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[Make sure to read Daniel Greenfield’s contributions in Jamie Glazov’s new book: Barack Obama’s True Legacy: How He Transformed America.]
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin stopped by the Reagan National Defense Forum to deliver an address titled, ‘A Time for American Leadership’. What leadership lessons did he have to offer?
“I learned a thing or two about urban warfare from my time fighting in Iraq and leading the campaign to defeat ISIS,” he told his audience. “Like Hamas, ISIS was deeply embedded in urban areas. And the international coalition against ISIS worked hard to protect civilians and create humanitarian corridors, even during the toughest battles. So the lesson is not that you can win in urban warfare by protecting civilians. The lesson is that you can only win in urban warfare by protecting civilians.”
He then went on to lecture that “we will continue to press Israel to protect civilians” and” that “protecting Palestinian civilians in Gaza is both a moral responsibility and a strategic imperative.”
Gen. Austin headed Central Command from 2013 to 2016. Obama officials blamed Austin for telling Obama that ISIS was “a flash in the pan” (while Austin’s people denied he said that.) Central Command’s intelligence failures against ISIS were so bad that they resulted in an investigation into whether intelligence had been falsified to make it look like we were winning.
By the fall of 2016, after 3 years of fighting, ISIS had only lost a third of its territory in Iraq and Syria. That was in large part because the Obama administration refused to allow the military to properly hammer ISIS. Under Trump, our hands were no longer tied and we hit ISIS hard.
Despite Austin’s claims that victory against ISIS came from protecting civilians allied with the Islamic terror group, the reality was just the opposite. Fussiness over civilian casualties during the Obama administration translated neither to victory nor civilian lives saved. On Austin’s watch, airstrikes against ISIS killed civilians, but that was always inevitable.
It’s impossible to take out Islamic terrorists whose entire operating model is to fight from behind and around civilians without civilian casualties. The choice is between a long grueling war, which Obama and Austin gave us, or a short devastating campaign, which Trump gave us.
What the Obama administration refused to understand in either Iraq or Afghanistan is that the leading cause of civilian deaths are the Islamic terrorists we are fighting. During the Holocaust, Jewish groups pleaded with the FDR administration to bomb concentration camps, despite the inevitable civilian casualties, because it would have stopped the killing. The Allied campaign hit Nazi-controlled territories hard, with little regard for civilian casualties, because only ending the war quickly would stop the killing. If we had fought WWII by today’s rules, we would still be fighting it and for that matter it’s not at all impossible that we would have long since lost it.
Obama and Austin prolonged a campaign against ISIS that allowed the Islamic terror group to rape and pillage its way across the region. The choice was not between no or civilian deaths, but whether the dead civilians would be ISIS supporters or their Kurdish victims.
Trump dropped more bombs every month than the entire three years of Obama’s fitful fight against ISIS.The media and activists blamed the majority of the civilian casualties in Iraq and Syria on Trump, but that was also what ended the war and the accompanying civilian casualties.
While Obama kept the pain going to avoid civilian casualties, Trump finished the job.
Gen. Austin is pointing to his campaign against ISIS as a model for Israel. That would be a disaster for any number of reasons. Israel doesn’t have the economy or military supplies to spend four years fighting at that level. Furthermore, the Biden administration isn’t likely to support four years of air strikes and house-to-house battles across Gaza. Even after a month, there are definite warnings from D.C. that Israel needs to wrap up its fight against Hamas.
Austin and some of his people have used their campaign against ISIS in Mosul as a model for Israel. Here’s a reminder of what that model looked like and what it would mean for Israel
The Battle for Mosul against some 10,000 ISIS Jihadis by some estimates took 5-6 months and relied on over 100,000 Iraqi allied forces with estimated casualties of over 1,000. Civilian casualties were estimated at between 10,000 to 40,000 with no way to really know for sure.
