Operation Enduring Presence

The stay-the-course vs. cut-and-run argument that once characterized the American dialogue on the war in Iraq has since moved eastward. The first half considers it irresponsible for U.S. troops to exit Afghanistan until their military can take the lead; the second half considers it irresponsible to spend billions of dollars on a seemingly endless mission. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) may have answered both concerns with his proposal to establish permanent military bases in the country.

Graham provided Meet the Press with a more detailed definition of an “enduring presence” in Afghanistan than President Obama has presented. In Graham’s view, a number of permanent air bases would ensure that the Taliban never regains control of the country, and also give support to the Afghan army. This has been the end goal of drawing down U.S. combat operations for the length of the Obama administration.

Permanent air bases would certainly provide consistency after the mission officially ends, and it would ensure a greater supply of jobs for military personnel and their civilian proxies. Such a strategy has worked when trying to protect countries from foreign invasion, namely that of Soviets after World War II. The government would have to make it explicit that the retooled mission is to protect Afghanistan from its own insurgents.

However, if Graham wants to make his proposal a reality, he will need to answer for the costs. In 1956, operations at the former Pepperrell Air Force Base in Newfoundland cost $2 million per month. In today’s terms, adjusted for inflation, that’s over $15 million. Not that a majority of Americans or fellow members of Congress will mind – defense is the one area in which it’s largely considered acceptable to spend big. But when fiscal responsibility is the recurring motif in current politics, it may be time for an attitude adjustment, in that respect.

Thinking back on major legislation, if this makes it past the Sunday news stage (yes, that’s a stage now), it will probably take anywhere from a year to 18 months to have a final floor vote on the subject, after months upon months of partisan debate and consultation with military brass. That will leave another 18 months to two years to set up the base by the combat deadline. Graham has the next three years cut out for him.

I personally hope this turns out successfully for him. With enemies foreign and domestic continuing to threaten the Mideast, as this weekend’s attack in Egypt proved, one more in the region won’t hurt anyone but American taxpayers. Graham may need to determine who takes priority.

The most obvious choice in the world

It was looking more and more headed for the chopping block by the day. A federal judge had ruled it unconstitutional. Lady Gaga had taken a day off from hat shopping to agitate for its repeal. A floor vote was finally taking place. That floor vote caused the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell to be blocked by four votes, three of which came from Democrats. (The fourth came from moderate Sen. Susan Collins [R-ME].) Here are their justifications:

• Collins believed Republicans “weren’t given sufficient chance” to add amendments to the defense bill to which the repeal was attached.
• Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) wanted further debate and the chance to offer her own amendments that would benefit Arkansas. Homegirl!
• Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR) also wanted more debate.
• Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) – yes, even him – used his no vote as a procedural tactic that would prevent the bill from being thrown out.

I’ve supported healthy debate countless times in my column, even if it slows things down in Congress, and I will continue to do so. But if DADT has been ruled unconstitutional, shouldn’t that be enough for the entire Senate to accept that it’s doomed to die anyway? I sometimes get the feeling that somebody’s gay cousin will need to be discharged for being gay before they finally wake up and smell the dung heap.

The repeal was attached to a $726 billion defense bill, the most notable element of which is a pay raise for the troops. My guess is that it was done in this way, as opposed to a single DADT repeal bill, so the rest of the bill could be used as a kind of padding. Even paying the troops more isn’t good enough for the 43 senators who voted against it. According to several of them, it will take a full report on the effect of the repeal for them to reconsider.

Let me repeat: They want a full report on what will result from soldiers being allowed to be open about something they can’t change about themselves, and not get kicked out of the military for it. Pardon my language, ma’am, but what unmitigated, unjustifiable asininity. The argument that DADT promotes military cohesion withers and dies in the face of it. How truly cohesive can you be when the threat of discharge hangs over your head if you wish to be fully open with your brothers and sisters in arms, and 13,000 troops are lost to it?

There are many occasions in which The West Wing sums politics up better than anyone else. Watch the clip. Consider the clip. Then get back to me and tell me it’s still a good idea to keep this piece of crap in place.

