US army’s kill-kill ethos under fire

[spindrifter]

The Sunday Times September 24, 2006

Sarah Baxter, Washington

THE American army should scrap the Warrior Ethos, a martial creed that urges soldiers to demonstrate their fighting spirit by destroying the enemies of the United States at close quarter rather than winning the trust of local populations, according to senior US officers and counter-insurgency experts.
Soldiers are instructed to live by the creed, which evokes the warrior spirit of the modern US army. It begins with the stirring vow, “I am an American soldier”, and goes on to affirm that “I will never accept defeat. I will never quit . . . I stand ready to deploy, engage and destroy the enemies of the United States of America in close combat”.

Admirable though this may be in the heat of battle, the Warrior Ethos’s emphasis on annihilating the enemy is inimical to the type of patient, confidence-building counter-insurgency warfare in which America is engaged in the Middle East, according to Lieutenant-General Gregory Newbold, former director of operations to the joint chiefs of staff at the Pentagon.

“The future crises that relate to Iraq and Afghanistan will be a struggle for hearts and minds,” Newbold said. “We’re in a different environment now and that requires different techniques.”

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http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-2372122,00.html

[sweetheart]

1. No, the Army is the wrong force for this job

The Army is there to win sovereign wars, and their job ends when the war is
won, its not their specialty, at all, to life-support a political-economy to
health. The problem lies not with the army but the persons who put it
wrongly in the field, who squandered strategic security on an optional war,
and now they're out to blame the Army.. wrong enemy, stupid bushian assholes.

[CarbonDate]

3. Absolutely correct.

This needed to be turned over to UN peace-keepers as soon as Bush delcared "Mission Accomplished". Then again, peace was never their goal. So to readjust the warrior ethos to meet an end that isn't really their true goal is disingenuous.

[sweetheart]

4. I am for creating this peace force

Like launching a space shuttle, the project of launching a democracy,
or sustaining a broken nation state to peaceful wealth, is in
the strategic interests of all people. It creates goodwill and
strategic trade. Bush has taken us back to the pre-ww1 world of competing empires,
where each empire sells a competing vision of energy sustainability and cultural
sustainability. A whole bunch of people who know how to get in there and run elections,
set up civil institutions and writing constitutions, working with people to achieve
consensus, education of police and so many complex institutions it takes to fully
uplift a society to the civility expected in a balanced rich nation.

Then that peace force could go to work in the American urban poverty, to fix the mess,
no need look further than DC, and if they can't get that sorted, what are they doing in asia?

[wtmusic]

2. "Destroying the enemies of the USA in close combat"? What a joke

More like, "From 22,000 ft with smart bombs", or "from 1/2 mile away with white phosphorus", ad nauseum