrictions on military service over the years, but our war dead represent every part of our great national constituency.

Among those who have fallen recently are many that I called comrade, friend, or brother. Not blood brothers, but “Band of Brothers;” Chris, Segun, Kevin, Casey, Wil, Mark. are a few of the names that I can’t summon to mind without a lingering sadness. This is the burden of service in our current military. Wherever one’s politics lie, these men and four thousand other Americans who have recently made the ultimate sacrifice deserve our respect and a moment of our time. They deserve a day.

As memorial day weekend begins I think of these brothers. My heart always turns first to Specialist Segun Akintade. Before deployment to Iraq I had served as his team leader. A Nigerian immigrant, an American Citizen by choice and affirmation, his full name was an alphabet soup of Nigerian naming conventions. To those who served with us,  he was and always will be Obi Wan.

He chose America seeing a better life for himself and his family here. He was putting himself through college at NYCCT, in New York. He worked nights at Goldman Sachs in an administrative support position. And out of Pride in his New country and because it made financial sense Obi Wan joined the Army National Guard.

He clearly loved being a soldier. He was tall, athletic, focused. He spoke in a deep fierce voice so thick with accent sometimes he was hard to understand. Deploying to Iraq after witnessing the aftermath of September 11, Segun never quite understood the connection. But as a man who had lived in the developing world he had deep abiding compassion for the people of Iraq.

On October 28 In Mushada Iraq, Segun Akintade was riding in the Turret of his squads hummvee when Iraqi Insurgents detonated an IED. His wounds were devastating, as shrapnel passed under the back of his helmet.

Never the less, two of his battle buddies, both civilian first responders with far better lifesaving skills then most line medics, worked feverishly, though in vain, to save him.

I miss my friend. And every Memorial Day I am in contact with my mates from that deployment.

Today, even in recent conflict, our Army is smaller than it has been in a long time. As we wind down nearly a decade and a half conflict Memorial Day has lost part of its meaning for many Americans. Some thank me, as if today were Veterans Day. But it's not. It's not about those of us who have fought and come home. It's about those who never came back.

It does highlight a significant lingering effect of our all volunteer force. We are in some ways more divided from our society than in past conflicts. Fewer Americans today are Gold Star families. And in some ways that is a good thing. We are fighting with smaller smarter forces. We have soldiers surviving wounds that would have killed them in the past.

We must recognize and work to lessen this divide. These men and women whose bravery and sacrifice we recognize here today, their memories may belong only to their families and their mates, but their honor and their sacrifice belong to all Americans.

Veterans, this divide is not only on civilians, but on us. We need to allow Americans to reconnect to our history, our traditions and our national honor. This weekend when folks thank me for my service, I kindly remind them it's not about me, but our national sacrifice.

Pet Generals or Warriors?

Americans expect our Generals to be aggressive, especially in a time of war. We want wildcats not housecats, wolves and not lapdogs. Presidents and other civilian leaders tend to prefer politicians in uniform, they want pets not guard dogs.

Very few Generals (and some Admirals too) in American history have found a way of entering immediately into the collective consciousness in a way that leaves no doubt of their ferocity as warfighters. Men like Grant, Sherman, Patton, Halsey MacArthur, Swartzkopf, Petraeus, McChrystal.

Others have proven their combat competence with less flair and flamboyance, George Washington, Phil Sheridan, Omar Bradley, Dwight Eisenhower all winners, and eventually household names. These were leaders, the kind whose warriors would follow them into Hell itself.

There have always been Generals who succeed more as political animals, leading organizations, developing a sterling reputation, but never evolving that fighting persona. George C Marshall and Colin Powell for example, led the military, in time of war, without . Some Generals, like William Westmoreland are haunted by the perception of failure.

Many Americans misunderstand the role of the Joint Chiefs.  They are NOT combat leaders.  They are the policy and administrative commanders of their respective services.  They ensure that the men and women under them are trained and led, and prepared to fight. They also serve as the senior military policy board, and the second senior most National Security policy board (second to the National Security Council).  They are led by the Chief and Vice chief, and the Chief serves as the President's Senior military adviser.  They must however, by law allow the Combatant Commanders (like Centcom) fight our wars.

There policy and advisory role, however is important to our military and to our nations.  Today these chiefs are a mixed bag in terms of Combat Leadership. A few of them Like Martin Dempsey and Ray Odierno have served as Generals in Combat. Some like National Guard Bureau Chief, have never seen combat. They have all shown the talent it takes to gain promotion to their services senior ranks.

The last decade, plus, of strife and combat has produced some Genuine American Hero type Generals, men with a reputation for taking it to the enemy. Petraeus, and McChrystal, along with General John Allen were perceived as warfighters, but have all been troubled by scandal, not for the first time in our history. Marine General James Mattis, and Navy Seal Admiral Bill McRaven heading Centcom and USSOCOM respectively, seem today to be the only real wildcats left in the fight, and it's probably best that they have the two key combatant commands in our current conflict.

Our current Joint Chiefs are largely a collection of house cats or lapdogs. Even the Commandant of The Marines Corps, a job held in esteem by active duty and prior service Marines, as THE Guardian of America's warrior traditions, ethos, and standards, is currently an Aviator. Sure USMC Aviators, like all Marines are grunts first, but isn't there a subtle signal sent when the Marines' Commandant, and representative at the highest levels of government spent his career supporting rather than executing the USMC's core competence of Amphibious Infantry operations?

