| From The Editor March 19, 2007 |
Idiocy in D.C., Progress in BaghdadIn order to preserve the cosmic harmony, it seems the gods insist that good news in one place be offset by misfortune elsewhere. It may well be that Gen. David Petraeus is going to lead us to victory in Iraq. He is certainly off to a good start. If the karmic price of success in Iraq is utter embarrassment for senior Bush officials in Washington, D.C.--well, in our judgment, the trade-off is worth it. The world will surely note our success or failure in Iraq. It will not long remember the gang that couldn't shoot straight at the Justice Department--or, for that matter, the antics of congressional Democrats--unless either so weakens the administration as to undercut our mission in Iraq.Obviously, it's too early to say anything more definitive than that there are real signs of progress in Baghdad. The cocksure defeatism of war critics of two months ago, when the surge was announced, does seem to have been misplaced. The latest Iraq Update (pdf) by Kimberly Kagan summarizes the early effects of the new strategy backed up by, as yet, just one additional U.S. brigade deployed in theater (with more to be added in the coming weeks): This "rolling surge" focuses forces on a handful of neighborhoods in Baghdad, and attempts to expand security out from those neighborhoods. . . . A big advantage of a "rolling surge" is that the population and the enemy sense the continuous pressure of ever-increasing forces. Iraqis have not seen such a prolonged and continuous planned increase of U.S. forces before. . . . The continued, increasing presence of U.S. forces appears to be having an important psychological, as well as practical, effect on the enemy and the people of Iraq. . . . [Meanwhile] in Ramadi, in the belt south of Baghdad stretching from Yusifiyah to Salman Pak, and northeast in Diyala Province, . . . U.S. and Iraqi forces have deprived al Qaeda of the initiative. This sense of momentum is confirmed by many other reports in the media, and from Americans and Iraqis on the ground. Full Story Gary Jackson |
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| QUOTE OF THE WEEK |
| "When reason is nurtured it becomes knowledge, when knowledge comes of age it becomes wisdom." unknown |
| PROFESSIONAL ARTICLES, EDITORIALS AND OPINIONS |
Petraeus Letter to the TroopsThe environment in Iraq is the most challenging that I have seen in over 32 years of service. Indeed, few soldiers have ever had to contend with the reality of an enemy willing to blow himself up for his twisted cause. In view of that, as you conduct your daily operations, remember that you have every right to protect yourself, even as you attempt to prevent situations from escalating without good reason.I also want you to be aware of my recognition that our focus on securing the population means that many of you will live in the neighborhoods you're securing. That is, in fact, the right way to secure the population--and it means that you will, in some cases, operate in more austere conditions than you did before we adjusted our mission and focus. . . . This approach is necessary, because we can't commute to the fight in counterinsurgency operations; rather, we have to live with the population we are securing. As you carry out the new approach, I also count on each of you to embrace the warrior-builder-diplomat spirit as we grapple with the demands that securing the population and helping it rebuild will require. Full Story Iraq Then and Now: What's Been Won and LostWhen I first came to Baghdad, Saddam Hussein was still in charge, and Iraqis lived in the sort of fear I had read about in old spy novels set in the Soviet Union. The dictator's network of spies and informants was reputed to reach into every neighborhood, every home, every family; so Iraqis- whether top government officials or the man in the street - were afraid to speak their mind to a journalist. It didn't help that I was always accompanied by a state-appointed minder, whose job was to ensure that nobody told me anything that might reflect poorly on the great leader. Whatever I asked, whoever I asked it of, the answers would be carefully calibrated to become an homage to Saddam. Even a simple inquiry about the price of eggs would be met by something like: "Well, thanks to our beloved President, eggs are ..." Driving through Baghdad one afternoon before hostilities started, I pointed to an imposing-looking building and asked my driver what it was. To my surprise, he grew wide-eyed in terror, hit the gas and simultaneously reached across and grabbed my hand, yanking it away from the window. "Don't point at that building, don't even look at it," he said, his voice cracking in fear. "I will explain later." After we had driven out of that neighborhood, he told me the building was the headquarters of the Mukhabarat, the dreaded internal spying agency, and my driver feared that even looking at it too closely might bring us - or him, anyway - no end of trouble. After the war, whenever we passed the old Mukhabarat HQ, my driver and I got a childish thrill by pointing to it, for no good reason. It is only the smallest of many, many freedoms that Iraqis gained after the U.S.