Final Protective Fire
Links to some interesting places:
R.J.Rummel's blog
Junk Science Blog and debunking discussion forum.
Pirate Ballerina
Dave Kopel's Home Page
Volokh Conspiracy
Glenn Reynolds' Instapundit
Prof Bainbridge Blog
Clayton Cramer
David Friedman's homepage
Overlawyered.com
Vodka Pundit
Tiki Lounge
Jim Dunnigan's site
Cold Fury
Karl's blog
email to finalprotfire at comcast.net
Note that there is someone sending the KLEZ ( and now SOBIG.F ) virus with forged blogger emails.
I will never send you email with attachments - delete any immediately.
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Monday, January 13, 2003
A gentleman named Sean Scarry sent me an long and thoughtful posting in reply to my rant below about DEBKA:
Robin,
I found your blog through Glenn Reynolds comments about your piece on the DEBKA comments on an airborne assault in Iraq. I enjoyed and learned quite a bit reading it. I added it to my favorites.As a former paratrooper, I both agree with you and disagree with you at the same time. Your reasoning is cogent and based on a firm understanding of the current "state of the art" military strategy, but I think misses some of the subtleties of current airborne doctrine.
First of all, I think that DEBKA is to the Internet as the Weekly World News is to the newsstand. They obviously don't have a corporate drug testing policy. A Airborne assault on a major city or its environs by an entire division is today ludicrous, you are absolutely correct there. And the 101st is an Air Assault division certainly. However, I feel that there are both tangible and intangible qualities that would argue that a conventional (as opposed to Special Operations) airborne force is a tremendous and useful force multiplier today.
INTANGIBLE
1. Show of National Resolve
Sending in the 82nd Airborne Division is a clear sign to foreign governments that the US government is taking a serious step. Part of the airborne reasoning is the ready units of the division can be wheels up in 18 hours and on the ground in the combat zone shortly thereafter. All of the combat equipment can be dropped and therefore carried by a transport aircraft. After the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq in August of 1990, the first major Army combat units to arrive were from the 82nd. Now if the Iraqis were going to invade Saudi Arabia, they certainly could have. The light Airborne units of the 82nd would only have been a speed bump to the incompetent, but heavily armed, Iraqi armored and motorized rifle formations. But they would have killed American forces and taken pretty serious casualties in the process. No one in this country would care what happened to Iraq if they assaulted American soldiers in a defensive posture. This also lets our allies know how serious about a particular engagement. The only other way to do this would be to deploy an MEU, but that might certainly take longer than 18 hours depending on the locale and how spontaneous the incident was. A secondary use (and one I disagree with) is a Peacekeepers. A unit from one of the US's premier units, Airborne or otherwise, shows we mean business.2. Uncertainty
I am sure that many tin horn dictators go to bed at night wondering if there are C-141s heading their way from Pope AFB. The Airborne (and all rapidly deployable light forces) are a wild card. The whole world knows where we have POMCUS sites and what they contain as well as where our MSPRON ships are and what they contain. Now, 1 brigade is not a lot, but it is something falling from the sky in the middle of the night.TANGIBLE
1. Tactical Exploitation, Bridgeheads, Airheads
There never will be another Airborne assault like that that took place in Normandy, but it will continue to be an exceptionally useful tactic for two purposes. First, most of the combat actions that this country will face will not be against 1st or even 2nd world forces. Most of the places where the Army will wind up fighting will be lucky to make 3rd world status (Iraq and N. Korea being among the exceptions, at least in terms of their militaries, sadly). These countries will have neither the Air Defense capability to detect, deter, or combat the Airborne assault. These assaults will not be large scale divisional operations, but smaller operations designed to secure specific objectives, chiefly airfields. With airfields seized and suppressed ADA, you land in forces. They need to hold for reinforcement by the heavy units (or the IBCTS, if they prove useful). The second use will be to vertically envelop, act as a blocking force to the enemy's rear, and cut and disrupt supply and C3I to the enemy's rear. These operations would obviously be carried out in conjunction with deployed forces of the heavier units of the XVIII Airborne Corps. The 101st did this to great effect in the Gulf War by conducting an air assault to 150 KM into Iraq, holding a blocking position to the rear of the retreating Iraqi forces.2. The Airborne Doesn't Operate in a Vacuum