The Chief of Naval Operations is a Submariner. The Air Force Chief spent the better part of the post 9/11 era in bureaucratic jobs, at The CIA and at training units. When he returned to a warfighting command it was in Europe, not exactly the current hotspot of conflict. National Guard Bureau Chief, Frank Grass served as an Army Engineer, as both a National Guard Officer and a civilian in the Army Corps of Engineers. In spite of an operational tempo that has seen hundreds of thousands of National Guard Soldiers and Airmen deployed to combat General Grass has not served overseas in combat.

The JCS, Chairman Army General Martin Dempsey, may at first glance seem like more of a war dog. He commanded the 1^st Armored Division during a prolonged and heated 13 month deployment to Baghdad in 2003-2004 where his division fought and tactically defeated Muqtada Sadr's Mahdi's Army. After promotion to deputy commander at Centcom, he was allowed to act as Centcom commander when Admiral William Fallon retired from that role. However after only six months under Dempsey, command at Centcom went to Dave Petraeus, and Demspsey was hustled off to head the Army's Training and Doctrine Command. Not exactly an endorsement of his warfighting.

General Odierno the Army's chief of Staff is the one semi-exception.  A division commander in Iraq as well, he is known, in the Army as a hard charging military leader.  More of a Bradley than a Patton, he still holds the respect of his soldiers unlike his immediate predecessors, (including Dempsey who he seems to overshadow during joint public appearances).

Look, it takes an enormous amount of education, dedication, competence and other traits to make to even a one star position in the US Military, there is no doubt that all of our Joint Chiefs, like all the men and women they lead are capable and dedicated public servants, who deserve our respect. One does wonder though why during a time of war, maybe one of our military's top brass has a reputation for killer instinct.

The internal politics, within each service, between them, with the civilians at DOD and at the White House, that determine who is on the JCS are complicated, and hardly transparent. Two things, however are clear. It is certainly is politics that determines who is at that table, and who sits at its head. The politics begin start at those officers careers, in service academies, ROTC programs, and their earliest commands. The second thing: the politics for JCS end at the White House.

The Joint Chiefs serve at the pleasure of the President. They may be recommended by current leaders, and they need to be confirmed by the Senate, but they are nominated by the president. Thus in his role as Commander in Chief the POTUS chooses the men who act as Service Chiefs and as his senior military policy advisers. If we ask why the JCS seem more like lapdogs than war-dogs? The answer is simply that President Obama prefers lapdogs.

Debt, Deficits, and Defense Dollars, what about Strategy?

“Our strategy starts by recognizing that our strength and influence abroad begins with steps we take at home. We must grow our economy and reduce our deficit.”

“We must also build and integrate the capabilities that advance our interests and the interests we share with other countries and peoples. Our Armed Forces will always be a cornerstone of our security...”

These statements appear in the opening paragraphs to the National Security Strategy of the United States of 2010. They are in the introduction, signed by Barack Obama himself, they are echoed in language throughout the rest of that document. The National Security Strategy is a document that is periodically rewritten by the executive branch which outlines the major national security concerns of the United States and how the administration plans to deal with them. These sentences are underscored by additional, similar statements within the document. President Obama and his administration have made it their unequivocal and official position that deficit reduction and military preparedness are keys to America's security. 

 

You wouldn't know it from the administration's words and actions since then. From last year's Debt Ceiling Crisis, to the most recent Fiscal Cliff deal, the President has demonstrated a lack of commitment to deficit reduction, debt relief, or serious defense reform. Not that Congressional Republicans have performed much better. Their negotiations have resulted in a continuing series of “Punts” that have postponed any real discussions on these issues.

America's strength has for decades rested on two integrated pillars, our economy and our military. Economic strength and growth ensured that our military maintained technological and training advantages over diverse threats ranging from the old Soviet Union, to today's International Islamist movement. Our military meanwhile, secured free seas and open trade, and ensured that our economy could grow and remain strong.

Long term economic trends in America today are undermining these pillars. Continued deficit spending has swelled our national debt to sixteen trillion dollars. That's roughly one fifth of the Global Economy. Servicing our debt now costs us roughly 250 Billion dollars a year, an amount that will grow with deficit spending. Our defense budget gobbles up another 900 billion annually. But these two numbers still don't account for the 1.27 trillion in deficit spending. 

A serious, and truly “balanced approach needs to be implemented. Continuing to raise the debt ceiling will only increase our interest payments. Serious spending cuts need to be implemented, and yes there is surely some fat to be cut from defense. Cutting the entire DOD budget, and nothing else though, would still leave us 400 billion in the red annually. While we need to reform defense spending, by analyzing threats and focusing on core capabilities to defeat those threats, and by reforming the acquisition processes that have wasted defense dollars since the 1950s, we also need to reform our entire national budgetary process.

March 1, looms as the next cliffhanger date, by which time defense spending must be addressed, or automatic “sequestration” cuts will proceed. More likely, Congress will act, by punting again. We will postpone any real discussion. Meanwhile the President will continue to dodge on spending reform outside the Pentagon. His selection of former Republican Senator Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense hints at a preference for deep cuts to the Pentagon's budget. In Congress, Republicans having caved on the Fiscal Cliff, and seem set in the Senate to cave on Hagel's appointment.
So the “who” and the “how” stand as open questions regarding our National Security Strategy. 

President Obama, in contradiction to his own written strategy appears unwilling to reduce spending anywhere but the defense budget. This will undermine our economic strength, erode our military power and weaken our security in the world today. Who will ensure that we reduce our debt, reduce our deficit, ensure continued military advantage? More importantly perhaps: how can we achieve this in the face of leadership that ignores its own strategy?

Women in Combat?

 "The Infantry closes with the enemy by means of fire and maneuver in order to destroy or capture him or to repel his assault by fire, close combat, and counterattack."

