B-2's Bomb ISIS!

H/T Edpop at F-16.net This is pretty much a repeat of what I posted at F-16.net

It is interesting that CNN focuses on the body count.

It does gives proof to the old adage "If it bleeds it leads' but my, how 'Southeast Asia 1965' of them.

What's more important: Were the right terrorists killed. This is pretty much a repeat of what I posted at F-16.net

Q: Why use B-2s?
A: So ISIS never saw us coming.

Q: Why 2 B-2s to drop 38 weapons when 1 can carry 80 500lb JDAMs?
A: To bomb both locations at the same time, like probably down to the last second unless they wanted to cause a response in one first by bombing the other. And more than 38-40 would have probably been overkill.

Q: Was this cost-effective?
A: Aside from killing the terrorists who would have carried out attacks in Europe and probably elsewhere now and later (CNN and their 'militants'....F*! both.) it probably:

a.  flattened their training facilities, weapons building capability and stockpile and the trainers of future terrorists,  

b. it will also make the survivors look up in the sky at night and loose their beauty sleep.

The immediate and later costs of letting any attacks happen probably far outweighed the cost of flying 2 B-2s and expending a few bombs.

There are some less obvious positives about this, given the 'international' interest in the region, but I will not air them here.

Now  expect some slacker in the media to use the 'kitchen sink' definition of $/FH to rail against the strike as 'wasteful' in 5...4...3...2...

On a personal note...

I had a very small role in fielding the Smart Bomb Rack Assembly (Smart BRA: gotta' love it). I suppose since they dropped only 38 JDAMs they could have used the Rotary Launchers (RLAs) but that's OK too, since I also played a small role developing and testing the smart weapons interface that allowed GATS/GAM then JDAMs etc. to be dropped as well.

I feel pretty good about all that right now.

Updated 20 Jan 17: Well now the reports coming in say 'over 100' JDAMs, and some specifically assert 110 JDAMs were dropped in two camps. It appears by some accounts there were to be up to four camps targeted initially but the terrorists had consolidated as well as relocated between the time the missions were conceived and executed. I'm sure the AF still enjoys it when targets bunch up. 

It would have been hard to move assets around the Middle East to hit Libya like this without contrarian interests leaking it beforehand, I still remember Operation Allied Force and how ops departures out of Comiso seemed to be on TV in real time. The message here is: you won't see us coming unless we want you to.   

As it perhaps looked like a last tasking from Former President Obama to our enemies, I imagine they were just as surprised as some of the media appear to be when a Buff and UAVs took out a few AlQaeda in Syria in followup. 

Moronic Jackjawing on B-1 CAS Friendly Fire Incident

Way to Stay 'Classy'...NOT!

Hat Tip: 'Count_to_10' over at F-16.net

The results of the investigation into the June 2014 ‘friendly fire’ B-1 incident is out.  Read the summary here. I’ll wait until you get back…..

Welcome back!

If you bothered to read the comments, you saw it sure didn’t take long for the morons to start twisting the results to mesh with their own stupid little beliefs held in the vast emptiness of what outwardly appears (to the unsuspecting) to be human heads sitting on their shoulders. 

In the first FIVE comments, on this article reporting on the findings, only one, made by a person named ‘Joe Hardy’, managed to make a cogent, if terse observation as the second commenter:

The JTAC may not have been up to date on the latest B-1 capabilities, in part because its relatively newness and the experienced JTAC might not have worked with a B-1 with this capability before or with any frequency, but Mr. Hardy's statement at least looks towards where the problem in this chain of events was: on the ground.

The guy with ‘firsties! Honors’, one Chris Smith, managed to conflate who did what out of the gate:

 

Yes Chris, you do need to “get this straight”…. and fast. Re-read what you wrote and see if it makes any sense to you the second time.

The B-1 crew told the JTAC and Ground Commander they could not see the IR strobes. The guys on the ground did not process that information correctly. This wasn’t about what they did or didn’t know, this is about confusion in the heat of battle leading to someone on the ground giving direction to the B-1 to bomb the wrong spot.

The on-scene Commander makes the call, the JTAC is supposed to make sure the on-scene Commander and CAS assets get the information they need to make the call and deliver the ordnance. No doubt the splintering of the commander’s forces without his or the JTAC’s knowledge was a serious compounding factor in the confusion. It could have even been the key link in the chain of events that created the confusion, but in any case it had to have contributed to the tragedy.

The B-1 put the bombs right where it was told to put them. It wasn't the choice of aircraft, or the aircrew's fault. Got it straight now? Well if not, read on.

The third commenter was the delightfully named 'Jerry Barker':

 

Jerry makes unsupported assertions and allusions, implying what he apparently perceives to be a deficiency in the B-1 or any aircraft that depend on “pods”. He also apparently operates under the mistaken belief that the A-10 would not have had ANY comparable problems in performing the same mission under those same conditions.

He assumes too much.

We cannot positively state that an A-10 would have been able to even DO the job under the conditions at the time. All we can say is that perhaps an A-10 driver might have been able to see the ‘IR beacons’ once he got within the range of his NVGs, but that would only be IF he could have discerned the general battlefield.

If an A-10 wasn’t carrying a Sniper pod, he would have had more difficulty using those same NVGs (and/or other targeting pod that are nowhere near as proficient at that task as the B-1’s Sniper pod), to even get into the position to where he might have seen the IR strobes, AND be able to figure out where most of everyone else was (remember, not even the ground commander knew his guys had split up).

The sun had set just before the B-1 arrived on the scene, and over an hour before the B-1 made its pass. This can be a bad time of day for visible and IR light contrasts. Was it on this night? What was the weather like? Was there haze? Dust? Clouds?

The waxing moon was a little more than half-moon, and would have been approximately half-way to apogee. This could have meant deep shadows (mountains remember?) were present that would have created contrasts that might play more hell with NVGs or any targeting pod with less capability than a Sniper Pod. Even if the A-10 had a Sniper Pod, unless he was at the same altitudes as the B-1, the scene would have been more difficult to assess.  Since there is only one set of eyeballs in an  A-10, the pilot would have had to spit his time between flying the plane, talking to the ground, and looking at his sensors.

