Dying For Montenegro

[_honorentheos]

The best NCO I was fortunate to serve with and the man I consider my mentor as well as a close friend is career military, and to be honest, he's told me of things he dealt with on deployments at command levels that reflect some of what Dog may have in mind. They were referring to certain troops from some of our smaller allied nations, and to someone deeply committed to the professionalism of our armed forces I can see what he found...peculiar. I don't dismiss you experience, Dog. Perhaps anyone who's watched the documentary film Armadillo would also wonder about the level of professionalism of some of the troops committed to combat service in Afghanistan and Iraq.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wevzsn7bfA

Thanks, Honor. I'll watch this. I recognize my perspective may be skewed.

Hi Morley,

I just noticed that link doesn't provide a video of the documentary. I think I watched it originally on Netflix but am not sure if it's still available there. It looks like it may be available through other video outlets, though.

I suspect that the documentary will be viewed differently depending on one's own experience but it does portray the Dutch soldiers in it in a way that captures them at their best and worst. And if one were a professional soldier there is a aura of amateurism to many of the things they do though it's hard to know how much of that is because it is so focused on the young men leaving for combat for the first time. Contrasted with Restrepo, though, that also takes a similar view when reporting on American troops in Afghanistan one sees their youth but also the structure around them is different.

[_Chap]

I suspect that the documentary will be viewed differently depending on one's own experience but it does portray the Dutch soldiers in it in a way that captures them at their best and worst. And if one were a professional soldier there is a aura of amateurism to many of the things they do though it's hard to know how much of that is because it is so focused on the young men leaving for combat for the first time.

Is anyone surprised to find that the Netherlands, a country that has not been involved in military operations on a national level since WWII, does not produce the world's best-trained combat soldiers?

It does, however, take all sorts of soldiers to make an major military force, and a large number of those will not be frontline combat troops. The Dutch contribution to NATO and other joint operations has its uses, so long as they are appropriately deployed.

[_Water Dog]

What the hell does this even mean?

It means perhaps you should send someone who knows what they're talking about over here to argue your position... because you suck at this.

[_Kevin Graham]

What the hell does this even mean?

It means perhaps you should send someone who knows what they're talking about over here to argue your position... because you suck at this.

Says the guy who thinks talking about an agreement from 1994 "literally describes" a revolution that happened 20 years later.

[_Morley]

What the hell does this even mean?

It means perhaps you should send someone who knows what they're talking about over here to argue your position... because you suck at this.

Ha! Point taken.

[_Water Dog]

The best NCO I was fortunate to serve with and the man I consider my mentor as well as a close friend is career military, and to be honest, he's told me of things he dealt with on deployments at command levels that reflect some of what Dog may have in mind. They were referring to certain troops from some of our smaller allied nations, and to someone deeply committed to the professionalism of our armed forces I can see what he found...peculiar. I don't dismiss you experience, Dog. Perhaps anyone who's watched the documentary film Armadillo would also wonder about the level of professionalism of some of the troops committed to combat service in Afghanistan and Iraq.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6wevzsn7bfA

My only experience was training in Germany before 9/11 but at the time I found the German forces quite professional and good to work with but when it comes to military personnel one can find all kinds of soldiers across the professional spectrum I suppose. I do find the statement that the UK is miles behind our abilities along with those of Germany, Canada and France to be improbable given my limited exposure.

Thanks. And link is bad, FYI.

Repeating myself, I have not said that Germany, France, et al, have useless militaries. What I've said is that they are of no use to us. We don't need them, they need us. If the USA pulled out of NATO, there would be no NATO. What does that say? They cannot provide any help to us whatsoever. What can they do for us that we can't and aren't already doing for ourselves?

NATO only makes sense in the context of a hostile USSR/Russia that is bent on world domination. Cold-War-Era thinking where we're seriously conceiving an invasion of the continental USA. In such a situation you'd have a multi-front conflict with both American and European theaters. Is this a legitimate concern? No.

Say the USA were to get attacked. China and Russia attack the western seaboard. I know, absurd, but go with me. What would our NATO allies do? They don't have the ability to even transport their personnel and equipment over here. Before having a discussion about how helpful they might be in a fight, they can't even get to the damn thing. Simply talking about raw assets, NATO military forces are really only of value in Europe.... with the exception of some Naval/Air support from the UK (who I included as being helpful). And they don't have the industrial capability to spin up assets in the course of a protracted conflict. Getting real, aside from the USA, everybody has similar problems. North Korea may have a million man army, but they can't move it anywhere, so who cares. South Korea may care, but why do we? So, at best, what good would our NATO allies be? They'd counter-attack Russia and form the basis for the European theater? Maybe? That is hard to fathom.

