by Tom Clancy
14
The same was true of the enemy. Something like eighty-five percent of contacts were initiated by the VC or NVA. They always tried to fight on their own terms and to refuse battle whenever it wasn’t to their advantage to engage.
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Clausewitz’s term for the key capability of a combatant. Without it, he loses.
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The senior adviser stayed with the battalion commander, but the junior adviser had to be out in the field where the fighting was.
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Later, I got chewed out again for “letting him go out toward the east,” but I explained again that I’d told him not to go out that way. Nothing more came of the incident.
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This fine U.S. Army captain was later killed in action.
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19
The rest of the Marine battalion caught up with us later the first day.
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Normally, a grenade can be lobbed about forty meters. Earlier during the Vietnam War, units had been equipped with the M-79 grenade launcher, which the troops called “the Blooper,” which lobbed a grenade about 150 meters. The Super-Blooper had an even greater range and a drum full of grenades that could be cranked out in a stream. This gave units the capability of covering with bursts of grenades an area between that covered by the 60-millimeter mortar and the M-79. It jammed often and was experimental when the Pacifiers got it. The flamethrower was a multishot — four cylinders in a boxlike frame.
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21
Kit Carson Scouts were former VC who’d come over to our side. After an indoctrination program, they were assigned to units operating in areas where they had operated as VC.
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22
The enemy didn’t have a code of conduct as Americans do; there was no “name, rank, serial number” kind of thing. It was simply assumed that everything they knew was compromised. Some VC and NVA proved to be open; others were harder to crack. Though Loi gave us a lot of information, we could tell that he was having a hard time deciding where his actual loyalties lay; and there were times when his wavering proved to be tense-making.
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23
Any who survived were put in reeducation camps and not released for many years. When Zinni’s friend Hoa and his old battalion commander Tri were finally released, they were allowed to come to the States with their families.
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Zinni learned later that eighty-five American cars, mainly military police cars, were burned that night during the communist attacks on U.S. posts around Koza.
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Called MOSs — Military Occupation Specialties.
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26
DeCosta later took Zinni under his wing. “While you’re on this island,” he told Zinni, “you can be like all the other Marines and just go out to town and see it as one big bar. Or else you can begin to take in a whole other culture. I’d be glad to take you around and be your guide.” DeCosta took Zinni to places few other Americans ever knew — to geisha houses… real geisha houses, not houses of prostitution. He took him to historical sites. He introduced him to Okinawan families and his many Okinawan friends — many of them martial arts experts, who introduced Zinni to the nonphysical side to martial arts… its mental and “spiritual” aspects. Zinni of course found all this fascinating.
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Because of the post-Vietnam shortage of manpower, many units had been stood down in what was called “cadre status,” with no troops and just a few caretaker administrators to maintain unit records and equipment. As the months went by, the Marine Corps refilled their ranks.
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28
The Marine Corps had a Cold War commitment to deploy to Norway, above the Arctic Circle, in the event that the Cold War turned hot.
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29
In those days, Marine Special Operations meant something different from what it has come to mean today. These were operations in harsh environments like mountains, deserts, or the Arctic.
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30
The augmentation program made regular officers out of young reserve officers deciding to make the Marines a career. This was a very tough competition, given the few slots that were available.
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31
Interestingly, even the Army is now starting to abandon their heavy forces. Smart ordnance is making tanks obsolete.
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32
During the next years, the Marines demonstrated in several major European exercises that they could indeed successfully “mech up” and hold their own in a highly mechanized battle space.
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The actual choice is made by a selection board, but the procedure is for the commandant to personally notify all the selected colonels.
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Regulation required new general officers to have a joint tour of duty as a first assignment if they did not have a previous joint tour.
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Later expanded to include new “flag-level” State Department and intelligence professionals.
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NATO has recently taken on a major role in Afghanistan.
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The Russian gave Zinni an excellent biography in English of Marshal Zhukov, which Zinni later read with pleasure.
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These problems remain.
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39
Western fears of a military coup in Russia weren’t totally misplaced. There were crazy generals running loose on the peripheries of the military. Some of them had gotten elected to the Duma, the parliament. And some took part in the attempt to unseat President Yeltsin in 1991 (giving him his unforgettable photo op on the tank). But there weren’t many of these crazies, and they were too ineffective to have become much of a real threat.
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The first Vlad the Impaler, a Hungarian nobleman who lived centuries ago, is thought to be an inspiration for Count Dracula.
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Poland, Hungary, and Romania.
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42
For more on this story, see Tom Clancy’s Into the Storm.
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EUCOM’s Air Force component, U.S. Air Forces Europe.
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44
Southeastern Turkey is largely Kurdish, and a significant part of this Kurdish majority wants to join their brothers in the Kurdish portions of Iran, Iraq, and Syria in a unified Kurdish state — Kurdistan. In Turkey Kurds have frequently signaled their separatist intentions by means of guerrilla insurrections and terrorist acts.
