There are a couple of things I've wanted to comment on the past day or two but have been too lazy or too busy (ha!) to actually sit down and write about them.
The first is this article on Donald Rumsfeld by Robert Draper. Abu Muqawama linked to it so I must link to it as well. All I really have to say is Rumsfeld was a douchewaffle and I hope to never have to serve under him again in any fashion. Tom Ricks also has a link to a book about Rummy and I'm sure some other bloggers out there have commented recently which just goes to show you how popular of a guy Donald is. To be honest, I don't like to think about how badly he screwed things up for us in Iraq because it will just lead me to want to hurt little puppies.
The second is a comment to this article on Abu M (sue me, I really like that website) about soldiers' responses to Tom Ricks' claims that true counterinsurgency didn't really begin in Iraq until The Surge. Officers are claiming that they indeed were establishing combat outposts and living amongst the Iraqi people in order to conduct COIN (counterinsurgency, see, the military makes an acronym out of everything). If you look carefully, soldiers/officers making these claims almost all were deployed to northern Iraq and more specifically Tal Afar and Mosul.
Of course those were the areas where COIN would actually be conducted. Units who deploy tend to conduct operations similar to the unit they are replacing, at least for the first 2 to 3 months and if it works they will continue to operate in the same way for the entire deployment until they pass off their tactics to the next unit. The reason this is a "duh" statement for me is because the first unit to operate in Mosul/Tal Afar was the 101st Airborne Division...under the command of General David Petraeus...the current CENTCOM commander and leader of the COINcentric fight cult. 3-2 SBCT replaced the 101st and while a brigade can't possibly do all the things a division can do, or operate as many combat outposts, it can certainly attempt to conduct operations in a similar manner. Those TTP's (tactics, techniques, and procedures) were then passed on to 1-25 SBCT, 3rd ACR, and 172nd SBCT who all operated around Mosul and Tal Afar.
3rd ACR was also blessed to have COL H.R. McMaster who is also a leader in the pack of the COIN club. 3rd ACR was able to re-establish many of the COPs that 101st had built but had been abandoned by previous units because they lacked the manpower. The Tal Afar/Sinjar region had been a bit of an economy of force area for 3-2 and 1-25 with both those Stryker brigades having to deal with the more immediate problem of Mosul, and both left only their cavalry squadrons to deal with western Ninevah until 3rd ACR showed up (thus allowing MNC-I to snatch up 1-25's cavalry squadron and send them out to Rawah, who then were forced to eat turkey for dinner for 4 straight months, but that's another story). 3rd ACR was able to conduct proper COIN in Tal Afar and by the time they left Tal Afar was passive enough, and the Iraqi Army capable enough, to allow for a single battalion again by the time 3-2 arrived for their second tour.
What's the point of all this? Only for me to say to those soldiers in Tal Afar and Mosul from '04-'06, yes, you were conducting proper COIN...it was those jackasses down in Baghdad who weren't.
Alot is being discussed in the blogosphere about the use of drone aircraft and kinetic strikes. Perhaps a good topic for me in a week.
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