The B-1 crew can use the sensors more effectively and manage the workload better. All they need is for someone to give them the right coordinates.

The fourth commenter was a ‘Michael Murphy’:

Less ardent and more succinct in his stupidity than Jerry, but every bit as thoughtless.

The fifth and final dipsh*t is one ‘Mister’ Curtis Conway:

Says the guy with no CAS aircraft design, development, or employment experience. His comment is more ‘Murphy’ than ‘Barker’….he’s just more self-assured in his stupidity.

I’ve not bothered to make much effort to slap him around in response to the usual tripe he manages to post with regularity (and with that same ‘qualifier-free' declarative style seen above) at sites I frequent.

I may have to change that.

 

In Closing

If anyone who reads this is on Facebook, feel free to share this far and wide. Point out that these D-bags made their stupid little statements without consideration for the well-being of the survivors (those who were involved in the mistake and those who weren’t) AND without consideration for the family and loved ones of those that were lost to this tragedy within a tragedy we call ‘war’.  Tell these sad losers to go vent their misplaced ‘outrage’ on the back of something less sacrosanct than the deaths of good men in a hard war.

Just in case some of this stupidity tries to get flushed down the memory hole, here's a screen cap of the thread at the time I excised the comments presented:

     

UAV Strikes in Pakistan Aren't Targeting Civilians

So they're not killing very many either.
When the evidence gets looked at closely we find Unmanned Air Vehicle strikes don't kill nearly as many civilians as collateral damage as the political opportunists in Pakistan or emoters in the United States try to lead us to believe.  There's a shocker for you (not).

There's nothing 'Sterile' about it.
Even the improper use of the descriptor 'Drone', which has now come into common usage as a label for all unmanned air vehicles seems to promote the 'thoughtlessness' meme. They are Unmanned Air Vehicles. I submit the human thought and decision process that go into deciding to launch a Hellfire missile off a Predator UAV are far more involved and rigorous than launching one off any other type of platform. People who carp about the 'sterility' of such strikes had ancestors who carried swords and lances and b*tched about the appearance of the longbow on the battlefield. No matter how far removed from the battle, combat involvment is not 'sterile' for the operator. Physically safer? Yes. Sterile and unthinking? NO.

Spare us the "Not One More Dead Child" bleating.
Civilian deaths are a burden our military and intelligence operators and decision-makers bear heavily. The only true unfortunates in this situation are innocent children and (most of) the women. They are the collateral damage that we can only mitigate but never eliminate when the perverse values in a primitive 'culture' prioritizes 'family' relationships over the fact that your relative is terrorist scum.  We work to minimize the collateral damage but some people seem to be unaware that "WAR!" isn't very nice.

Dead Terrorists & Stupid Politicians: Anwar al-Awlaki Edition

Updated and Bumped!
News reports today have now added a third significant 'kill' to the list of 'al-Qaida' operatives:
One "Ibrahim al-Asiri"



"--Top bomb maker Ibrahim al-Asiri 'killed' in triple hit drone strike Anwar al-Awlaki killed by same unit that took out Osama bin Laden
 --Al-Awlaki first American on 'kill or capture' list
-- Linked to 9/11 hijackers and the Fort Hood shooter
-- Officials say al-Awlaki planned to use WMDs on the U.S.

Read more.

100% confirmation would be nice, but I'll take what we can get.


Original Post:
My wife was going across the TV dial looking for news with details about the good guys winning one and killing Anwar al-Awlaki (earlier video of the loser in action here). Lo and behold! Gary Johnson (s*) was just on Fox News (video) claiming this is the first time we have killed an ‘American Citizen’ instead of giving him ‘due process’. (*Sack of Sh**)

NOT in war, you Effing Idiot!

From the AP Report:

In a significant new blow to al-Qaida, U.S. airstrikes in Yemen on Friday killed Anwar al-Awlaki, an American militant cleric who became a prominent figure in the terror network's most dangerous branch, using his fluent English and Internet savvy to draw recruits for attacks in the United States…..

Blah Blah Blah….‘Civil liberties groups’ have questioned the government's authority to kill an American without trial. Blah Blah Blah….’  

…The 40-year-old al-Awlaki was for years an influential mouthpiece for al-Qaida's ideology of holy war, and his English-language sermons urging attacks on the United States were widely circulated among militants in the West. But U.S. officials say he moved into a direct operational role in organizing such attacks as he hid alongside al-Qaida militants in the rugged mountains of Yemen. Most notably, they believe he was involved in recruiting and preparing a young Nigerian who on Christmas Day 2009 tried to blow up a U.S. airliner heading to Detroit, failing only because he botched the detonation of explosives sewn into his underpants.  

Yemen's Defense Ministry said another American militant was killed in the same strike alongside al-Awlaki — Samir Khan, a U.S. citizen of Pakistani heritage who produced "Inspire," an English-language al-Qaida Web magazine that spread the word on ways to carry out attacks inside the United States. U.S. officials said they believed Khan was in the convoy carrying al-Awlaki that was struck but that they were still trying to confirm his death. U.S. and Yemeni officials said two other militants were also killed in the strike but did not immediately identify them.  

Washington has called al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula, as the branch in Yemen is called, the most direct threat to the United States after it plotted that attack and a foiled attempt to mail explosives to synagogues in Chicago.

Good. A traitor who was a key enemy operator and recruiter gets his due on the global battlefield and we get a traitor enemy propagandist as a bonus. Hey! That’s like a ‘50% off all Terrorists’ sale! Yea!
Go Modernity! Boo Dark Ages!

Johnson is one of those ‘Republicans’ who are more correctly described as ‘Business -Friendly libertarians’. Think ‘Ron Paul’… only more self absorbed and insufferable.

