Table of Contents

Hack's Target For The Week:

Rumsfeld Was Right to Cancel the Crusader

By David H. Hackworth

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld killed the Crusader artillery system early last week with his usual no-nonsense style.

The porkers immediately shot back: No way would that happen to the military-industrial-congressional complex's top gun, designed to stop the dreaded Soviet hordes as they gallop toward Paris.

Oklahoma Sen. James Inhofe - in whose state the system would be assembled - fired first and inaccurately when he called the obsolete $11 billion system the "crown jewel of our Army modernization program."

Another Oklahoman, Rep. J.C. Watts Jr., followed up with the threat that Rummy's "unilateral and misguided decision regarding (the) Crusader will be resisted by Congress." He carried on about how the Pentagon generals swear the 40-ton cannon is required to protect the "troops on the ground," a standard obfuscation for pork. We can assume he was referring to the same American troops facing a mean enemy in Afghanistan without even one U.S. cannon!

Before the week ended, the Watts gang in the House had approved the biggest lard-laden defense budget in my memory, which, coincidence of all coincidences, included almost half a billion dollars for the Crusader.

Inhofe, Watts and the other congressional Crusader crusaders get their advice from the same generals who cash in when they retire by going to work for the weapons makers. Few of these pols would know a cannon from the south end of a mule heading north - none has served on the ground in combat, and most haven't even bothered to wear a soldier suit. They're all worked up because if Rummy has his way, billions of dollars will stop flowing into their states to cover the friends who fund their election campaigns. Not to mention the loss of jobs for the good folks who'll be showing their gratitude at the polls when it's time to vote.

Unlike the super-slickies desperately seeking the new gear, I spent five years as a cannon-cocker, and more than three of these as an artillery battery commander. Granted, I was a recycled grunt, but I did accumulate a fair amount of knowledge about what makes artillery tick. No question, the push-button Crusader - with a crew of only three soldiers who run the system from a Star Wars-like command center - is a real wonder weapon, by far the most advanced automatic artillery system in the world. A rapid-firing, self-propelled cannon that blasts shells 31 miles away, it does everything but salute and fire at the same time.

Against the Nazis, Soviets or similar past powerful ground opponents on a European battlefield, it easily would be the King of Battle. But the robotic Crusader is too heavy to be flown to today's far-flung killing fields and simply doesn't fit into what's needed down the track: a lighter, more agile and far more mobile Army ready to fight the real wars of the future.

Since the killing game has changed so drastically, the Crusader would only end up decorating gun parks at forts everywhere when not on display at country fairs, where citizens could touch and wonder at the gold-plated toy that ripped off their tax dollars.

The system should go. The $9 billion saved should be spent for the right stuff to really defend our nation and really protect our soldiers.

We could start by equipping our warriors with a replacement for the piece of Beretta pistol junk that jams almost when you look at it. They also sorely need a new rifle, boot, flak jacket, web gear and a mechanized system to lighten their load. If the pols pushed away from the pork table, went out in field and checked out what our kids have to use while fighting for our country, they'd find out in a hurry that they now go into battle with basically the same kit their fathers and grandfathers wore and toted in Vietnam.

George W. Bush said he'd veto any effort to stop the slaying of the Crusader - which happens to be built by Texas-connected United Defense. Looks like we might soon have a brave president taking on an extremely aggressive weapons-making cartel that employs another George Bush, who just happens to be his old man.

Now that takes rare moral courage.

http://www.hackworth.com is the address of David Hackworth's home page, and he can be reached at teagles@hackworth.com. Send mail to P.O. Box 11179, Greenwich, CT 06831.

© 2002 David H. Hackworth

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

FROM THE EDITOR:

This War Will Dwarf All That Has Gone Before

By Ed Offley

Somewhere in the last few months, the prospect of the United States organizing a massive military campaign targeted on the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq has gone from a definite "if" to a steadily-hardening "when."

Given the relative ease with which the U.S. military toppled the Taliban regime in Afghanistan - as well as the fragmentary and under-reported accounts of problems U.S. units encountered in combat against al Qaeda holdouts in the remote Afghan mountains - the public reaction of another front opening up in the war against terrorism has been remarkably muted.

But military people know better: An Operation Desert Storm II, particularly one whose goal is to destroy Saddam Hussein and his regime and - presumably - mount an occupation of Iraq so that a stable and responsible successor government might appear, is a wartime mission that dwarfs the combat to date in Afghanistan. It also presents a set of both political and military challenges that the United States and its coalition partners intentionally side-stepped in 1991.

As you can read in the excellent set of articles we are publishing today in our Special Report: Target Iraq, the stakes will be far greater should the Bush administration indeed follow up on the president's stern rhetoric and begin deploying combat forces to Southwest Asia in anticipation of invading Iraq.

For one, it remains unknown how Iraq's geographic neighbors will respond to preliminary U.S. moves to stage forces - anywhere from 70,000-150,000 personnel, according to Pentagon sources - on their territory months before an actual attack could begin. All governments in the region recall Saddam's attempt to widen the conflict by launching Scud missiles at Israel in his attempt to provoke an Israeli counter-strike that would have wrecked the fragile U.S.-Arab coalition. Contributing Editor Andrea West focuses on this concealed but vital issue.

A second challenge concerns the possibility that the Iraqi dictator - confronted by an attack aimed at killing him or driving him from power - will not hesitate to use the chemical and biological weapons that outside experts know he has developed. This will create the likely scenario for mass civilian casualties as well as a much more deadly fight than our troops experienced a decade ago. Contributing Editor John M. Szelog has written a sobering analysis that raises the possibility many of our units are unprepared for combat in an environment contaminated by NBC weapons.

A third complication involves the U.S. military itself, already seriously overstretched after a decade of massive force cuts and eight years of an administration all too happy to tolerate the erosion of unit morale and combat readiness by a never-ending list of peacekeeping missions. This topic, which sometimes seems to be a subtext of every military news story, is addressed in terms of war with Iraq by Contributing Editor Paul Connors.

The most difficult issue confronting any president who opts to send his nation's armed forces to war stems from a two-word question: "What next?" Contributing editor Patrick Hayes illustrates the grave dilemma confronting the Bush administration today by the extreme difficulties and incredible costs in lives and money that would begin after a U.S. military success against Iraq.

Contributing Editor Robert G. Williscroft identifies a little-regarded challenge to both the ongoing war against al Qaeda and a potential clash with Iraq: The success of radical news media organizations in the region, particularly Al Jazeera television, to enflame public opinion against the United States and Israel constitutes a separate "information war" that we have yet to effectively fight - and must confront as part of our strategy to win both a war with Iraq and secure postwar stability in the Middle East.

But does this justify continuing the Clinton administration's appeasement policies toward Iraq? DefenseWatch Deputy Editor J. David Galland offers a compelling argument that the United States - having been attacked by murderous terrorists on 9-11 - simply cannot afford to allow Saddam Hussein to succeed in developing weapons of mass destruction and the means to threaten other nations with them, for that would transform his regime from a regional nuisance to a global threat.

