Manning’s enablers

The US Army — and our schools

By Ralph Peters

http://www.nypost.com

July 31, 2013

Yesterday, military judge Col. Denise Lind found Wiki-leaker Pfc. Bradley Manning guilty on five counts of espionage, as well as multiple counts of theft, computer fraud and military infractions. Giving Manning every benefit of the doubt, the judge found him not guilty of the charge of intentionally aiding the enemy — but still convicted him on 19 of 21 counts.

Now begins the separate sentencing phase of Manning’s military trial. But the long “guilty” list ensures he’ll spend decades in a military prison.

Yet two “unindicted co-conspirators” were missing in the dock throughout the trial. Not Julian Assange and his Wiki-gnomes, but the US Army and our blame-America culture.

Getty Images

Doing what the schools and Hollywood direct: Supporters of Pfc. Manning yesterday, outside the main gate of Ft. Meade, where he was sentenced.

Consider the guilt of the Army and Military Intelligence. Six weeks into basic training, Manning was tapped to be discharged as unsuitable. But the Army, hungry for even the worst cuts of meat, not only canceled the discharge move, but sent him to its Intelligence Center and School, granting him a Top Secret/Special Compartmentalized Information (TS/SCI) clearance.

Initially stationed at Ft. Drum, NY, Manning was referred for mental-health counseling. But he kept that sensitive clearance. Then he was sent to Iraq, where his behavior was erratic and provocative, but he continued to have access to high-level intelligence until he threw a destructive office tantrum and had to be restrained.

Eventually, he was demoted one grade and, finally, sent to work in a supply room. But the damage was already done: a vast dump of confidential and secret US government documents.

Extreme political correctness and the Army’s insatiable appetite for troops with top clearances had combined to enable the largest leak of classified information in our history.

Prior to 9/11, a soldier could lose his or her clearance over a minor infraction and access to Special Compartmentalized Information was granted on a strict “need to know” basis. To lose access today, you have to hand over 700,000 classified documents to WikiLeaks or give the Chinese and Russians the NSA’s gravest secrets.

Back when I served in Military Intelligence, Manning never would’ve gotten a clearance in the first place — warning flags were everywhere. Same thing with Edward Snowden: He never should have gotten a clearance of any kind.

But serious vetting ended with 9/11: Today, it’s just a meat market.

None of this excuses Manning’s betrayal of his country. But the Army and the intelligence community need to do some soul-searching.

The other enabler that helped make Manning the disaster he became is our patriotism-trashing, dumb-it-way-down culture.

Want to find the root of the reflexive anti-Americanism and irresponsibility that propelled Manning, Snowden and others to betray their country? Start with the removal of serious history study from our classrooms.

What are kids taught about our country now? They learn about our “collective guilt” for slavery — but not about the hundreds of thousands of Americans who died ending it. They learn about the “crime” of dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki — but not about the Bataan Death March. Guadalcanal? The Bulge? Nah. But they learn about the internment of Japanese-Americans — a regrettable mistake, but not the Holocaust.

In short, kids are programmed to feel ashamed of the United States of America. Young men such as Manning (who, yes, also attended school in peevishly anti-American Wales for several years) or Snowden make fateful decisions in a mental and moral near-vacuum littered with anti-American garbage.

And think of all the Hollywood films, television series and talk shows preaching endlessly that the real bad guys are the Feds (or the US Marines — thanks, James Cameron).

Undoubtedly, Manning and Snowden are troubled souls. But they’re also narcissistic, dishonest and malicious. The fact that each has defenders only validates the points made above: In pop culture and the classroom, America’s a menace.

It’s a shame that Col. Lind, the judge, couldn’t render a much broader verdict.

Ralph Peters is a former US Army Military Intelligence enlisted man and officer.

Making treason cool

Leaker loving his celebrity

• By RALPH PETERS
• http://www.nypost.com
• June 11, 2013

Edward Snowden, seen here in an interview with The Guardian newspaper, told the newspaper he was the source of a series of leaked documents from the National Security Agency. (The Guardian, Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras)

Forget skinny ties and retro hats: The surest way to attain super-cool status (and fame) today is to betray your country.

The impossibly self-important NSA contractor, Edward Snowden, who “exposed” two vital intelligence programs, isn’t a leftie Paul Revere. He’s Kim Kardashian with stubble.

He revealed very highly classified programs, alerting our enemies about our most sophisticated intelligence-collectioncapabilities (programs designed to keep us safe, not spy on us).He broke his oath to protect the information with which we entrusted him, lied about who we target and aided those who want to kill Americans.And he hintshe could do more damage.

