[Peace-discuss] information to consider

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Among GIs' problems in Afghanistan: Their own stuff

By LISA HOFFMAN
Scripps Howard News Service
October 02, 2002- Boots fell apart, bullets packed too little punch and 
rifles frequently were fouled by sand.Some Marines failed Foxhole Digging 
101. And Air Force commandos complained they were unduly weighed down by the 
nearly 150 pounds of gear they had to lug on their backs.Those were just a 
few of the gripes U.S. troops have made about the performance of their 
equipment during the Afghanistan war - criticisms certain to be pertinent to 
the Pentagon if it sends soldiers to war in Iraq.As the start of Operation 
Enduring Freedom's one-year anniversary arrives Monday, military leaders are 
studying what went right and wrong in the still-unfolding mission in 
Afghanistan, where about 8,000 U.S. troops remain.In March, while the war 
raged, the Army dispatched experts from its Natick Soldier Center, a 
Massachusetts research facility that innovates solutions to soldiers' needs, 
to Afghanistan to hear firsthand from GIs hot off the battlefield how their 
gear performed.The other services, which also consider the best laboratory to 
be a real battle, are assessing the "lessons learned," as well. While troops 
were generally pleased with their gear, they pinpointed some significant 
problems.Among them:- Army combat boots proved too inflexible for maneuvering 
in mountain terrain, and had soles that too easily wore out or were torn up 
by walking and climbing on rocks. Soldiers also said their feet were 
perpetually cold and wet because the insulated lining of the cold-weather 
boots made their feet sweat too much, and the boots could take days to dry 
out.- Soldiers also panned the leather insulated gloves they were issued. The 
coverings were so bulky that soldiers could not fit their fingers inside 
weapon trigger guards. Some troops thought ahead and spent their own money on 
aviator flight gloves before they left for Afghanistan, reasoning that it was 
better to have cold hands than to be unable to shoot.- Commercial trucks and 
other vehicles sometimes proved far better for operations than military ones. 
Army Rangers and special forces bought Toyota pickup trucks in Afghanistan in 
order to blend in better with the local traffic. The commandos also had 
commercial all-terrain vehicles shipped from a Minnesota manufacturer after 
the Army's "High Mobility Multi-Purpose Wheeled Vehicles" were found to be 
too big for the terrain and so obtrusive they would make the troops 
vulnerable to enemy fire.-Elite troops of the Air Force's Special Operations 
Command had high praise for the abilities of their high-tech reconnaissance 
and communications equipment, but said the 140- to 150-pound packs they had 
to carry were a huge hindrance when they scaled ridges thousands of feet 
high, or trudged through deserts and snow.The portable radio batteries they 
toted weighed 2 pounds each and, because of the items' short life span, the 
commandos had to carry as many as 24 at a time - or nearly 50 pounds of 
batteries - for a prolonged mission.- Many of the Marines ordered to dig 
foxholes and trench latrines after landing at a desert airstrip in southern 
Afghanistan had never before even attempted to perform those fundamental and 
age-old combat tasks. Marine Lt. Gen Edward Hanlon attributed those lapses to 
the fact that environmental laws prohibit digging on the desert base at Camp 
Pendleton, Calif., where Marines train.- While the body armor worn by all 
Army fighters saved scores of lives, soldiers said the bulletproof plates 
interfered with everything from wearing rucksacks to sighting and firing 
weapons while prone on the ground. Helmets were criticized by 85 percent of 
the surveyed GIs as way too heavy, especially when combined with night-vision 
equipment. Serious head and neck aches were a constant companion.- Some 
soldiers said the standard-issue rifle ammunition - the 5.56 mm round, a size 
comparable to the .223-caliber bullets used by ranchers and others in the 
civilian world to kill such small game as coyotes and rabbits - wasn't 
powerful enough to stop the Taliban and al Qaeda enemy with a single 
shot.Called M-855 ball rounds, they were designed to penetrate body armor 
worn by Soviet troops in the Cold War. But because the U.S. enemies in 
Afghanistan had no such protection, the bullets would pass speedily through a 
person without causing major, mortal damage, soldiers said.- The ubiquitous 
fine sand that permeates Afghanistan was blamed for constant fouling of GIs' 
rifles, automatic pistols and other weapons. The troops also reported that 
they weren't issued the proper tools needed to keep the weapons clean and 
functioning.
(Reach Lisa Hoffman at hoffmanl(at)shns.com)