Leon Panetta's decision to open more Combat roles to women is a potentially disastrous action. In seventeen years of service, in the USMC, and the Army's National Guard, I have held only two Military Occupational Specialties, Combat Engineer and Infantry. Both of these are designated as Combat Arms, roles that until this week had been closed to women. I have served in three combat zones including Somalia and year long tours in Iraq, and Afghanistan. Each time, there were women serving alongside, executing their missions with outstanding professionalism. So why, am I against this change?

In the summer of 2001, just weeks before the September 11 attacks, my Army National Guard Brigade completed a grueling rotation at the Army's Joint Readiness Training Center (JRTC) at Fort Polk Louisiana. JRTC is where the Army evaluates Infantry units. JRTC rotations are highly realistic exercises which require soldiers to perform round the clock under simulated real world conditions. In 2001 we spent eleven days “In the Box!” participating in a simulated counter guerrilla campaign on a notional Atlantic Island nation. 

 
The night before our notional deployment, several soldiers were weighed with and without the equipment we would be carrying, the average load was 100-110 pounds. This included food, water, ammunition and helmet and equipment. It did not include the body armor that deployed soldiers wear today. We spent eleven days “humping” this load through the swamps and woods of central Louisiana in the summer heat and humidity. We walked an average of sixteen miles a day, and slept an average of four hours a night.

Each movement was a combat patrol. This required moving this 100 lb. load while maintaining awareness, holding one's weapon in a ready position. Some bodily functions were handled while on the move, more complicated ones during security halts with a battle buddy standing guard. There were no showers. It was more brutal then most of my real world deployment time. We were actually lucky, active duty units usually spend as many as 30 days in that scenario.

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Most of the war in Iraq and much of it in Afghanistan followed a different template. Humvees, MRAPs, Strykers, and other vehicles tied troops to the road net. Females have been able to engage in active combat operations, and they have performed exceptionally. Women perform in multiple roles that work closely with combat troops. Medics, Intel specialists, Civil Affairs troops, Motor Vehicle operators all are routinely attached to or members of units that may end up in contact with the enemy. Women serve in the Military Police, where there is at times an overlap with the Infantry mission, in that MPs can and do, on occasion, directly assault enemy positions. At the end of the day each and every US Military Service member male or female, needs to be prepared to fight, when necessary.

Not every battle has been along a roadway however. In Afghanistan particularly our enemies have used mountainous terrain as their ally. When it comes to tackling al-Quaeda and Taliban forces in the mountains, our leaders rely on those Infantry soldiers, (Engineers, Scouts, Artillery Observers, and Special Forces as well) in those all male units that have been prepared to move hundred lb. loads up mountains that are two miles high. 

 
During Operation Anaconda in 2002, a combination of Special Forces and Infantry battled al-Quaeda on and around Takur Ghar an 11,000 foot giant near the Afghan-Pakistani border. All male Infantry battalions from the 101^st Air Assault and 10^th Mountain Divisions climbed their way into battle. When battles like this begin, commanders of all male units are able to send them up that mountain without females attached in support roles. If those units included women, they could not be pulled out of their squads and fire teams without degrading unit integrity and combat effectiveness.

“So what?” Ask the feminist advocates for women in the Combat Arms. “If women can meet the standard they should be allowed in. Right?” Not so fast. Selection for Infantry and other Combat Arms does require passing standard Army (or Marines) Physical Fitness Tests, and trainers for those MOS's hold recruits headed that way to high standards, but... The tests don't measure one's endurance “humping” that rucksack day in and day out. Only training and time in a unit can measure that. Statistically speaking men can, and generally do develop into stronger and faster load bearers than women. Those men who simply cannot cut it in these Combat Arms units are generally transferred into other specialties. 

 A very close friend, and overseas battle buddy confided in me. On active duty, in an Army Infantry Battalion, he had served in a Scout/Sniper Platoon. When he was injured and undergoing recovery from surgery his platoon sergeant hinted that he should use steroids to build back his muscle mass. “If you can't keep up, I can't use you!” While this is a reprehensible act, contrary to the Army Values, it does indicate the pressure to perform in those roles.

Dropping the occasional male from a Combat Arms billet, and re-classing him somewhere he can still serve, raises no political red flags. What happens when women begin to crash and burn out of these units? Will politicians who have never served in combat have the wisdom to leave it alone. Will Generals who rely on Congressional support have the integrity to uphold the standards? Not if recent history is any guide. Then, will our politically correct, equality focused military be capable of defending us? One can only hope.

Of Battleships and Bayonets!

The mission of the Navy is to maintain, train and equip combat-ready Naval forces capable of winning wars, deterring aggression and maintaining freedom of the seas.
—Mission statement of the United States Navy




It is true that the US Navy is the largest Navy, by far, in the world.  It is estimated to be larger , with more vessels, than the next thirteen navies combined.  Our Navy has as many aircraft carriers, eleven, as all the other navies in the world combined, and most of those are in the hands of allies.  So why could we possibly need to enlarge the US Navy?

Well first of all, let’s note that the US Navy must carry out it’s mission on more than 139,000,000 square miles of ocean waters, this planet’s surface is  as we know from grammar school, almost 71% water.  There are nearly 223,000 miles of coastline in the world.  Something approaching half the seven billion humans alive today live within 100 kilometers of a coastline.  All this water and coastline must be covered with only 287 ships of the US Navy.

Iran, North Korea, China, Russia all have coastlines.  They all have large relatively modern air forces, of the kind that can make life difficult for US Naval forces off their coast.  They all have sophisticated anti-ship missiles, which can be launched from ships, planes or from land.  In the case of Russia and China, each has an aircraft carrier, which while no match for America’s forces could pose a significant obstacle to operations in contested seas should they choose to.