Given the "tyranny of distance" involved in moving units from the United States to Southwest Asia, it will take many months for the Bush administration to organize and deploy a Central Command fighting force capable of overthrowing the Iraqi regime. But with Operation Desert Storm I as a model, it means that the planning is probably already underway.

It also means that the time is now for the Bush administration to take its case against Iraq to the American people.

We at DefenseWatch hope that this Special Report will serve as a catalyst for your own thoughts and discussions concerning a matter of the gravest importance to our nation, and especially to the men and women who will find themselves ordered into combat.

Ed Offley is Editor of DefenseWatch. He can be reached at dweditor@yahoo.com.

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

ARTICLE 01

The Case For War Against Iraq Has Been Made

By J. David Galland

Four months ago, President George W. Bush in his State of the Union Address asserted that Iraq, Iran and North Korea were countries that comprised an "axis of evil" for their attempts to develop weapons of mass destruction and support of international terrorist groups.

As events have continued to unfold in the ongoing war against terrorism, it has become clear that this was no rhetorical gesture by the president: His speech on Jan. 29, 2002, clearly outlined the reasons why the United States is slowly gearing up for an all-out war with Iraq in the months ahead.

This was the key passage in the president's speech:

Currently, the United States maintains limited but ongoing diplomatic relations with Iran and North Korea, but in the case of Iraq, diplomacy is dead. In fact, you can argue that we remain in a state of war with Baghdad that regularly erupts when his army attempts to shoot down our aircraft patrolling the no-fly zones, and we retaliate with attacks on missile sites and radar stations.

Some political analysts initially faulted Bush's tactic to lump the three regimes into an "axis" solely because of their similar efforts to create WMD and delivery systems - after all, Iran and Iraq themselves fought a bitter war during 1980-88 - but such criticism missed a key point. In making America's case against Iraq, Bush revealed his intentions to stand firm, and discarded the Clinton administration's eight-year "containment" policy on Iraq that failed to prevent Saddam's ongoing WMD efforts.

It is unnecessary today for the United States to justify decisive military action against Iraq by digging up new evidence regarding Iraqi WMD programs or to "prove" a suspected link between 9-11 hijacking ringleader Mohammad Atta and an Iraqi intelligence officer in Czechoslovakia. What we already know about Saddam Hussein and his brutal regime is justification enough.

President Bush accurately summarized Washington's position in articulating four key points that define the increasing threat to the United States and our allies posed by the current regime in Iraq. They constitute the justification for the use of devastating military action against Saddam Hussein, his dictatorial Ba'ath Party and the Iraqi military machine.

First, Iraq a decade after its military defeat in the Persian Gulf War continues to be an active state sponsor of terrorism. While direct links to al Qaeda and the 9-11 attacks remain elusive, Saddam and his regime do support other murderous terror groups such as the Palestinian militant organization, Hamas.

Even analysts who currently oppose a U.S. military invasion to depose Saddam - on grounds of probable high casualties and increased regional tensions as a result - warn that confirmation of direct Iraqi support for terrorism against the United States would justify a full invasion with the goal of overthrowing the Iraqi regime.

But we should not forget that Saddam has already done so in the recent past. In 1993, Iraqi intelligence agents tried to assassinate former President George H.W. Bush during a visit to Kuwait. Confronted by irrefutable evidence of this plot, President Clinton was forced to react and ordered a cruise missile strike on Iraqi intelligence headquarters. And experts say Iraq continues to harbor a number of terrorists who attacked American targets during our involvement in Lebanon in the early 1980s, including the infamous Abu Nidal.

Washington accuses Iraq of sponsoring and training groups on its "terrorist list," and in the post-9-11 era, this alone justifies massive military retaliation.

Second, the United States has accused the Iraqi regime of plotting the development of anthrax, nerve gas, and nuclear weapons for over a decade despite its formal agreement in the Gulf War cease-fire agreement to halt all such efforts. Both American and British leaders argue that an Iraq armed with weapons of mass destruction poses a threat, not just to the region, but to the entire world.

A U.S. State Department report published in early 1998 asserted that Iraq still had the potential to develop WMD, concluding that "enough production components and data remain hidden and enough expertise has been retained or developed to enable Iraq to resume development and production of WMD." The report added, that Iraq had maintained "a small force of Scud-type missiles, a small stockpile of chemical and biological munitions, and the capability to quickly resurrect biological and chemical weapons production." It also noted Baghdad's well-known interest in acquiring or developing nuclear weapons.

This was further underscored by a UN report published in March 2001 that asserted Iraq still had chemical and biological weapons, as well as the delivery systems to launch them at targets in other countries.

As recently as last week, an American diplomat informed me, off the record, that photographs taken by our photoreconnaissance satellites reveal that trucks, imported into Iraq from other countries ostensibly for civilian purposes, have been converted into mobile missile launchers.

Third, the Iraqi regime in a military campaign known as the Anfal (or spoils, in Arabic) against the Kurdish population in the late 1980s, murdered countless thousands of men, women and children with chemical warfare agents, including mustard gas and sarin. Iraq evaded major retaliation for this because it occurred at a time when Iraq was considered an ally of the United States and Great Britain during its war with Iran. The best estimate is that Saddam ordered the deaths of between 70,000 and 150,000 Kurds in 1989, including approximately 5,000 killed with chemical agents.

Separately, the Iraqi regime forcibly relocated roughly 150,000 Marsh Arabs from southern Iraq by draining the marshes in which they lived.

Fourth, it is clear that the United States can justify a military campaign against Iraq for Baghdad's deliberate violation of the March 3, 1991 cease-fire agreement.

The United Nations weapons inspection program in Iraq - a key element of the cease-fire accord - was forced to shut down in December 1998 after years of operation. Even while the inspections were going on, Iraqi officials continuously harassed and blocked their efforts and interfered with monitoring equipment.

Iraq's attempt to justify expelling the inspectors on grounds they were serving as spies for Washington and Great Britain was laughable, given the overwhelming evidence of ongoing WMD production efforts there. After UNSCOM's withdrawal, they were replaced by UNMOVIC, (the U.N. Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission) which has not even been allowed into the country.

And after four years of intensive inspections, U.N. inspectors did not even discover Iraq's biological weapons program until they got a tip from Saddam's son-in-law, Hussein Kamel al-Majid, who defected to Jordan in 1995.

Given Saddam Hussein's proven track record of ruthless aggression against his own people and neighboring states (Iran, Israel and Kuwait), his confirmed role in the attempted assassination of former President Bush, and the overwhelming evidence of his desire and efforts to acquire chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, it would be folly for the United States to allow what is now a regional menace to become a genuine threat to the entire world.

Sometime in the months ahead, it is likely that President Bush will once again address the nation to announce that the U.S. military has begun combat operations for the purpose of removing Saddam Hussein from his murderous grip on power in Iraq. When that day comes, I anticipate that the president will repeat a telling line from his State of the Union Address on Jan. 29, 2002: "The price of indifference would be catastrophic."