Moreover, at this point on the timeline of technological advancement, nobody can invade the continental United States without pre-emptive nuclear strikes. Does anyone disagree with that? Even if a naval force were assembled to transport a sufficiently large ground force (ROFL), we'd simply shoot it out of the water. Detonate a nuke right over the fleet in the middle of the pacific. The missile traveling at the speed of sound, how would they stop it? Game out any strategy you like, in a situation where the USA is under attack, it's infeasible to think of NATO members coming to our rescue in a meaningful way. They would be like pesky flies, easily swatted in the course of an attempt to attack the USA... were there an enemy strong enough to mount such an attack.

There is no defensive argument for NATO, only an economic one. And when you consider things like OPEC, or Germany building pipelines to Russia, the economic argument becomes untenable. All these Russia conspiracies. It's nothing but a fight over money. Competing pipelines for both oil and natural gas. Russia wants to build a pipeline, Iran wants to build a pipeline, Qatar wants to build a pipeline. Debates over NATO and Syria, that's all it's about. Not defense. Money. Competition over a large customer base that resides in Europe.

[_Chap]

There is no defensive argument for NATO, only an economic one.

Er, yes, you could put it that way.

States do not generally maintain military forces in order to have fun fighting other countries to see who wins. They mostly find it worthwhile to spend money on their military in order to maintain access to their trade and supply routes, by as far as as possible deterring actions that might impede such access, or damage the markets or commodity sources to which access is desired to be maintained.

North Korea may have a million man army, but they can't move it anywhere, so who cares. South Korea may care, but why do we?

That statement is a wonderful example of why war is too important to be left to generals. Especially of the armchair kind. Do I really need to spell out the immense direct and indirect damage to US economic interests (regional in East Asia and worldwide) that would follow from even an ultimately unsuccessful large scale North Korean attack on the South?

[_Water Dog]

That statement is a wonderful example of why war is too important to be left to generals. Especially of the armchair kind. Do I really need to spell out the immense direct and indirect damage to US economic interests (regional in East Asia and worldwide) that would follow from even an ultimately unsuccessful large scale North Korean attack on the South?

Yes

... and I don't care?

This is the thing. We can game out lots of outcomes. Maybe you're right. Maybe I'm right. But to a large extent it just boils down to the principle of the situation. Kick the can arguments are weak. On principle, I am of the opinion that if South Korea cannot stand on its own two feet after all this time, too bad, so sad. I have the same opinion of Israel. And the US national debt. If we have allowed ourselves to grow dependent or otherwise interconnected with these at-risk unsustainable economies, that's our bad and we we shouldn't have done that. At some point you gotta cut the cord and deal with the consequences head on.

[_Chap]

If we have allowed ourselves to grow dependent or otherwise interconnected with these at-risk unsustainable economies, that's our bad and we we shouldn't have done that.

Right. So the US should never have got itself involved in economic activities outside its shores - either buying or selling stuff - in order to avoid the necessity of defending its right to pursue such activities unmolested.

Somehow I don't think the average American would like the consequences of that on their standard of living.

[_Morley]

That statement is a wonderful example of why war is too important to be left to generals. Especially of the armchair kind. Do I really need to spell out the immense direct and indirect damage to US economic interests (regional in East Asia and worldwide) that would follow from even an ultimately unsuccessful large scale North Korean attack on the South?

Yes

... and I don't care?

This is the thing. We can game out lots of outcomes. Maybe you're right. Maybe I'm right. But to a large extent it just boils down to the principle of the situation. Kick the can arguments are weak. On principle, I am of the opinion that if South Korea cannot stand on its own two feet after all this time, too bad, so sad. I have the same opinion of Israel. And the US national debt. If we have allowed ourselves to grow dependent or otherwise interconnected with these at-risk unsustainable economies, that's our bad and we we shouldn't have done that. At some point you gotta cut the cord and deal with the consequences head on.

1) I'm genuinely curious. If the US hadn't been attacked by Japan in WWII, should the US have stayed out of the war? You seem to suggesting as much. The world map would certainly be different today if we'd stayed home. We'd be dealing with a Nazi Europe and an Imperial Japanese Asia.

2) If, in this dog-eat-dog world you envision, Russia gets to gobble Crimea, Iran gets to munch on Israel, and North Korea is justified in swallowing their southern brother, shouldn't we in the US be taking over some of our weaker neighbors, too?

I'm trying to figure out your thinking. Thank you in advance.