To this old-fashioned American, that’s plain treason.

It’s always been a hipster thing to trash government, but the left’s generations-long effort to destroy the positive image of patriotism has made betraying our country a fashion statement. Snowden is a copycat who “admires” Pfc. Bradley Manning, another now-famous young man who knew better than those who serve dutifully for decades. He’s also enamored of Julian Assange, the left’s favorite accused rapist.

There’s nothing brave about his brag that he was the source of the NSA leaks (especially since he fled the country first). This is clearly about the desire to be a star.

To get a sense of Snowden’s phenomenal vanity, check out the 12-minute film (all over the Internet) in which he justifies his deed. The high-school dropout may have a flair for tech, but he knows nothing about our history, trade relations, international affairs or even the conditions in Hong Kong (where he says he now fears assassination by CIA-backed Triad gangsters).

Claiming that he only wants to make government accountable, Snowden then brags that he could expose CIA stations around the world. He wants “asylum from any countries that believe in free speech.” So he went to China? Hope you enjoy your stay, Mr. Snowden.

In his I-love-me interview, he further opines that the American people, not the government, should decide about programs such as those he revealed. He should have stayed in school until he got to the Civics block on democracy. The American public does vote on these programs — through their representatives in Congress. That’s why we have regular elections.

And to my leftist friends: Do you really want a 29-year-old high-school dropout, rather than Congress, deciding which intelligence programs should be authorized? Really? Sounds like a dictatorship to me.

Snowden, not the NSA, subverted democracy.

It may disappoint conservatives, but I’m a fan of Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.). I don’t agree with all of her positions, but I respect her integrity. Protective of civil liberties, she’s an excellent litmus test on intelligence matters. And Feinstein believes the NSA programs in question help keep us safe.

Again to my leftist friends: Do you really think Snowden or Manning or Assange care more about your freedom than Sen. Feinstein?

There is a scandal here, though, one that’s overdue for serious attention: the out-of-control use of contractors to perform vital government services.

This is a mess for which Republicans bear the chief blame. For a generation, they’ve insisted that the private sector can perform all government work cheaper and better — even when it comes to national security. But as I’ve seen myself, from the Pentagon to Iraq, it ain’t cheaper and it’s rarely better.

This spoiled-brat, dropout Benedict Arnold claims he was pulling down a $200,000 salary for his NSA contract work. A direct NSA employee on the government payroll might get between $75,000 and $90,000 for the same work. And the contractor adds on exorbitant overhead, so Snowden probably cost us at least $500,000 per year. Wonder why we’ve seen the defense and intelligence budgets soar?

Obviously, Snowden’s employer, Booz Allen Hamilton, failed in its oversight duty. But contractors are desperate for techies with security clearances, and Snowden already was cleared above top secret. There was no incentive to look too closely at him: The company needed a warm body in Hawaii.

And Booz Allen Hamilton is actually one of the better contracting outfits.

So: We have a fame-hungry traitor, a compromise of vital security programs, a turncoat who’s put himself at China’s mercy, the left-leaning media making the creep a hero and contractors desperate to cover up their greed.

Coming to a TV near you: “Real Spies of DC.”

Ralph Peters spent much of his US Army career in intelligence.

Related: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/09/edward-snowden-nsa-whistleblower-surveillance (includes video)

O’s cynical picks

Politics first, foreign policy last

• By RALPH PETERS
• http://www.nypost.com
• June 6, 2013

President Barack Obama, second from left, former aide Samantha Power, right, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice, second from right, and incumbent National Security Adviser Tom Donilon, left, return to the Oval Office after a personnel announcement at the Rose Garden of the White House June 5, 2013 in Washington. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

There are three big losers from President Obama’s cynical appointment of Susan Rice as his new national security adviser: Secretary of State John Kerry, Congress and the American people.

As for the nomination of left-wing activist Samantha Power to replace Rice as UN ambassador, the losers are our foreign policy, our allies and the lefties bellowing for the closure of Gitmo. (It ain’t shutting down soon; this nomination’s a consolation prize to O’s base.)

These personnel choices are brilliant hardball politics — but, once again, the Obama White House has elevated politics above serious strategy.

Media pundits promptly opined that Rice’s appointment will alienate Republicans. But our president’s written off Republicans as dead meat. Bringing Rice into the Executive Branch’s innermost circle rewards her for being a good soldier in taking the fall on Benghazi, and it makes it virtually impossible for Congress to subpoena her for a grilling, thanks to our government’s separation of powers. Sharp move, Mr. President.