Command cutter in chief

Observers of U.S. federal budgets will have come to understand that when Defense is targeted for cuts, standard-issue calls for fiscal responsibility tend to wind down, especially in times of war. Some might call this hypocritical. But in the case of a specific cut recommended by Defense Secretary Robert Gates, it’s as principled as it gets.

The proposal is to cut $100 billion (over five years) from the department’s budget where deemed acceptable and spend the savings on weapons modernization. One of those places is the United States Joint Forces Command, otherwise known as USJFCOM, which is located in Norfolk, VA and employs nearly 5,000 people. It is one of the ten Unified Combatant Commands (UCCs), responsible for implementing the president’s strategies; coordinating the work of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines; modernizing military operations; and providing conventional forces.

Big important stuff, right? I should think this command out of all the others would be best equipped for the task of modernizing weapons. There are three other functional commands – Special Operations, Strategic, and Transportation – and six regional commands, which are mapped out like this. Any other time, I’d recommend integrating Central Command into Africa or European Command, but because of where today’s wars are taking place, I’d say the Mideast warrants its own command.

In short, shutting down any of the UCCs would not be a course I could support in wartime; to do so would be irresponsible in terms of both job losses and capability losses. Gates would have to wait until troops in both Iraq and Afghanistan had been shipped back home, and then pray another war hasn’t come up by then. It can’t be absolutely impossible to make cuts in the Defense budget, but this isn’t the way to do it.

At least this part of the story isn’t as embarrassing as the last one. Both Virginia senators, both Democrats, and four members of its 11-member House delegation – two Democrats, two Republicans – reminded Gates in a letter that he would probably have to open a base closing commission before shutting down USJFCOM, which would of course add to the bureaucracy bill. “We are eliminating an organization,” said Gates’ press secretary, Geoff Morrell, ”not closing a base.” A 5,000-strong organization that makes the military work.

Perhaps this move would technically circumvent Base Realignment and Closure, but under these circumstances, if Gates is going to pursue this cut at all, he should at least accept a few extra voices at the table to see that it runs smoothly.

The Manning who knew too much

I’m torn between wanting to praise Pfc. Bradley Manning for his courage in bringing important facts about the Afghanistan mission to light, and wanting to see him in the hole for possibly compromising national security. The WikiLeaks scandal is the result of combining military service with unyielding political ideology that may or may not have come about during one’s stint. More often, you will find members of the Armed Forces refusing to comment on their personal politics for the sake of military cohesion.

In the above link, you may end up unconvinced that Manning has exposed much information that we didn’t already know or could guess. Although Pakistan’s national army seems to be doing a good job shooting up Taliban, is it possible that some are spies who have been working with the enemy? Of course it’s possible. There’s no surefire way to safeguard against that sort of thing. Civilian casualties? Duh, everyone knows about that. Poor Afghan governance? Old news. The feds know all this as well as anyone else.

Adrian Lamo, a reporter for Wired magazine who interviewed Manning for posting the infamous “Collateral Murder” video on the same site, suspects that “[Manning] was dissatisfied with certain military policies and he wanted to adversely affect U.S. foreign policy.” Certainly the leak will motivate those in charge to review their strategy, if only for the sake of PR. But it is not the responsibility of a single soldier, least of all someone as low-ranked as Manning, to provide them with that kick in the pants.

It does raise many questions about ethics vs. security. If the public is paying for a war they are liking less and less, do they not deserve to know exactly what their money is being used for? Is a government not accountable to its citizens, especially its military personnel, first and foremost?

Without a doubt, Manning committed a blatantly illegal act and should be punished accordingly; hopefully that includes a dishonorable discharge. I’m baffled that he didn’t just leave the forces if he didn’t like the mission. Peace activists and their ilk will regard him as a hero for telling the truth, even if we weren’t exactly being lied to. Everyone else (security proponents? Pro-war people?) will simply slap their foreheads and say, “You fucking idiot.” Middle-roaders like me may not know what to think for months.

I personally blame Lady Gaga for all of this. Once Manning decided to pretend he was burning her songs to his CD instead of war documents (and how did he get access to those?), it was only a matter of time.

