props, army changes, and possible state-run army needs

I’m glad you found the article interesting. Hopefully I can keep it up. As for the first question, my answer is “sort of”. The Army is attempting to change in order to meet the threats posed by international terrorism and the problems involved in rebuilding a country in the midst of an insurgency. The Army is restructuring its forces in order to build modularity by streamlining units and instituting a homogeneity of organization that we haven’t had before. This is supposed to make units more deployable and flexible, while limiting the number of rotations a soldier would have to endure. The Army is also, it its credit, eliminating many of the overly specialized job distinctions and trying to build the “warrior spirit.” These changes are all well and good and really, are about all we can expect from a huge bureaucracy. Large organizations don’t change quickly and their inertia is hard to overcome. Even so, I fear that these reactions all fail to address the real problem. In our current age, and for the foreseeable future, the decisive factor in war is not material or offensive capability. We clearly have an advantage in all of that. The decisive factor is now commitment; who can outlast who. Your average Al Qaeda operative’s commitment to this fight is an order of magnitude greater than any American soldier. For the American, this war is not personal enough and our hazy objectives (e.g. build democracy) are not capable of inculcating the necessary passion in our own fighting men. In order to fight year on and year off in a far away land, one has to be either deeply committed to that cause or extremely well paid. Barring the second option, we must develop some recourse for the first. In essence, the nature of this war has changed radically and we have not changed with it. The original reasons and objectives are now in the past and are not pertinent to the present or the future. Actually, by maintaining our reliance on those past ideas, we are hamstringing the possibility of eventual success. Al Qaeda or the Shia militias don’t care about Saddam Hussein anymore. He is gone and they have moved on. They are now fighting Americans, and more importantly, western culture. For them this war is unlimited, in scope and ferocity. They seek our overthrow and, if possible, our complete annihilation. We, on the other hand, are trying to fight a narrowly defined war with carefully defined objectives. We can’t maintain this fiction for long. Limited war can only exist when both parties agree on those limitations. Once one belligerent has raised the stakes, we are obliged to do likewise or withdraw. Now for your second question. I am skeptical of democracy’s ability to effect real change in Iraq. Iraq is not like the West, where we have a long tradition of democratic government and where democracy took shape over hundreds of years. Iraqis do not think of themselves, fundamentally, as Iraqi. Their first allegiance is to their particular group, whether that be Kurd, Sunni, or Shia. They will not accept a broader electoral system that does not reflect the distinct interests of their particular group and many of these groups are very much unfriendly toward one another. The violent hatred that exists between these various sects makes the squabbling of Democrats and Republicans almost laughable. There is little doubt that if John Kerry were elected he would not vote to exterminate all Republicans. The same cannot be said in Iraq. I hope I am wrong though. If Iraqis want peace and stability badly enough they can fix this situation. What we must accept is that we cannot, necessarily, fix it for them. My basic proposition concerning the huge conventional army is that it will not be a useful tool in international policy in the future, or even now. The conventional segment of the war in Iraq was a foregone conclusion. The Iraqi Army was hopelessly outclassed and overmatched. I suspect that this is the last time we will be afforded such a nice opportunity. For those armies in the world that could confront the American Army on equal footing, they also have the “bomb.” This means that to fight them is veritable suicide and, in my estimation, will not occur. But back to the point. Yes the conventional army was convenient for the removal of Saddam, but now that that stage of warfare has passed, we must move on. I believe that the invasion of Iraq was conventional war’s last glorious gasp.