Soft Targets

 --the Jolly Roger 

 We kindle and char and inflame and ignite
Drink up me 'earties, yo ho
We burn up the city, we're really a fright
Drink up me 'earties, yo ho 
--A Pirate's Life for Me

 And the seasons they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
We're captive on the carousel of time
We can't return, we can only look behind
from where we came 
--The Circle Game, Joni Mitchell
_____________________

Terrorists -- our topic du jour and theme de l'annee, for the forseeable future -- habitually attack soft targets. Vis-a-vis this fact, let us look at the United State's Special Operations Command (SOCOM), a group of not-terrorists, and its historical tactics.

First some history. Your study assignments are the S'on Tay Raid in Vietnam and the Cabanatuan prison camp raid of World War II.

At S'on Tay, U.S. Special Forces led an incursion into a hard target, killing enemy soldiers and exfiltrating following the mission's completion. The Rangers breached another hard target at the Cabanatuan prison camp in the Philippines, deep in enemy terrain ("The Great Raid"). There, they sought to liberate allied prisoners of war and civilians. (In the European theatre, the Hammelburg raid was a similar operation, though with a more dire outcome.)

At both S'on Tay and Cabanatuan, there was a great possibility that the action could go South, which is exactly what happened to Task Force Baum, but those difficult actions characterized the Special Forces credo. The Special Forces of yore enlisted special men for challenging operations.

Today, the U.S. enlists its Special Forces to "take out" soft targets, crowing after the fact about the foregone conclusions. SEALs now kill such soft targets in their bedroom (= Osama bin Laden), or kill meaningless pathetic targets like the Somali pirates (the fictional Black Spot still inspiring fear.) The U.S. may as well paint targets on the foreheads before doing them the favor of releasing them from their miserable lives of poverty and desperation.

--Special Forces recruiting poster, ca. 1970

Now you have men like former SEAL Robert O'Neill bragging about being the triggerman in the OBL assassination, but not all soldiers in his community find his braggodocio endearing.

No one has the pirate's backs, and if the UBL raid went South the Pakistanis (stationed a short hop away) would not have moved to destroy the SEAL team; they love our money too much for such a dumb overreaction.

But what happens when the SEALs move against medium threat targets as in Robert's Ridge (Takur Ghar), the site of the Murphy Medal of Honor scenario? Well, they get blown out of the water.

Now to the current Islamic State (IS) - ISIL scenarios. Why don't the SEALs attempt hostage rescues against hard targets, like the British-speaking beheading specialist, for he is surely no less a target than the pirates. Do they lack the capability? Why not attack and destroy an IS command post? 

Word is, the SEALs who whacked UBL in his jammies received Silver Stars (SSM) for conducting their assassination. However, the Army regulations for bestowing such an award requires "close combat with the enemy", none of which was reported. Where is the heroism required to meet the bar of "conspicuous gallantry"? 

Special Operations has become specialized in "taking out" soft targets, much as the terror organizations against whom they are arrayed.

Oh Dark Thirty

--President Obama's Disposition Matrix,  
The Atlantic 

When in doubt,
 have two guys come through the door with guns 
--Raymond Chandler, on story writing 

~Please help me.
~You can help yourself by being truthful 
--Zero-Dark-Thirty (2012) 

When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing,
but that rather a tumult was made, he took water
and washed his hands before the multitude,
saying, I am innocent of the blood
of this just person: see ye to it 
--Matthew 27:24
__________________

One iconic image from the Vietnam War disabused Americans of their concept of rule of law in war zones: Eddie Adams stark photo of the street murder of a VC officer by General Loan, chief of the South Vietnamese National Police. That image showed General Loan acting as a one man judge, jury and executioner.

It is not too much to say that the outcome of that war hinged on the shift in American sentiment toward the North Vietnamese after viewing such apparent lawlessness.  The social upheaval stateside could not brook one more assault on the pillars which prop up a civilized existence.  Even though the Vietcong were themselves killers, U.S. citizens would not countenance the compromise of their own values; the impulse to Due Process was still strong, and they saw themselves in The Other.

Fast forward 44 years and our President acts like a rogue cop on a Saigon street corner (without actually pulling the trigger, to understand that awesome action), but unlike General Loan, Obama does so with impunity. A paltry 44 years has brought the tolerance of outright stomping on our core values regarding the rule of law as we accept his Presidential targeted assassinations (How Obama Decides Your Fate If He Thinks You're a Terrorist.)

When the deed is executed by drones it is all the better, as we like tidy "surgical" things; we like to be told what pills to take, and when and apparently what organs need to be excised (CFR Targeted Killings.)  Habitues of FOX - Limbaughrundia obediently excise their hearts, brains, spinal cord and sometimes stomach (for all their blood lust, they are weak and fearful.)

What else can account for our moral and ethical comedown? Perhaps our inborn sneaky natures are being stoked by our addiction to our personal technologies; hidden behind the intermediary of a screen, the worst offense can be committed yet it is almost as though nothing has happened at all -- change the screen shot and the pixels are gone.