Obama doubts your commitment to Sparkle Motion

From the “Shit, I hope they don’t notice that I said this” desk: Gen. Stanley McChrystal, top commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, recently participated in an interview with Rolling Stone in which he didn’t present a completely united front. Before I list exactly what the problem quotes are, let me just say that I do not mean in any way to suggest that McChrystal has no right to have or express his opinion. It is simply ill-advised for him to put his problems with the higher-ups into the public consciousness. More on that later.

• On attending a dinner with his NATO counterparts in order to get some assistance out of them: “How’d I get screwed into this dinner?”
• On a strategy favored by Vice President Biden: It was “shortsighted” and would lead to “Chaos-istan.” (He should be reprimanded for that Sex and the City-grade pun.)
• On an upcoming meeting with the admin: “Are you asking about Vice President Biden? (laughs) Who’s that?”
• On President Obama: “McChrystal thought Obama looked ‘uncomfortable and intimidated’ by the roomful of military brass.”
• On a disagreement over the troop surge: “It was Obama versus the Pentagon, and the Pentagon was determined to kick the president’s ass.”

And those are just on the first two pages; you can read on by yourself.

So, as you can expect, Obama and Co. are pissed and have arranged a meeting with McChrystal at the White House. I have no authority to speak directly for them, but it is my expectation that nothing too serious will happen to McChrystal. For all intents and purposes, he has been a good commander and a good debater. The above article brings up the memory of President Truman stripping Gen. Douglas MacArthur of his command after a dispute; don’t wait around for that to happen to McChrystal unless he screws up the mission.

Surprisingly, even Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) wants McChrystal to resign over this. If McCain were president, he probably would have called for the guy’s resignation yesterday. However, Obama’s preference for lengthy debate that McChrystal found so frustrating earlier will slow this down, at the very least; he might see the point of it then.

Now here’s the PR problem. Readers might enjoy McChrystal’s ability to loosen up in an interview, but this will fade into the realization that bad blood between him and the president can be bad, especially during a war. Just play nice, boys.

Michelle stands up for military families (in style!)

I didn’t watch President Obama’s State of the Union last night, but I’ll read the text in full and post my notes tomorrow. Until then, here’s some news about an Obama I haven’t written about in a long time:

It’s refreshing to see an article about First Lady Michelle Obama that has nothing to do with her clothes. When her Wikipedia article lists “Style and fashion sense” before “Work undertaken and causes promoted,” you know the media’s priorities are tetched. I can’t say I’m jumping for joy over the work she’s undertaking right now, but it’s a start.

On Tuesday, Obama announced that hubby’s 2011 budget would include a 3% jump in funding for aid to military families, a total of $8.8 billion. Of this, there would be

• $1.9B for counseling;
• $1.3B for child care;
• $439M to rebuild Defense Department schools, 103 of which will be replaced or redone within the next five years;
• $84M for “career development for military spouses”;
• $14M for “Coast Guard housing”;
• and an unspecified amount for “youth programs for military kids.”

Certainly, none of these items are inherently bad, and military families deserve the best in aid. The question is, do they need it so soon? President Obama’s proposed budget freeze would not include Defense, which you can expect when someone is trying to appease fiscal conservatives. Even so, perhaps they ought to consider restricting DoD funding to the wars until 2012.

“But military families can’t wait for this!” Sure they can. They’ve done it before.

Also, should the aid come from the federal level? Obviously, the military is a federal priority, but what specific families need is more of a concern on the level of their own constituency. They might instead consider allowing states or counties or House districts to apply for this aid – which they probably couldn’t get away with turning down, but that’s besides the point – and distribute it on the basis of need (and want) per household. There is, after all, the chance that some families can afford what’s on the above list.

“Aides justified the spending on military families by saying their welfare is an important part of U.S. national security.” Sheesh, isn’t that laying it on a little thick? Just say that servicemembers do their jobs better when they know their families are getting everything they need.

