US to send military advisers to Iraq

[Travel2003]

2 questions:

How many? One advisor for each solder?

and

For how long? Must reach same body count as last time?

[Travel2003]

Thank you George W Bush. Still cleaning up your mess

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O0WUzU-Kxc

[coma]

Thank you George W Bush. Still cleaning up your mess

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O0WUzU-Kxc

[Robby nz]

US military "Advice" in the last few decades does not seem to have led to a lot of peace around the world.

A military is in the fighting business (except in Thailand). Diplomats are in the peace business.

Not sure what business you're in. Hope it doesn't take a lot of smarts.

So called military advice in this instance and in the past, will and has been, given on behalf of the politicians for US armies never go anywhere without the orders from above.

The army here is an exception of course for they had to take over from the remains of a corrupt government who were ruining the country.

If it is the diplomats that are supposed to be promoting peace then those from the US have not preformed well from Vietnam to the present day.

I am not in the business of throwing insults.

[rijb]

US military "Advice" in the last few decades does not seem to have led to a lot of peace around the world.

A military is in the fighting business (except in Thailand). Diplomats are in the peace business.

Not sure what business you're in. Hope it doesn't take a lot of smarts.

So called military advice in this instance and in the past, will and has been, given on behalf of the politicians for US armies never go anywhere without the orders from above.

The army here is an exception of course for they had to take over from the remains of a corrupt government who were ruining the country.

If it is the diplomats that are supposed to be promoting peace then those from the US have not preformed well from Vietnam to the present day.

I am not in the business of throwing insults.

You're still wrong.

Diplomats are trained professionals. They have a difficult job.

The military takes orders from the Commander-in-Chief. They have a difficult job.

Yes, the president is a politician. He has a difficult job.

Politicians think re-election is their number one job. The voters have a difficult job trying not to vote for the idiots.

In summary, the military didn't make the mess, the idiot politicians did.

[Scott]

Off-topic posts removed. Please stay on topic.

[Johpa]

There once was a time when US Army 12 men teams were sent to advise and train groups ranging from insurgent groups to foreign militaries. They were bright young men with linguistic capabilities relevent to a region, who integrated well with both Civil Affairs folks and Psy-Ops to not only train but to also win over the hearts and minds of the trainees. They tended to be a cerebral bunch, graduates of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School, wearers of the "flamimg piss pot". Today all such folks are all attached to JSOC and they all compete to get the same door kicking missions, competing with SEALs and Rangers and even para-military groups. I fear that the US Army has lost their ability to focus upon counter-insurgency tasks after so much of the funding went to counter-terrorism tasks.

[ravip]

US military "Advice" in the last few decades does not seem to have led to a lot of peace around the world.

A military is in the fighting business (except in Thailand). Diplomats are in the peace business.

Not sure what business you're in. Hope it doesn't take a lot of smarts.

And the self appointed "world policeman" is in which business?

[rijb]

Are you asking a question or making a point? Either way, you failed.

[boomerangutang]

If the US hadn't intervened, with the 'Coalition of the Willing' in the first Gulf War, Kuwait would be an Iraqi state. Maybe that's not such a bad thing. Saddam or one his sons (who would have killed the other) would be head executioner in Iraq.

If the US hadn't intervened in the 2nd Gulf War (the one which found no WMD) then Saddam or one of his sons would be head honcho there, similar to above, but without owning Kuwaiti oil fields. Would that be better than what's ensued, which has brought us to the current warlike scenario?

The M.East has had a long history of end-to-end disputes and bloodshed, that it's a constant issue of whether one scenario is worse than the other options. In other words, it's a daisy chain of bad options all around. There are no good solutions, unless everyone there gets a frontal lobotomy and their tubes tied. Every choice becomes a matter of deciding; 'what's worse, option A or options B, C, D, E, F.?' And there aren't really choices for the regular people. Instead, everything which happens on a macro scale HAPPENS TO THEM. The puppet strings are controlled by religion-crazed mafia-like bosses - each with their own little fiefdom and agenda.

[NeverSure]

This is a religious war that won't end in my lifetime.

Let the EU, China and India sort it out. They are the ones that need the oil.

The US has been keeping the sea lanes open... Why?

Send Tony Blair in to fix it.

You posed the same question in a different topic & here's the the same answer you may like to review. I'll be interested to read your or others thoughts.