Last week the film Zero-Dark-Thirty premiered-- the latest agitprop by our own Leni Riefenstahl (aka, Dir. Katheryn Bigelow).  The film perpetuates the mythical proposition that torture is a useful tool leading to successful targeted assassinations, an act contrary to core U.S. values.  But instead of being jeered for her glorification of this transgression, Bigelow is touted as having directed the best film of 2012.  Nietzsche was prescient, and we the self-elected Ubermensch have allowed for the transvaluation of our values. (An interesting aside: In its first week of release, "A Haunted House, "Gangster Squad", "Django Unchained" and "Les Miserables" rounded out the top five box stars; there is a theme here.)

Neither my President, my Army nor the propagandist movie director are acting with our concurrence here at RangerAginstWar.  How can we condemn the assassination of John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Robert F. Kennedy or any other, and yet accept this illegal act as a justifiable tool in a questionable national endeavor?

At least Pilate had the good sense to wash his hands of it.

Beanie Babies

 Vengeance is mine; 
I will repay, saith the Lord 
--Romans 12:19 (KJV)
 _______________

In the political circus we call nomination season, Vice Presidential nominee "I'm very fit and Catholic" Paul Ryan ended his first debate with VP Joe Biden with a comment on his 7-week-old Beanie Baby, implying that even the life of a bean is sacred.

Ranger wonders why an avowed Catholic would have a 7-week-old fetal ultrasound unless it was to discern any early possible problems with the fetus, and wouldn't that open the possibility of medical abortion of grievously damaged or non-viable beans?  Or is viewing the ultrasound just feel-good entertainment for self-involved pro-lifers? 

The same week a YouGov.com survey showed 69% of Americans favor assassinating know terrorists; 41% approve of using torture on suspected terrorists (Torture Creep).  Interesting that assassination is acceptable to a larger portion of respondents than is torture -- could this have something to do with the queasiness of facing the consequences (the tortured), versus the comfortable finality provided by death?

Glenn Greenwald notes, 

"It is often noted that the Catholic Church stridently opposes reproductive rights. But it is almost never noted that the Church just as stridently opposes US militarism and its economic policies that continuously promote corporate cronyism over the poor (Martha Raddatz and the Faux Objectivity of Journalists)."  

Our candidates all claim to be religious and presumably moral men (two Catholic, one Mormon, one, a pastiche) for whom assassination is acceptable while abortion gives them the willies.  Perhaps for them and the rest of the 69%, death by Hellfire missile is more moral than an abortionist's curette; it certainly sounds more apocalyptic.

So, Americans like Ryan oppose abortion, but are o.k. with blasting terrorists (=fully formed fetuses) into the great beyond.  What is missing from the debates and the party platforms are discussions of torture and assassination, and a coherence with the feel-good bean comments. 

The U.S. Army Military Police school used to teach that all life is sacred to an officer of the law, including that of the perpetrator. It is a clear and unambiguous statement, and forms the basis of federal law enforcement policy and doctrine.  It is not muddied by terms like "suspected perpetrator". 

Simply, the life of a terrorist is to be respected in the United States legal system.  But grasping this idea would require an honesty and intellectual rigor which has succumbed to visceral reactions.  Instead, the U.S. body politic operates as a blob of amoebic protoplasm, reacting to the light by lurching away.

How can a journo like Raddatz or politicians like Biden or Ryan or the lot of them look themselves in the mirror and imagine themselves to have done well by the people they supposedly serve?

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, Pt. II

 Two shots in the heart, one in the mind
--T-shirt sold at a gun show

 Johnny's in America
Johnny wants a brain
Johnny wants to suck on a Coke
Johnny wants a woman 
--I'm Afraid of Americans, 
David Bowie
 __________________________

Former SEAL Mark Bissonnette's "No Good Day" recounted the assassination of Osama bin Laden, and though trying to serve as patriotic doggerel instead reveals the sham that is the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©).

Instead of having America's finest assassinate an ailing terrorist has-been by breaching his compound, why not find out where he was having his weekly dialysis performed -- would not that be a better place to conduct an operation?  What other possible scenarios could have occurred?  Bissonnette writes of the ever-re-converted modular structure in which they trained, but there is no talk of training OUTSIDE of the box.

Of course, that would not be Bissonnette's call, but his higher ups, and one must wonder why such an anti-climactic denouement with such apparent contradiction was executed.  However, this quality should come as no surprise when one of the founding theatrics of the PWOT © -- the all-services "rescue" of Jessica Lynch -- was revealed for the sham it was.

Further, was it necessary to kill bin Laden?  Was he still an operational threat, or just a symbolic target of revenge?  If the latter, then the United States is using terror to combat terror, a never-ending Mobius strip of murder.

If the PWOT is about winning hearts and minds, how do we justify assassination? If the operation was so vital to our national security, then why is the helmet cam footage not being released?  Surely we the citizens have the right to see our tax dollars at work killing folks and alienating Islamic hearts and minds.