J. David Galland, Deputy Editor of DefenseWatch, is a retired veteran of over thirty years of service in military intelligence who resides in Germany. He can be reached at defensewatch02@yahoo.com.

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

ARTICLE 02

Victory Is Possible - But Then What?

By Patrick Hayes

Revolts, insurrections, terrorism, riots and anti-government activity. A military that lacks the discipline of its forbearers, is poorly trained, ill-equipped, ill-led, and is stretched to its limits, as are the nation's coffers. These are signs of decay and weakness.

Sound familiar? It ought to, but this is not the current situation facing the United States, even though it could easily be. This is the situation in which a corrupt and weakened Roman Empire found itself on the eve of the battle of Andrianople in 378 - a battle that marked the beginning of the end of the glory that was Rome.

Over 1,600 years later, the United States prepares for battle again. Following one of the most brutal terrorist attacks in history, President George W. Bush last fall declared a war against terrorism wherever it exists. In so doing, he ordered a weakened, Clintonized, politically-correct U.S. military to respond quickly and decisively to close with and defeat the enemy - anywhere that enemy could be located. So far, our primary military campaign in Afghanistan has succeeded in scattering al Qaeda into the boondocks, but in a strict military sense we have not yet won.

That was the opening gambit, cloaked in absolutist rhetoric. However, on the current chessboard, black is not pure black and white is not pure white. Much of the action is in the gray area of shadows, rumor and sudden death. But now, the battle for which we are suddenly preparing is not with a global network of homicidal terrorists, but rather with Saddam Hussein's Iraq.

Here is the major question that must be asked, and answered truthfully: Is the United States prepared and capable to do this?

Left to his own devices by his neighbors and fellow Arabs since Operation Desert Storm 11 years ago, Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein has been busy buying himself back into favor with his Arab brothers. At the price of $25,000 a head, he has rewarded the families of innumerable suicidal/homicidal Palestinian terrorists who murdered men, women and children in Israel. Meanwhile, Saddam is also siphoning baksheesh (kick-backs) off the oil he sells, presumably to finance production of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

However, as the war drums beat harder and the bugles sound louder in a prelude to launching an all-out war against Iraq, Americans must look at the larger picture. There is little doubt that Saddam Hussein must go and his WMDs destroyed. But then what? What is our ultimate objective beyond deposing Saddam Hussein?

Consider this straightforward scenario for removing Saddam Hussein from power: Supported by air power and stand-off weapons, U.S. troops fight their way into Iraq all the way to downtown Baghdad. In the end, Saddam perishes or flees for his life, while the U.S. military force destroys his "elite" Republican Guard divisions and compels the regular Iraqi military to surrender. U.S. military teams capture laboratories and storage facilities, and locate and destroy Iraq's WMD stocks. The entire operation takes maybe two months to carry out once a sizable U.S. force deploys to the region. So what would victory over a Third World Iraq, a far cry from Japan and Germany in 1945, look like?

Like 1991, I venture: There would be triumphant parades with American generals in Washington and Florida patting each other on the back, still marveling at their highly sophisticated weapons systems. Meanwhile, in Little Town USA, the dead Grunts, the guys who did most of the dirty work with rifles and bayonets, would be buried - mostly forgotten - except by their comrades.

What would happen next inside Iraq itself?

That is the question that no one has yet raised, or answered. What the policymakers in Washington seem to ignore in all U.S. endeavors in the Middle East is that the locals see the United States, or any Western power, as interlopers, infidels and outsiders. As such, U.S. troops would be unable to remain in Iraq as an occupying force for long without further inflaming the Muslim world - even if we had the capability of staying.

In any event, the United States just does not have the staying power it had following World War II to maintain a large and effective occupying force in Iraq while that country tries to pull itself together after more than 33 years under Saddam Hussein's psychotic rule (and a tangled history of despots before him).

Fighting a multi-faceted war against Islamic terror worldwide, the United States does not have the resources (read manpower and logistics) to "occupy" Iraq until it has the capacity to elect a parliament and move towards a stable economy and democratic system of government. We can't even maintain a viable combat force in Afghanistan!

So, do we turn the country over to the Kurds in the North (some of whom are fighting along side al Qaeda terrorist groups), or to the Shi'ite Muslims in the south (recalling that Shi'ite Muslims bombed the Marine Barracks and American Embassy in Beirut in 1983)? Or do we turn the country over to those Iraqis who have spoken out against the rule of Saddam Hussein over the years, but all of whom, for obvious reason, no longer live in Iraq and have no political base there?

Maybe Turkey, our NATO ally, would be prepared to step in as a Muslim peacekeeping force. But then there is the history of Iraq, which was under Ottoman (Turkish) rule for centuries.

In addition to setting Iraq up for civil war once the United States dethrones Saddam Hussein and pulls out, there is another reality to consider: Iran.

Briefly, the disputed border region and consequent animosities between the two states date back to 1534, when Iraq was conquered by the Ottoman Empire. When Iraq became an independent state after World War I ended in 1918, the border disputes became more animated. One reason was the Shatt al Arab waterway dividing the two countries, which is Iraq's only means of access to the Persian Gulf, therefore of strategic importance. Another is the divided tribal loyalty along the border region, including a Kurdish population in northwestern Iraq and northern Iran, and the large number of Shi'ite Muslims in southern Iraq, which is also the dominant Muslim faction in Iran. Also, the Iranians are Persian, while the Iraqis are Arab.

The instability between the two states continued, sometimes encouraged by Western influence. In 1964, Iranian Shi'ite leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini was forced to flee Iran and took refuge in Iraq, which added to animosities that continued into the 1970s. At the time, Iran was under the rule of Muhammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, who had the support of the United States. Major General Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr, an anti-western Arab nationalist, led Iraq. In 1979, Saddam Hussein replaced Hassan al-Bakr.

In 1980, Iraq invaded Iran, initiating an eight-year war that produced about a million casualties, but little else. The U.N. mandated a cease-fire. There was no victor, no loser, and the issues dividing the two countries remain unresolved. In the intervening years, while Iran has also supported terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah, an uneasy stalemate between the two countries has existed.

Whatever else happens and however long it might take Iraq to try to stabilize - if that is even possible in the Arab world - it is doubtful that its old nemesis, Iran, will wait. When one state is defeated and weakened militarily, a vacuum is created. If given the opportunity, the Iranians will take advantage of that vacuum. And if or when they do, what would the U.S. response be?

The ugly truth is that for all of the quantitative superiority of the U.S. military on paper, we do not today have a sufficient force to carry out the long-term requirements that our political leaders have identified.

The United States has become like Rome in the fourth century, A.D. At home we face political and social unrest, while moral decay permeates society and the barbarians are literally at the gates. The U.S. military, after eight years of cutbacks and ambitious peacekeeping missions by President Bill Clinton, is spread too thin to occupy Iraq, maintain a peace and protect it from Iran.