This is what they call a “pregnant pause”

On the list of “prohibited behaviour” for servicemembers in Iraq: “drinking alcohol, taking drugs or becoming pregnant,” or causing pregnancy. At least they recognize that conception is a two-way street.

As is the case with any government, business, or military policy relating to reproduction, this new regulation – the work of Maj. Gen. Tony Cucolo, a commander in northern Iraq, and only to be applied to his soldiers (for now) – has caused a significant uproar, mostly from women’s advocates. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) put it this way in a letter to the secretary of the U.S. Army: “We can think of no greater deterrent to women contemplating a military career than the image of a pregnant woman being severely punished simply for conceiving a child.”

My understanding of the policy is that a) she would be punished for getting pregnant during her deployment, which sounds like an extremely bad time to do it; b) as previously mentioned, the male progenitor would be getting a kick in the pants of his own; and c) their escapade “could result in a variety of punishments including criminal charges,” but not a court-martial. To listen to Boxer, you’d think Cucolo was prohibiting all mothers, current or aspiring, from enlisting.

The intent of Cucolo’s policy is to “retain combat power” prior to the 2011 withdrawal of Iraq forces. Does that sound ridiculous? No, it doesn’t, and it wouldn’t in any combat scenario (even though women still can’t participate on the front-line kind, cough cough). Becoming pregnant in a war zone is about as ill-advised an idea as an Israeli settling on Palestinian land. 

The phrase “criminal charges” seems highly dubious; I’d only support those if it could be proven that the pregnancy was premeditated and intended specifically to have the partners discharged. Note to soldiers reading this column: DON’T. Just apply for a discharge if you want it that badly, and if you can’t get it, shut up and keep your legs closed. A baby should never be a get-out-of-war-free card.

Although ”U.S. Central Command rules do not prohibit ’sexual contact between consenting, single servicemembers’” (thou shalt not commit adultery or thine ass is theirs), I wonder if Cucolo would be willing to take it upon himself to provide extra birth control, if his soldiers are that randy? No sense in making this an unfunded mandate. I’d suggest looking into the development and use of some kind of libido suppressor, but we’ve already seen what comes of that: awful, awful TV shows.

We all live in a sexist submarine

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus and Admiral Gary Roughead, Chief of Naval Operations, have recently decided that women could be allowed to work and sleep on naval submarines. It is 2009, after all.

I’m somewhat accustomed to arguing about women’s place in the military. Most people to whom I’ve spoken who are opposed to it – sadly, this includes plenty of women – believe that women are physically ill-equipped to serve and should avoid any task requiring corporeality. I usually respond to this by asking “What about the exceptions? Say one woman meets the same physical standards by which men are judged. Could she be allowed?” Then they often get into the YOU CANNOT HURT TEH WOMENZ! rhetoric, which is never resolved.

But the submarine ban had little to do with that sort of thing. It was all about the sleeping arrangements: “US naval officers in the past have cited the extremely tight quarters of a submarine as the main reason for the prohibition, but those who favor lifting the ban say subs could be outfitted with separate berths and bathrooms.” . . . That’s it? What, they instituted a systemically discriminatory policy because they didn’t want the mission to turn into an episode of Defying Gravity? (That’s a near-clone of Grey’s Anatomy in which hot astronauts have to deal with ineffective libido suppressants and their own emotional bullshit. I wish I was making that up.)

Critics of the ban pointed out that officers’ bunks are already segregated from enlisted members’ bunks on subs, so it’s not like such things haven’t already been done. If someone would like to explain the point of that segregation, go right ahead. And even if this problem was “insurmountable,” which Roughead says it is not, what’s the big deal? Well-trained and well-behaved soldiers ought to know how to regulate themselves when it comes to stuff like this. And if they don’t, they can learn. To say otherwise would be to imply that they’re wholly controlled by their reproductive systems. In any case, call me heartless, but the living quarters should be the last area of a sub on the minds of officials; how about the work areas?

Of course, if you want to talk about sexism, the U.S. Navy doesn’t beat the British Royal one: “Service in submarines is closed to women because of medical concerns for the safety of the foetus and hence its mother.” So all British female naval officers are constantly pregnant at the same time? I’d think none of them would be if they were on the mission at all!