-led coalition toppled the dictator. They also got the right to vote, satellite TV, cellphones, the ability to travel out of Iraq, and a new education system that doesn't brainwash children into worshipping Saddam. Full Story Lessons of WarTOMORROW MARKS the fourth anniversary of the start of the Iraq war, as appropriate a moment as any to take stock. What matters most is finding the best policy now -- doing whatever can be done to help Iraq and safeguard U.S. interests in a vital region. But looking back also is essential, particularly for those of us who supported the war.We will never know what might have happened had Saddam Hussein and his sons been left in power. Nor do we know how Iraq will evolve; history's judgment in five years or 10 may look very different than today's. But the picture today is dire, and very different from what we would have hoped or predicted four years ago. The cost in lives, injuries and dislocations, to Americans and Iraqis, has been tragic; the opportunity costs for U.S. leadership globally have been immense. So there is an obligation to reassess. What have we learned? The easy way out is to blame President Bush, Vice President Cheney or former defense secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld: The decision was right, the execution wrong. There's no question that the execution was disastrous. Having rolled the dice on what everyone understood to be an enormous gamble, Mr. Bush and his team followed up with breathtaking and infuriating arrogance, ignorance and insouciance. Read Post reporter Rajiv Chandrasekaran's account of the first year of occupation, "Imperial Life in the Emerald City," and weep at the tales of White House operatives sending political hacks to overhaul Baghdad's stock exchange and tinker with its traffic rules as a deadly insurgency gathered strength. Full Story |
| BREAKING NEWS FOR THE PROFESSIONAL |
Threat Perception and Risk InversionTHERE REMAINS an inversion of public discourse and policy direction with regard to two of the most significant threats we face. In particular, the most pressing nuclear threat is widely perceived to be from Iran while the more imminent terrorist threat is believed to be found in Pakistan. While both threats remain very real, few seem to understand that the most imminent nuclear threat is posed by Pakistan--the only current nuclear power considerably within reach of becoming an Islamist-run state aligned with al Qaeda, the Taliban, or other Islamists. Conversely, Iran's still-developing nuclear weapons program deceptively overshadows the significant state-sponsored international terrorism emanating from Tehran. This, while Pakistan's increasingly embattled--and internally challenged--President Pervez Musharraf stands as the primary buffer between Islamist forces of the ISI, the Taliban, and al Qaeda taking ownership of Pakistan's significant nuclear arsenal of 30 to 50 warheads. Iran has a nearly 30-year track record of state-sponsorship of terrorism, complete with funded, supplied, and supported acts of terror and terrorists--Shia and Sunni alike--throughout the region and the world.Full Story Army rushes to promote its officersTo fill a growing number of vacancies in the officer corps, the Army is promoting captains, majors, and lieutenant colonels more quickly and at a higher percentage than before the Iraq war, a trend that some military specialists worry is lowering the overall quality of the officer corps. The Army, already stretched thin from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, attributes the accelerated promotion rates to the pressures of war and the urgent need for field commanders. Another reason for the vacancies, military analysts say: unit leaders are quitting the Army faster than anticipated -- after multiple tours of duty in Iraq. The shortage of captains, majors, and lieutenant colonels is especially pronounced among experienced officers who have between five and 15 years in uniform, according to Army officials. In 2006, the Army had to promote more officers ahead of its own timetables, according to the most recent statistics. For example, the Army had a goal of promoting about 70 percent of eligible majors to the next rank of lieutenant colonel; instead, it promoted 90 percent of them to fill the vacuum. The same year, the Army advanced nearly all of its captains to majors, roughly 20 percent more than its guidelines call for.Full Story Gifted generals can change dynamics of warThe verdict on four years of fighting in Iraq hinges on the events of the next few months. With the U.S. public and many politicians intensely skeptical that a changed military strategy can salvage the