Although there are still brave young officers who will lead their ill equipped, ill-trained, but politically correct troops in combat, there are scant true warfighters left in the upper levels of the officer corps. They were either forced out during Clinton's watch, or simply gave up in disgust.

As it becomes clear that we are nearing war with Iraq, the problem we face is that even if we are capable of destroying Saddam Hussein and defeating his regime, the consequences of such a victory may contain the seeds of a subsequent, much larger defeat that presages the fall of the American Empire.

There is an alternative scenario that can provide a battlefield victory and provide for the postwar stabilization of Iraq. But that requires President Bush - long before issuing the execute order - to acknowledge and warn the American people of the true costs of taking out Saddam. To succeed in such a war (while continuing the war on terror) and years of volatility in the aftermath of victory will require a total mobilization of personnel, a massive infusion of funding for weapons and ammunition, and a sustained military effort the nation has not had to support since World War II.

Patrick Hayes is a contributing editor to DefenseWatch. He can be reached at gyrene@sftt.us.

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

ARTICLE 03

Who Holds the Veto Power Over a U.S. - Iraqi War?

By Andrea West

The United States has a serious problem to resolve before setting out to prosecute the anticipated war on Iraq: The Pentagon will need to stage anywhere from 70,000-150,000 troops, hundreds of aircraft, and countless tons of materiel in suitable locations throughout the Middle East.

And, more so than in 1990, this doesn't sit well with the Arab states there.

To be fair, the Arab states are wrestling with their own twofold problem: 1. They have serious trouble controlling the radical Islamic factions in their respective countries, and 2. They don't want to be seen as aiding the United States. It is therefore politically expedient and face-saving to take a belligerent stand against U.S. military basing - at least publicly.

Even after September 11, mobs of Islamic militants have demonstrated in the streets whenever any Middle Eastern government makes the slightest conciliatory gesture toward the West. The militants' aim is to intimidate both the government in question and ordinary citizens who might be neutral or even support U.S. action against Iraq.

"See our power," is the militants' message. "If you who now hold power want to keep it, and don't want to see blood in the streets, repudiate not only the United States but the entire Western world as well." The advocates of this message also use intimidation against the ordinary citizens of the Middle East, with the result that few in these countries are willing to publicly rock the boat.

As a result, the news media in recent weeks has been full of reports that the Arab governments have given the Bush administration dire warnings about the consequences of attacking one of their Arab neighbors, Iraq. (That Saddam Hussein is a secular dictator and a menace to his neighbors is immaterial in this argument.) What these Arab states can actually accomplish as a group is somewhat in question, as the recent Arab League Summit in Beirut suggests.

The Summit, as a show of Arab unity, was a disaster. Roughly half of the member governmental leaders were no-shows, and even the Palestinians and Saudis bailed out after it started. The departure of the Saudi delegation is particularly telling when one considers that one of the two stated agenda issues was Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah's own peace initiative with Israel. (The second, more germane item was the prospective U.S. campaign against Iraq.)

The private research organization Stratfor.com suggested in one recent analysis that the boycotting nations were influenced by Vice President Dick Cheney's arm-twisting tour of the Middle East in March. The New York Times on March 28 quoted a senior Bush administration official - who supports military action - as saying, "It has been the consistent drumbeat from our friends in the region that if we are serious [about dealing with Iraq], they will be with us." (For a lively discussion of the Middle East, Iraq, and our allies, peruse the archives at www.nationalreview.com and www.opinionjournal.com.)

But the issue of how and where Operation Desert Storm II will be organized is no small problem. Where can we launch from, and what will the locals do about it?

So far, the launch base options include Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar on the Persian Gulf, and Turkey to Iraq's north.

Oman has publicly declared that it will not allow the United States to launch an attack on an Arab country from its territory. (This brings up an interesting question: if the U.S. cannot strike another Arab country from Oman, then why is it in Oman's interests to have U.S. bases in its territory at all? Is this also a statement for public [read Islamic militant] consumption only, or does it reflect an ambivalence on the part of the government of Oman?)

Certainly, gaming the system is not out of the question in the Middle East. Most Arab nations are caught in the position of despising the United States and all it stands for, while simultaneously courting its power and protection for their own ends.

The Saudis are a case in point. Saudi Arabia, which was the beneficiary of U.S. protection during the Gulf War, feels itself under less immediate pressure from Saddam Hussein and under more pressure from its indigenous Wahhabi militants, who object to the continued U.S. military presence in the land of Mecca.

The Saudis don't want to get on really bad terms with their best customer, nor do they want us to leave the bases in case Saddam or some other nut gets back on his horse. (It is pure speculation, but still quite possible that the Saudi Royal Family may privately want U.S. protection against the Wahhabi militants as well, should another revolt such as the 1979 uprising at Mecca occur.)

Nevertheless, it remains an open question whether the Saudis will allow the United States to launch from its territory. Recall the restrictions against operating combat aircraft from Prince Sultan Airbase during either the no-fly zone patrols or the air war in Afghanistan.

Kuwait, for its part, has made the odd noise in objection to a second invasion, although it seems to be going along with the action.

Bahrain, while cooperating with the United States, has been roiled with Islamic militants protesting in the streets, including the mob attack against the U.S. Embassy last month. Qatar and Turkey seem skeptical of the proposed U.S. action against Iraq, although their governments have not made definitive announcements regarding use of bases on their soil.

The nation to watch very, very carefully is Syria. Britain's The Guardian newspaper, as quoted by the private intelligence company GeoStrategy Direct, reported that three Iraqi defectors claim that arms dealers in the Czech Republic illegally sold missiles to Iraq. Syria has shown a tendency to act as an arms middleman for Iraq in the past, and could be a likely source of trouble once the invasion starts.

On the other side of the Persian Gulf from Iraq and our jittery allies, Iran has a problem. Its citizens want out from under the yoke of the Ayatollahs and were heartened, rather than cowed, by the inclusion of Iran in President Bush's "Axis of Evil." In order to hang on to power, the Iranian authorities will most likely obfuscate, prevaricate, hand us a strategic concession with one hand and whack us over the head with the other. This effort will be designed to keep us off-balance and out of Iranian domestic affairs.

Nobody can tell what Libyan dictator Moammar Ghadafi will do from one minute to the next, but one thing is certain: If he sees an opportunity to stab us in the back, he'll do it. This is the watchword for the Middle East: trust no one.

Another key area where we can take nothing for granted is the European Union. Some EU member nations are in favor of invading Iraq, but others are opposed. Having woken up to an Islamic militant threat in its midst, most nations in Western Europe have come through in such matters as arresting terrorists and providing intelligence information.

More important, European troops have fought alongside our soldiers, Marines and Navy SEALs in Afghanistan, and NATO aircraft have guarded our own shores while our AWACs were overseas. Whether or not they are willing to send troops into Iraq, or whether they will fall back on the old policy of appeasement, also remains to be seen.

