Study: Army Stretched to Breaking Point

AP via Yahooooo ^ | January 24, 2006 | ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer

[ARealMothersSonForever]

More cut and run "journalism".

[Just mythoughts]

I got to wonder if the enemy did not get this leaked first.

The mooolah in Iran sure sounds like he thinks he can pull a "Reagan" on US.

[One Proud Dad]

I call BS.

[saveliberty]

How does this guy know that they are not breaking the back of the terrorists?

And BTW so he says that there are no Iraqi troops?

Where the heck was this guy? Now even the local insurgents are going after foreign terrorists. Whatever offensive they did, it worked, because the Iraqis find them offensive and are taking action against them.

[Lakeshark]

Unbelievably ignorant these so-called reporters. Old Media agenda journalism at its worst.

Did Nancy Pelosi and John Murtha write this one?

[chilepepper]

funny thing about rotating troops like that. after a while it means 90-100% of your army has combat experience...

[goodnesswins]

"Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency."

NOW.....HOW would HE know HOW many INSURGENTS there ARE????? Talk about a Coward.

[samtheman]

More lies from the left.

[bikepacker67]

The problem is that we as Americans aren't really supporting our troops - except for lip service.

It would be nice to have a checkbox on our Fed Tax to donate $50 or $100 directly to the troops.

And maybe some PSA's that direct folks to where they can donate goodies and necessities.

If you didn't watch the news, you'd never know there was a WORLD war on. That is so strange when contrasted with WWII.

[penelopesire]

Isn't that what OBL said in his last communique? (rolling eyes). Now the leftist press is parotting OBL's 'talking points'!

[Migraine]

Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract,

If that's true, then it must be Army property, and, given the conclusions, and the fact that Army info like this should be TOP SECRET, and that it is seriously priviliged info in a national security sense -- I wonder who at AP, or in the "leaks" division at the Pentagon, or the author himself, is going to do major time in the slammer for this.

Oh yeah, I forgot, compromising national security and bad-mouthing the military is the newfound, treasonous job of our space-cadet press.

[dirtboy]

"Andrew Krepinevich, a retired Army officer who wrote the report under a Pentagon contract, concluded that the Army cannot sustain the pace of troop deployments to Iraq long enough to break the back of the insurgency."

We don't have to.

The Iraqis will break the back of the insurgency. As is now starting to happen. We will continually take more of an advisory and support role.

[Antoninus]

PsyOps seems to be working overtime.

Yeah, that's right, Iran. We're stretched to the limit...

[jazusamo]

Article by Robert Burns, AP military writer.

That says it all.

[ARealMothersSonForever]

after a while it means 90-100% of your army has combat experience...

It is odd that this was not mentioned in this hit piece. Not.

[God pays good]

As evidence, Krepinevich points to the Army's 2005 recruiting slump — missing its recruiting goal for the first time since 1999 — and its decision to offer much bigger enlistment bonuses and other incentives.

And does this author think that recruiting goals changed at all after 1999, for any reason like 9/11 maybe. This is ridiculous

[ARealMothersSonForever]

;0)

[Flavius Josephus]

To wax Rumsfeldian, there are two ways in which a report like this can be characterized -- BS, or true. If it's BS, we can dismiss and go on about the prosecution of the war as per normal. If it's NOT BS, then I have some serious concerns about our ability to handle a real war with real casualties.

(Not to minimize anybody's pain, but what would it be like if we took 2000 KIA in a single day as opposed to over a span of four years?)

[penelopesire]

From the article:
"While not released publicly, a copy of the report was provided in response to an Associated Press inquiry."

Which means it is a bogus lie that some dems sent to the Pentagon and then sent to the press to back up OBL!! These people are the enemies of this country!

[goodnesswins]

WONDER how much of what he wrote about Vietnam he's writing about IRAQ? See Below for his Vietnam Book....