Graphic based on October 2008 AP File Photo/Muhammad ud-Deen)

Libyan Rebel Leader Admits to Al Qaeda Ties

H/T Instapundit

A Libyan 'Rebel Leader' admits to Al Qaeda Ties? I'm shocked! Shocked I say!
Ok, not really...
Hey Rubes! Told ya! (Which should have been a 'Captain Obvious' call)

F35B Agitprop ala Sweetman

Bill Sweetman ran what I would characterize as an ‘opposition propaganda’ piece yesterday (Ares Blog: A Cat is Not a Dog). He bemoaned the Marine’s touting of the F-35B program as their 21st Century solution for the “Air” half of their Future Air-Ground Task Force as “propaganda”:

“The Marine propaganda offensive in support of the F-35B, carried on through events like last Friday’s media visit to Patuxent River, and through Marine-friendly websites, pounds relentlessly on the advantages of short take off and vertical landing.
It has to, because that’s the only respect in which the F-35B is not inferior to the F-35A and F-35C. Avionics are identical. The weapon load and range are less and it is (according to the UK) the most expensive of all the versions.“

Sweetman was taking what turned out to be a fairly gratuitous swipe at the F-35B’s raison d’être. Gratuitous, because he immediately changed the subject for the rest of the post with an awful(ly) lightweight critique of the ‘LHA/D-as-aircraft-carrier’ idea. I won’t dwell too much on what turned in to the main thrust of his agitprop in this post. Instead, I’d like to focus on his ‘damning with faint praise’ sucker-punch on the B’s STOVL capability as quoted above.

Comparing the F-35B STOVL to the CTOL (A) or CV (C) Models is a Red Herring.
The relevant comparison is the one that was NOT made by Mr. Sweetman: that of comparing the capabilities the F-35B brings to those of the plane it is replacing – The AV-8B. Could that have been because the disparity in total performance between the F-35B and AV-8B is the greatest of all in the F-35 vs. ‘legacy’ comparisons, with the F-35B blowing away the AV-8B ? In combat configuration the F-35B is supersonic, low observable, network-centric warfare capable, AND easy to land vertically for starters. The AV-8B is… ‘none of the above’.

About that ‘most expensive’ assertion Mr Sweetman then makes (and cites the UK as the source). We’ll assume that is true from a unit cost POV, but how do you account for the net equivalent combat power of a B model with forward basing vs. an A or C model staged more remotely?
Fortunately, this is an easy one to answer. The difference is found in the Sortie Generation rate KPPs of the three variants: The F-35B, as it is planned to be operated, will be capable of generating 4 sorties/day in a surge which is 33% more ‘surge’ sorties per the specification than either the A or C model as they are planned to be used. In a sustained operating environment the B model will be providing 50% more sorties per aircraft per day than the CTOL (F-35A) or CV (F-35C). The Marines, by operating ‘forward’ get a lot more 'Bang' out of their F-35 'Buck' than if they operated an A or C model from the big deck carriers or a main operating base farther from the fight.
    
This ‘forward operating’ capability advantage is not simply hypothetical. From an Armed Forces Journal article last year, as object lessons we find three conflicts with instances of the Marines exploiting ‘Forward Basing’ (emphasis mine).

Desert Storm
During Operation Desert Storm in 1991, shore-based AV-8B Harriers initially operated from a 10,000-foot runway at Sheik Isa Airbase in Bahrain. This resulted in a 45-minute transit to Kuwait with in-flight refueling, yielding a 30-minute time on station. The aircraft then moved to King Abdul Aziz Airstrip, a 4,000-foot asphalt runway 90 miles from Kuwait. With the addition of a flight line made of AM-2 matting, this forward operating base (FOB) housed 60 AV-8Bs for eight months. It was often referred to as “the soccer stadium” since the Marines set up headquarters and billeting in the adjacent stadium; from there, the transit to Kuwait was reduced to 20 minutes, yielding the same 30-minute time on station without aerial refueling. This reduced the burden on tanker aircraft, increased sortie generation rates and allowed these aircraft to be more responsive to ground forces.

Operation Iraqi Freedom
During the first phases of the war in Iraq in 2003, Marine Harriers were the first aircraft to conduct sustained operations from an airfield inside Iraq and the only tactical air aircraft to conduct combat operations from a road. In the first two weeks of the conflict, Marines established an FOB on the remains of the Iraqi airstrip at An Numinayah, just 60 nautical miles south of Baghdad. Damage to the runway rendered it unusable to other tactical fixed-wing aircraft. The FOB at An Numinayah facilitated forward positioning of aircraft to stand ground alert as well as a forward arming and refueling point for Harriers supporting combat operations in and around Baghdad. Eliminating the need for Harriers to reserve fuel for a lengthy return flight to ships or bases in Kuwait, the FOB at An Numinayah allowed the AV-8Bs to extend time on station without placing a logistical burden on aerial refueling assets. With an airfield in such close proximity to the forward edge of the battle area, Harriers stood a credible ground alert and reduced response times from one to two hours to less than 15 minutes.

Operation Enduring Freedom
The war in Afghanistan is the most recent example of the effectiveness of STOVL operations. In the last year, Marine AV-8Bs have routinely operated from FOB Dwyer, a 4,300-foot expeditionary airfield built by the Marine wing support squadrons. Just a few miles from the town of Marjah, FOB Dwyer was constructed to facilitate rapid logistical support and fire support for Marines operating in the southern Helmand River valley. Launching from their main base at Kandahar, Harriers recovered to Dwyer after completing a time on station and were able to quickly rearm and refuel while talking to ground commanders. A basing option in such close proximity to the supported unit enabled longer times on station and rapid ordnance reload capability, in addition to reducing the burden on airborne refueling assets.

Basing AV-8Bs at FOB Dwyer during the fight for Marjah resulted in 65 percent of their sortie duration being spent on station. In comparison, aircraft based at Kandahar spent 55 percent of their sortie duration on station while aircraft operating from a carrier spent only 25 percent of sortie duration on station. Over the service life of an aircraft, the real benefit of STOVL aircraft is more time in support of ground forces with less time in transit to and from the fight.

As they say on the big blogs, read it all here.

In the meantime, the Marines will keep leaning (and basing) forward.

Middle East Burning = Bad.