Pity poor John Kerry, though: He really, really wanted to be a noteworthy secretary of state. Already held at arms-length, now he’ll be relegated to visiting countries that never make the headlines and handing out retirement awards (plus working on the Middle East “peace process,” the ultimate diplomatic booby prize).

Rice has the weakest credentials of any national security adviser in the history of the office, but she has the president’s ear as his old pal. And she’ll work in the White House: Proximity to POTUS is trumps in DC. Kerry’s desk in Foggy Bottom might as well be a hundred miles from the Oval Office.

However incompetent, Rice may become the most influential national security adviser since Henry Kissinger eclipsed the entire State Department. Which means that Obama’s foreign policy, already disastrous, is now going to get worse.

As for the earnest Ms. Power, she has zero qualifications to serve as our UN ambassador. She’s a left–wing militant who has yet to show the least interest in defending America, rather than merely using our might as her tool. Her cause is human rights abroad, and that’s her only cause. And while respect for human rights should be a major factor in our foreign policy, it can’t be the only factor.

Both Power and Rice consistently advocate using our military to protect the human rights of often-hostile foreign populations. Of course there are, indeed, times when measured intervention is strategically wise and morally imperative — but our military’s fundamental purpose is national defense, not mercy missions to those who spit in our faces.

(By the way, I know of no instance when Power has vigorously defended Jews or Christians murdered or driven from their homes by the Arabs she wants to “save”; guess human rights aren’t universal, after all.)

As leftists cheer both choices, one can’t help recalling the cries of “Chicken hawk!” directed at the neocons in the Bush years. Much was made of the neocons’ enthusiasm for sending in our troops, although none of the movement’s leaders had served in our military. Now we have leftist kill-for-peace activists who never served in uniform. That’s different, of course.

On a purely practical level, Power is a terrible choice to be our UN rep. It’s a job for a veteran, polished ambassador who understands the arcane ways of diplomacy and the UN’s exasperating rules and procedures — which the Russian and Chinese ambassadors employed to humiliate Rice. It’s not a job for a zealot on a hobby horse.

Obama knows that, of course. But the Power nomination’s a win for him, even if she’s not confirmed. He just covered his left flank on the cheap. It’s not about Power, just about power.

Ralph Peters’ new book is “Hell or Richmond,” a Civil War novel.

The Arab collapse

Middle East a vulture’s feast

• By RALPH PETERS
• http://www.nypost.com
• May 19, 2013
• 
  

An Iraqi woman passes by the scene of a car bomb attack in the Kamaliyah neighborhood, a predominantly Shia area of eastern Baghdad. -AP Photo

The Arab Spring has unleashed the Arab Collapse. Everybody still standing in the region is picking the flesh of the helpless. The Islamist cancer proved more virulent than Arabs themselves expected, while dying regimes behave with unrestrained ruthlessness.

And our diplomats still think everyone can be cajoled into harmony.

We’re witnessing a titanic event, the crack-up of a long-tottering civilization. Arab societies grew so corrupt and stagnant that violent upheaval became inevitable. That’s what we’re seeing in Syria and Iraq — two names, one struggle — and will find elsewhere tomorrow.

We can’t stop it, we can’t fix it, and we don’t understand it. But we can stay out of it.

When the US is in the Middle East, the Arabs want us out. When we’re out, they want us in. But our purported Arab (and Turkish) allies consistently agree that Uncle Sam should pay the party bill, while they take home all the presents.

Yes, Syria’s humanitarian crisis is appalling. And no, I don’t like to see innocents dying or suffering. But the calls from the region for American action are nakedly cynical.

Turkey has the largest military in NATO after our own, but cries “helpless” crocodile tears over Syrian refugees — while dreaming of rebuilding the Ottoman Empire upon their ruined lives. Our Saudi “friends” spent decades building the most-sophisticated military arsenal in the Middle East, apart from Israel. Now the Saudis wring their hands over Syria’s misery — but won’t intervene directly to stop the killing.

The Saudi position is always “You and him fight!” As long ago as Desert Storm, Saudis joked about renting the American army and our bumpkin gullibility. (Try to find one US officer who’s worked with the Saudis and doesn’t hate their guts. . .) Now they want Washington to spend our blood and treasure to open the mosques of Damascus to their Wahhabi cult.

Well, the Assad regime is horrible, but not al Qaeda horrible. Better poison gas than poisoned religion, as far as our own security’s concerned. This is an Arab struggle (with Turkish and Iranian vultures overhead). This time, we need to let them fight it out.