The idea that the Battle of Mosul showed that “you can only win in urban warfare by protecting civilians” is entirely false. Iraqi forces, the vast majority of them members of a different religious group, Shiites (some members of Iran’s militias) or Kurds, were anything but gentle with Arab Sunnis. Iraqi soldiers killed whomever they liked, including women and children, and claimed they were ISIS. There’s no way to know what the truth was except that it was not a clean war.
Iraqi forces used heavy firepower in civilian areas to defeat ISIS forces on the ground. And there were no protests, not from the White House, from other Muslim countries or the mobs that howl every time Israel takes out a Hamas target in Gaza. Everyone understood that nothing else could be expected when fighting ISIS. And even the reports by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch documenting civilian deaths were mostly cursory and lacked outrage.
Israeli generals could only have rolled their eyes about being told that Mosul should be their model. In Mosul, Iran’s Shiite militias did much of the fighting on the ground in a prolonged and brutal campaign. The decision to turn the battle over to them saved American lives in the short term, but helped solidify Iran’s grip on Iraq. The rocket attacks on American forces in Iraq since then are the consequences of the decision to recruit one terror group to go after another.
There are no models here for Israel unless it can somehow recruit a bunch of Islamic terrorists to fight Hamas while it limits itself airdropping leaflets in between desultory airstrikes.
Beyond Israel’s fight against Hamas Jihadists, the truly worrying thing is that Gen. Austin and much of the brass actually believe what they are saying. Much as they believed what they were saying in Afghanistan. Because what it really means is that military leaders have forgotten how to fight. And they never seem to have learned what wars are or how we go about winning them.
Gen. Austin’s contention that “you can only win in urban warfare by protecting civilians” would have come as news to the Allies in WWII, to the Russians in Chechnya and to his own tenure in Iraq His insistence on the notion of a “strategic victory” that can only be won in the hearts and minds of the enemy is the same misguided strategy that cost us so many lives in Afghanistan.
And that ended with our defeat.
“We will not win simply by killing insurgents,” Gen. McChrystal had argued, kicking off Obama’s surge in Afghanistan. “Earn the support of the people and the war is won, regardless of how many militants are killed or captured.”
In the real world, you win the war by defeating the enemy, not by winning the support of the people. Wars are not democratic elections and the battlefield isn’t a political campaign. When wars are run by politicians, the end result is a defeat that comes from never really trying.
Why don’t we win wars anymore? Listen closely to Austin, McChrystal and virtually every military head honcho in the last twenty years and the answer is obvious. We don’t set out to win wars by defeating the enemy on the battlefield, but on the battlefield of ideas. Our forces are led by a generation of politicians in uniforms who have been indoctrinated, beginning at the academy level, to think of wars as contests for the hearts and minds of enemy civilians.
If Israel adopts this strategy, it will fail and be defeated. But so will we. We’ve been fighting wars that we can afford to lose (if you can describe leaving thousands of dead and many more wounded as acceptable) but we may soon find ourselves in a war against a peer competitor.
Like China.
If we go up against the People’s Republic of China, will we be trying to win their hearts and minds or to beat them? Our wars until now had a limited existential risk, but that may change. The day may come when, like Israel, our wars are not something we fight abroad, but at home. Are our military leaders ready to make the tough choices of a Sherman or a Patton, or Austin’s notion that we should always risk our soldiers and the war, rather than risk enemy civilians?
Without a military leadership that understands the purpose of war, the next time we may not lose thousands, we could lose millions. And we could lose the United States of America.
Well said, thank you.
Yes, well said. And, most appropriate.
Austin should not be allowed set foot in anything carrying the Reagan name. Austin is symbolic of most of what went wrong in America.
Wars are won on the battlefield and in rendering the civilian population that supports the enemy incapable of rendering support in any manner not by winning over their hearts and minds
Not sure if flushing out their sewer has anything to do with it but Hamas is now apparently more engaged with people who are in a position to fight back.
If we had fought WWII by today’s rules, we would definitely have long since lost it. (FIFY.)
Why don’t we win wars anymore? We don’t set out to win wars (period). (FIFY again.)
It could be argued it is because of the Military-Industrial Complex: they want their products purchased in order to keep their bottom line alive yet they do not want to go all out to win because that would shorten their usefulness for on-going profits.