In case anyone was wondering why I don't seem all hep on our latest military adventure (but I'm willing to "get it on" over military efficacy during/over/in any conflict), it's just that I'm not crazy about toppling tyrants to make the world safe for Radical Islamic fascists, be they Muslim brotherhood or AlQueda or whatever. The title says it all:

Rebel Commander in Libya Fought Against U.S. in Afghanistan

Is this 'hope' or is it 'change'? Oh yeah.... it's 'Smart Diplomacy'!

Holding Back the "Cruise Missile Cultists"

I just know they're coming....a nefarious faction of the Opponents of Long Range Strike.

Sheesh. First at SNAFU, we get a winners and losers list with the B-2 and Tomahawks reversed and on the wrong lists (Sorry Solomon - I still love ya' bud). It gets linked to AvWeek's Ares' Blog 'Frago' post which also links to a doozy at Information Dissemination which in turn has an extract from, and link to, a cruise missile puff piece at National Defense Magazine .

Time for a short course in economics and the application of long range strike.

Why I'm the Guy to Give it....

This is the first air campaign (using the term loosely) that I've not been at least a small part of since 1991, or a significant contributor to since 1999. Between moi' and the sources above I'm probably the only person who has actually launched and tested cruise missiles, as well as understands their strengths and limitations. I'm also probably the only one to have done long range strike 'bang-for-buck' analyses and what-if scenarios for DoD campaign planning efforts and/or wrote his Master's thesis or capstone on the subject of the proper methodology for top-level conceptual design of next generation LRS platforms.

Ready? Here we go!!!!!!!!!!!

Lesson 1. There is no ONE best weapon for everything and cruise missiles are only the one best weapon at attacking a very small subset of the total target set in any conventional (non-nuclear) campaign. There are efforts to make them more effective against a wider subset of targets but that will add cost and probably complexity to their designs. The very best subset of targets for conventional cruise missiles are taking out 'soft' nodes of Integrated Air Defense Systems and Command and Control networks/Power Grids. They are 'enablers' that allow the non-stealthy aircraft in the force-mix to operate more freely over the battlefield and do that killing hoodoo-that-they-do so well....instead of getting shot down before their 'magic' happens. Valuable? Within a narrow confine, yes. Wonder-weapon? No.

Lesson 2. Cruise missiles are VERY expensive.... unless you never use them or if you use them, you won't miss them. Complexity costs money, and increases the probability of failure. The farther and longer a system has to operate to get to the target, the more the system is likely to fail on the way (see TLAM in Desert Storm note in the slides below).

Lesson 3. As long as the attrition rates are low enough, (and they don't even have to be THAT low) Direct Attack is ALWAYS cheaper and more effective than stand-off attack even if standoff attack has a PERFECT success rate.

I've dusted off and sanitized an extract of publicly available and unclassified data from a circa-2000 briefing I gave after Operation Allied Force. The exact dollars are 'off' now, but the relationships remain the same. Cruise Missiles are orders of magnitude more expensive to operate than using precision direct attack. BTW: These charts were all based upon 2000lb JDAM usage. Smaller JDAMs would be relatively cheaper and just as,or more, effective than TLAM Tomahawks.

Enjoy.


The TLAM accuracy and reliability have improved since Desert Storm, but it doesn't make any difference. It is a more complex machine than a JDAM, and must operate reliably for a much longer period of time. That line waaaay down at the bottom is the JDAM cost line. The cruise missiles are so expensive their real value comes in reducing risk to other systems: use as necessary - and no more.

In Operation Allied Force, the B-2 was dropping JDAMs using developmental software and it still had a 95% hit rate. The B-2 had the highest percentage of first-pass 'kills' of all the aircraft employed.
These dollar figures were probably mid-late FY 1990s when I used them in 2000. I notice TLAMS are even more expensive now, but JDAM kits are as well I suppose. As I noted at SNAFU in the comments, prices are very sensitive to lot buy quantities. So even if cruise missiles were 100% successful, and even if all aimpoints were suitable for cruise missiles, what would you spend your savings on using JDAMs?

Getting Helos Back in the Fight

'Solomon' at SNAFU! has an interesting post covering the return to service of two HH-60 Seahawks that had a little 'accidental contact' in late 2008. Interesting story and photos.

The Crash of Moccasin 02.
Snafu's post reminds me of a mishap a buddy of mine had on a H-53 Pave Low III after Desert Storm. This bird already had repaired combat damage from the SS Mayaguez rescue operation on it's logs (Most people have no idea how many times the Pave Low III airframes had been 'remanufactured' and had seen action from Vietnam to their retirement).

Initially, this was listed as a Class A mishap. By the final review of the accident and through judicious scrounging in the Boneyard, it had been revised down to a 'Class B'. I checked the records again years later and a miracle had occurred: it was then listed as a 'Class C'. A lot is broken with the Air Force, but the Pilot Protection System is apparently running just fine.

File this under "I got my 1000hrs 'Pave Low'. I got my war. I got my crash. - I'm outta here!"

This little meeting with a sand dune broke the boom off, scattered a lot of piece parts, rolled the FLIR ball backwards into the belly.

This episode provided me with enough material for three term papers on Human Factors, System Safety, and Cockpit Resource Management while pursuing two different college degrees. I probably know more than I should about this crash, not because I know one of the survivors, but because somebody did an awful redaction job in response to a FOIA request.

When I'm certain all the parties are no longer flying anywhere, I'll publish the whole, sad tale.

'Carpet Bombing' vs CARPET BOMBING!

Etymological Observations: A Safari into the Semantics of the Left

From the back and forth in my last adventure in the threads at Defense Tech here, it was driven home that industrious but small minds had sometime succeeded in perverting the English language (once again) to suit their purposes. In this specific instance I am referring to the use of the term: 'Carpet Bombing'.

From the thread at the referenced link, two individuals identify air strike activity conducted in wars after Vietnam as 'carpet bombing'. I ruminated as to why this must be, since I distinctly remember interviews and briefings with senior DOD civilian and military leaders where they corrected such mis-perceptions...repeatedly. I specifically remembered the 'repeatedly' part because it seemed that the questioners/interviewers seized on the term in Desert Storm and seized upon it again early during Operation Allied Force. It then reappeared again for Operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom. The term was not originating within DOD and NOWHERE is it spoken of in military community as an acceptable, much less preferred 'technique' in applying force through Airpower.