“Here's What the Battle Over Iraqi Oil Means for America”.

In part to answer your question on why US should/would contribute to trade route security:

“Middle Eastern oil still plays an important role in US policy, says Cordesman. "It is precisely because US security is global. It is not a matter of direct US dependence [on foreign oil]," he said. "Because what really counts is global prices, and what counts is the steady and predictable flow of oil to a global economy​"

http://www.motherjon...ji-oil-fracking

Well first, I don't agree at all with that author's premise. He's writing for one of the nuttiest websites out there. Of course they think that. They are globalists if you happen to agree with that idea. They can't see anything that isn't global.

You asked for an answer. If Iraq or other ME oil were cut off and the US did nothing, the EU, China and India would have to. They depend on that oil. Ironically, Saudi Arabia, Iran and others would have to keep those lanes open or their economies would collapse from lack of sales.

Meanwhile the US could stop spending so much money on international military conflicts, and stop being the world's policeman just as most Europeans keep asking it to do. (Until they are in trouble, of course.)

Seriously, it's time for the EU to step up to the plate as an ally of China and India in defense of their oil supply.

[Credo]

The world police are at again.

I hate the police. They stop from speeding and getting places quickly. They've probably kept from killing myself in an accident or two. They stop drunk drivers and have probably saved countless lives by doing so.

But, like a lot of people, I HATE the police, until I need them.

[simple1]

This is a religious war that won't end in my lifetime.

Let the EU, China and India sort it out. They are the ones that need the oil.

The US has been keeping the sea lanes open... Why?

Send Tony Blair in to fix it.

You posed the same question in a different topic & here's the the same answer you may like to review. I'll be interested to read your or others thoughts.

“Here's What the Battle Over Iraqi Oil Means for America”.

In part to answer your question on why US should/would contribute to trade route security:

“Middle Eastern oil still plays an important role in US policy, says Cordesman. "It is precisely because US security is global. It is not a matter of direct US dependence [on foreign oil]," he said. "Because what really counts is global prices, and what counts is the steady and predictable flow of oil to a global economy​"

http://www.motherjon...ji-oil-fracking

Well first, I don't agree at all with that author's premise. He's writing for one of the nuttiest websites out there. Of course they think that. They are globalists if you happen to agree with that idea. They can't see anything that isn't global.

You asked for an answer. If Iraq or other ME oil were cut off and the US did nothing, the EU, China and India would have to. They depend on that oil. Ironically, Saudi Arabia, Iran and others would have to keep those lanes open or their economies would collapse from lack of sales.

Meanwhile the US could stop spending so much money on international military conflicts, and stop being the world's policeman just as most Europeans keep asking it to do. (Until they are in trouble, of course.)

Seriously, it's time for the EU to step up to the plate as an ally of China and India in defense of their oil supply.

Just my opinion...

I thought the article was spot on with it's point that trade / oil is global, with complex interdependencies. The US major trading partners are dependent on secure ongoing global oil trade. Any downgrades in major trade partner economies due to lack of secure access to energy suppy has a flow on effect to the US. Accordingly in the strategic interest of the US for stable oil supply from the M.E. region.

We will have to agree to differ.

[Morch]

Won't be long now until they start calling in air strikes. Likely targets being ISIS leadership. Public enemy number one Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abu_Bakr_al-Baghdadi

Easier said than done..."decapitation" efforts from the air have a pretty low success rate. The problem with air strikes is that there are few ISIL targets that still still for long. Hence the need for FACs and the ability of drones to loiter.

Also despite the armchair general games, the only solution (as ever) is a political one. The military with or without foreign intervention need only hold the ring and put a lid on the threat long enough for a political solution to be reached...Federal Republic of Iraq anyone?

Also worth mentioning that this is usually a temporary setback, someone else will come along. In addition, having to deal with a fragmented ISIS will not necessarily be much easier.

A political solution would be nice, but with whom? Do the Sunni in Iraq have a widely accepted leadership able to represent them? Will the USA and Iraq's neighbors accept ISIS as a sovereign regime?

While Iraq does seem destined to be split into (at least) three entities, with neighbors making some territorial adjustments, it seems unlikely this would be achieved in a peaceful manner. None of the factions is inclined to make substantial concessions,

and too many outsiders have their own agendas.