The region’s outdated order is disintegrating. But Washington’s still mesmerized by the artificial boundaries on the map.

Nine decades ago, the diplomats at Versailles ignored the region’s natural fault lines as they carved up the Middle East, forcing enemies together and driving kin apart (while Woodrow Wilson turned his back on the Kurds). Only brute force and dictators kept up the fiction that these were countries. Now the grim charade has reached its end.

Iraq was carved out for British interests, while Syria was France’s consolation prize. Now Syria’s collapsing in a too-many-factions-to-count civil war. And Iraq’s in the early stages of its own dissolution; even a would-be dictator — another of our one-time “friends,” Nouri al-Maliki — can’t keep the “country” together.

We don’t even know how many new states will emerge from the old order’s wreckage. But the Scramble for the Sand is on, with Iran, Turkey, treacherous Arab oil sheikdoms and terrorists Sunni and Shia alike all determined to dictate the future, no matter the cost in other people’s blood.

We had our chance to extend the peace and keep both Iran and Wahhabi crazies at bay after we defeated Iraq’s insurgencies. But a new American president, elevating politics over strategy, walked away from Baghdad, handing Iraq to Iran. Now it’s too late. If George W. Bush helped trigger the Arab Spring, Barack Obama made this Arab Winter inevitable.

We must not be lured into the current fighting — centered, for now, on Syria — by cries of humanitarian necessity. The local powers could step in to stop the killing. But they won’t. Once again, they want us to pay the bill. (It’s time for the Saudis, especially, to give their own blood.)

We’ve paid enough. Rhetoric and red lines notwithstanding, we need to back off from Syria, if for no other reason than a strategist’s golden rule: If you don’t understand what a fight’s about, stay out.

Ralph Peters is the author of the new Civil War novel “Hell or Richmond.”

Treachery at the top in Afghanistan

By Ralph Peters
New York Post
http://www.nypost.com
February 27, 2013

In his latest act of ingrate treachery, Afghan President Hamid Karzai has ordered US Special Forces out of Wardak Province, the back door to Kabul. His demand came two weeks after he halted US close air support for the Afghan National Army, crippling his own military’s capabilities.

And that came atop multiple incidents when “our man in Kabul” blamed US troops for everything that went wrong in his wretched country.

That’s what you get for $600 billion these days. Without our support and protection, Karzai would have been swinging from a lamp post years ago — just as his predecessor Najibullah did in 1996. But stuck in our strategic battered-wife syndrome, we’ve continued to make excuses every time Karzai lashed out at us.

The decisive point came in 2009, when we let him steal the presidential election, discrediting all our rhetoric about democracy and the rule of law. After that, Karzai must’ve figured he had us by the “stacking swivel,” as my drill sergeant used to say.

And Karzai was right. Two thousand American troops have died to keep in power an unscrupulous incompetent who isn’t even grateful. And Karzai is confident that we’ll keep the money flowing after we leave. Meanwhile, he appears to be cutting deals with side-jumping tribal chieftains, fence-sitters and our outright enemies to ensure his own survival.

Which brings us back to that order to remove our Special Forces from a key province. Our special operators have been by far the most effective tool we’ve had on the ground in Afghanistan. While the tactics forced on our other troops left them easy targets for roadside bombs and assassins, the SFers built the only counterinsurgency programs that worked.

With Karzai’s Afghan National Police hated for their corruption and unreliability, our Green Berets built village militias — neighborhood policing, frontier-style. They empowered locals to protect themselves. Unsurprisingly, the locals liked it.

Karzai resisted the program: The National Police were under his control, but not those village self-defense forces. Solution? Trumped-up charges that Afghanelements associated with our troops engaged in torture and kidnapping.

Although NATO and US investigations found zero evidence of such activities, it served Karzai as a lever to neuter both our most effective troops and those pesky militias.

Who benefits? Karzai apparently thinks he does, but the real winners are the Taliban, who were losing ground in Wardak.

Karzai seems to be positioning himself for an ultimate bargain with some Taliban elements, renegade tribal chieftains and his ethnic-Pashtun homies.

He doesn’t trust the members of the old Northern Alliance (our 2001 allies in Afghanistan and the guys we should’ve supported all along) who serve in his government. But by trying to forestall a civil war that would drive him out, Karzai may be making civil war inevitable. And the guy we’ve backed looks likely to be on the anti-American side.

That’s what we get for backing individuals, rather than supporting institutions.