Eleven aircraft carriers may seem sufficient, and the President’s comment, in the third debate seemed to suggest that our carriers,  along with submarines (“boats that go underwater“) have rendered other vessels obsolete.  This is patently false as the president knows.  While WWII and post war developments indeed saw large battleships fade into history’s junkyard, our aircraft carrier supremacy depends on other vessels.

As noted, anti-ship missiles have proliferated throughout the world.  Compared to carriers and modern airplanes anti-ship missiles are cheap.  While these weapons do not allow the projection of power the way even a small carrier based naval force does, they do allow for  the denial of  access to a nation‘s coast.  In 1982 an Argentine air launched Exocet missile destroyed Britains HMS Sheffield, a modern destroyer.  Carriers operating alone would be extremely vulnerable to these types of missiles.

In the same conflict a British submarine sank the Argentine cruiser Belgrano.  Along with missiles all four of our most dangerous competitors abroad have a submarine fleet.  Like missiles, these vessels cannot dominate the seas, but they can deny the seas to unfriendly vessels.  Carriers are also vulnerable to submarines.

To combat the combined missile and submarine threat US Navy Carriers never travel alone.  They cruise the oceans in Task Forces of mixed vessels, cruisers, destroyers, submarines, frigates and smaller patrol and support vessels.  These vessels form a screen that use integrated technology and layers of weapons to protect the carriers from their greatest threats.

Our navy also has the mission,  in conjunction with the US Marines Corps of projecting power ashore.  “Boots on the Ground“, are sometimes a requirement to ensure sea power.  To this end we have ten  Amphipbious Assault Ships, which are like flexible small aircraft carriers, full of Marines.  They are in turn supported by another twenty or so amphibious support and docking ships.  Like carriers these vessels are vulnerable to attack and must be screened by surface vessels and submarines to be able to approach the shore and fulfill their mission.  These are organized into Amphibious Readiness Groups of three or more ships.

A typical Aircraft Carrier Strike Group (CSG) has about seven vessels altogether, depending on circumstances.  An Amphibious Readiness Group  (ARG) is often attached to a CSG.  So Carriers typically travel in Squadrons of eight to ten  ships.  This requires ninety five ships, just  to keep all eleven carriers and attached ARGs safely at sea.

The maximum range of  strike aircraft operating off of a carrier is about 550 nautical miles.  This limit’s the effective ocean footprint of a CSG to something less than 100,000 square miles of ocean.  With only eleven CSGs and 139 million square miles of ocean there’s simply too much  blue water to cover.  Even with all eleven carriers at sea we could only patrol 7-8% of the Ocean with aircraft carriers.

A few facts.  Some Hotspots in the world require more than on carrier, the Mid-East for instance.  Carriers can’t stay at sea indefinitely, nor can sailors.  US Navy Cruiser and other surface vessels cannot patrol alone, and none of them can stay at sea forever either.  A further sixty one of our naval vessels are Nuclear Missile submarines (SSBNs), which can patrol in an information gathering capacity but are not designed to secure a section of  ocean.

As mentioned,  neither sailors nor ships can remain at sea forever.  In fact the operational tempo of the last decade has exhausted the US Navy much as Iraq and Afghanistan have exhausted Army and Marines forces.  Cruises are getting longer, and in port turn around time is getting shorter.  Some task forces have spent more than a year at sea recently, a situation which stresses ships, sailors and families back home.  Typically, ships and crew are in port at least as long as they are at sea.

So let’s look at the Math.  We now have 287 ships in the US Navy.  Subtracting our 61 SSBNs leaves us with 226 surface vessels and attack submarines.  We have approximately 90 ships tied up in our Carrier based CSGs which if they work 50/50 tours, can ensure coverage of about 3-4% of the Oceans at any given time, and which are surely focused on China, North Korea and  Iran and the Mideast.  That leaves 136 vessels to patrol 95% of the world’s oceans.  Now they can’t stay at sea forever either , so they split 50-50 as well (and that is generous.)  That means 72 ships are available to patrol  the rest of the oceans.  They as stated must patrol in small task forces as well.  Say they average 3 ship task forces, we are then talking about 24 task forces, to patrol some remaining 132 million square miles of Ocean.  These units have even smaller footprints than carrier groups do, so some 125 to 130 million miles of Ocean is routinely un-patrolled by US naval forces.

So what happens in these un-patrolled oceans of Earth?  Why is it our problem?

Well aside from ensuring the best behavior of North Korea and Iran, which is in both the world’s and the US’s interest, likewise keeping a wary eye on China and Russia; the Navy secures the sea lanes for trade.
Piracy is still a huge issue in the world.  Piracy already costs the world economy an estimated 15 billion in losses every year.  Some of these losses are in oil, which causes a rise at the gas pump, and in all consumer goods.  Pirates also fund terror groups.  Some amount of piracy occurs as does terrorism, under the permissive eye of local navies.  Without the US Navy, piracy would be much more costly.

Drug smuggling is another social ill that would be worsened by a smaller navy.  Illicit drug trade continues to bleed dollars out of the legitimate economy.  In short the US Navy does the heavy lifting in today’s world, ensuring freedom of the seas for all nations.  This along with their role in defending our nation and pursuing our enemies are fundamentals of the navy’s mission.

We are asking them to do this, without enough tools.  President Obama can glibly compare ships to horses and bayonets (I still have an assigned bayonet as a soldier in the National Guard) but he is obfuscating.  His cuts have stressed our Navy’s ships and our sailors and endangered our economy and our national security.  They quite frankly have also risked the peace that we do have in many regions.  When hegemons are seen to be receding, war, rather than peace usually follows.