war, the U.S.'s new commander in Iraq, Gen. David Petraeus, must win them all over - and fast. Petraeus takes over on the heels of the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, the departures from Iraq of Gens. John Abizaid and George Casey, and the electoral gains of anti-war Democrats. Despite the gloom and doom, he has arrived in Iraq with a surge of more than 20,000 American combat troops, and new theories on how to conduct counterinsurgency - involving ridding terrorists from neighborhoods, and replacing them with Iraqi and American troops to ensure public safety and the restoration of basic services.Full Story Abizaid's Long ViewAn enduring image of Gen. John Abizaid is of him bounding from an armored Humvee in one of Baghdad's toughest neighborhoods last summer and conversing with shopkeepers and imams who were dumbfounded to encounter a four-star general chatting with them in Arabic. Abizaid, who retires today as Centcom commander, brought something special to the job. He was an Arab American who understood the region's culture and spoke its language. But more than that, he was an intellectual who thought more deeply about the strategic issues involved in what he liked to call the "long war" than almost anyone else in the U.S. government. "Not since Douglas MacArthur have we had a regional commander who understood so well the area for which he was responsible -- its culture, history, language," says Chuck Boyd, a retired four-star Air Force general who heads a group called Business Executives for National Security. Abizaid likes giving interviews about as much as he likes going to the dentist. But he agreed to talk this week about some of the lessons he has learned as commander of U.S. forces in Iraq and Afghanistan since he took over at Central Command in July 2003.Full Story Chief of Chaplains @ Walter Reed AMC: Can't be Quiet AnyI have had enough and am going to give my perspective on the news about Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Please understand that I am speaking for myself and I am responsible for my thoughts alone. The news media and politicians are making it sound like Walter Reed is a terrible place and the staff here has been abusing our brave wounded soldiers; what a bunch of bull! I am completing my 24th year of service in the Army next month so you decide for yourself if I have the experience to write about this topic. I have been the senior clinical chaplain at Walter Reed for four years and will leave to go back to the infantry this summer. I supervise the chaplain staff inside Walter Reed that cares for the 200 inpatients, the 650+ daily outpatients from the war who come to us for medical care, the 4000+ staff, and over 3000 soldiers and their families that come for clinical appointments daily. Walter Reed has cared for over 5500 wounded from the war. I cannot count the number of sick and non-battle injured that have come through over that timeframe. The staff at this facility has done an incredible job at the largest US military medical center with the worst injured of the war. We have cared for over 400 amputees and their families. I am privileged to serve the wounded, their families, and our staff.Full Story |
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Why The Iraqis Can't Get Their Act TogetherThe halls of Iraq's Parliament today provide a stark contrast to the bloody realities outside the blast walls and barbed wire. Politicians munch Kit Kats and Twix from a free candy table in the members' lounge area. Leaders of rival factions greet each other as if they were old friends, with air kisses on both cheeks, with a long hand shake and a pat on the shoulder. Meanwhile in much of Iraq death squads take turns torching homes and lopping off heads. Holidays are observed, days off are taken, it's easy to think that while the country goes up in flames, its leaders are doing little more than sipping tea. Washington pundits and officials in the Bush Administration who want to goose the government into action are fond of saying the Iraqi leaders just aren't taking a firm hold of the reins. Meanwhile, Iraqi politicians chafe when American officials complain about their incompetence or selfishness or laziness. They bridle over one of major flaws of the U.S. occupation: American condescension. No one wants to be told they can't run their own country. The fact is, no one has run their country well in the last four years; there is plenty of blame to go around.Full Story Terrorists Proving Harder to ProfileOn the surface, the young Dutch Moroccan mother looked like an immigrant success story: She studied business in college, hung out at the pub with her friends and was known for her fashionable taste in clothes. So residents of this 900-year-old river town were thrown for a loop last year when Bouchra El-Hor, now 24, appeared in a British courtroom wearing handcuffs under an all-encompassing black veil. Prosecutors said she