We’re suckers for the devious exile who speaks English and knows the magic words “democracy” and “human rights.” Result? Iraq has become a satellite of Iran, and Afghanistan’s going to come apart again.

Meanwhile, we’re chained to one of the world’s most corrupt regimes and enthusiastically backward countries. We want to get out, but can’t do it overnight. The huge force infrastructure we’ve built up takes years to dismantle and ship home — over Pakistan’s rickety transportation net (we’re hostages to the Pakistanis, too), or through Central Asia and Russia.

We have never before chosen to expose a major US force in such a strategically idiotic position. We never should’ve had one more soldier or system in Afghanistan than we could bring out by air in an emergency. Logistics, not nation-building fairy tales, should’ve shaped our actions. Now we’re going to have to bribe our way out, paying tribute money to thugs from Moscow to Islamabad.

My bet is that Karzai isn’t half as smart as he thinks he is. If he’s expecting to cut a deal with Taliban elements, he may be focused on the wrong threat. By pandering to terrorists and halting the US air support his army desperately needs, he may have set himself up for a post-American coup staged by Afghans who actually care about their country.

Karzai may swing from a lamp post yet.

Not Fighting Back

By Ralph Peters
New York Post
http://www.nypost.com
February 21, 2013

This week, a cutting-edge security firm in Virginia, Mandiant, reported that it had traced major cyber-attacks on 140 US and other Western targets back not merely to China but to a specific Shanghai high-rise belonging to Chinese military intelligence.

Mandiant did splendid detective work at the unclassified level. But the situation’s even worse. Exasperated government workers tell me we should beterrified at what the Chinese already have done to us.

The Chinese government has hack-attacked our military, other branches of government, the defense industry, our energy infrastructure, telecommunications, hi-tech research and basic manufacturing.

According to the US International Trade Commission, Chinese intellectual property theft cost the United States $48 billion in 2009, as well as taking away 2 million jobs. Since then, the amount of theft has worsened, so the total loss is likely around $300 billion. But US companies, afraid that making their losses public will shake consumer confidence, won’t go public with their outrage.

Our military and intelligence services know the situation has gone beyond the Chinese preparing for cyber-war: Beijing’s already waging war against us.

It’s not that we can’t fight back. We have stunning, close-held capabilities to respond with punishing cyber-strikes of our own. We have the intelligence. We have the targets.

But the order never comes.

We’re bleeding money, government secrets, technology secrets, corporate strategies — and seem to have suffered trial attacks on our critical infrastructure. Why won’t the Obama administration doanything to retaliate against Chinese cyber-assaults?

Playing defense doesn’t cut it. The Chinese won’t throttle back until they feel pain. Serious pain.

There are four possible reasons for President Obama’s inaction — only one of them faintly valid:

Our own businessmen put profit over patriotism. The minority of US-based corporations that make money in (or off of) China form an influential lobby in Washington. It was bad enough when outsourcing dumped hardworking Americans out on the street, but arguing that we shouldn’t respond to Chinese attacks is greed bordering treason.

Imaginary legal concerns paralyze this administration. If Obama had been president on Dec. 7, 1941, he’d have spent all of 1942 having government lawyers research whether sinking our Pacific fleet in a surprise attack was an act of war. We are under attack. Every day, around the clock. And our president seems afraid that Chinese spies are going to sue us.

Team Obama just has other priorities: If the administration had a theme song, it’d be the old country number, “Make the World Go Away.” Obama came to office with no serious interest in foreign policy, but a highly charged domestic agenda. And foreign policy has bewildered, befuddled and bloodied his presidency, as it’s done to Democrats since the Vietnam War. He just wants foreign problems to disappear.

We fear a massive cyber-attack. This is the only remotely valid reason for responding carefully, but inaction merely worsens the prospect of disasters to come. And the administration is doing precious little to improve our defenses in the meantime.

The more complex a socio-economic system becomes, the more vulnerable it is to any kind of attack. Our vast infrastructure offers countless target nodes, while our centralized systems for distributing everything from energy to foodstuffs rely on national networks and long-distance supply chains. An African village wouldn’t suffer much from a cyber-attack; a Chinese town would feel it, but not severely. An American city would shut down.

Which means you can’t play tit-for-tat and let the Chinese continue to escalate. You have to hit their military and intelligence computer networks with shocking force — demonstrating what we could do to their showcase cities, if they don’t behave.

They have to be punished for their massive theft of our secrets and intellectual capital — as well as for the direct damage they do.

If you don’t stand up to the bully, the bully keeps taking your lunch money.