Speech At USS NC!

Apologies to those who've seen some of this before.  I used a past speech as a preview for a call to action, if you find my experiences on 091101 boring, just skip to the end.



Good morning!

For those of you who don’t know me, I’m John Byrnes.
It’s a beautiful morning outside here in North Carolina. Just more than  eleven years past , I can still remember a beautiful morning in NYC. The sun was out, it was a warm September day.

That day was an Election day in New York, primary day.  Like our coming election day, September 11, 2001 was to be a decisive day in history.

Eleven years ago, I was an adult student at Hunter College in upper Manhattan.  I had been an enlisted Marines in the 1990s, and in September of 2000 I joined the New York Army National Guard combining free tuition, with GI Bill payments. That Tuesday, after a
morning swim, I sat down early for a 9:10 Am class.

Moments later, fire engines, sirens wailing, began rolling outside the window. After a few minutes a young woman in the rear of the class room looked up fromher cell phone and said:

“ An airplane just hit the World Trade Center.”

And the world changed.

I’m hoping some of the folks who stand here were only children that day. You have grown up in a post 9-11 world. Some of you are veterans from a previous era.

It has been a different world.

My Armory was 2 miles downtown from Hunter College.

I jumped in a Taxi, the driver offered to take me over the bridge to Queens.

I showed him my Military ID and promised bodily harm if he didn’t get me to the Armory. I was one of the first soldiers from my company to arrive, but there were already a few soldiers standing guard, with Bayonets attached.

By 10 AM I was in uniform double timeing to Barnes and Noble, running against the Human current pushing north from lower Manhattan,  Civilians staring at me in fear and in awe.

Most of the first day was spent in frustrating formations, getting new head counts. Watching the events unfold, in horror, two miles away and feeling powerless.

Eventually as the sun went down my company moved out to help secure lower Manhattan. After we were posted in teams we took turns walking the last single block down to ground zero to view the devastation. It remains to this day the single most horrific sight I have ever seen. Even after three combat tours.

For the two weeks we stood a 12 hour shift every night, securing ground zero. By day we helped out with traffic management, crowd control, and the bucket brigades. I averaged only three or four hours of sleep. Almost every New Yorker lost friends, family, or acquaintances that day. Five of my school friends from Grade School, HS, or College, perished. Our armory became the family support center for families of the the nearly 3000 murdered NYers.
My platoon leader lost his sister, it took, a long time for him to accept the loss. Her funeral, weeks later was the saddest I have ever been to, as my unit’s shared grief focused on one woman.

We worried for comrades too. Like all Guard units we had a number of firefighters and police. While almost all the police in my unit chose to respond with the Guard, the firefighters all reported in to their fire companies that day.

When SSG Sean Goodridge, and Sgt Chris Engeldrum appeared on our lines wearing their bunker gear, our relief was overwhelming.

Chris Engeldrum died three years later in an IED attack in Baghdad, on November 29 2004, he was killed alongside Spc Wilfredo Urbina who stood next to me that morning when Chris “finally showed up.”
I don’t imagine there are many veterans here who don’t know the sense of grief from losing a battle buddy, if you don’t I hope you stay lucky.
Loss is now part of a soldier’s life, part of the fabric of being in a military family

We are losing more than buddies though.

Deployed in 2004 and 2008 I essentially lost the right to vote in a presidential election.  Twice the local BOE in Queens NY failed to send me a ballot and forced me to rely on the default federal ballot.

I recently got an email from a NC NG NCO who is deployed to Kuwait.  Today in 2012 he can’t get a ballot from NC.  The Army has been in Kuwait for 20 some odd years, and they haven’t figured out how to ensure soldiers there can vote?

It’s unacceptable.  Military leaders have, frankly pissed away, millions of dollars of money designated to help SM’s vote, and now they publicly fret over sequestration.  A concern BTW  I share. But come on!

Veterans are slowly losing access to benefits we earned, as the VA  lags and wait times for cases drags on past one year. Tricare is raising premiums on new retirees.

Eleven years after September 11th we veterans and military are in danger of losing ourselves.  I was proud, and thankful that day that I had a role, that I was already in the military and could play a part.

Today I am concerned,
Veterans need to speak, united where possible, in one voice.

There are some things we can all agree on.  America needs a strong National Security policy.  This must be founded upon a sound economy.  America must stand up for her military assigned overseas, ensuring their vote counts.

And America must stand by those who have served.  Veterans and retiree benefits are not entitlements.  They are offsets to the opportunities that Veterans opted to forego, to serve our country.




We can and must hold our leaders accountable.  Let’s show them what that looks like.  Veterans have to get out and vote.  They have to be seen voting.  If everyone here today picks up the phone and calls for one hour, encouraging veterans to get out and vote  I guarantee you our voice will not only be heard on November 6, but it will continue to be heard.

A Word About Veteran's Employment

As North Carolina’s servicemen and women return from protecting our freedoms around the world, many are coming home to a job market that is anything but welcoming.

In January of 2009 my wife and I moved to Raleigh, following my last deployment, to Afghanistan.  While I had a college degree, over 15 years of military experience, six on active duty, and a resume that reflected both military leadership and civilian management experience, I still struggled to find meaningful employment.  I volunteered for a start up veteran’s charity that currently remains unable to pay their employees.  Additionally, I served as press secretary to a local political party.  And yet none of my connections or efforts helped me to score a career oriented job.

I worked for a few months managing a holiday store, eventually I took a private security job that required downsizing our family budget and stressed my marriage but enabled us to stay afloat.