It did not take much researching to verify my memories of on the topic during the wars from Desert Storm forward were correct. From a 15 March 1991 briefing during Desert Storm (emphasis mine):

This is the 117, you've seen it. It's been operational now for nearly 10 years. It still represents the state of the art as far as operationally fielded technology. As far as we know, it's never been tracked by any Iraqi radar. It has certainly never been touched by bullets or SAMs or anything else. We operated for 43 days with this aircraft completely invulnerable,so far as we know. As it says, never touched by target defenses.
I want to make a little more on this point here, because with the combination of stealth and precision attack capability in the 117, we were able to attack targets very discretely. We did not carpet bomb downtown Baghdad. As a matter of fact, it's obvious to anyone who has been watching on television, the pictures of Baghdad neighborhoods untouched,people driving around, walking around on the sidewalks, and so forth. We took special care to make sure that we attacked only military targets, and we attacked them quite precisely.
Aircrews were informed to bring home the ordnance if they weren't sure they were locked to the right targets. We made very few mistakes. I'm quite proud of the fact that we achieved high levels of destruction against military targets with minimum collateral damage.

The statement reads as if someone was out there claiming that the US was 'carpet bombing' Baghdad doesn't it? Such claims must have happened more than once: From an article in the Spring 1997 Airpower Journal (emphasis mine):

When news from Basra in early February suggested carpet bombing, Pentagon spokesmen seemed increasingly exasperated. “We never said there would be no collateral damage,” Lt Gen Thomas Kelly complained at one of his afternoon briefings:
What we did say is that our pilots scrupulously adhered to good targeting . . .and in fact flew that target profile to the best of their ability. We go to great lengths . . . to avoid collateral damage. But war is a dirty business, and unfortunately, there will be collateral damage. There's no way one can prohibit it.
Iraq wasn't claiming even five hundred civilian casualties, yet military spokesmen were practically admitting hidden damage. One might have thought Dresden or Tokyo had occurred.

Now we skip forward to 1999, and Operation Allied Force. From a May 1, 1999 Pentagon briefing (again, all emphasis mine) where the briefer describes precision attack against area targets, and specifically how sticks of unguided bombs are laid down in very defined target areas:

One of the things that's been talked about a little bit is targets and collateral damage. We've talked about that a lot. There's some discussion about B-52s being used in carpet type bombing. We don't do that with B-52.
I mentioned yesterday that our B-52s have changed over the years dramatically, with increases to their avionics capability, increases to their GPS capability, increasing in their overall avionics.

[Chart - Prahovo Petroleum Production Storage Facility, Serbia]

This is a target, you've seen many of these before. This is about 1,000 feet long in this area, probably, maybe a couple of hundred feet wide. It's not an atypical target. We have several of those we've seen before.
Next slide.

[Prahovo Petroleum Production Storage Facility, Serbia]

This would be about the lay down pattern of the B-52 today at whatever altitude we want them to fly at. So you can see that, basically, this is not carpet bombing. This would be a perfect target for that type of weapon to hit. There are other targets, assembly areas we could use with the B-52, and it has a very, very capable delivery method with their avionics they have today to attack a target like this with very little collateral damage. As you can see, there wouldn't be much of a problem with anything around here being in the category of collateral damage.
So as we talk about the B-52, it has the capability to attack with standoff weapons or gravity weapons, and these gravity weapons are not dumb bombs anymore because of the avionics we have in the aircraft to make sure that we do, in this case, what would be called precision on that area target.

But it seems there is 'movement' out there who insists on perverting the term 'carpet bombing' for reasons of their own - perhaps as part of a fey attempt to evoke some emotional response among the weaker and more unprepared minds among the masses. I have to conclude as much because the knee-jerk response of crying 'carpet bombing' again emerged in Operations Enduring and Iraqi Freedom. First, from a 31 October 2001 DOD briefing (still my emphasis) on operations in Afghanistan:

Q: Admiral, of all the strikes south of Mazar-e Sharif -- the airstrikes on the Taliban positions, have they all involved precision-guided weapons? Or have the B-52s started to drop strings of 500-pound unguided bombs -- colloquially "carpet bombing" -- now that you have better information on where these divisions are.
Stufflebeem: I'm not sure if it's -- if it's necessary to get into specific mission by mission, but it is -- it is fair to say that we're using both precision and non-precision weapons while attacking Taliban forces -- you know, while they're deployed.
Q: Could use [sic] deterrent carpet bombing and the strings of the unguided bombs against those positions around Mazar-e Sharif?
Stufflebeem: I'm familiar with the term "carpet bombing." I think it's an inaccurate term. It's an old -- an old expression. Heavy bombers have the capacity to carry large loads of weapons, and oftentimes if a target presents itself either in an engagement zone, or when directed, it's possible to release an entire load of bombs at once, in which case -- the real formal term for that is called a "long stick," which has also been called carpet bombing.

So now 'carpet bombing is a 'colloquialism' versus a highly defined term? It is a slippery slope that we seem to be riding.
Now, from an interview that Paul Wolfowitz gave to the BBC in November the same year (more of my emphasis) we see further refutation of the the term 'carpet bombing':

BBC: Can I just ask you first of all about the latest developments in the war in Afghanistan which is that positions north of Kabul are being now carpet bombed,we hear. Is that a change of strategy?

Wolfowitz: I don't think it's a change of strategy. That's a journalistic term, I believe. We are certainly putting very heavy effort against Taliban positions. The strategy from the beginning has been to empower the opposition forces inside Afghanistan to be able to undermine and eventually hopefully overthrow the Taliban.

BBC: But moving from a position where clearly the strikes were one off from surgical to B-52s going in and it looks like carpet bombing to anyone who saw the pictures.