The Canadians have said they will go with us. What about the British?

The Brits, also, have a problem. Prime Minister Tony Blair is having trouble balancing his country's membership in the European Union with its friendship with the United States. While the British will, as they have so many times before, keep their promise and help us out in Iraq, their credibility and standing in the European Union have been taking a beating.

Snide comments in the Continental press about Great Britain's "close relationship with a nation 3,000 miles away" may be so much chicken scrap, but they reflect the attitudes of the powers-that-be in Brussels. This war may be a watershed event for Britain, especially with regard to its own sovereignty and its relationship with the European Union.

Any war against Iraq will be determined by the old realtor adage - location, location and location. Iraq is surrounded by six nations, two of which - Iran and Syria - can be guaranteed to oppose the U.S. invasion to topple Saddam Hussein. That leaves only three invasion corridors: Turkey into the northern Kurdish zone; overland from Israel through Jordan; and north via Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the narrow Shatt al-Arab waterway.

Four small groups, in the end, must provide basing rights and overflight permission for any invasion to succeed: the Saudi Royal family, the al-Sabah clan of Kuwait, King Abdullah of Jordan and his government, and Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer and his government. It is they who will determine whether the Anglo-American Army ever sets off to war against Iraq.

Andrea K. West is Veterans Editor for DefenseWatch. She can be reached at defensewatchvet@yahoo.com.

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

ARTICLE 04

U.S. Military Not Yet Ready For a Desert Storm II

By John M. Szelog

The word going around is that we're going back to Iraq, probably early next year, with Saddam Hussein as the number one target.

Many people believe that when we do go back in, it will be another short, low-casualty operation, just like Operation Desert Storm in 1991, where we routed the Iraqi Army and killed tens of thousands of Iraqi soldiers at the cost of only 268 American lives.

Unfortunately, the situation today doesn't favor such an easy outcome. In 1991, the U.S. military was significantly larger, better-trained and prepared for a major theater-level war in the desert than it is today. The U.S. military has significantly more "smart" weapons and advanced command-control-and-communications networks than it did a decade ago - witness the use of "smart bomb"-loaded B-52s for tactical close air support in Afghanistan - but serious shortcomings and other factors will complicate our planning.

The issue of overall U.S. combat readiness is pertinent: The U.S. military that will deploy combat units to Southwest Asia is 40 percent smaller than the Cold War-era force that we had in 1991. We no longer have the Army's VII Corps and its heavy divisions in Europe for rapid deployment to the Persian Gulf region. And while the ancient C-141 fleet is being replaced by more capable C-17s, the planned fleet of 120 new cargo planes will be forced to do a job that 234 C-141s were hard-pressed to do a decade ago.

Even more important, years of peacekeeping missions combined with declining defense budgets under President Bill Clinton have undermined overall combat readiness in the force, raising troubling questions for both the active-duty and reserve components.

The National Guard and Reserves, which will have to play a significant role in any war with Iraq, were already strained by training problems and declining recruitment and retention, problems that were only exacerbated by the mobilizations since 9-11. And while invisible to the general public, many people in uniform today are focused less on military service, and more on getting in, getting benefits, and getting out with a minimum of fuss.

With major combat operations apparently over in Afghanistan and - thankfully - no more terrorist attacks to date here at home, there are signs that the public is paying less attention to the war and the unresolved terrorist threat. So apart from military planning, the Bush administration faces an entirely separate challenge of rousing the American public for a military campaign that has the potential to be much more violent and bloody than Afghanistan and the Gulf War combined.

Finally, in 1991, Saddam knew that he wasn't the primary target object of the U.S.-led coalition, whose stated mission was to eject the Iraqi army from Kuwait - not to overthrow the Baghdad regime. This time, the Iraqi dictator surely knows that he has been designated as public enemy number one, and it must be expected that he will try to pre-empt any invasion planning by stirring up trouble elsewhere in the region. Failing that, Iraq will certainly attempt to disrupt the staging and assembly of forces, something it failed to do in 1991 to its deep regret.

All of this puts the U.S. military in a potentially vulnerable position. One example concerns the issue of rear-area security competence, a topic previously examined in DefenseWatch ("Why Air Force People Need Ground Combat Training," Apr. 17), which is a concern that can be extended to the other services to one degree or another.

Since Saddam and his generals know that they are on the target list in such an operation, it takes no military genius to anticipate that the Iraqi defensive strategy will be one of harassment and denial: Making life as miserable as possible for U.S. and allied troops in the region, and using whatever measures it takes - possibly including chemical and biological agents, and even suicide attacks against critical combat support areas.

All of this requires that rear-area personnel be prepared to survive and continue supporting combat operations. This means not only being physically prepared to survive attacks, but also being mentally prepared to survive attacks and the aftermath. The problem is, most rear-area units do not direct much attention to preparing people for combat, generally sticking to meeting minimum training standards. Unfortunately, such standards fail to prepare rear-area personnel for the shock of combat, and possibly operating for extended periods in a Nuclear, Biological, Chemical (NBC) environment.

Wearing chemical protective gear is not something that comes naturally. The mask is claustrophobic, the suit is heavy and hot, and the boots are difficult and tiring to walk in. The flak vest, helmet and web gear all add to the effects of the chemical garb. Mental and physical fatigue, and heat injury losses figure heavily into operations in a NBC environment. Personnel need to be trained in what to expect in the event of such an attack. They must be psychologically prepared to persevere even after seeing fellow personnel killed and mutilated. They must be prepared for the actual sounds, smells, sensations and feelings of combat.

That form of realistic training is notable for its absence in many U.S. military units today.

The U.S. military has been lucky in the war on terrorism - so far. The enemy it has confronted to date militarily hasn't shown that it can conduct coordinated attacks outside the local battlefield area. However, that same enemy has proven its ability to conduct sophisticated and coordinated operations on a global scale, albeit against non-military targets so far.

But Saddam Hussein and his generals aren't stupid. They know that they probably won't make it through the next war, but they can certainly make it as costly as possible for us, by identifying and exploiting any weaknesses in our own military structure.

Before launching Operation Desert Storm II, it is imperative that U.S. military leaders take steps to put forces earmarked for combat and combat support operations on a true wartime training regime to reduce and minimize the many weaknesses that exist.

It will require an urgent, combined effort from both the people on the line and the uniformed leadership to carry this out.

John M. Szelog is a Contributing Editor to DefenseWatch. He can be reached at streetgang52@hotmail.com.

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

ARTICLE 05

Stretched U.S. Military Can Win, But At a Steep Price

By Paul Connors

Media reports over the last several weeks have alleged U.S. government plans to mount a combined air and ground campaign against Iraq early next year with the ground forces ranging from 100,000-250,000 troops.