Today, veteran unemployment—at 10 percent—is two full percentage points higher than the national average, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.  Military personnel returning from Iraq and Afghanistan have the hardest time finding work.  Here in North Carolina alone, more than 40,000 veterans are currently without jobs.
The government has responded to the problem of high unemployment among veterans with ineffectual programs narrowly targeting unemployed veterans. Sadly, this has not done enough to help our veterans—and there’s no shortage of news reports telling of the fate of hundreds of thousands of vets who are frustrated and disheartened at being shut out of the work force after returning from deployment.  The government needs to focus on implementing broad pro-growth policies to get the economy moving again for everyone.  As John F Kennedy reflected fifty years ago:  “A rising tide lifts all boats.”
To make matters worse, planned cuts to defense, scheduled for 2013 and beyond, will only worsen the problem.  Officials estimate that the U.S. Army could see layoffs of up to 24,000 enlisted personnel, including up to 5,000 officers, while the U.S. Marine Corps could shrink by some 20,000.  This means more young veterans will soon be competing for work, in a very tough jobs environment.
In addition to the lack of job security in the military and lack of opportunity in the economy in general, veterans face a culture of waste and inefficiency at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that results in long waits, delayed benefits, mishandled documents and poor service to veterans.  Currently, the VA has 890,000 pension and compensation claims that remain unfulfilled—a number that has more than doubled since 2008. Today, it takes 240 days to process the average claim—60 days longer than a decade ago.
Runaway government spending makes it all the  more difficult to address these problems in the future.  In a nationwide Concerned Veterans for America (CVA) poll conducted in late September, 72 percent of veterans named the economy and the debt as their top concerns in 2012.  These veterans recognize that a weak economy and towering national debt only serve to compromise our nation’s long-term security.  This leads to a continued lack of opportunity for work and prosperity for military families as well as the country in general.

We can do better than this. We must do better.

CVA is bringing attention to these and other issues facing our country’s returning service members — many of whom have had little say in our country’s leadership because of dysfunctional military voting procedures that disenfranchise service members.  The “We Can Do Better” bus tour, slated to swing through North Carolina on October 22-23, will allow veterans to hear directly from leaders in the veterans’ community about these and other critical issues.

We at CVA invite you to join us, whether on the road or at the ballot box, in urging Washington to focus on a comprehensive agenda of fiscal restraint and pro-growth policies that allow businesses to expand and create jobs by holding the line on taxes, cutting burdensome regulations, and getting out of the way of the private sector.

We owe our military servicemen and women better.  We can do better.  Join us in urging our leaders to deliver the future that North Carolina’s 765,900 veterans, and all Americans, deserve.

John Byrnes is a writer, a veteran and a member of Concerned Veterans for America.  He served in the USMC in the 1990s, and was deployed to Somalia for Operation Restore Hope.  He returned to service in 2000 When he joined the New York Army National Guard.  He was deployed to Ground Zero on September 11 2001, and has since served in Iraq and Afghanistan.  He currently serves in the North Carolina Army National Guard, and lives in Raleigh with his wife.

Learn more at: http://concernedveteransforamerica.org/.

Originally printed in the Fayetteville Observer:
http://www.fayobserver.com/articles/2012/10/21/1211431?sac=fo.opinion

A Very Brief Summation of Conservative Objections to Obamacare

 In response to a friend who could not see any downside to ObamaCare, I have to say that anyone who says they can’t see the down side of a major piece of legislation, forged in compromise between the various factions of one party with a handful of defectors from the opposing party, hasn’t looked at the law or the facts. Even when Congress acts in ways I approve of , I know that there is a downside, and that a significant portion of the citizenry strenuously objects.

 The foundational concept of economics is scarcity. There are simply never enough resources to do everything. Even the wealthiest persons and the wealthiest societies must prioritize where to spend their resources. For example, Even Bill Gates cannot maintain his lifestyle and feed everyone in Africa, even his resources are not enough to do both. How we organize our society to use resources defines our economy. 

Modern economies exist along a continuum, stretching from capitalism through socialism to communism. Neither pure capitalism, where a laissez faire market makes decisions with no governmental interference nor pure communism where no markets operate and the government makes all economic choices, actually exist. 

America has primarily had a democratic capitalist economy throughout history, with growing government regulation of markets since around 1900. Europe, on average, has a stronger socialist tradition and has markedly more government decisions made in the economic sphere, while still retaining quite a bit of a capitalist market. In Europe over the last few decades the government has essentially taken control of the healthcare industry and removed the market’s ability to make decisions based on supply and demand, and the government allocates the resources. In America government interference in the health care market has been slower but growing.

 In the last century, medical technology has improved exponentially. Diseases, disorders and injuries that were once life threatening are now routinely cured. In western civilization, infant mortality has virtually vanished and average life spans have almost doubled. The technological means to treat illness and injury have created a longer lived populace. No one has yet found a way to pay for all of this. Health care is now said to occupy 18% of the US economy. A few more cancers subdued with new treatments and that percentage will grow. Larger, and aging populations along with better treatments mean more and more people demanding health care. Eventually, if technology advances enough, economic demand for health care will become completely unsustainable. More 90 year olds, 25 years retired, demanding their latest cancer be cured, their lives prolonged, will subsume the economy.

 Conservatives believe that the best way to solve the problem is through the market. Let an open market system value health care and it should make efficient decisions about how to allocate resources. Market economics also allows for the best re-investment in R&D, which is why the US’s much criticized health care system still counts as the most technically advanced.