Wolfowitz: Again, I find it -- this is not carpet bombing a la Dresden and World War II. It is one of the reasons, by the way, we did not send (inaudible) from the beginning is, it is twice the size, it covers a significant area, but it's areas that are chosen quite precisely to be front line units. When you're going after front line units you don't take out one soldier at a time.

So even the civilian leadership gets the difference between bombing a city and bombing 'front line' units in the field. A fine point as to why Dresden doesn't meet my high standard for the term 'carpet bombing' is one I will put aside as 1) irrelevant for this argument and 2) a more complex issue than can be tackled in a blog post - Heck, I have read books that have fallen short on the issue.

Finally, we note that the 'carpet bombing' meme survived to OIF, and that the press refuses to make/see the distinction between precision use of unguided weapons and 'carpet bombing' as a convenient scare term. From a March 3, 2003 briefing at the Pentagon we find the now-retired General McChrystal jumping in to correct a questioner on the topic:

Q: Torie, on the use of the heavy bombers -- and I address this to the general primarily -- the B-1s, B-2s and B-52s, can you tell what kind of ordnance they're dropping? The B-52 is dropping dumb bombs, what we used to call carpet bombing, on the Republican Guard troops?

McChrystal: Sir, they are not. They are dropping a combination of munitions, a large number of precision munitions. So there's really not carpet bombing occurring.

I would have loved to know who asked that question. The phrasing dismisses the distinction that exists between carpet bombing and techniques into a simple change or terms for the same thing.

You don't have to look hard for where the MSM gets their ideas on 'carpet bombing'. Just enter the terms "carpet bombing" with the name of the war you are interested in in your search engine and you get such lovely link suggestions:

"Operation Desert Slaughter": http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Iraq/Oper_Desert_Slaughter_1991

PBS Frontline:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/gulf/weapons/b52.html

Rabid Montclair State University faculty (A Stalinist-English Teacher?-ROFLMAO!):
http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/Vietnam/gulf-war-fingrut.html

Project on Defense Alternatives:
http://www.comw.org/pda/0201oef.html

...you get the drift. All the usual 'Blame America First' scumb...er...suspects.

Defeating IEDs/EFPs: Possibilities Part One

I've got a little lull in the workload at the moment (only working partial weekends) so I, though it would be a good time to start following up on a previous post concerning the military concept Persistence, how Persistence relates to IEDs/EFPs, and more specifically what can be done to attenuate the placement and detonation of these 'weapons that wait'.

In this post, I present the general processes an enemy could use to employ what has to be their current weapon of choice. The processes shown are not designed to be all inclusive: They are general enough to capture all the relevant concepts, but are also specific enough to allow me to efficiently propose how and why the enemy's behaviors can be shaped and IED/EFP deployment and effectiveness attenuated (no threat can be completely eliminated).

First, the obvious:

The employment of Weapons That Wait (from this point forward they will be referred to as WTW) I have broken down into two sub-processes: 'Acquisition' and 'Employment'. There were a couple of other ways I could have broken things down, but these will serve my greater purpose. If the enemy does not have a weapon or weapons in hand, they have to first get their hands on it/them.

Now for the less obvious. I have chosen (there are other ways) to break the acquisition process down as follows:

The enemy, once they have a weapon in hand, must complete the Employment process. That process I have chosen to break down as in the flowchart below. (Note: sub-processes of both the Acquisition and Deployment processes can be conducted concurrently but are, obviously, completed sequentially.)

We will return to these processes several times in future posts, but I am planning to next bound the concept of 'Persistence' sufficiently such that when we do return to these processes, we will only be dealing with Persistence as it relates to stopping these WTW.

Is Beth Fouhy Lying, Stupid, and/or Incompetent?

Beth Fouhy

Or is this article her AP editor's fault?

Ignoring the cynical tone oozing out of the article covering Karl Rove's new book (it is to be expected I suppose) what I absolutely cannot abide is paragraph four:

"In the run-up to the war, Bush and his national security team, including Vice President Dick Cheney, attempted to link Saddam to the attacks as a way to build support for the invasion."

In an entire piece otherwise devoted to what Karl Rove wrote in his book, paragraph four sits there: detached from the rest of the article. It is the only paragraph without reference to Rove or his writing, and it is a complete lie, gratuitously dropped in the article like a turd in a punchbowl.

Ms. Fouhy, are you stupid enough to actually believe what you wrote? Were you merely incompetent in accepting the assertion without reflection from some less-than-reputable source? Or did you know better but threw it out there as a lie because you wanted it to be true?

Alternatively, was the paragraph just slipped in by an uncredited editor for any/all of the reasons above? What IS the explanation? Is the AP still trying to rewrite History?

It won't work. Here are a couple of examples why:

2003 Bush: No Iraq link to 9/11 found

2004 Cheney blames media for blurring Saddam, 9/11

Interestingly, what you WILL notice is that within just about every credibly-sourced news article on the subject between 2001 and today (including those linked above), is the assertion that while the Bush Administration never claimed a linkage between 911 and Iraq, they “implied” or “hinted” or “gave the impression” that there was a link.

Big Media would like you to believe it was the Bush Administration ‘linking’ Saddam and 911, but a review of the reporting shows us that it was Big Media doing all that hintin’, implyin’ and impressin’-- and this hardly a revelation at this late date: Polls, not Bush administration, helped shape Americans' bias against Saddam.

England: Just Another Fascist State?

Sigh~Seems to be going that way...
Just another reason to want to live where I am a 'Citizen' and not a 'Subject'.

I visited my parents in England in the early '80s for a month on leave. The general quiet in a London that was relatively free of the Troubles (for a while after 1983) had not yet happened, so living with the idea that a bomb might go off at any time while in London was the norm for visitors. My parents were living out in the 'Shires where the threat was seen as pretty much non-existent. In London, it was all 'stiff-upper lip' and 'life goes on' as one might expect of a people who gave us Churchill and had survived the Blitz among other things.