What is really interesting is that the U.S. government officials who are busily leaking our combat intentions toward Iraq remain silent on a very important issue - that the U.S. military today is 40 percent than it was in 1991. And recall that for Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm, when there were more than 2.1 million people on active duty, the Pentagon was still forced to mobilize more than 200,000 reservists and National Guardsmen to active duty.

Even before we engage in any policy debate over the need to liberate Iraq from Saddam Hussein and thwart his attempts to build an arsenal of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons, it is important first to discuss our overall capability to project military power to the other side of the world, and second, to assess the real chances for success in such a war.

In 1991, the U.S. Army numbered more than 750,000 people with a massive armor and mechanized infantry force designed for fighting a conventional war against the Soviet Union on the plains of Europe. The "iron fist" of the European-based U.S. VII Corps that destroyed Iraqi armored formations in the now-famous left hook maneuver that flanked the Iraqi Republican Guard. (This occurred, of course, after more than six weeks of aerial pounding by U.S. and allied combat aircraft that enjoyed complete air superiority over Iraq and Kuwait.)

Even so, it had taken the United States more than six months to move that armor-heavy Army from the continental United States and bases in Europe to the region and to prepare for the "mother of all battles."

In contrast, the U.S. Army in 2002 numbers fewer than 460,000 people and less than 100,000 of those are infantrymen, tankers and artillerymen. This much-reduced cadre of combat-arms soldiers - along with their counterparts in the U.S. Marine Corps - are the people who will constitute the spearhead of any U.S. effort to end Saddam's reign of terror once and for all.

Simple mathematics dictates that in order to carry out any massive ground campaign against Iraq, the Army will again have to activate Army National Guard combat units. But unlike the Gulf War of 1991, where only a few Guard artillery units saw action, this time, Guard infantrymen will also be needed. The question is, are ARNG infantry units really ready for large-scale maneuver warfare? Some experts I know argue that they are not.

Then there is the issue of overextended commitments. The Army today is actively engaged in ten foreign countries: South Korea, Germany, Bosnia, Kosovo, Colombia, Egypt, the Philippines, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait (with the rest stationed throughout the United States). From a Cold War total of 18 divisions, the Army today has shrunk to 10, with two of them - the 10th Mountain Division and 101st Airborne Division - having already seen combat in Afghanistan.

The rest of the Army's ground combat punch is contained within National Guard units spread across 54 states and U.S. territories. As Defensewatch has examined in recent articles, the quality and combat readiness of the Army Guard is at best, mixed. Certainly, not all units are ready to go to war.

Call that the Clinton administration's "peace dividend" coming home to roost. Faced with sustained budget cuts and unrelenting peacekeeping requirements, the active Army, in an attempt to retain most of the dwindling resources for itself, long precluded essential modernization for Army Guard and Reserve units. Nevertheless, it is the Army Guard, designed as a force in reserve, that will be summoned to active duty and foreign deployment should the United States organize a ground invasion of Iraq.

The U.S. Navy today is stretched equally tight. It is currently down to 315 ships, a drop of 30 percent from its fleet of 450 in 1991. Its aircraft carrier fleet has shrunk from 15 to 10 (for the foreseeable future, at least one Nimitz-class nuclear carrier will be out of service at any time for reactor refueling). Throughout the 1990s and beyond, the Navy has been decommissioning warships faster than newer models are commissioned to replace them, even though its overseas commitments remain high.

There are less than 360,000 men and women in today's Navy and many of our ships steam out of port severely short of crew members because there just aren't enough to go around.

The U.S. Marine Corps fortunately preserved its size and force structure after the Cold War, but is struggling with an aging aviation arm that is becoming obsolete.

The U.S. Air Force is as small today as the day it became a separate service in September 1947. Numbering fewer than 365,000 officers and enlisted personnel, the Air Force is composed of a fighter force with an average age per airframe of 20 years. The B-52H bombers that are still part of the inventory are all older than almost all the pilots who fly them. The 22 "fighter wing equivalents" that the Air Force is supposed to be able to field is a misnomer because almost 10 of those wings are assigned to the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve.

The loss of capability within the active Air Force is why that service has come to rely so heavily on its reserve components. Not only do the ANG and AFRC provide vital airlift and aerial refueling assets to support worldwide operations by the parent service, but they also routinely support Navy and Marine aviation units as they transit the world.

The Air Force today - much less in a war against Iraq - cannot support its worldwide missions without the Air Guard and Air Force Reserve. The proof of this statement is the number of Air Guardsmen and Air Force Reservists on duty in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Turkey, keeping the logistical pipeline flowing. Even the fighter and rescue forces from the reserve components have been tasked to exhaustion. ANG and AFRC fighter squadrons routinely fly the "no-fly" patrols over northern and southern Iraq.

Further complicating U.S. military planners contemplating action against Iraq is the knowledge that this next time there will be no allied coalition as we saw in 1991. Most of our alleged European allies (with the exception of the stalwart British) want no part of Desert Storm II. The Brits will, in all likelihood, stand by our side.

So the question remains: Can the United States and British successfully pull off an invasion of Iraq? That's a tough one, because there are so many factors that come into play and this time around, we will probably not be able to launch our assault from Saudi territory.

Meanwhile, the logistical "tail" from the United States to the Persian Gulf remains as long as it was in 1991.

In short, between 100,000 and 250,000 ground troops will be fighting an uphill battle from the time they enter staging bases (or fight their way in to secure enclaves). It is equally likely that casualties will be much higher than they were eleven years ago, particularly if Iraq launches NBC weapons at the force. And when we succeed, we will be forced to garrison Baghdad and large parts of Iraq's interior, possibly for years into the future.

Can the U.S. military prevail against Iraq? Yes, but at a terribly high price.

Do I think that U.S. armed forces are spread too thin to carry out this mission today? I do.

Paul Connors is DefenseWatch Air Force Editor. He can be reached at paulconnors@hotmail.com

Table of Contents

Special Report - Target Iraq

ARTICLE 06

Target Al Jazeera - 'Information War' Weapon

By Robert G. Williscroft

Suppose you want to launch a culture-wide attack against the most powerful country in the world. The constituents from which you will draw your people reside in 22 sovereign nations, united by a common language, culture, and religion. How do you pull it off?

In what we call the Western world, you probably would use television, radio, and more recently, the internet, to get your message out. Since we operate under a relatively free press, if you have sufficient time, you can preach your message across the airwaves, until your following grows to substantial numbers. If you are an Osama Bin Laden, however, you don't have access to the traditional airwaves we take for granted in the West. Across the Arab world, television and radio are tightly controlled by the petty dictators who rule all but a tiny fraction of these 22 nations. Yes, I know we like to call these men kings, princes, sheikhs, emirs, or what-have-you, but bottom-line, they are nothing more than unelected dictators, despots ruling by force of arms.

In any case, they all control their airwaves as tightly as possible. This means for a budding Bin Laden, that you will have to find another way to get your word out.

As the U.S.-led campaign against terrorism continues, and the Bush administration prepares for a military campaign against Iraq, it is important for us not to overlook the critical "information war" being waged by radical Islamic factions against us.