As for the nonsense that we can’t retaliate because Beijing holds so much US debt, that situation makes China our prisoner, not the other way around. The Chinese economy is far more fragile than the leadership in Beijing lets on.

In the time you spent reading this column, the Chinese launched multiple attacks upon our country. Your president, whose fundamental mission is to protect the United States, did nothing.

Ralph Peters is a retired Army officer and former enlisted man.

Asking for defense cuts

By RALPH PETERS

Last Updated:10:45 PM, February 14, 2013

Posted:10:38 PM, February 14, 2013

The looming budget sequestration imposes almost $50 billion in cuts on the Defense budget this year. It’s a terrible idea — and I’m for it.

This hatchet job trims not just fat, but muscle and bone, too. It’s going to be ugly. But as I’ve watched the Defense Department pull shameful stunts and listened to congressional blather attempting to block sequestration, this defense hawk has become one irate taxpayer.

The last straw came earlier this month when our Navy ostentatiously cancelled the deployment of the supercarrier USS Harry S Truman to the Persian Gulf, crying poverty. That’s like Donald Trump claiming he can’t afford a cab.

The Navy could have cut back other, less-sensitive deployments or acquisition programs. But the Chief of Naval Operations, Adm. Jonathan Greenert, chose to embarrass the White House and pressure Congress. He should have been fired.

Did the admiral eventhinkof the message he sent to Iran?

Dear admirals and generals: It’s your job to protect our country, not just your budgets.

As for Congress, its members agreed to this sequestration. The terms weren’t secret. Now panicked members act as if they’ve been innocent dupes.

Won’t wash. You voted for it. Now suck up the consequences.

To get a sense of the scare tactics rampant on the Hill, consider “What Sequestration Really Means,” from the House Armed Services Committee. It has all the integrity of a drunken teenager in a backseat with a cheerleader.

The paper makes four bogus claims about what “reductions at this level would mean”:

The smallest ground force since before World War II.We’re going to have that anyway, because our troops’ real friends on the Hill would fit in an aircraft lavatory. Congressmen love photo ops with soldiers, but when it comes budget time they’ll always sacrifice grunts to preserve home-district defense-contractor jobs, no matter how wasteful. Congress is going to slash troops whatever happens.

The smallest Navy since before World War II. It’s also a much more expensive Navy, with ships costing up to $4.5-billion raw from the shipyard. The Navy decided that fewer, more-expensive ships are better, with supercarriers our maritime-strategy centerpiece.

In fact, our Navyistoo small. Want a bigger one? Buy cheaper, smaller, faster ships. The next revolutionary shock in naval warfare is going to come when a second-rate power, such as Iran or North Korea, sinks one of our supercarriers.

The smallest tactical fighter force in the history of the Air Force. Again, this is a choice. Despite possessing incontestable air dominance over every other air force on earth, the “fighter pilot mafia” within our Air Force keeps pushing for extravagant hi-tech fighters. That means fewer airplanes.

Do some basic math. During the Korean War, our top fighter was the F-86D Sabre. It cost under $400,000 per plane. In 2013 dollars, that’s under $4 million. Our second-newest fighter, the F-22 — so troubled it hasn’t been sent on one combat mission — costs $200 million a copy (with R&D and downstream costs included, $350 million). So: For one F-22, you could buy 50 F-86Ds.

It gets worse: The F-22 requires 60 hours of maintenance for every flight hour; the F-86D needed five or fewer. So those 50 F-86Ds could fly600sorties to that single F-22’s one. Is the problem-plagued F-22 really 600 times better than the old Sabre?

And our newest fighter, the equally troubled F-35, has an estimated life-cycle cost of up to $1.5trillion. Want to guess where to start saving?

Of course, we don’t want our pilots flying 1950s aircraft (Oops: Wearestill flying the B-52s, which actually work).

The fat years are over. Our military needs to make hard choices, but refuses. Leaner reallycouldbe meaner — if Congress stopped protecting incompetent contractors.

The smallest civilian workforce in the history of the Defense Department. Why is it smaller? Because Congress went in for an orgy of outsourcing that raped the defense budget—while providing inferior services (the waste during the Iraq War was stomach-turning).

The true problem is that Congress has been giving the defense industry an endless supply of blank checks, with no real accountability — while CEOs wrap themselves in the flag on Capitol Hill. Patriots? In our recent wars, not one defense-industry CEO volunteered to be a dollar-a-year man as captains of industry did in World War II.

Sequestration will do serious harm. But our corrupt system has already done far worse. It’s time for a reckoning.

