When a person joins the military he or she signs a covenant with death. True, the recruiter doesn't mention it and few people ever think of it until it's way too late.
It's not pleasant to think about or acknowledge the covenant that has been signed. I sure didn't enjoy the idea whenever it flashed across my consciousness. No matter how hard I tried to ban it, the thought always came back: You know, they really are trying to kill me.
The covenant doesn't care about race, religion, gender, or sexual preferences. Death follows the ultimate of don't ask-don't tell policies. While the covenant particularly applies to infantrymen, it applies to all military occupation specialties. In a war without fronts like Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, the covenant applies to everyone no matter how REMF the person might be. The mine, the roadside bomb, the odd rocket or mortar shell, the ambush invite everyone to die.
In an even lesser known (or acknowledged) codicil to the covenant, the individual agrees that he or she might be taken prisoner, kidnapped, snatched by the black hats. The individual might be held for years in conditions making the worst of medieval dungeons look like five star spas in comparision. (Of course, the black hats may simply get flatly medieval on your body and mind as well.)
If the covenant applied with impartiality to the draftee forces which did the heavy lifting in World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, it applies all the more rigorously today in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now we have an "all volunteer force." whether the Regulars, the Reserves or the National Guard. Each and every member of each and every component signed unread the Covenant With Death, including the Capture Codicil.
This is where we, the American people as well as the troops in or going to the Twin Wars must get a grip. A grip on reality. The reality of war. The reality of counterinsurgency. The reality of being an occupying power.
As an occupying power we are engaged in war. It is a war of a particular and peculiar sort, counterinsurgency. This is a war fought by its own unique rules and methods. It is as different from conventional wars such as World War II or even the first few days of the Invasion of Iraq as NFL football from soccer.
Methods and tactics, hardware and doctrine that can bring a quick and decisive victory in a conventional war will result in a long, slow and certain defeat when used in counterinsurgency.
In conventional war saving friendly lives has the highest priority. In conventional war saving time counts for much for not only does that save lives, it assures the political will of the nation remains strong and committed.
In conventional war the use of firepower, preferably highly mobile firepower commanded and controlled by a flexible communication system allows a force concentrate its effort and obliterate the enemy. Firepower kills. Killing brings victory.
The US has long focused on refining its doctrine, tactics, organization and equipment to provide the most flexible, mobile and lethal military forces. We have suceeded brilliantly as the successes against the Iraqi conventional forces in two wars showed.
So what?
So this. It is massively irrelevant. Period. When Cheney, Rumsfield, Wolfewitz, Feith and company planned our wars, particularly the one in Iraq, they focused (with I have often imagined lip-licking, gonand-grabbing adolescent anticipation) on "shock and awe."
Shock and awe. No doubt, the US military machine in full noise-making, thing-breaking, body-killing splendor can shock and awe anyone who watches and doesn't die in the process. I suppose they imagined that the survivors whether in Afghanistan or Iraq would be shocked and awed into gibbering thanks for the liberation with arms outstretched to embrace pluralistic democracy, liberal institutions and free enterprise.
What the hell were they smoking?
In both countries the insurgency started before the US press stopped cheering our victory.
Now the real war started. The war we weren't ready to fight. The war, perhaps, our highest officials never thought we'd have to fight.
Here we were, the NFL champs all suited up, playbook in hand. Right off we hit a problem. The other guys, the insurgents, were playing soccer--on a rugby field.
What's wrong with those insurgents? Don't they read the papers? We had won! We held the capitals. We held the cities. Their leaders were dead or on the run. Their conventional forces were routed. Hey! By all the standards of conventional war, the Afghans and Iraqis had been stripped naked, defenseless, their necks under the heels of our boots.
The better state of peace for which all wars are fought (at least in principle) was ours to dictate. Theirs to gratefully accept.
The reality on the ground in both Afghanistan and Iraq was easy, very easy to predict on the basis of history. The long, mixed experience with both insurgency and counterinsurgency extending from our War of Indpendence through the War Between the States to the Vietnam War.
Some folks, a minority of folks, would welcome our presence and the new order brought in my the US and its allies. Some folks, again a minority, would oppose us and our new order. Most people would simply want to get on with their lives according to their culturally conditioned expectations, hopes and fears. The majority view was simple: leave me alone; let me live in peace; color me a major non-participant.
Take a hard grip on this basic fact. The majority of the population, any population whether caught up in purely internal political violence or the aftermath of invasion and occupation (I refuse to use the euphamism, regime change.) want only to sit it out.
This uncommitted majority become a large part of the human terrain on which the new war, the war of insurgent and counterinsurgent will be fought out.
There is another part of the human terrain where the war will be fought. This part is the civilian population of the invading countries. Once again, there is a three part division. Some folks will be supportive, even wildly supportive of the invasion. A smaller percentage will be opposed, even wildly so, of the invasion. Many, perhaps most, will sit somewhere in the middle, not wanting the home team to lose, but not being sure they're comfortable with the role of occupier.
Get a firm grip on this second fact. The population of the invading country is a critical component, even the most critical area of the human terrain where the war is fought. (I use the singular, because the focus now is on the US and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.)
Now for the third fact. It comes from history too. From the history of every insurgency in our experience. You can read it's emerging reality every day on-line.
The third fact? Simple. The side which can accept casualties and expend time will defeat the side which seeks to limit casualties and save time.
To put it another way. If the United States cannot accept the Covenant With Death, it has signed a Contract with Defeat.
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