That England is apparently no more. These days, it seems, if a 'Community Police Officer' thinks that taking pictures of Christmastime crowds is 'suspicious', and you choose to not identify yourself when asked (and evidently no answer is required by law)......then apparently that constitutes 'anti-social' behavior' (the definition of which is decided upon by policeman on the scene). Upon declaring that your behavior is anti-social, the policeman THEN can legally require you to answer with your 'particulars'.

Nice system.

The video at the link seems to be an interesting case study in how things get blown out of proportion as more people get involved in a serial fashion. Visit the link and view the video.

My take?
Most striking (I kid!), the first 2 out of 3 policemen in this video are quite attractive. Lovely Officer 1 is equally pleasant, (Community Police?) and the exchange with her is short and without event....

But she apparently follows some rule whereby if someone refuses to answer a question, she reports it up the line. A hapless cog in a Fascist 'system'? Cute as a button though...
Attractive Officer 2 (Constable it appears) comes in later at a different location.

She's all business up front. She also appears to get quite resentful that someone is not being compliant and knows the law does not require it. She has trouble forming a response to the person she wants to question and who is repeatedly questioning her if he is free to go or is he being detained, all the while trying to think of any possible reason to require the 'interviewee' to answer her questions. Her hand gestures indicate to me she is experiencing some frustration, or does she have anger management issues? Never answering if she is detaining the man or not, the men with the video camera announce that they are leaving, then walk away.

The third officer strikes me as being at heart just another 'cowboy cop' that one runs into from time to time in the US (and as a rule on the TV shows like COPS). He is going to close the deal HIS way no matter what it takes. Is he this way all the time, or does he feel his manhood is on the line on a rescue mission of the previous officer(s)? Very polite...but his punkin' head was made up before he ever approached the 'suspects'.

I have no idea how this video plays in Britain, but in Texas, I think a case could be made to reprimand Attractive Officer #2 and fire Cowboy Cop #3.

Given that 'public photography' problems have occurred in the US (example), I've got a lot more faith that this will play out in favor of the individual and Liberty on this side of the pond.

'Allo 'Allo 'Allo! What's all this then?
It's called Fascism, with a couple of cute, and one happy, face.

Obama Administration Negotiating With The Enemy?

File this under "As if the Obama Administration hasn't done enough to us already" -- From Doctor Zero we now learn that while most of America was preoccupied with the holidays and evils of Healthcare 'reform':

It seems unlikely that the Khazali outrage could have happened without President Obama’s authorization. I’m ready to hear him explain this… and then, considering his reputation as a liar, every thinking American should be ready to fact-check every word he says. I don’t mind admitting I’m a hostile audience. You should be, too. Nothing this President has done since taking office has earned him a shred of trust or faith, especially in the area of national security.

Read it all HERE.

VDH on the Obamification of America

At some point, Obama may conclude that the vast presidential jet, the opulence of the Presidency, the power and influence at his fingertips, all that national wealth and more were not created by Acorn, community organizing, Michelle’s legal brilliance, Axelrod’s savvy advice, or Emanuel’s crassness, or by claiming that doctors needlessly take out tonsils and amputate limbs, or in general by sonorous tones promising to give someone vast amounts of someone else’s money, but rather through preserving a climate of freedom, respect for continuity and tradition, and government non-intrusion into the market place that encourage people to try to go into business and retain some of their profits—as recompense for getting up on Saturday morning at 6AM to get down to open the dry cleaning store, or borrowing one’s net worth to open a new stationary outlet, or staying late till 7PM to do a crown, or gambling that the new $500,000 crane will pay for itself in 5 years, or going under someone’s house on a Sunday to unclog the toilet when the employee doesn’t show up.

He may, Professor, he may. But I hold no hope of it happening. The supply of Obama Brand© 'Hybris' appears to be infinite.

Read all of Professor Hanson's beautiful summation of 'the story so far' here.

Gen. George Casey's Finest Hour

Not!

"Our diversity, not only in our Army, but in our country, is a strength. And as horrific as this tragedy was, if our diversity becomes a casualty, I think that’s worse”

Man! He did not just say that did he?

If George Casey didn't regret spewing that crap the second he uttered it he should resign immediately. But of course, if he had a competent Commnder-In-Chief he would have been asked to submit one already for loss of confidence. Gen. Casey, Ralph Peters is talking to YOU!

Vocal Minority lays out the problem with Casey's little PC slide bullet pretty well:

"Do you understand what this man is saying? He is saying that the loss of “diversity”—the feel-good, meaningless, superficial, and artificial practice of ensuring that a given group has x number of whites, blacks, men, women, Christians, Jews, Muslims, gays, etc., etc.—is worse than 13 people’s lives violently snuffed out in cold blood by a radical fanatic. In short, protecting a politically correct sacred cow is more important than protecting human life."

I would only add to that description of 'diversity' the modifiers of 'warped' and 'poorly-conceptualized'-- because I believe in the value of the idea of 'diversity'. People from different backgrounds will bring different experience, ideas and perspectives to any group dynamic. And I contrast that 'diversity' with the perverted idea of 'Diversity!': the folly whereby the inane must be given equal respect with the thoughtful merely because it is different (aka "Diversity! for Diversity's! sake") and which eschews societal norms that are needed as a framework for applying diversity in ways that can actually move societies forward.

.....And even the unperverted idea of 'diversity' is irrelevant compared to the taking of innocent lives - the ultimate violation of a civil right.

What to Do About Iran?

"Many policy makers and journalists dismiss the military option on the basis of a false sense of futility. They assume that the U.S. military is already overstretched, that we lack adequate intelligence about the location of covert nuclear sites, and that known sites are too heavily fortified.

Such assumptions are false."

General Chuck Wald knows that of whence he speaks. Read it all.

Netanyahu Understands Cause and Effect

Security Fence to remain because, y'know... it like, actually provides security.

Here's The Jerusalem Post quote (emphasis mine):

"The security barrier won't be dismantled," he stressed. "I hear people saying that since there is quiet, the fence can be torn down. My friends, the opposite is true. Because we have the fence, there is quiet.
"The separation fence will remain in place and will not be dismantled," Netanyahu said in a speech in parliament.
...
The most vocal opposition to Netanyahu's speech undoubtedly came from the Arab lawmakers, who called out throughout his remarks. Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin ordered ushers to remove MK Muhammad Barakei (Hadash), who broke loose
and attempted to return to the floor for one last comment - and was grabbed and removed once again. After him, MK Taleb a-Sanaa (United Arab List-Ta'al) was also removed, at which point the other Arab legislators rose and left the chamber.