The 82nd Airborne is designed in its present configuration to operate as a part of the XVIII Corps, which includes both heavy and light units. The lighter units, like the 82nd, 101st and the 10th Mountain, establish the "airhead" and the heavier forces, from the XVIII and other formations follow on and reinforce. Here is a listing of the units assigned to the XVIII:+ XVIII Airborne Corps (Ft Bragg, NC) # 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized) (Ft Stewart, GA) * 1st Brigade (Ft Stewart, GA) * 2nd Brigade (Ft Stewart, GA) * 3rd Brigade (Ft Benning, GA) * 3rd Aviation Brigade (Hunter AAF) * Division Artillery (Ft Stewart, GA) * Engineer Brigade (Ft Stewart, GA) * Division Support Command (Ft Stewart, GA) # 10th Mountain Division (Light Infantry) (Ft Drum, NY) * 1st Brigade (Ft Drum, NY) * 2nd Brigade (Ft Drum, NY) * 10th Aviation Brigade (Ft Drum, NY) * Division Artillery (Ft Drum, NY) * Division Support Command (Ft Drum, NY) # 82nd Airborne Division (Ft Bragg, NC) * 1st Brigade / 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment (Ft Bragg, NC) * 2nd Brigade / 325th Airborne Infantry Regiment (Ft Bragg, NC) * 3rd Brigade / 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment (Ft Bragg, NC) * 82nd Aviation Brigade (Ft Bragg, NC) * Division Artillery / 319th Field Artillery Regiment (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) * Division Support Command (Ft Bragg, NC) # 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) (Ft Campbell, KY) * 1st Brigade / 327th Infantry Regiment (Ft Campbell, KY) * 2nd Brigade / 502nd Infantry Regiment (Ft Campbell, KY) * 3rd Brigade / 187th Infantry Regiment (Ft Campbell, KY) * 101st Aviation Brigade (Ft Campbell, KY) * 159th Aviation Brigade (Assault) (Ft Campbell, KY) * Division Artillery (Ft Campbell, KY) * Division Support Command (Ft Campbell, KY) # 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment (Light) (Ft Polk, LA) # (11th Armored Cavalry Regiment (OPFOR) (Ft Irwin, CA)) # 229th Aviation Regiment (Attack) (Ft Bragg, NC) # 18th Aviation Brigade (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) * 449th Aviation Group (Lift) (NC ARNG) (Kinston, NC) # XVIII Airborne Corps Artillery (Ft Bragg, NC) * 18th Field Artillery Brigade (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) * 54th Field Artillery Brigade (VA ARNG) (Virginia Beach, VA) * 103rd Field Artillery Brigade (RI ARNG) (Providence, RI) * 113th Field Artillery Brigade (NC ARNG) (Greensboro, NC) * 130th Field Artillery Brigade (KS ARNG) (Topeka, KS) * 135th Field Artillery Brigade (MO ARNG) (Sedalia, MO) * 138th Field Artillery Brigade (KY ARNG) (Lexington, KY) * 142nd Field Artillery Brigade (AR ARNG) (Fayetteville, AR) * 147th Field Artillery Brigade (SD ARNG) (Sioux Falls, SD) * 151st Field Artillery Brigade (SC ARNG) (Sumter, SC) * 169th Field Artillery Brigade (CO ARNG) (Aurora, CO) * 196th Field Artillery Brigade (TN ARNG) (Chattanooga, TN) * 197th Field Artillery Brigade (NH ARNG) (Manchester, NH) # 108th Air Defense Artillery Brigade (Ft Bliss, TX) # 16th Military Police Brigade (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) # 20th Engineer Brigade (Combat) (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) # 30th Engineer Brigade (Theater Army) (NC ARNG) (Charlotte, NC) # 525th Military Intelligence Brigade (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) # 35th Signal Brigade (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) # 1st Corps Support Command (Ft Bragg, NC) * 2nd Corps Material Management Center (Ft Bragg, NC) * 24th Corps Support Group (Ft Stewart, GA) * 46th Corps Support Group (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) * 101st Corps Support Group (Ft Campbell, KY) * 507th Corps Support Group (Airborne) (Ft Bragg, NC) * 30th Corps Support Group (NC ARNG) (Durham, NC) # (350th Civil Affairs Command (USAR) (Pensacola, FL)) # 44th Medical Brigade (Ft Bragg, NC) # Dragon Brigade (Rear Operations Headquarters) (Ft Bragg, NC) # 18th Air Support Operations Group (Pope AFB, NC)The above was such a well-written discussion that I decided to post it essentially unchanged, although I'm to blame for the bizarre formating. Well, blame me and Blogger.
At the risk of appearing to have the last word, I would point out that Sean's "Show of National Resolve" can translate to "tripwire" which implies something of a Forlorn Hope at times. And I would point out that serious SAM systems are showing up in a lot of 3rd World countries besides Iraq and North Korea these days. Sean lists the many units in XVIII Airborne Corps but note how few of them are really air transportable, much less airborne. My thanks to Sean for taking the time to write such a long and thoughtful reply.
Robin 9:21 PM