 According to liberals, the market is not fair. It is, by their narrative, essentially unjust because the wealthy do better than the poor. Even with America’s evolving system of insurances and HMOs, poor folk are can be priced out of newer and more expensive treatments.

 For conservatives, the issue is complex but the principles are simple. While the market may make decisions that seem unfair to certain observers, it makes them efficiently and facelessly. If the insurance market was more de-regulated, allowed to cross state lines, used only as insurance, and not as a complete health care funding apparatus, costs would become more generally affordable.

 ObamaCare means to further regulate the market. But Hayek and history have shown that when governments attempt to supplant markets several negatives accrue. First the government becomes more powerful. No more does the market decide that nonagenarians who still have wealth can be treated for melanoma. Now a bureaucrat decides that no melanoma patients over 93.25 years will be funded for melanoma treatments. Second, the government is never as efficient as the market at making decisions, so it will use resources far less efficiently. Ultimately inefficiency will create even more unfairness than the market.

ObamaCare’s mandate/tax provision means that the government is now essentially telling everyone how much they are required to spend on Health Care. The act also defines what everyone must receive as part of their health care plan. Hence, the religious community’s objections to cover abortion and abortifacients. So the conservatives see downsides in inefficiency, in growth of government power, in loss of freedom of choice.

 I’m sure there are positives, especially for those who believe in a different philosophy of government. I simply don’t believe they outweigh the negatives. It seems either extremely biased or extremely uninformed to deny any downside to ObamaCare.

9-11 Speech to NC Guard in Charlotte

Good morning!

For those of you who don’t know me, I’m SSG Byrnes. It’s a beautiful morning outside here in Charlotte. Ten years ago today, it started off as a beautiful morning in NYC. The sun was out, it was a warm late summer day, just like this.

It was Election day in New York, primary day.

I had only been back in the military about a year. I was an adult student at Hunter College in upper Manhattan, and I had joined the National Guard after a break in service from active duty, too help pay for tuition. That Tuesday, after a morning swim, I sat down early for a 9:10 Am class. Moments later, fire engines, sirens wailing, began rolling outside the window.

After a few minutes a young woman in the rear of the class room looked up from her cell phone and said:
“ An airplane just hit the World Trade Center.”

And the world changed.

Some of the soldiers who stand here were only children that day. You have grown up in a post 9-11 world. It is a different world.

My Armory was 2 miles downtown from Hunter College. I jumped in a Taxi, the driver offered to take me over the bridge to Queens. I showed him my Military ID and promised bodily harm if he didn’t get me to the Armory.

I was one of the first soldiers from my company to arrive, but there were already a few soldiers standing guard, with Bayonets attached. By 10 AM I was in uniform. My CO sent me out to get city maps, we had none. I doubled timed to Barnes and Noble, running against the Human current still pushing north from lower Manhattan. Civilians stared at me in fear and awe.

Most of the day was spent in frustrating formations, getting new head counts. Watching the events unfold, in horror, two miles away and feeling powerless. Eventually as the sun went down my company moved out to help secure lower Manhattan. After we were posted by fireteam, we took turns walking the last block down to ground zero to view the devastation. It remains to this day the single most horrific sight I have ever seen.

For the next two weeks we stood a 12 hour shift every night, securing ground zero. By day we often helped out with traffic management, crowd control, and the bucket brigades. We averaged only three or four hours of sleep.

Almost every New Yorker lost friends, family, or acquaintances that day. Five of my school friends from Grade School, HS, or College, perished. Our armory became the family support center for families of the the nearly 3000 murdered NYers. My platoon leader lost his sister, it took, a long time for him to accept the loss. Her funeral, weeks later was the saddest I have ever been to, as shared grief focused on one woman.

We worried for comrades too. Like all Guard units we had a number of firefighters and police. While almost all the police in my unit chose to respond with the Guard, the firefighters all reported in to their fire companies that day. When SSG Sean Goodridge, and Sgt Chris Engeldrum appeared on our lines our relief was overwhelming.

Chris Engeldrum died three years later in an IED attack in Baghdad, on November 29 2004, he was killed alongside Spc Wilfredo Urbina who stood next to me that morning when Chris “finally showed up.”

I don’t imagine there are many soldiers here who don’t know the sense of grief from losing a battle buddy, if you don’t I hope you stay lucky. Loss is part of a soldier’s life especially now. Just as fear of terror attacks is now part of the American fabric, though being Americans we bear it with courage.

Today we mourn not only those who died on September 11, 2001, but the thousands of Soldiers and service members we have lost fighting to prevent further attacks. Soldiers are the kind of men and women who don’t forget. We don’t forget our comrades, and we don’t forget why we have to do this job.

Since that fateful day 10 years ago we have been a nation at war. Many of you joined the military since then. Everyone here has made a choice to join, re-enlist or extend since, everyone here has volunteered knowing we are a nation at war. 9-11 changed my life, as it surely changed the life of every soldier here.

We have all experienced the sense of pride, mixed with humility when a civilian thanks us for serving. That is a good mix.

Proud of our service, humbled by the gratitude of our fellow citizens.

I want to thank you too.

I was incredibly grateful ten years ago that I was in the National Guard, that I was able to respond in a meaningful way. I am incredibly grateful that I have the opportunity to spend this morning with fellow soldiers as well. I understand I am not welcome this morning at ground zero, I was not invited! Of course I wasn’t invited ten years ago either I just went. But Thank You, as a soldier, an American and a New Yorker thank you for having the courage of your convictions to serve in a wartime Army. And thank you for helping to ensure that we never forget.

At the Gate!

Grief!

An email from Major Vincent Heintz, a leader and a friend came my way this morning!