Amen!! We haven’t won a war since WWII, which incidently was the last war we actually declared. I’m an old coot in my mid-seventies, and I don’t remember a time in my life when American soldiers were not being shot at by “enemies” somewhere in the world. All those bullets, rockets, bombs, and materials made the MIC lots and lots of money and will continue to do so. Sadly, karma has a way of catching up with us sooner or later. Heaven help us.
That’s absolutely right
I just dont believe Loyd Austen ever saw true military action. And that would be ok with me if he were not put in such a position of authority. Thankfully most US soldiers never see true combat (Im one of those, never once in true danger) But I also dont fool myself into thinking Im ready to lead soldiers.
I made a search of his career, maybe it was incorrect, but by the time it shows that he was anywhere near combat, he was too old to really mix it up, plus he already had obtained sufficient position to not be put in the line of fire.
His career was likely made in DC, and skin color didnt hurt one bit.
Precisely.
Plus, it is interesting to compare him and his position with men in like-positions with enemies. In almost every case, they more closely resemble true warriors that the political animal Austin. All generals are political, four stars especially so. Some have recently pointed out that in WW2, we had something like 7 or maybe it was 17 vs now maybe 400 with huge budgets and support staff. I do not recall precisely right now. I believe it was a Lou Dobbs podcast wherein this scene was described. Bottom line: America’s current military would be no match for the heroes of WW2, we are flufffed up, inflated beyong recognition with metro city dudes. If interested check out China’s generals. No fatty frat metromen there.
Israel is way ahead of any previous models. For example in using AI in target selection.
Similarly the war in Ukraine is way ahead of previous models. That seems to be the flaw that wrecked the Ukrainian counter-offensive, they were pressured to use old NATO models that didn’t fit the concrete situation.
Highly important and significant comment. Thx.
Thanks LuzMaria!
Great article! I find myself posting that more on this site than any other!
The most HUMANE way to fight a war is to DESTROY the ENEMY where you find them! Simple as that!
Now I know we have more sophisticated weaponry today that can do the job without the “collateral” damage as before but there’s no way you can fight a war and not have collateral deaths. In the case of Gaza, the people there are as close to a militia or actively supporting the terrorists as you can get! Other than the tiny babies, no one there has an open mind regarding the right of Israel to exist! They are taught to HATE very young and it only grows as they get older and their life becomes more miserable due to their leaders and the general HATE that consumes the entire “nation”! I do hope and Pray that Israel will end this mess and let the Gazans (not palestinians) see that LIVING a LIFE is better than living to DIE in HATE! OR, just continue to kill hamass, raze a buffer zone, maintain security, and let the survivors live a better, more peaceful life. But under no circumstances should the Gazans be afforded the benefits of entering Israel!!
The celebrations in their streets actually exposed that too. Old, young, women, men. They all were jumping up and down with glee. Of course, now that Israel responds, they changed their tune. Still, none of them merit living in a modern society, imv.
Possibly an accomplished medium can be engaged to contact General Patton on the other side to come and torment and Austin and Milley in their dreams every night until they go insane from the nightmare’s and commit suicide.
Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin knows nothing about Islam and its followers. Except for his brainwashed delusions, he’s dumb as a stick.
Islam 101
http://media-quest.com/Islam101.pdf
Read 11 pages marked starting from the middle of page 4 thru 14.
Read the section on the Media-Quest page “A recent comment is as follows.”
The followers of Islam have been indoctrinated since infancy that Islam and its faithful will eventually rule the earth. The commands canonized in their Qur’an very explicitly make that a point and dictate that it should be accomplished by slaying the Jew and the infidel until the task is accomplished. Again, this is what Muslims from childhood are taught, believe and expect. The orthodox Muslims that practice it are labeled “terrorists”, “radicals” or some other euphemistic label that lets Islam itself off the hook, when in fact they are carrying out to the letter explicit and very clear Islamic religious commands. An example would be to say that there is a problem with the radical SS, thus implying that Nazism itself would otherwise be okay if it were not for those pesky SS.
