A former Marine officer applies Ramadi lessons learned to the fight for Afghanistan – “Step one is showing up.”
We’d better hurry up.
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5 comments to Lessons Learned |
Targets of Opportunityblog advertising is good for you Credo"Sign on, young man, and sail with me. The stature of our homeland is no more than the measure of ourselves. Our job is to keep her free. Our will is to keep the torch of freedom burning for all. To this solemn purpose we call on the young, the brave, the strong, and the free. Heed my call, Come to the sea. Come Sail with me." -- John Paul Jones "Pardon him, Theodotus; he is a barbarian, and thinks that the customs of his tribe and island are the laws of nature" --George Bernard Shaw, "Caesar and Cleopatra" "And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music."--Friedrich Nietzsche "A kind Providence has placed in our breasts a hatred of the unjust and cruel, in order that we may preserve ourselves from cruelty and injustice. They who bear cruelty, are accomplices in it. The pretended gentleness which excludes that charitable rancour, produces an indifference which is half an approbation. They never will love where they ought to love, who do not hate where they ought to hate."--Edmund Burke "Μολὼν λαβέ" -- Leonidas "Blogito Ergo Sum" -- Neptunus Lex For the Effort!Subscribe Tagsafghanistan AGW army Blogging buffoonery china culture economy Flying Friday Musings geopol Gratuitous slap GWOT Headlines health care History iran iraq issues Media Memory Lane Military Navy norks Oz pakistan piracy politicians politics Politics and Culture pundits Russia science sea stories silliness Small Stuff SoCal sport Tech Lust technology UAVs UK usaf usmc weapons WP Cumulus Flash tag cloud by Roy Tanck and Luke Morton requires Flash Player 9 or better. Categories |
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Good reading. And sorta OT on LL: I just was reading back in a blog I found and there was a long article on the V-22. Might be good fodder round these parts, since StormBringer looks like a newbie with some good stuff. With all the expertise and flight hours on this blog, I suspect the discussion wil lget very interesting, too.
I guess my comments about the Tribes that I made down-thread under “Still Seriously Dead” would apply here equally–if not better–as well.
The Marine Captain should be careful with the facts before giving the perception that the Pennslyvania National Guard heavy brigade was derelict in doing its mission in Ramadi in ’05 and ’06. I find the captain’s assertion disingenuous at worst and misinformed at best.
One of those ARNG heavy task forces was RIP’d by elements of 6 different battalions to cover the same area with the same mission, a significant disproportion in relative combat power between the outgoing and the incoming units. It was a case of too many bad guys in one area and insufficent force to clean them out. The insinuation the Marine Captain makes that these soldiers refused to engage the AQI in Ramadi rhymes with bullshit.
Tomorrow, I am going to share his piece with several officers, company commanders, platoon leaders, and TF primary staff officers, and NCOS who were there, including one of the heavy task force commanders. I am sure they will have some strong opinions of the Marine junior officer’s accessment of their performance. That ARNG Brigade bled plenty in the performance of their duty. And they bled with and for their active component Marine brothers in that AOR. They never balked at rolling up AQI and insurgents when it was their AOR right up to the point to the TOA. The son of one of my best friends was killed trying move across multiple canals, out of sector, to get his mounted patrol to a downed Marine Cobra crew. Marines died with these Guardsmen too.
Another fact, it was one of the ARNG task forces that first forged an alliance with one of the Sunni tribes in Ramadi. Some of theise tribal sheiks were brought over to visit Washington by the State Dept. I have met the Sheik here in the US as he asked to visit the former TF commander and soldiers in their home state and it was granted. The captain better get the facts before slandering someone’s reputation.
I’m pretty sure I never slandered the performance of our Guardsmen in Ramadi. I’m simply pointing out the fact that the southern side of the city had no coalition presence: affording the enemy a safe haven. We also exerted no control over southern Ramadi during this time, not by choice, but because of a lack of comabt power.
[...] people on a one-on-one basis. As Tom Daly wrote in his guest post “Lessons from Ramadi”—which Neptunus Lex also pointed out to his readers (Thanks, Lex!)—“step one is showing [...]