Qatari ruler Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani seized power from his father in 1995 (another one of those "democratic" reforms). About the same time, the BBC signed a deal with Orbit Communications in Saudi Arabia. Through its World Service radio network this Saudi-owned company had built a strong tradition of objective Arabic-language news coverage. The BBC intended to provide Arabic newscasts for Orbit's main Middle East channel, insisting the while on editorial independence. In April 1996, the BBC broadcast a story including footage of the beheading of a criminal. Following that, the Saudis pulled Orbit out of the deal. As I said: Despots all.

The new Qatari leader saw an opportunity - so the story goes - to modernize and democratize his new government. On Nov. 1, 1996, he created Al Jazeera as part of that effort, allocating $137 million towards a goal of self-sufficiency for the station within five years. Most of the former BBC employees joined the fledgling network, carrying on in the tradition of BBC objectivity.

For the first time, the common Arab had a voice. Al Jazeera quickly became the most widely listened to station throughout the Arab world. By comparison to the tightly controlled national stations, Al Jazeera seemed like a breath of fresh air. The U.S. State Department sang its praises. Al Jazeera was being called the CNN of the Arab World.

Programs such as "The Opposite Direction" and "The Other Opinion" featured debates on controversial issues similar to CNN's Crossfire. Islamic militants argued with secular liberals, and supporters of the peace process with Israel debated its opponents. Al Jazeera interviewed political dissidents from across the spectrum, even airing Osama bin Laden in June 1999. During the last Israeli election campaign, Al Jazeera sent Muhammad Kreishan to interview representatives of all major Israeli political parties, including an David Bar-Illan, who was an adviser to former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. It was heady stuff.

Then 9/11 happened, and the U.S. military commenced operations against al Qaeda and the Taliban. Almost immediately, the Taliban expelled all news-gathering groups except for Al Jazeera. Nearly everything you saw during the first dramatic weeks of the war originated with Al Jazeera.

The seeds had been well planted. All that remained was to set the hook firmly in the mouth of Western media. Al Jazeera interviewed Secretary of State Colin Powell, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice. What the common Arab on the street saw and heard, however, were short excerpts from these interviews, taken totally out of context. These snippets reinforced the growing perception in the Arab world that America is the Great Satan and our war on terror is somehow a Zionist plot.

No longer was Al Jazeera a free-wheeling Arabian copy of CNN. It still carried the veneer; its 500 employees included 70 journalists; its 27 bureaus include offices in Washington, New York, London, Paris, Brussels, Moscow, Djakarta and Islamabad. But the focus, which had been moving slowly and steadily away from a CNN-like image, had now shifted totally.

Instead of balanced reporting, the Arab on the street now receives a 24/7 barrage of the worst kind of propaganda. Bin Laden has complete unedited access to Al Jazeera; George Bush is quoted out of context. On Al-Jazeera suicide bombers are martyrs and Israelis "devils." Jews are "descendants of apes and pigs," and the Holocaust never happened. Bin Laden is an heroic romantic. 9/11 was a Zionist plot, and 4,000 Jews did not show up at the WTC on the morning of 9/11. Slow periods are filled with endless loops depicting dying Palestinian children accompanied by inflammatory martial music.

Al Jazeera now feeds 150,000 American homes, homes occupied by Islamic adults and children. With its arrival via the Dish Satellite Network, most Arab Americans no longer listen to CNN or FOX or any of the other relatively unbiased news sources. For the adults with their minds already made up this probably makes little difference. For the children, however, there is no counterpoint. They are immersed in this stuff around the clock: hate, anti-American, anti-Israel, with nothing to offset the pictures of Palestinian children being butchered by jack-booted Jews.

Perhaps you've noticed: the free-world press no longer touts the goodness of Israel. Instead, we see and hear more and more of the plight of the unfortunate Palestinians. We hear about Israeli "massacres" of innocent Palestinians. Our president issues "orders" for an Israeli withdrawal.

And yet the preponderance of Western media still writes that Al Jazeera represents the best hope for a free press throughout the Arab world.

Qatar's five-year deadline for Al Jazeera self-sufficiency is more than a year past, and still the network receives an annual subsidy from the Qatari government approaching $100 million. The government of a supposedly friendly Arab nation underwrites the vilest, most acrimonious, inflammatory lies and half-truths ever broadcast.

The hook is set. Millions of Muslims who were still unsure now know with a certain conviction. Our recently-launched new hip Voice of America is a day late and a dollar short. The con is complete. Al Jazeera rules. And it is a wartime propaganda weapon aimed at the United States and the West.

As we ready our military for the onerous task of finding and taking out Saddam Hussein we cannot ignore the battle that is taking place in full fury right before our eyes. We are in a war for survival - nothing less. Arab public opinion is already on the side of the holy warriors, and thanks to Al Jazeera, world opinion is steadily moving in their direction. Already, the most popular Middle East figures are Osama bin Laden, Saddam Hussein, Yasser Arafat, and Mullah Mohammed Omar. President Bush calls them evildoers, but to their fellow Muslims and much of the rest of the world, they are heroes. That won't change no matter how many leaflets we drop on them, or how many hip songs VOA broadcasts.

We still have an option, or maybe two: We can jam the Hell out of Al Jazeera broadcasts, or we can destroy the facilities. Either way we will anger a lot of people. But if Al Jazeera can't be heard - ever, and neither can its lesser imitators such as the Arab News Network (ANN) and Sharjah TV, the end result can be millions of Muslims harboring less anger, because they're not being fed this garbage on a daily basis.

Two satellites form the nexus for all the anti-American inflammatory broadcasts: Arabsat 2A/2B and Nilesat 101. We wouldn't hesitate to take out an Iraqi SAM battery that threatened U.S. aircraft. These birds are far more dangerous. How difficult would it be to eliminate these offending satellites?

To assuage those who would lose beneficial broadcasts that also use these facilities, we could offer space - without charge, if necessary - on any one of our own satellites; or we could even launch a replacement unit that we control.

The bottom line is: This is war. We are losing one of its most important battles. It's time we changed this!

Robert G. Williscroft is DefenseWatch Navy Editor. He can be reached at dwnavyeditor@argee.net.

Table of Contents

ARTICLE 07

Pentagon Memorial to 9-11 Is an Inspiring Site

By Lt. Col. Matthew Dodd

Just 235 days after the Pentagon became the target of a terrorist-hijacked airliner, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld respectfully unveiled the official Pentagon Memorial before an audience largely composed of family members of the 189 victims of American Airlines Flight 77 and Pentagon employees lost on 9-11.

Several days after the May 4 ceremony, I visited the memorial site to observe and pay personal homage to those men, women and children whose lives were unexpectedly taken in the opening moments of our nation's latest war. Let me share my memorial perspectives with you.