[Morch]

If the US hadn't intervened, with the 'Coalition of the Willing' in the first Gulf War, Kuwait would be an Iraqi state. Maybe that's not such a bad thing. Saddam or one his sons (who would have killed the other) would be head executioner in Iraq.

If the US hadn't intervened in the 2nd Gulf War (the one which found no WMD) then Saddam or one of his sons would be head honcho there, similar to above, but without owning Kuwaiti oil fields. Would that be better than what's ensued, which has brought us to the current warlike scenario?

The M.East has had a long history of end-to-end disputes and bloodshed, that it's a constant issue of whether one scenario is worse than the other options. In other words, it's a daisy chain of bad options all around. There are no good solutions, unless everyone there gets a frontal lobotomy and their tubes tied. Every choice becomes a matter of deciding; 'what's worse, option A or options B, C, D, E, F.?' And there aren't really choices for the regular people. Instead, everything which happens on a macro scale HAPPENS TO THEM. The puppet strings are controlled by religion-crazed mafia-like bosses - each with their own little fiefdom and agenda.

Second generation dictators are not always a success story in the Middle East. There is not guarantee Saddam's son could have held the country together, regardless of the Gulf Wars. A more likely outcome, post-Saddam, would have been either an "Arab Spring" like revolt, or something similar to the current situation. Modern Iraq was a work of fiction, and lacking an accepting and benevolent, the existing frictions and divides were bound to materialize sooner or later.

[klikster]

There once was a time when US Army 12 men teams were sent to advise and train groups ranging from insurgent groups to foreign militaries. They were bright young men with linguistic capabilities relevent to a region, who integrated well with both Civil Affairs folks and Psy-Ops to not only train but to also win over the hearts and minds of the trainees. They tended to be a cerebral bunch, graduates of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School, wearers of the "flamimg piss pot". Today all such folks are all attached to JSOC and they all compete to get the same door kicking missions, competing with SEALs and Rangers and even para-military groups. I fear that the US Army has lost their ability to focus upon counter-insurgency tasks after so much of the funding went to counter-terrorism tasks.

I was, once upon a time, a member of one of those teams. Our team, an "A"- Team, deployed to Vietnam to staff a camp in the Central Highlands about 25 km from the Cambodian Border.

FWIW, some of us had very limited linguistic capabilities. Integrate well? Um ..

Bright young men? Many were Korean War vets. Cerebral? I suppose you mean 'smart". Generally we had higher scores that OCS required, but ..

I did graduate from a medical program which drew on training at 3 different Army posts.

Flaming Piss Pot?????? I wore a green beret and if someone had called it a piss-pot he may have just started a fist fight! (depends on how tough he looked)

Don't believe every bit of PR that you may have read back in the day.

[folium]

There once was a time when US Army 12 men teams were sent to advise and train groups ranging from insurgent groups to foreign militaries. They were bright young men with linguistic capabilities relevent to a region, who integrated well with both Civil Affairs folks and Psy-Ops to not only train but to also win over the hearts and minds of the trainees. They tended to be a cerebral bunch, graduates of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School, wearers of the "flamimg piss pot". Today all such folks are all attached to JSOC and they all compete to get the same door kicking missions, competing with SEALs and Rangers and even para-military groups. I fear that the US Army has lost their ability to focus upon counter-insurgency tasks after so much of the funding went to counter-terrorism tasks.

I was, once upon a time, a member of one of those teams. Our team, an "A"- Team, deployed to Vietnam to staff a camp in the Central Highlands about 25 km from the Cambodian Border.

FWIW, some of us had very limited linguistic capabilities. Integrate well? Um ..

Bright young men? Many were Korean War vets. Cerebral? I suppose you mean 'smart". Generally we had higher scores that OCS required, but ..

I did graduate from a medical program which drew on training at 3 different Army posts.

Flaming Piss Pot?????? I wore a green beret and if someone had called it a piss-pot he may have just started a fist fight! (depends on how tough he looked)

Don't believe every bit of PR that you may have read back in the day.

A little while later I had the fortune to spend 2 years working for various BMATTs (British Military Advisory &Training Teams) in Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique. Thus technically served capitalist, socialist and Marxist governments ( in those days Mugabe was well on side, and willing to help out).