The Army and Vietnam (Paperback)
by Andrew F., Jr. Krepinevich "In early June 1965 the United States Army had been in South Vietnam in one capacity or another for nearly fifteen years..." (more)
SIPs: traditional counterinsurgency doctrine, big unit war, airmobile forces, insurgent infrastructure, demographic frontier (more)
CAPs: South Vietnam, Viet Cong, Southeast Asia, Army Concept, General Westmoreland (more)
(2 customer reviews)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly
Krepinevich, a major with the Strategic Plans and Policy Division of the Army, raises serious questions about the military's ability to learn from its mistakes in Vietnam. The emphasis here is on the Army's stubborn insistence on pursuing a strategy of attrition, through large-unit operations and heavy firepower, and largely ignoring the political and social dimensions that form the foundation of successful counterinsurgency warfare. The result was a high-cost, low-payoff strategy which the Army stuck with until civilian leaders in the defense establishment openly challenged the policy after the Tet Offensive. Krepinevich praises the pacification programs of the Marines and suggests that their methods could have been profitably employed by the Army. More significantly, he suggests that the Vietnam experience has had little effect on the doctrine by which the Army is currently preparing for future low-intensity engagements. Illustrations.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal
Why was the U.S. Army in Vietnam? What was the nature of the war? What was the Army's plan for winning? Was there a possibility the war could have been won? A career Army officer, Major Krepinevich answers these questions and argues in a cogent and probing analysis that the Army believed that its might and firepower left it no room to lose; and that, because of that belief, it really had no chance to win. This excellent book is well researched in recently declassified documents and well written. Because it is a broad survey, it opens more questions than it answers, leaving many interesting side trails for further research. For all readers interested in Vietnam, especially those who supported the war. Edward Gibson, James Madison Univ. Lib., Harrisonburg, Va.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Inside This Book (learn more)
First Sentence:
In early June 1965 the United States Army had been in South Vietnam in one capacity or another for nearly fifteen years. Read the first page
Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
traditional counterinsurgency doctrine, big unit war, airmobile forces, insurgent infrastructure, demographic frontier, unconventional warfare operations, counterinsurgency mission, counterinsurgency capability, counterinsurgent forces, defeating the insurgents, insurgent strength, attrition strategy, airmobile concept, airmobile division, maneuver battalions, enclave approach, enclave strategy, population security, advisory duty, insurgency conflict, main force units, overt invasion, counterinsurgency operations, counterguerrilla operations, counterinsurgency training
Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
South Vietnam, Viet Cong, Southeast Asia, Army Concept, General Westmoreland, General Johnson, General Taylor, World War, Tet Offensive, President Johnson, General Wheeler, Joint Chiefs, White House, Korean War, General Decker, General Harkins, Central Highlands, Airborne Division, State Department, Alexis Johnson, Sir Robert Thompson, Third World, Howze Board, President Kennedy, Ambassador Taylor

---

Citations (learn more)
This book cites 30 books:

Swords and Plowshares (Da Capo Paperback) by Maxwell D. Taylor in Back Matter (1), Back Matter (2), and Back Matter (3)
War in the Shadows: The Classic History of Guerrilla Warfare from Ancient Persia to the Present by Robert B. Asprey in Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
Lessons from an unconventional war: Reassessing U.S. strategies for future conflicts (Pergamon policy studies on international politics) in Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
No More Vietnams by Richard Nixon on page 251
See all 30 books this book cites


56 books that cite this book:

Encyclopedia of the Vietnam War : A Political, Social, and Military History by Spencer C. Tucker on 10 pages
Masters of War : Military Dissent and Politics in the Vietnam Era by Robert Buzzanco on 6 pages
Modern Strategy by Colin S. Gray on 4 pages
Vietnam: The Necessary War: A Reinterpretation of America's Most Disastrous Military Conflict by Michael Lind on 4 pages
See all 56 books citing this book

---

9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

Most Interesting book I've read on the Vietnam War, February 3, 2004
Reviewer: William Nathan Alexander (Cambridge, Massachusetts, Massachusetts United States) - See all my reviews

This book deserves to be far more widely read than it is--and I have no idea why it isn't. Krepinivich's thesis is a brilliant one--the US army was "conceptually" unprepared to fight the Vietnam war: it brought a cold war mentality to the jungles of Vietnam and spent the first seven or eight years of the war trying to "find" this war. The US army imagined that the Viet Cong was a variant of the Soviet army--they "must" have been controlled by a central organization and "must" have had "hidden armies" lurking in the jungle. Decively defeating them would, the Army believed, end the war.
In fact, Krepinivich convincingly argues, the VC was not in the jungle at all--but in the cities along the coast. "We should have done less 'flit'in' and more 'sit'in'", he says.

The war was actually fought more effectively after US troop reduction prevented the "jungle search" strategy from being implemented. This was something akin to what the Marines performed in I Corps: rather than participate in large scale jungle sweeps, troops were divided up and put in small villages with radios. The strategy was more hazardous as troops, because of their small numbers might be overrun. However, it was more effective because it allowed allied forces to prevent the VC from retaking a village after they had withdrawn from their major operation.

This book should eventually allow for US military operations in the first part of the war to be put in the context of greater US cold war culture. The "willing blindness" of the US military during much of the sixties came from what amounts to a cultural fixation on a way power was imagined to function. Even in '71, Nixon believed that the Vietnamese communists was controled by a "COSVN", which functioned like a sort of "tumor": nip the tumor and the body will fall. This, Krepinivich proves, was all part of the American imaginary. Our blindness went far beyond the generals: it was part of our culture.