Chaitanya Jyothi Museum Opening, 2000
RAMANAM
In the Name of The Father, and of The Son and of The Holy Spirit, Amen.
Countrymen,
ORBIS NON SUFFICIT
SOLUS DEUS SUFFICIT
The United States Army comprises six components:
The Army Of The Future
Children who are and who will be born to be Soldiers, or the spouse of a Soldier, and their families.
The Active Army
Soldiers in uniform and their spouses and families.
The Army Reserve
Soldiers in and out of uniform and their spouses and families.
The Army National Guard
Soldiers in and out of uniform, under state executive control, and their spouses and families.
The Present Army
Soldiers retired and resigned and their spouses and families.
The Permanent Army
Soldiers deceased and their living and deceased spouses and families.
Edmond Burke sees a free society based upon a contract between the dead, the living and the unborn. The Army is the vitality of that contract. The United States Army is vital quantity, quality and purpose.
Update 1: Putting Women In Combat Is An Even Worse Idea Than You’d Think
Update 2: Murphy’s Law: The Realities Of Defense Spending
Update 3: Attrition: The Incredible Shrinking U.S. Army
Update 4: Special Operations: What Makes It All So Special
Update 5: Heritage Foundation assesses, FWIW, 2016 US military posture and position
Update 5: 6 Reasons Why Starship Troopers Is The New The Art Of War
Update 6: I have not read the report and do not know the man. But off the top of this ancient and declining head, this sounds seriously unAmerican. FWIW, if anything at all, which may well be a stretch too far, that’s this nobody’s knee-jerk response to this report of CSA Milley’s statement. Unless deceived and forced by politicians and wimpy senior officers, Americans do not fight for lost causes. We fight only to win. I am happy to be declared ephemeral in my estimate of the CSA’s statement if needs be.
My knee-jerk was to Milley’s tone, which stuck me as insufficiently proactive and suspiciously willing to tolerate outcomes short of unconditional surrender by/annihilation of whatever enemy the electorate’s representatives choose to fight.
My health improves in direct proportion to said representatives’ resolve to drive any enemy to the surrender-signing deck of BB-63, so to speak.
Even my long-time close friend, socialist-leaning, Democratic Party partisan Soldier here is now talking unconditional surrender by the enemy as the only acceptable outcome of US war action in MENA.
Mattis’/POTUS’ moving policy from attrition to annihilation in re ISIL steps in that direction. Milley’s tone, such as I read it, suggests to me that he does not grasp the importance of that. If that is true, it means he also does not grasp the mood of the country he serves or the Army he leads. Also, if true, it means SECDEF likely is giving him an attitude readjustment.
The other thing I picked up from Milley is the trap of tech worry. It makes suppliers happy, and is necessary, but it not primary. Primary is the reason for engaging an enemy, the objective sought from that engagement and the congruence, or not, of assets committed with the objective stated. Since 1950, USA citizens’ representatives have been fighting wars without the objective of victory — except briefly with Reagan in re the USSR — and without assets provided that are commensurate with the only rational objective of war, namely, unconditional surrender of the enemy force.
Magnificent personal and unit heroics and other achievements cannot substitute for or repair an absence of grand national strategic goal that is rational in Von Clausewitz’s sense of national objective, and assets committed to achieving it, matching actual national interest. Since 1950, USA statecraft had been irrational, except briefly in the mid-to-late 1980s, and then narrowly only in regard to the USSR. It has been containment or negotiated peace rather than unconditional surrender. These doctrines defy national interest in that they leave an enemy puissant. Containment and negotiated peace are irrational statecraft. They are not statecraft at all, really, merely treacley bromides.
Perhaps that weakness is being pushed out now by strength, aka patriotism willing to take an enemy to his own wall and make him an offer he cannot refuse. If so, I would expect some starred personalities to be retiring and some fighters taking their place.
Technology is a means like money and any other asset: when proper objectives are resolved upon, proper conduct practiced, proactivity rampant, there is no lack of it. Get out of Americans’ way and they will supply means required to protect themselves.
Update 7: Army Creates Security Force Assistance Brigade and Military Advisor Training Academy at Fort Benning
AUM NAMAH SHIVAYA