The memorial is located on the third floor of the Pentagon between Corridors 9 and 10, immediately appropriately adjacent to the Pentagon Chaplain's office. The memorial is about 30 feet wide and about 10 ten feet deep, with the opening wide enough for eight people standing shoulder-to-shoulder to visit at the same time. Besides the interior's spiral-polished aluminum-colored enclosing structure, the most noticeable presence is the three large, black, shiny hardened plastic panels centered below and to the sides of the capitalized quote, "AMERICA'S HEROES." The memorial lighting is subdued and solemn, but bright enough to take in all the sights and displays.

The middle panel below the capitalized quote is the initial and the busiest attraction. In the center, at eye level, is a symbolic Pentagon memorial seal - an eagle, an olive branch, and the Pentagon in front of our flag. It is adorned with and bordered by stars, with the words, "United In Memory" at the top and "September 11, 2001" on the bottom. To the left and the right of the seal are selected excerpts from the speeches given by President George W. Bush and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, respectively, at the Oct. 11, 2001 Pentagon memorial service.

Beneath the speech, quotes and seal, in capital letters, are the words, "A Grateful Nation Remembers." These words tie in nicely with the small table attached to the bottom of the panel that holds three three-ring binders. The two flanking binders contain the personal vignettes and photos and mementos of all the Pentagon attack victims. The middle binder contains blank pages for memorial guests to sign and express their feelings.

The remaining two flanking black panels have the heading, "September 11, 2001/Those Lost and Missing." Reminiscent of the Vietnam Wall, these panels alphabetically list the engraved names of all the Pentagon attack victims. As you enter the memorial, tucked in the rounded left and right corners, is a little stool that holds a tray of blank etching paper, a box of pencils, and a small pencil sharpener. I helped a young lady hold up her paper so she could concentrate on carefully etching the name of a fallen friend.

Facing outward from the sides of the memorial entrance are two lighted pentagon-shaped windows. The left window features the engraved profile of George Washington from the Purple Heart Medal, and the right window features the engraved determined eagle of the Defense of Freedom Medal. Inside on the left and right extremes of the memorial are encased Purple Heart and Defense of Freedom Medals. Beneath each medal are engraved descriptions of the medals and their relevance to the Pentagon attack victims.

The medal descriptions are equally poignant. Excerpts from the descriptions include:

This memorial is a special and personal place to me, for it stirs up a lot of emotions and memories from the tragedy of that day which struck this building at 9:38 a.m. I still have a hard time believing that the Pentagon was targeted and attacked. I vividly recall the chaos in the streets of our nation's capital immediately following the Pentagon attack as I tried to make my way back from a meeting one block from the Capitol to the Pentagon to make sure my office mates were safe (they were). I will never forget the warm relief and sense of security I felt when I finally returned home later that afternoon to hug and kiss my wife and infant son.

I knew three of the people whose names are engraved on the memorial's panels. I will always remember my fallen comrades, and live with the realization that for the blessings of God, my name could have very easily been engraved on one of the memorial's panels.

I used to think that being stationed in the Pentagon I was safe and far from war dangers. Not anymore.

Experiencing the Pentagon Memorial has been another step in my continuing personal program of coping and healing. I believe many others will also find it a great spiritual and emotional experience.

My only criticism is that the DoD leadership was so careful to avoid creating a media feeding frenzy at the dedication ceremony on May 4 that no advance announcement was made to the more than 20,000 employees who continue to work in the Pentagon. I believe this memorial to some of "America's Heroes" deserved more public recognition than that.

To the designers and makers of this important tribute to some of "America's Heroes," I say, "Bravo Zulu" for a job well done.

Footnote: The Defense Department has re-opened the Pentagon tour program on a restricted basis, currently limited to school students, ROTC cadets and other educational groups, but tours include a visit to the Pentagon Memorial. Information on signing up for a visit can be found at the Pentagon tour website.

Lt. Col. Matthew Dodd is the pen name of an active-duty Marine Corps officer stationed at the Pentagon. He can be reached at mattdodd1775@hotmail.com.

Table of Contents

ARTICLE 08

Guest Column: Nothing But the Full Truth For Our Troops

By George S. Kulas

Despite a perceived resurgence in patriotism following the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, the military services have not experienced a dramatic increase in enlistments, and senior military officials testified before a Senate subcommittee on March 20 that in fact they are having difficulties meeting current recruiting goals.

Sen. Max Cleland, D-GA, chairman of the Senate Armed Services military personnel subcommittee, expressed concern that the problem could become worse if Congress authorizes a significant expansion of personnel endstrength in response to expanding military missions/requirements.

As it is, the U.S. military is so short-handed in some critical specialties that many of those who have already served out their enlistments are being forced to stay on involuntarily. Even some service members who have served over 20 years are being told they cannot retire. In the U.S. Army alone, the "stop-loss" order has affected over 10,000 soldiers in over 30 occupational fields.

There are many reasons some young people are not willing to step up and join to fight the war on terrorism. Sadly, one of the reasons may be that in the past our government hasn't been completely honest with the American people and their soldiers.

Recently, secret audiotapes President Lyndon B. Johnson made during the early years of the Vietnam War were released. They reveal that in early 1965, Johnson told then-Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, "I don't see any way of winning" in Vietnam. The very next month he sent two Marine battalions into battle and a year later he called up 600,000 additional troops.

Again and again, Johnson stated privately that he did not believe the war was winnable. Yet publicly, in an August 1965 speech, Johnson said, "America wins the wars that she undertakes. Make no mistake about it!"

By the time the war ended with a North Vietnamese victory ten years later, 2.6 million Americans had fought in it, over 58,000 of those died and 304,000 were wounded.

One would hope that with the Vietnam experience history never repeats itself. Our military is the best trained and equipped in the world and we need many more of our best and brightest to want to have the honor and privilege of serving in uniform. After all, if we can't get young Americans to serve when the homeland has been attacked, how can we get them to enlist to fight for and defend a place like South Korea?

Unfortunately, it appears that our senior leaders continue to play politics with the military, even as the war against terrorism continues.

For example, in mid-March two senior regional commanders-in-chief testified before the House Armed Services Committee on the overall readiness of their commands. Both Adm. Dennis Blair, U.S. Pacific Command CINC, and Air Force Gen. Joseph Ralston, European Command CINC, both indicated that it would be a very close call to carry out military action against Iraq while maintaining their existing operations with their current strengths.

However, a week later Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld insisted that the military is prepared to do that. Rumsfeld was also agitated by remarks by Gen. William Kernan, U.S. Joint Forces Command CINC, who told the committee that our troops were tired. Rumsfeld responded that Kernan's claim showed a "fundamental misunderstanding" of the situation.

It was distressing to see Rumsfeld rebuking his military commanders, who are in the best position to know the true status of their commands. Military commanders have an obligation to tell the full truth to their soldiers and the American people through their congressional representatives.

The great Prussian general and military strategist, Karl von Clausewitz said, war is the extension of politics by other means. Unfortunately, most politicians don't fight the wars. If they had to, there would pr