Ralph Peters is a retired Army officer and former enlisted man.

Read more:Asking for defense cuts - NYPOST.comhttp://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/asking_for_defense_cuts_JMVPBqujQudb1Jc68tKeVP#ixzz2Kxu7EhB0

Sergeant rock-ette

By RALPH PETERS

Last Updated:10:57 PM, January 24, 2013

Posted:10:11 PM, January 24, 2013

Listen up, men at arms: Stop whining. You sound like a bunch of girls.

Our military is not going to collapse because more combat-related jobs will be opened to women. I’ve heard instant griping from old vets and talk-show pundits since this story broke, but the fact is that the gals with guns are already in the fight to a far greater extent than yesteryear’s rules foresaw. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s decision largely recognizes existing reality.

Anyway, it’s going to happen, like it or not.

So those of us who care about our military and its combat effectiveness need to stop wailing and start working to make sure the admission of women to more combat-focused military specialties is done right.

Because thereisone serious danger, as well as a number of lesser concerns, that could do real damage if we screw this up.

First, it’sessentialthat physical standards not be lowered to allow women to qualify for point-of-the-bayonet positions. And not all of the women who apply will measure up.

Some of our trigger-pullers hump 120 pounds as they scale those Afghan ridges. You can’t give some soldiers a special dispensation to carry half that weight, or the other members of the squad or team have to lug even more. Want fairness? Start here.

The integration of women into our military to date has been overwhelmingly positive, but there have been undeniable downsides that we should learn from. One example: When the Army integrated basic training a generation ago, physical requirements were lowered for everybody (we pretended otherwise). We now have the chubbiest, tubbiest military since Sgt. Bilko. Physical toughness should be requirement No. 1 foreverysoldier or Marine.

(The gender integration of basic training also destroyed the folk-poetry tradition of magnificently obscene, hilariously inventive marching and running cadences — political correctness killed those wonderful “jodies.”)

On the other hand, the Neanderthals among us have to recognize that more than a few women in uniform have not only participated in combat, but performed heroically. In the Military Police Corps, convoy escort duty often led to ambushes and firefights in Iraq. No-nonsense female NCOs won medals for bravery leading men in combat.

What ultimately matters is who can fight. This can’t be about gender above all. It has to be competence-driven.

Which brings us to another potential problem: Our military already has barely disguised promotion quotas for women and minorities. And while our military should be (and long has been) about equal opportunity, it suffers when used for politically driven affirmative action.

Not only do promotions made for the sake of political correctness cheat competent soldiers, they also cast an unfair shadow over the many first-rate officers and NCOs who just happen to be women or minorities. Nor should we prolong a system in which a male soldier is fired and gone, but a female soldier has recourse to endless protests. That’s not fairness — that’s bigotry.

A last issue is that activists who want the world their way demand impossibly perfect behavior from those in uniform. Sorry: If you put physically rambunctious young people in prolonged intimate proximity to one another during their peak years of sexual energy, the platoon isn’t going to pass for a Baptist seminary. Sexual abuse cannot be tolerated, but we do have to show some understanding for stupidity and oafishness among 19-year-olds.

And the guy isn’t automatically the guilty party.

Back to the first point: Don’t lower standards, physical or ethical. If standards are maintained with rigor, the force will be OK. The services have until 2016 to pound out the details. Senior generals and admirals will have to show some backbone on this issue — and backbone hasn’t been their salient characteristic in recent years.

Who’s going to be disappointed? Some women will measure up, while others will do their best and fail (as men do). But the truly crestfallen are apt to be the activists who expect women to flock to combat-related positions in huge numbers.

They won’t. Surveys of military women show that, although dedicated, they don’t long to join the Infantry.

But to that GI Jane who proves she can hump her own gear plus the mortar base plate: You go, girl.

Ralph Peters is a retired Army enlisted man and officer.

Read more:Sergeant rock-ette - NYPOST.comhttp://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/sergeant_rock_ette_S5ma7Hhot4Cwg1jTC2qsSN#ixzz2Izu22abW

Bam's Benghazi Lies

By Ralph Peters
New York Post
http://www.nypost.com
November 5, 2012

To get to the truth, connect the lies. Do what intel analysts and detectives do: Build a scenario from the facts and watch the lies blink red. And when anyone tells as many lies as this administration has told about its Benghazi debacle, you get a Christmas tree.

A three-act drama emerges from the facts that have leaked out. It starts ugly and turns hideous.

Act One:Our personnel in Libya worried for months about security, repeatedly petitioning the State Department for enhanced protection, especially for Benghazi. Requests denied.