had covered up plans for a terrorist attack and wrote a letter offering to sacrifice herself and her infant son as martyrs. "We were flabbergasted to learn that she had become a fanatic," said Renee Haantjes, a college instructor who recalled her as "a normal Dutch girl." People in Zutphen may have been surprised, but terrorism suspects from atypical backgrounds are becoming increasingly common in Western Europe. With new plots surfacing every month, police across Europe are arresting significant numbers of women, teenagers, white-skinned suspects and people baptized as Christians -- groups that in the past were considered among the least likely to embrace Islamic radicalism.Full Story General: Al-Sadr's fighters feel heatCoalition forces have detained about 700 members of the Mahdi Army, the largest Shiite militia in Baghdad, the top U.S. commander in Iraq said Monday. The militia, which is loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and has clashed with U.S. troops in the past, has mostly avoided a direct confrontation with American and Iraqi government forces, Gen. David Petraeus said in an interview with USA TODAY. Some of the militia's top leaders have left the capital, and Iraqi government officials are negotiating with al-Sadr's political organization in an effort to disband the militia, Petraeus said. "I think in part one reason that al-Sadr's militia has been lying low ... is due to some of the discussions being held," Petraeus said in a telephone interview from Iraq. "It's also in part due to some of the leaders leaving Baghdad" and others being arrested, he said.Full Story Rocket ushers new era for combat tacticsWhen soldiers kicked off the battle in 2005 to retake the insurgent-held Iraqi city of Tal Afar, the assault also began a new era in Army combat tactics. That first precision strike in September 2005 did not come from combat aircraft, as so many other military operations have begun, but from an artillery piece more than 40 miles away from the northern Iraqi city. The U.S. Army that day introduced in combat the Guided Multiple Launch Rocket System, a satellite - directed warhead that is revolutionizing the use of artillery. In a densely packed neighborhood, the GMLRS can - just like a smart bomb - zero in on a single building. It has given Army commanders a whole new option for how to take out a target in what is mostly a war fought in the streets, not on battlefields. Since Tal Afar, which ranks in importance with the retaking of Fallujah in November 2004, the Army has unleashed the GMLRS at a rate of about a dozen volleys a month. Sometimes, what is described by military spokesman as an "air strike" was actually the artillery system's direct hit. It was used, for example, in western Iraq to take out an enemy mortar battery.Full Story Hamas digs in for war in GazaHAMAS is busily fortifying the Gaza Strip with the help of Iranian expertise and funding for what may be the fiercest fighting the embattled enclave has seen. "They're digging bunkers and tunnels 20m underground equipped with airconditioning," retired Israeli intelligence officer Brigadier General Shalom Harari said this week. "That's something the Iranians taught them." Since Israel's withdrawal from Gaza 18 months ago, hundreds of Hamas fighters have gone to Iran for intensive military training sometimes lasting months, according to Shin Bet security service chief Yuval Diskin. Iranian experts have also reportedly reached Gaza. Mr Diskin said on Tuesday that militants last year smuggled more than 30 tonnes of explosives into the Strip, mostly through tunnels from Egypt. According to an Israeli assessment, there are 120,000 automatic weapons in Palestinian hands in the 40km-long strip.Full Story |
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Blackwater Executive Self Security TrainingBlackwater is pleased to announce the launch of the Blackwater Executive Self Security Training course - BESST. This course is designed to assist individuals in establishing and maintaining a clear understanding of their security situation, in avoiding security issues and in properly reacting when potential threats occur. The knowledge and techniques learned in this course are invaluable to the corporate employee or government official who finds themselves on assignment overseas or traveling through potentially hazardous or unstable regions of the world. Taught by world class security and intelligence instructors, the BESST course offers a rapid and effective method to ensure personnel safety anywhere in the world. Please see the attached document for more information on the BESST course. Training Schedule Now Available for Blackwater North
Mount Carroll, IL – Blackwater USA’s newest facility, Blackwater North, is announcing its 2007 training schedule and enrollment instructions through its website. Students are now able to access the website and review a full training schedule and enrollment forms.