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Tangney, as a lieutenant general, was later the commander of the U.S. Army Special Operations Command.
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46
This story is told more fully in Tom Clancy’s Shadow Warriors, chapter 14, “The Face of the Future.”
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47
Both leaders maintained ongoing negotiations with Saddam during our relief operation. At one point, Barzani asked for advice about what to settle for that the U.S. might support. He never got an answer from us — in my view, a serious missed opportunity.
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48
Teams from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) came in to help.
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49
DART, which operates out of the U.S. Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA), is a civilian agency whose mission is to assess and handle for
eign humanitarian relief. They send out teams to make on-the-ground evaluations, and they coordinate with other government agencies and civilian contractors. Dayton Maxwell was a senior-level professional with the OFDA.
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He was recalled back to Baghdad toward the end of our initial operation. We heard he was executed for plotting against Saddam.
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51
We had twelve casualties from land mines, which littered the area and were a constant source of concern both for our troops and the local Kurds. The operation ended up costing the Coalition seven dead and 130 injured from a variety of causes.
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One big reason they don’t trust the militaries: They’re used to trying to fix the disasters that result from militaries in conflict.
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This was the base used in 1948 for the Berlin Airlift; it therefore had an ironic and historic significance.
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Toward the end of Provide Hope, much effort was put into the problem of stabilizing the ruble.
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The Marine counterpart to the Army’s Training and Doctrine Command (TRADOC).
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The son of a legendary Marine general.
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57
In the military, the chief of staff is something like a civilian chairman of a board of directors. He’s the senior man on the staff who pulls together all its sections — administration, operations, logistics, planning, etc. He’s also third in command after the commander and his deputy.
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58
In the military, the chief of staff is something like a civilian chairman of a board of directors. He’s the senior man on the staff who pulls together all its sections — administration, operations, logistics, planning, etc. He’s also third in command after the commander and his deputy.
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59
Aideed was a highly intelligent man, Western-educated and Western-trained militarily, but also cunning, violent, and brutal. After rising to the rank of general in Siad Barre’s army, he had turned against Barre and then had been imprisoned for seven years. After his release and “rehabilitation,” Barre made him Somalia’s ambassador to India, to get him out of the way. He turned against Barre again after his return.
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Operation Provide Relief was absorbed by Operation Restore Hope in February 1993.
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61
Newbold had a distinguished career in the Marine Corps, and retired as a lieutenant general.
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There was also a Pakistani battalion already in Mogadishu under UNOSOM I, but they were largely ineffective, with neither sufficient forces nor mandate to make a significant impact.
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Oakley and Hirsch have written the best account so far of recent events in Somalia in their book, Somalia and Operation Restore Hope (United States Institute of Peace Press, 1995).
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Oakley and Hirsch have written the best account so far of recent events in Somalia in their book, Somalia and Operation Restore Hope (United States Institute of Peace Press, 1995).
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I later added a ninth HRS as our forces increased.
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That is, the collection of weapons in secure locations.
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The Mogadishu airport was their base.
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The nonlethal issue stuck with me. After I returned from Somalia, there has been a major effort to develop more sophisticated capabilities. And over the years, I have been called to testify before several congressional committees and attend numerous conferences and study groups on this subject.
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69
Annan is a tremendously impressive human being, with a rare intellect and the common sense to handle the most complex situations. His selection as UN Secretary-General was a splendid choice — and a much-needed change.
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70
Zinni was replacing General Butch Neal, one of his oldest, closest friends in the Corps. After extensive experience in CENTCOM (three tours of duty in the command), General Neal had been selected for promotion and assignment as the assistant commandant of the Marine Corps.
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71
Units that were not based permanently in the region but which rotated in and out from other U.S. bases.
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72
Facilities operated jointly with the local governments.
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73
Just as the term implies, we help other nations improve their security situation by improving their military and security forces.
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74
The current Bush administration has seriously limited the powers of the CINCs; and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, who has a passion for centralized control, has changed their name. They are no longer CINCs; they’re “Combatant Commanders.”
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75
Some journalists have accused the CINCs of becoming the proconsuls of this new American empire. This opinion is flattering, but far from the truth. Dana Priest has developed this point of view very well in her interesting and provocative book The Mission.
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There were hundreds of these military and civilian personnel in the CENTCOM AOR — all worth their weight in gold to the CINCs. They administered the extensive programs of military assistance to the friendly countries in the region. They coordinated and administered foreign military sales, military exercises, military school attendance, training, and other cooperative efforts with local militaries. Along with the military attachés at American embassies, they provided the CINCs and diplomats with a vital link to local leaders. They were the day-to-day connections to the local militaries, and were an invaluable means of communications to the military and political leadership in the various countries. The job they do has never been valued by superiors, and promotions for those in the military have never come easy.