Other than flat-out liars ("Arab legislators?") , the only people who could actually think otherwise are the same kind of idiots ("Arab legislators?") who would also believe a falling crime rate in the presence of a rising prison population is some kind of paradox.

Happy Endings off Somalia: AP Pi**ing in Wind

Sheez,
Captain freed. Mostly dead pirates. A good day. But no matter how good things go, the AP tries to put a negative spin on what goes down. Case in point: "Military crackdown hasn't deterred Somali pirates" put out just 7 hours ago and authored by someone named Lara Jakes. The opening:

"The U.S. military's moves to crack down on high seas piracy have done little to deter the epidemic of ship ransoms that preceded Sunday's Indian Ocean rescue, a top Navy official said Sunday."

Is that what was really 'said'? - Or is that just Lara Jakes' and/or her editors' creative 'interpretation'? The article does provide more insights...

"Despite heightened ocean crackdowns that led to criminal charges against 130 suspected pirates over the last three months,it wasn't having an effect of drawing the number of attempts down," Gortney told reporters during a telephone conference call from Bahrain.
...
For months, the Navy has sought to prevent or disrupt scores of ship hijackings near the Gulf of Aden. More than 100 ships off the Horn of Africa came under siege in the past year.

Well there you go!, sounds like the AP is just reporting the facts. But... wait a second! What's this?

But as the Navy began focusing on the Gulf of Aden and seeing results, Gortney said, the pirates shifted their activity south into the Indian Ocean. Over the past week, pirates commandeered at least seven new ships, including the Maersk Alabama.

Seeing results? Pirates shifting their activity? No deterrence in effect there eh? Any other info provided?

"As a result of our activity and a lot of Navy presence up in the Gulf of Aden, we saw both attempts and successful attacks go down," Gortney said. "But the last couple of weeks, we saw activity, attempts and successful attacks occur on the east coast of Somalia — where this one did."

So the pirates 1.) changed their behaviors such that we "saw both attempts and successful attacks go down" (i.e. the response we wanted) and 2) are trying something different (which I'm sure we expected them to do...after all, they're just turd-world thugs) . But I guess just stating the obvious isn't doom-laden enough for the AP, at least not as doom-laden as implicating our efforts are bearing no fruit.

BTW: How does the AP rule out the possibility that the last couple of weeks are not just a rough patch on the road to success? Especially since:

"Additional Navy ships also have been sent to the region to patrol for pirates, Gortney said."

Not to mention the pirates knew they screwed up by accidentally attacking an American ship.

Quick! Somebody send AP (and President Obama) a copy of Frederick Leiner's book The End of Barbary Terror, maybe they will catch a clue that success doesn't come in a day or a week.

Moral: There Are Good Reasons For Tankers to be MORE Than Tankers

Our guys in the deep canyons of Afghanistan just got a whole lot 'better connected' to their lifelines.

Note: Keep in mind when you are reading this post how Boeing attempted to minimize the importance of 'excess capability' including non-tanking duties as part of their disinformation campaign supporting their KC-45 protest. (See here for more on the KC-45 fiasco)

In a recent public release, the Air Force reveals a success story that Boeing may not want you to think about too much....even though it involves their venerable KC-135s. the title of the piece is "Manas KC-135s revolutionize combat operations", and it gives accounts of how Air Force KC-135s are now contributing more than just fuel on station in prosecuting the War on Terror:

"During the fourth mission with a ROBE refueler on July 27, our aircrew overheard radio chatter between an F-15 (Eagle) pilot and a joint terminal air controller on the ground," Colonel Bence said. "A forward operating base deep in a valley was under attack and in danger of being overrun. We could tell the F-15 pilot was struggling to identify and strike the targets without causing collateral damage or friendly casualties. We turned on ROBE and within minutes, we knew the system was a success by a comment made by the F-15 pilot. The fighter pilot said, 'I don't know where the picture (target imagery) is coming from, but I got it (the target) now. Thanks.'

That is only one of the success stories of the ROBE provided in the article, and the AF article honestly airs a little dirty laundry by also giving an account of the difficulties involved in fielding the system, including having to overcome significant institutional intransigence in getting the ROBE capability actually in the planes, working AND deployed forward :

Despite its initial successes and demonstrations in several military exercises, ROBE was not embraced by everyone, and many of the "B-kits" purchased by the Air Force remained shrink-wrapped for years in storage, quietly waiting for the right opportunity to prove the system's worth.

Honestly, I didn't think this would ever happen. It has been a LONG time coming considering the relative scope and benefit of fielding such a capability. The last thing I heard about the program was at a lecture given a couple of years ago by a retired AF Chief of Staff who gave an account of the fact that even HE couldn't get the Tanker Community to get past the tanker-only mindset and 'get with the program'.

When Jumper was pushing this on his watch I thought it was a great idea. He likes to point out that tankers are nearly always around and overhead wherever airpower is operating. I knew from flying test missions as an LCO and telemetry systems operator, over the mountainous Western test ranges, that our plane invariably collected the cleanest data with the fewest droputs than any of the range ground stations ever collected-- and that when we relayed the data we collected from our operating altitude, every ground station involved could pick up our transmissions. It is a simple matter of line-of-sight working better (and farther) going up and down than it does sideways over the horizon.

There's another interesting facet to this success story that always gets overlooked AFTER a success. If the press/detractors had gotten their teeth into this program BEFORE Spiral 2, the program might have been cancelled before it could have a fair chance to succeed:

"With previous versions of ROBE, because of the limitations of the satellite antenna, whenever the aircraft would bank through a turn it would lose connection to the satellite, Sergeant Judd said. With Spiral 2, they are installing more antennas which should drastically improve the aircraft’s ability to stay connected." (source here)