The teams were usually 8-16 strong, half SNCOs, half Captains/Majors. All tended to be well experienced, and certainly in my Mozambique team half the officers were graduates of either Oxford or Cambridge and we certainly knew our ZIPRA, from our SWAPO, from our UNITA. We took on the role from the North Koreans and the Mozambicans were amazed that we were apolitical, had no intention of running political indoctrination lessons as the NK guys had done, and once we had trained them up we would be going home.

Thatcher wanted us to bring Mozambique's military into a more professional outfit. So we got on with it. Interesting times!

[Asiantravel]

ISIS found and the promptly executed Rauf Rashid Abd al-Rahman, the judge who sentenced Saddam to death

[Chicog]

Thank you George W Bush. Still cleaning up your mess

*Deleted post edited out*

You're forgetting that their support was based on a fabricated premise that Saddam was a threat to the region.

We know now that the opposite was true (some of us always knew).

Sent from my SM-N900T using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

[kamahele]

Saddam did invade Kuwait during Bush's father's presidency and we drove him back to Iraq. George W Bush invaded Iraq under the pretense that there were weapons of mass destruction, which there were not. While Saddam was a tyrant, we do know there were no terrorist organizations in Iraq until the US invaded

Sent from my iPhone using Thaivisa Connect Thailand

[Scott]

Off-topic, inflammatory posts and replies deleted.

[Morch]

Thank you George W Bush. Still cleaning up your mess

*Deleted post edited out*

You're forgetting that their support was based on a fabricated premise that Saddam was a threat to the region.

We know now that the opposite was true (some of us always knew).

Sent from my SM-N900T using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

Saddam was certainly a threat to the region, but probably more of a conventional regional threat, rather than the global WMD threat he was marketed to the media. You could say he was a stabilizing factor as far as Iraq goes, though.

Also, this assessment was relevant to the Gulf Wars era - had they not taken place, Saddam could well have developed to be a greater threat than he actually was. That is not said as any kind of justification for the Gulf Wars, more of a hindsight observation.

[Johpa]

There once was a time when US Army 12 men teams were sent to advise and train groups ranging from insurgent groups to foreign militaries. They were bright young men with linguistic capabilities relevent to a region, who integrated well with both Civil Affairs folks and Psy-Ops to not only train but to also win over the hearts and minds of the trainees. They tended to be a cerebral bunch, graduates of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School, wearers of the "flamimg piss pot". Today all such folks are all attached to JSOC and they all compete to get the same door kicking missions, competing with SEALs and Rangers and even para-military groups. I fear that the US Army has lost their ability to focus upon counter-insurgency tasks after so much of the funding went to counter-terrorism tasks.

I was, once upon a time, a member of one of those teams. Our team, an "A"- Team, deployed to Vietnam to staff a camp in the Central Highlands about 25 km from the Cambodian Border.

FWIW, some of us had very limited linguistic capabilities. Integrate well? Um ..

Bright young men? Many were Korean War vets. Cerebral? I suppose you mean 'smart". Generally we had higher scores that OCS required, but ..

I did graduate from a medical program which drew on training at 3 different Army posts.

Flaming Piss Pot?????? I wore a green beret and if someone had called it a piss-pot he may have just started a fist fight! (depends on how tough he looked)

Don't believe every bit of PR that you may have read back in the day.

I can't speak about early teams in Vietnam, most of my experience with SF folks was during the early 1980s up in Chiang Mai where the ODA teams came in twice a year to teach up north and would hang out in a bar favored by the free lance teachers like myself. None of the guys I met from the 1st of the 1st, then based in Okinawa, tried to appear as tough or ever seemed to be looking for a fight. They were all easy going and just there to enjoy the comraderie and the music and perhaps because the local "hostess" bars had informally become off-limits for some reason they were reluctant to divulge. Everyone one of those guys were conversant in at least one language of Southeast Asia. The "flaming piss pot" does not refer to the green beret but to the symbol on the shoulder patch of the JFK ("Swick") School, a patch you would not likely to have seen worn in-country in Vietnam unless you had turned into a Kurtz. And, my primary point being, that at that time the primary emphasis was counter-insurgency and not counter-terrorism. Today I read in all the media of the focus on counter-terrorism and ignoring the reality that ISIS is an organized insurgency group that may use terror as a tactic but is most definitely not some small terrorist cell. I do hope to find other people cerebral enough to appreciate that not very subtle difference.