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| FRANKS REVIEW |
Service Equipment ReviewNew Products for the LE / Military End User Courtesy of Sgt. Allan GarciaI recently came across some new and innovative products and seminars and I wanted to share them with the readership. I received the new Victorinox/Swiss Army Rescue Tool from the company for testing. The tool is based on their rugged, larger knife frame and includes some excellent force entry equipment for use at a scene of an emergency. The Rescue Tool has been developed by Victorinox in close collaboration with rescue and safety services. It can be operated with gloves and has luminescent handles. Crate opener and one-hand blade can be locked in place through Liner Lock. The Rescue Tool has some slick features such as a replaceable window breaker/punch, and a disc saw for cutting through shatterproof glass. The standard high quality Victorinox/Swiss Army standard is evident throughout the entire construction of the Rescue ToolFull Story Can Be Viewed At: http://www.borelliconsulting.com/evals/other/sogmiscplus.htm Recreational Equipment ReviewThe Pennsylvania Law Enforcement Expo: One Cop's Idea of "A Good Time" Courtesy of Officer Steve ForguesThis last week I had the opportunity to attend the Pennsylvania
Law Enforcement Expo in Harrisburg. Prior to attending the Expo,
I had browsed through the Expo website (www.lawenforcementsecurityexpo.com)
to see what companies would be represented. To my delight, there
was also going to be several Keynote Speakers over the two day event.
Needless to say, there was going to be plenty to drool over. To
start things off was Keynote Speaker, John Giduck. If you're not
familiar with Mr. Giduck, he is the author of Terror at Beslan:
A Russian Tragedy With Lessons for America's Schools. I was really
looking forward to hearing him speak, and I was not disappointed.
If you haven't already heard him speak, I would recommend to everyone,
to do your best and find an event near you where he will be speaking.
He will open your eyes to what is happening
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| CHAPLAINS CORNER |
HEALING... AFTER HORRIBLE INCIDENTS"Officers need to be closer than any family to take care of each other." PoliceOne - Week 324 Volume 3 , PoliceOne Exclusive: A sergeant's worst nightmare... and the healing bond of the "blue family"The above quote came from an article about an on-duty Deputy witnessing his own father's suicide with a shotgun in his mouth. The full story tells of his recovery and return to the job because of the support of his fellow Sheriff's Deputies and an officer from another department. When military personnel are allowed to stay within their units there is also the opportunity for that military family to assist in recovery and restoration... but often this has to be done in a hospital or as an out-patient in a home environment. My week has been spent dealing with education and tragedy. Education while reading and learning... tragedy in memories being relived and in calls for service to help others in crisis. An interesting experience was the receipt of several letters regarding last week's CC message about Fidelity... "Chaplain, I just wanted to say thank you for this article. I didn't expect you to write one concerning this subject, just thought I would put it out there. I hope it helps everyone that may be struggling through infidelity. Thank you again and be safe." Full Story Can Be Viewed At: http://www.blackwaterusa.com/btw2007/article/031907chaplain.htm
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The Blackwater Tactical Weekly is a free weekly e-publication. The BTW provides readers valuable information from diverse sources regarding tactical and strategic security issues. Editor-in-Chief – Gary Jackson (btw@blackwaterusa.com) Questions regarding Security Consulting or Training
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