INTERNATIONAL



Options for a military strike against Iraq

By LISA HOFFMAN
Scripps Howard News Service
September 19, 2002- The endgame is clear - rid Iraq of the "evil" regime of 
Saddam Hussein. How to do so is all that remains to be decided.That is the 
unstated message President Bush and his national security team are sending to 
the United Nations and beyond this week, serving notice that the mighty 
weight of American power will be wielded, once and for all, to accomplish 
that end.That conviction remained unwavering, even after the Iraqi 
President's offer Tuesday to allow U.N. weapons inspectors in to hunt for 
chemical and biological toxins complicated the situation.Bush and his 
military leaders are weighing a range of diplomatic, economic and military 
methods to finally force Saddam and his police state from power.According to 
military experts at the Center for Defense Information, Jane's Intelligence 
Review and GlobalSecurity.org, war planners are likely to mix and match the 
options, each with its own sets of risks and repercussions. Options include:- 
Foment a coup. With this strategy the CIA and U.S. commandos would curry 
favor with disaffected members of Saddam's regime, supply them with covert 
intelligence and other aid, and then back up a coup attempt with U.S. bombs 
and missiles against Saddam's elite Republican Guard and armored 
divisions.While this approach would avoid a large-scale commitment of U.S. 
forces and give at least the veneer that the change in government sprang from 
within, it also could be a years-long endeavor with too-high odds of failure. 
This option is rated a long shot by defense analysts.- The Afghan model. The 
game plan here would be to mobilize the Iraqi Kurds in the north and the 
Shiia Muslims in the south to battle Saddam's army, much as the Northern 
Alliance and southern warlords took on the Taliban in Afghanistan. U.S. 
special forces would train and coordinate the proxy fighters, who could 
number as many as 25,000, and organize punishing air strikes by U.S. combat 
planes against Iraqi military targets.Unlike Afghanistan, however, 
combat-ready military militias do not currently exist among the Kurds, Shiia 
or any of the exile opposition groups. Arming and training them could take 
several months, and for this option to succeed, significant numbers of Iraq's 
army would have to flip sides and join the revolt. Defense experts expect any 
U.S. military operation to include these indigenous fighters, though most 
likely in a supporting role.- Operation Desert Storm II. Like the ponderous 
1990-91 operation - which took six months to stage and involved 500,000 U.S. 
forces - this plan would require a massive buildup of U.S. troops, though 
only about half the number who fought the Persian Gulf War.After weeks of 
hundreds of U.S. warplanes bombing thousands of Iraqi military and 
infrastructure sites, a U.S. invasion force with tanks and artillery would 
swarm into Iraq from Kuwait, Qatar, the Persian Gulf and, perhaps, other 
directions. Simultaneously, special forces commandos or covert CIA operatives 
would hunt down Saddam's suspected weapons of mass destruction and the 
missiles to lob them, as well as the Iraqi dictator himself.Major drawbacks 
of this approach include at least three months required to mass so many 
American soldiers and armament, and the vulnerable target that large 
concentrations of U.S. troops would make for Saddam's alleged chemical and 
biological weapons.Plus Kuwait, at least for now, has signaled opposition to 
being a staging area, and other Gulf states are equally leery. And, given the 
deterioration of Saddam's military capability from its generally sorry shape 
a decade ago, and the vast improvement in U.S. weapons, this could amount to 
a costly oversupply of forces needed for victory.- Inside-Out Plan. For now, 
this evolving strategy appears to be finding the most favor, although the 
Bush administration is keeping its cards uncommonly close to its collective 
vest.Cobbling together some of the elements of the other options, war 
planners envision this as a quick, deep strike towards Baghdad with the goal 
of decapitating Saddam's command structure, collapsing his government and 
sowing chaos among his army, spurring a widespread revolt.Air strikes would 
radiate outwards from Baghdad, while a U.S. ground force of 50,000 to 90,000 
troops would seize other cities in a rapid advance from Kuwait, and possibly 
Turkey, to Baghdad, where they would destroy Saddam's elite Republican Guard 
troops. This, in theory, would lead to a domino-effect army mutiny or mass 
surrender.One advantage of this plan is that it could be launched as quickly 
as two weeks after Bush gives his okay. Another is that, if executed well, 
the plan could keep Saddam from being able to order pre-emptive deadly 
weapons strikes against Israel or U.S. troops.On the Net: 
www.cdi.orgwww.janes.com