No decent person can remain a follower of Islam. Islam commands that its followers must not take infidels as friends. And indeed what decent person can claim to be your friend yet remain a willing follower of a religion which has indoctrinated them since earliest childhood that they are commanded to either murder you or at very least subjugate you to the status of a dhimmi, to expect that their religion will become superior over all other religions, to practice taqqiya and kitman in claiming to be your friend all the while knowing it is the opposite that is true. Disgusting.
“Learn about Islam. That is the most important thing for people to do. Learn who it is that you are not.” – Samuel Lurie
The hyper-sensitivity about civilians is a symptom of weak, liberal thinking that turns war into policing and imposes rules of engagement that simply cost the lives of patriotic American military members. These wars have in common that they are long, don’t produce victory, and ultimately end having accomplished nothing (and often, as with Vietnam and Afghanistan, looking like ignominious retreat). We haven’t had the correct approach since WWII: Kill people and break things until the enemy—military and people— is beaten and surrenders.
Not since WWII have we had a congressional declaration of war signed by the president. We have only had “police actions”.
Interesting jus in bello dilemma. The same idiot utopians had no problem with the bombing of Dresden or Truman’s decision on how to bring WWII to an end, for example, but they get their panties all in a wad if Israel defends itself from satanic evil. As for the United States protecting herself, they had no problem with FDR imprisoning hundreds of thousands of American citizens of Japanese descent, but they have an issue with housing ILLEGAL immigrants crossing our borders at will and flaunting our laws until they are vetted and we know for sure who they are, including laws designed to protect us from identity theft, drug and human trafficking just to name a few.
IF the predicted fight with China actually presents, the screaming fools will very possibly learn a lesson. But, it likely will be too late to be able to adjust.
On the contrary, they do object to Truman’s dropping the bomb and the bombing of Dresden.
Nearly everyone alive in 1945 has since died, those objecting to Israel defending itself weren’t born before 1945..
Altruism, put into practice, is why America forgot how to win.
Obama ran an altruistic policy against ISIS.
Austin is a buffoon We will never win an armed conflict with the likes of him in charge. Austin is one of Obama’s agents directed to destroy the military in this country and wreck foreign policy. Israel needs to ignore the State Dept BS and threats. They need to keep the pressure on Hamas and win this war. Any Palestinian civilians killed, I’m sure are allied with Hamas. As for the hostages, Israel cannot allow 150 people to dictate the fate of a nation. .
Your last sentence emphasizes the tragic reality of this dirty war: Sometimes you have to write off the hostages. If they can be saved, great, but let that be by military action, not at the cost of Israel’s future security.
Austin is the Claudine Gay of the Department of Defense, a role he prepped for in the army
Great analogy. Thanks.
The Pentagon needs to be put back under real command not this Touchy Feely liberal snowflake stuff
He simply has no business telling Israel how to wage war. It is fighting an enemy that does not recognize any non-Islamic rules of war, deliberately massacres Israeli civilians, hides behind its own civilians using them as human shields, routinely lies to the world media, shoots unguided missiles at population centers hoping to cause civilian casualties, etc. It’s not a type of war he’s ever had anything to do with and he hasn’t been particularly successful at any of the wars he has had anything to do with. Like Tom Hagen, he is not a wartime consigliere. He should shut up and let the serious people do their job and defeat their enemy.
when you have woke milksops like milley , austin and the rest of the brass more concerned with DEI and the rest of the drivel they now espouse america will always lose . that they are telling israel that they have to lose as well is treason and a travesty . the jews would be better off going their own way , unfortunately israel is full of the same genderless miscreants that inhabit the halls of power in america . what has happened on oct. 7 will continue to occur because the left in israel have the same mindset as the left in the u.s. oct. 7 will be repeated ad nauseam and will only come to a stop after the 7 year tribulation spelled out in the book of revelation . the jews are in for a rough time , this heartbreak will be an ongoing theme until their messiah intervenes just before they are on the brink of annihilation .