Men,



Six years ago today the enemy killed SPC Segun Frederick Akintade at ASR Boa. Time passes. Grief, anger and survivor’s guilt remain. We think about a family that has been shattered forever.



I will always carry a debt of gratitude to the men in that patrol who fought so selflessly to save him. As a company, we remain deeply grateful to the intrepid aviators and docs who rushed forward to keep him alive. As Akintade began to pass, these rescuers defied not just risk but policies and protocols by taking him from the battlefield in the most respectful, decent way possible under hard circumstances.



After we came home, I learned that Akintade was not completely sold on the war in Iraq. Was his exceptional performance just the swagger of a young man trying to be a tough guy, politics be damned? Hardly. The men of first platoon in particular will remember Akintade as a modest, steady, centered man who knew his job and did his job. He superbly met the high oath that he took as a Soldier upon enlistment in 2001. He far surpassed the one he took as a new US citizen at Fort Drum in January 2004. Given the ambiguity of the war and his own views, and his humility, how and why did Akintade serve so consistently, so bravely?



After six years, the only reason that I can see is that he served, fought and died to protect his brothers.



Men, stay as safe as you can given your obligations, and stay focused. I thank you for passing this on to other members of A/2-108 IN (OIF II).



-MAJ Heintz



“There are still men out there... When I go home, people ask me, ‘Hey, Hoot, why do you do it, man? Why? You some kind of war junkie? I won’t say a God-damned word. Why? They won’t understand. They won’t understand why we do it. They won’t understand. It’s about the man next to you. And that’s it. That’s all it is... Hey, don’t even think about it, alright? I am better on my own. Hey, we started a whole new week. It’s Monday.”



-Hoot, Blackhawk Down

I'm reposting an edited version of something I wrote a year ago, I think it still matters!

It has now been more than two years; on August 19, 2008 my friend was murdered. Taliban gunmen assassinated Mohammed Ayoob on his doorstep, in a village along the Kunduz River, in the Kunduz Province of Northern Afghanistan. Ayoob, only twenty years old, served as the supply sergeant for an Afghan Police unit in the district of Chahar Darreh where he lived.


Hardly the toughest soldier, Ayoob sometimes seemed to fear his own shadow. His commanders assigned him to the supply section; the Taliban noted his gentler nature and targeted him. In the end, he was tougher than he realized.

Courageous in the face of death, when three terrorists ambushed him with AK-47 assault rifles, he drew his sidearm, and fired a single round at his killers before falling, the pistol smoking in his hand.


My friend’s death exemplifies the dynamics of the violent struggle for Afghanistan. A small, fringe minority resorts to terror to intimidate the majority. Wherever Afghan and US Forces fail to secure the populace, the Taliban terrorizes the people into obedience. Since I left Afghanistan last fall, the Kunduz Province has slipped further into the Taliban grasp. Ayoob’s murder was merely a single act in their long campaign.


The last time the Taliban ruled Afghanistan, fear and violence reigned. The rule of the Mullahs confined women and girls to their homes. Taliban officials destroyed schools. The Taliban stoned adulterers. They killed apostates who converted to Christianity and then destroyed the iconic Bamiyan Buddha statues. Afghans, with America’s help, overthrew their oppressive regime.


As an American soldier, I was proud to call Ayoob my friend, but language and culture made understanding difficult. I never knew whether he was more concerned with defeating the insurgent than with holding a paying job. I suspected the latter. Ayoob, and his family, lived in a state of poverty. Like most Afghans they scraped by as best they could from year to year.



Whether he fought for patriotism or money, Ayoob chose to stand up to the Taliban. Despite the risks involved, Sgt. Ayoob accepted a job that endangered his life. He demonstrated personal courage and a rejection of the Taliban. Soon after he died, I realized his family stood with him.



Muslims must be buried within twenty four hours of death. The day after Ayoob died, my team, continued our own anti-Taliban efforts in the district. On the way back to our base we passed Ayoob's funeral. In a nation where few people have cars, I saw dozens of cars, packed with hundred’s of friends and relatives at the hilltop cemetery where they laid Ayoob to rest. Attendance at Ayoob’s funeral represented a public rejection of the Taliban.



Ayoob’s friends and family are hardly unique in their rejection of the Taliban. Last year, Afghan presidential elections were held for the second time this decade. While insurgents intimidated millions of Afghans into staying home, millions more risked heir lives to vote.



Today, in the US, politicians quote recent polls worded insure that a majority of Americans reflect the belief that Afghanistan is no longer worth fighting for. The left worked to prevent the surge strategy. President Obama campaigned for office on the claim that Iraq had distracted us from fighting the “right war” in Afghanistan.

The mid-term elections are little more than a month away.

Americans may be weary of the war after nine years. Surely though, we are not more weary than the Afghans; they have known only war and terror for decades. The difference is that millions of Afghans know this war is worth fighting.


Like the loved ones of Mohammed Ayoob, they clearly want to end the violence. Their communities have been torn apart by decades of violence, but they will not surrender to terror to achieve peace. They know that the peace of the terrified is no peace at all.

Here at home, Americans are bombarded by the objections of the political left, and spoon-fed the dubious opinions of mainstream media pundits, but hopefully we will remember our own recent past. Eight years ago the Taliban allowed al-Quaeda to plan and train in Afghanistan. Al-Quaeda used that sanctuary to attack America here at home.


Today liberals, and an increasing number of conservatives are willing to allow that same Taliban to reclaim rule over Afghanistan. Today when Pakistan is much weaker and more susceptible to the Taliban in its own borders, this would spell disaster. Disaster for Afghans, and disaster for America; our enemies, safe in their sanctuary will plot once again to export their violence to our shores.