Osama is Right
I hate to say it, but ultimately the observation Osama Bin Laden made about Americans following the Black Hawk down incident in Mogadishu holds true. You kill a couple of Americans, and we turn tail and run. In the case of Iraq, it took longer for this to happen and the killing of Americans had to be sustained over three years. Over that time 1800 American men and women have died in Iraq. That works out to about 2 deaths a day. And the media has been there to document and report on every one. Thank goodness the media doesn't pay more attention to our highways which kill 116 people every day. For some perspective, in Vietnam we lost 16 people a day for a total of 58,177 dead over 10 years.
Even with just two dead a day for three years, the American public has turned on the war in Iraq. It looks increasingly unlikely that the American public will allow for the mission to be completed and withdrawal will be demanded. It will be a ringing victory for crazy islamists who will have defeated the premiere power on earth. It will encourage them to take the fight throughout the middle east, Europe, North Africa, South east Asia, and the occasional bloody reminder in the US.
Because of our inherent weakness, we will need to fight and be ready for the next war. We don't need to change our assault tactics and training. Clearly the American military is extremely capable of overruning foreign armies, taking land, disrupting supply, and reducing opposing armies to rubble. We have nearly perfected the conquest phase of combat. The problem comes in the garrison stage of the conflict. It's not that the army isn't effective, it is simply unable to keep casualties below a tolerable threshold for public consumption. With that threshold being essentially zero, it is impracticle to use Americans in this role. We need an alternative. We need to outsource this job.
Thus I'd like to propse the Indian Foreign Legion.
The US would fund, arm, and train large divisions of Indian Infantry. The Indian mission would be very specific to garrison duties such as anti-insurgency activities, urban defense, police training, convoy guarding, and infrastructure guarding. The arms, equipment, vehicles, and uniform would be tailored to the job.
The officer corp would consist of Indians and Americans while the enlisted soldiers would all be Indian. The troops would only be deployed after US troops had finished the conquest phase of combat. In the event of India being invaded by Pakistan, China or anyone else, the units would be turned over to the Indian government for domestic defense.
The advantages to India would include thousands of jobs and job training to India's millions of unemployed, underpaid, young men. A large number of Indians would recieve the professional military training provided by America that could be transferred to modernize and improve India's national forces. The alliance between India and America would be strengthened and provide deterence to possible aggressors such as Pakistan or Iraq. The bases funded by the US would have the same economic boosting impact in India that bases in America have on local communities. Most Indian's have some knowledge of english and would be further educated. Reciprocity of citizenship to America could be offered as an incentive to Indians who complete their enlistment.
The advantage to America is that we will be able to complete our missions, defeat our enemies, and take the time required to establish stable governments without the American public going soft and scared half way through.
Win-Win
Even with just two dead a day for three years, the American public has turned on the war in Iraq. It looks increasingly unlikely that the American public will allow for the mission to be completed and withdrawal will be demanded. It will be a ringing victory for crazy islamists who will have defeated the premiere power on earth. It will encourage them to take the fight throughout the middle east, Europe, North Africa, South east Asia, and the occasional bloody reminder in the US.
Because of our inherent weakness, we will need to fight and be ready for the next war. We don't need to change our assault tactics and training. Clearly the American military is extremely capable of overruning foreign armies, taking land, disrupting supply, and reducing opposing armies to rubble. We have nearly perfected the conquest phase of combat. The problem comes in the garrison stage of the conflict. It's not that the army isn't effective, it is simply unable to keep casualties below a tolerable threshold for public consumption. With that threshold being essentially zero, it is impracticle to use Americans in this role. We need an alternative. We need to outsource this job.
Thus I'd like to propse the Indian Foreign Legion.
The US would fund, arm, and train large divisions of Indian Infantry. The Indian mission would be very specific to garrison duties such as anti-insurgency activities, urban defense, police training, convoy guarding, and infrastructure guarding. The arms, equipment, vehicles, and uniform would be tailored to the job.
The officer corp would consist of Indians and Americans while the enlisted soldiers would all be Indian. The troops would only be deployed after US troops had finished the conquest phase of combat. In the event of India being invaded by Pakistan, China or anyone else, the units would be turned over to the Indian government for domestic defense.
The advantages to India would include thousands of jobs and job training to India's millions of unemployed, underpaid, young men. A large number of Indians would recieve the professional military training provided by America that could be transferred to modernize and improve India's national forces. The alliance between India and America would be strengthened and provide deterence to possible aggressors such as Pakistan or Iraq. The bases funded by the US would have the same economic boosting impact in India that bases in America have on local communities. Most Indian's have some knowledge of english and would be further educated. Reciprocity of citizenship to America could be offered as an incentive to Indians who complete their enlistment.
The advantage to America is that we will be able to complete our missions, defeat our enemies, and take the time required to establish stable governments without the American public going soft and scared half way through.
Win-Win
posted by Bill Gilles | 12:30 PM
3 Comments:
Any chance you could include our Native friends (Louie?) in that definition of "indian?" That would free up valuable real estate (well - real estate, anyway) and help local and state governments by virtue of their take over of the currently indian-run casinos.
You started out with the post just fine, then you went crazy. I doubt America will ever high mercenaries to do its dirty work. Such activities belong too much to the old world.
I bet pakistan would just love having the US train and equip hundreds of thousands of Indian soldiers.
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