Why? In Iraq, the State Department played tough guy, hiring mercenaries who gunned down innocent locals to “protect their packages” (our diplomats were the least diplomatic people we had in Baghdad). When Secretary Hillary Clinton took over, she moved, to her credit, to dump the psychos.

But the pendulum swung to the other extreme. Security issues became the preserve of soft-power lefties who despise our military. Putting more trust in local gunmen than in the US Marines, they got Ambassador Chris Stevens killed. “Small footprint,” indeed.

The White House bears no blame for this stage. Security for diplomatic posts doesn’t makeanypresident’s briefing calendar. Blame State and Mrs. Clinton.

Act Two:We now know, almost minute by minute, what happened in Benghazi. We know (as the White House knewimmediately) that there was no riot. The attack had nothing to do with that goofball video.

What matters isn’t just what happened in Benghazi, tragic though it was. What matters to our country is what happened in the White HousethisSept. 11: All the president’s men panicked.

Instead of asking themselves what they coulddoin Benghazi, their priority was what they couldsayin Washington.

Obama had campaigned as the great bin Laden-slayer. Now he faced a major terror attack on the 11th anniversary of 9/11. The “tough-on-terror” president had let down the nation’s guard on the one day of every year when an Islamist terror attack is most likely.

His “White House plumbers” didn’t think about the danger over there, but about the election over here. They flailed about for a way to blame the security lapse on anything but their policies. And somebody said,Hey, that Cairo demonstration was about, like, this video thing. Just say the Benghazi stuff was, like, the same and it got out of hand.

The words may not be exact, but I’d bet you a falafel sandwich they nail the essence. And the coverup began, focused not on strategic needs, but on political expediency.

Why no attempt at a military rescue? I don’t think one could have gotten there in time — this was hard — but, jeez, we should havetried. Yet the White House feared escalating the situation and elevating the story (great work, guys!). A Benghazi rescue mission was less important than rescuing the election.

The panicked decision to tell that first big lie precipitated all the other lies that followed (and the media’s disgraceful collusion). That near-sighted, self-absorbed decision to promote an obscure video as the cause of the attack also gave the video global publicity — whichdidlead to widespread rioting and deaths.

The second act ends with that shameless White House whopper: “The video did it.”

Act Three:It’s the old “hubby did something really dumb and lied to the wife about it” scenario. One lie is never enough. Other lies must be told to defend the first lie.

If the strategic shenanigans were inept, this White House showed its Chicago side when it came to shielding the president. The director of National Intelligence and the CIA director may have been pressured to support the lies told to Congress and the American people about the Benghazi debacle.

Let me be clear:Nointelligence professional could have believed that a complex attack with accurate mortar fire, heavy weapons, a detailed scheme of maneuver and well-placed roadblocks popped out of a flash mob.

But the professionals were silenced as intel-community political appointees toed the “blame the video” line until it became clear that the emperor not only lacked clothes, but hadn’t bathed in a while. Now the finger-pointing has begun (note to former four-star generals: You aren’t tough enough for this brand of politics).

This White House has several protective rings. The president fills the innermost ring, defended at all costs. His morning-after remarks (before he flew off to a Las Vegas fund-raiser) were beautifully crafted to commit him to nothing at all. Hillary’s in the second ring, with a few others. She has to be protected, too (at least until Bill does his part for the campaign).

Everybody else is disposable, even Obama pal Susan Rice, our UN ambassador, who was shoved out on the world stage to lie.

The administration ruthlessly pursued two goals: Stonewall until America votes, then drag things out until the story withers. The political hacks have gotten away with the first one.

The lies continue, although they twist and turn as facts emerge — White House spokesman Jay Carney’s so shameless he’s bound to end up with his own reality show. And the president, while refusing to risk a press conference, won’t associate the attack with Islamist extremism (“workplace violence,” perhaps?).

Watergate’s starting to look small-time. Now we’re only waiting for “Son of Deep Throat.” Meanwhile, Congress must put our top intelligence-agency political appointees under oath and ask them, “What did you know and when did you know it?”

Expect a “Saturday Night Massacre” if this president is re-elected. Heads are going to roll. The wrong heads. But as a better president learned, the lies don’t go away when you dump the bodies.

Barack Hussein Nixon?

Ralph Peters is Fox News' Strategic Analyst and a former Military Intelligence officer with tactical and strategic experience.

Read more:http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/bam_benghazi_lies_U8R3y5iHVbs3uurhjsiMjO#ixzz2BMapHqlG