[folium]

Thank you George W Bush. Still cleaning up your mess

*Deleted post edited out*

You're forgetting that their support was based on a fabricated premise that Saddam was a threat to the region.

We know now that the opposite was true (some of us always knew).

Sent from my SM-N900T using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

Re the " fabricated premise that Saddam was a threat to the region"... You may find that Israel (1948, 1967, 1973, 1981 and 1991), Iran (1980-88) and Kuwait (1990-91) would strongly disagree with your viewpoint.

Also the regional threat that Saddam posed in 1990 would explain the fact that, unlike 2003 with its lonely US/UK participants in the invasion, the 1991 land war saw 34 nations take part, including 9 fellow Arab states.

Whether Saddam was a threat beyond the region is far more debatable, and with the apparent non-existence of WMD or any material links with AQ, perhaps he never was..

Edited June 22, 2014 by folium

[folium]

There once was a time when US Army 12 men teams were sent to advise and train groups ranging from insurgent groups to foreign militaries. They were bright young men with linguistic capabilities relevent to a region, who integrated well with both Civil Affairs folks and Psy-Ops to not only train but to also win over the hearts and minds of the trainees. They tended to be a cerebral bunch, graduates of the JFK Special Warfare Center and School, wearers of the "flamimg piss pot". Today all such folks are all attached to JSOC and they all compete to get the same door kicking missions, competing with SEALs and Rangers and even para-military groups. I fear that the US Army has lost their ability to focus upon counter-insurgency tasks after so much of the funding went to counter-terrorism tasks.

I was, once upon a time, a member of one of those teams. Our team, an "A"- Team, deployed to Vietnam to staff a camp in the Central Highlands about 25 km from the Cambodian Border.

FWIW, some of us had very limited linguistic capabilities. Integrate well? Um ..

Bright young men? Many were Korean War vets. Cerebral? I suppose you mean 'smart". Generally we had higher scores that OCS required, but ..

I did graduate from a medical program which drew on training at 3 different Army posts.

Flaming Piss Pot?????? I wore a green beret and if someone had called it a piss-pot he may have just started a fist fight! (depends on how tough he looked)

Don't believe every bit of PR that you may have read back in the day.

I can't speak about early teams in Vietnam, most of my experience with SF folks was during the early 1980s up in Chiang Mai where the ODA teams came in twice a year to teach up north and would hang out in a bar favored by the free lance teachers like myself. None of the guys I met from the 1st of the 1st, then based in Okinawa, tried to appear as tough or ever seemed to be looking for a fight. They were all easy going and just there to enjoy the comraderie and the music and perhaps because the local "hostess" bars had informally become off-limits for some reason they were reluctant to divulge. Everyone one of those guys were conversant in at least one language of Southeast Asia. The "flaming piss pot" does not refer to the green beret but to the symbol on the shoulder patch of the JFK ("Swick") School, a patch you would not likely to have seen worn in-country in Vietnam unless you had turned into a Kurtz. And, my primary point being, that at that time the primary emphasis was counter-insurgency and not counter-terrorism. Today I read in all the media of the focus on counter-terrorism and ignoring the reality that ISIS is an organized insurgency group that may use terror as a tactic but is most definitely not some small terrorist cell. I do hope to find other people cerebral enough to appreciate that not very subtle difference.

Without getting into a knotted discussion of semantics ( rather than the software firm, Symantec), concerning the definitions of terrorism and insurgency, I attach a short explanatory piece.

http://www.e-ir.info/2010/12/21/what-is-the-difference-between-counter-insurgency-and-counter-terrorism/

In essence "terrorism" is a strategy that can be used by insurgents. Not all "terrorists" can be classified as insurgents, for instance folk such as McVeigh or Brievik are terrorists not insurgents, whatever they might like to think.

Thus the military is usually involved in counter-insurgency, while countering individual/small groups of radicals is normally a police operation, which may call on military assets if required. ISIL, PIRA, Taliban, ETA, Eastern Ukrainians are all insurgents that use terrorism as one of their MOs.

To truly combat insurgency though requires far more than just a military response as, like all forms of warfare, it has a political origin and thus can only have a political conclusion if the aim is to achieve a long-term resolution to the conflict.

Edited June 22, 2014 by folium