Pentagon: F the F136!

I can’t tell you how good it feels to be writing about a spending issue again. It’s just like coming home after a frigid winter day and sitting down with a nice warm bowl of soup.

This story is that Defense Secretary Robert Gates is making another veto threat to the development and construction of a plane to be used by the military. The plane itself is safe, but some of its specs are not; Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter already uses a Pratt & Whitney F135 engine, but General Electric and Rolls-Royce, P&W’s major competitors in the aero engine manufacturing sector, won a contract in 2005 to develop a joint F136 engine. That funding was cut off in 2007.

Here’s some more aviatic background on the F-35, supplied to me by my father, an avid enthusiast of military aircraft:

• it’s called the Joint Strike Fighter because it’s used by all members of the USAF, except, obviously, the Coast Guard;
• it’s a combination of technologies from the AV8 Harrier (vertical takeoff à la helicopters) and the F-22 (stealth activity);
• though it has been proven to be functional, it is still in its testing phase and has yet to be used in combat.

That also means that it remains subject to many, many modifications, as is the case for all aircraft. But no other plane used by the Armed Forces today can compare with its capabilities.

So, should the Pentagon reserve this $560 million fraction of its $680 billion defense spending bill for these engines? If their funding is secured, by 2010, they will be competing with P&W for Lockheed Martin’s love; for now, they have to deal with the U.S. government. Extra competition within U.S. borders (GE) is always a good thing, and this one will create badly needed manufacturing jobs. Extra competition between two countries (RR) is also a good thing, in the interests of the globalized economy. Besides, their engine is better. So the economic advantages do indeed outnumber the costs.

It’s a bit trite for Gates to complain about less than a hundredth of $680 billion. Surely there are other items in these defense bills that can be cut? It appears to be the one area in which no one has a problem with a lack of fiscal restraint. And let me close by saying that there should be more partnerships such as this one between American and international companies; it’s a good midpoint between the two extremes of trade.

The steadfast tin soldiers

Another war resister gets to avoid extradition to the U.S. from Canada, at least for “a little longer,” which could mean up to six months. This one, Kimberly Rivera, came here in February 2007 after becoming “disillusioned” with the war in Iraq. She’s one of several who have become the new darlings of Canadian peace activists, and the new bones of contention for Canadian courts and lawmakers, who for the most part seem all too willing to cut them some unnecessary slack, likely for political points.

Sigh. This is akin to letting a U.S. advertising executive become a “refugee” because he or she doesn’t want to lead a campaign for Monsanto. It’s not their decision to make.

We Canadians have historically prided ourselves on providing a safe haven for draft-dodgers. But why should we be emotionally manipulated into housing members of a volunteer army who just don’t like the gig anymore? When you enlist in the army, you don’t get to choose where you get deployed, and the only superior to whom you can complain with even the faintest hope of results is the president of the United States. If another tour in Iraq would have been that traumatizing, Rivera should have done the (slightly) more honourable thing and asked to be discharged, instead of becoming an illegal immigrant and wasting our time.

“Michelle Robidoux, spokeswoman for the War Resisters Support Campaign. . . . said they would use the coming months to continue lobbying the federal government to grant U.S. war resisters safe haven in the country.” And why is that, Ms. Robidoux? What purpose does it serve us to shelter U.S. soldiers who would otherwise have been rightfully court-martialed? So we can look all happy and loving and peaceful while we stay in Afghanistan for another two years? Because that’s what we used to do (when there was a draft)? Because the war in Iraq sucks? Not good enough, I say. You call it “support”; I call it “aiding and abetting people who break the law.”

I’ve heard a few people suggest that we should keep resisters who are “useful” to Canada. But that would require asking who is fit to judge the usefulness of war resisters, and there’s no good way to answer that. So the remaining solution is to make them abide by the laws of the military they joined on their own accord, and let them back in only if they’re on vacation. (And make sure they really are on vacation, just in case.) And as for the peaceniks who try to convince the government to do otherwise, please take some classes in military law. Knowing is half the battle, after all.