It has not been explained how the U.S. has the right to violate the sovereignty of the borders of the  nation of Pakistan.  Would we Americans welcome United Nations black helicopters invading our borders?

The U.S. romps and stomps like a bull in a China shop, acting as though the entire world -- or even just U.S. taxpayers -- buys into the Special Operations view of the world, which is that they may kill at will.

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

  Can't kill your way out of war
--General David Petraeus 

Acting is all about honesty.
If you can fake that, you've got it made
--George Burns

 I think I'll move to Australia 
--Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible,
No Good, Very Bad Day, Judith Viorst
________________________

Retired SEAL Matt Bissonnette's No Easy Day (published under the pseudonym, "Mark Owen") is a kiss-and-tell about the assassination of Osama bin Laden by Seal Team 6 (ST6), of which he was a member.  Many things surrounding this book reveal the questionable nature of the War on Terror.

First, if the Phony War on Terror (PWOT ©) were real, would it not be an act of sheer insanity to identify oneself in the media?  Would one not then be a sitting duck for al Qaeda retribution?

Second: All members of ST6 were awarded the Silver Star Medal (SSM) for this operation in which there was, by Bissonnette's account, less-than negligible hostile action.  This award should be bestowed for conspicuous valor in the face of an armed enemy -- how does this equate with assassinating an unarmed man in his nightshirt, in his house?

The Silver Star is appropriate for the Bedford Boys in World War II Normandy and later, the Battle of the Bulge. Appropriate for the Battle of Lang Vei or the Son Tay raid in Vietnam, in which large enemy forces were engaged and neutralized in a genuine military raid conducted for a military reason.  More recently, think Waygul and Wanat.

The SSM is NOT awarded for service or achievement; the Bronze Star without "V" device (valor) device takes care of that need. As with the Pat Tillman scenario, the statutory requirements for the award were not met.  There were more SSM's awarded for the OBL action than were awarded to entire Ranger and Airborne Battalions on D-Day.  Moreover, assassination is not a military term.

Third: The Law of Land Warfare and the Geneva Conventions, which are the law of our land and all civilized nations, does not recognize the actions of Bissonnette's "No Easy Day".

Bissonnette admits that OBL was shot in the entry phase with two to the head, and he said he himself then fired a handful into the body of a grievously-wounded adversary, whom he "could not identify".  If the target was no longer capable of hostile action (any man  is neutralized when he takes two to the head from a 5.56 carbine, and Bissonette describes OBL's brains spilling onto the floor), then his action is a violation of the GC's.  

He justified his trunk shots on the program 60 Minutes by saying he wasn't sure if OBL held a grenade under his clothing which he might throw, but that would be a scenario only seen in Marvel comics. Of course, after a cascade of dissimulation from the highest levels, what matter a final fib from a triggerman?

Fourth, but perhaps most significantly: Why was there no credible effort made to capture the most valuable source of intelligence concerning al Qaeda?  A live prisoner is an invaluable asset for neutralizing terror networks.  A kill mission in this case lacks military (though perhaps not political) logic.

The author has been criticized for jeopardizing national security, but what SEAL or SOCOM technique, training or operational imperative was exposed that had not already been revealed in the recent Navy propaganda film, "Act of Valor"?

If Act of Valor is a righteous film, then too is this book.  If this is a false conclusion, then Bradley Manning may be getting a new bunk mate.

Washington's objection to this book is that this soldier compromised the White House's carefully-scripted theater, revealing that the rapt faces in the NSC viewing room the day of the assassination were actually conducting the finest performance of the day.

[cross-posted @ milpub]

Notorious B. H. O.

I know. You know I know. 
I know you know I know. 
We know Henry knows,  
and Henry knows we know it
--The Lion in Winter (1968)

My grandma had a picture of J.F.K.
above the kitchen table.
Now I like Tupac, but the day ain't gonna come
when your grandma looks at a picture of Tupac and says,
"That Tupac was a great man"
--Chris Rock, SNL

I see you walkin' on your beat
Searchin' strangers on the street
Especially the whores you meet
It's a shame such a disgrace
--Mr. Policeman, Rick James
__________________

Ranger Question of the Day:
How do U.S. presidentially-mandated kills in Yemen
differ from those called by President al-Assad in Syria?
_________________

Biggie Smalls is no longer with us; how unfortunate. The new gangster culture idolizes members like Biggie, 50 cent and Tupac because they stopped a few 9 m/m rounds. Enter the latest gansgta whom we will call, Notorious B.H.O.

B.H.O. does flybys from Hellfire missiles, as opposed to pimped out slabs. However, unlike the new gangstas, B.H.O. subcontracts his bitchfags out to the poor white and Latino boys, and we idolize him for it. This is presumably B.H.O.'s idea of "nearsourcing".

Nobel Prize winner, assassin -- our President can claim some diverse company.