Another non-Expert who thinks she knows about Afghanistan

First let me say I am a signed up contributor to the Andrew Breitbart blogsite, The Big Peace. I have yet to write anything for them because of my schedule but I am part of the site.

I recently read this posting on The Big Peace by contributor Diana West and was blown away at how ignorant she is to what is happening in Afghanistan and how wrong she is. According to her bio she is an accomplished and recognized journalist and author. That is great, but based on what she wrote in the blog posting titled “Our COIN Strategy is killing our soldiers” I think she needs to focus on domestic issues and stay away from AfPak issues as it is clearly out of her lane.

She wrote this piece after six soldiers were recently killed by an Afghan Border Policeman who turned on them and gunned them down. While that is a terrible incident, but not one that is surprising or new to me, it is a necessary risk we take. Executing combat operations is all about identifying, mitigating and accepting risk.

I have been, admittedly, having fits over the “strategy” of the US military command, which, in its zeal to implement COIN ideology,..

It is not a “zeal” or a idealogy and with her calling it that, I quickly recognized this piece would be yet another “expert” insight into how war should be conducted by an un-informed civilian from back in the States.

COIN is just another mission in combat, no different than a deliberate defense or a movement to contact. COIN is also not new, we have been doing it for years. We did it in WWII, Vietnam, etc., etc. Our US Special Forces have been executing COIN since their inception in the 60s. It has had other names like Foreign Internal Defense (FID) which it was known as for years in the Special Ops Community. And just like the risk that SF takes or our ETTs and MITT teams have been taking for years, the teams must always have their guard up and always paying attention to the local nationals, never fully trusting them. When I was an ETT a few years ago my team was always in “RED” status on our weapons and we always had at least one weapon with us on the FOB. Since we lived with the Afghans on the FOB, our guard was always up that one of them could turn on us. There have been embedded advisors (ETT, PMT, STTs) being killed by Afghan forces since we started embedding with them. Does that mean we just abandon the mission and not train them anymore?

Another indication I had that Diana knew nothing about Afghanistan or our military and was nothing more than a hot air pontificator was her statement of

six Marines in the photos above were shot and killed by one the Afghan policemen

Because the six that were killed were US Soldiers, not Marines. We all don’t wear the same uniform anymore so it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out who is in what service branch.

It is clear that she has a hatred towards or is trying to incite hatred towards all muslims.

Did he shout “Allahu Akbar”? Story doesn’t say. Story does say, however, that the shooter was himself was then killed by two Americans — not by any of the Afghans.

Unlike the US Army Major (Hassan) who killed 13 people and wounded many more at Ft. Hood last year who did yell “Allah Akbar”, there was never a mention that this guy did. Asking that question just incites the stereotype image that many have of Muslims. To even mention that tells me she is trying to play on the fears of ignorant Americans who think that is standard operating procedure for all Muslims. She also highlights the fact that he was killed by Americans and not Afghans…AND? Yeah I am sure Americans killed the perp because there were other Americans there and they had situational awareness and are trained to act at an instant when there is a threat. I would hope their training worked, and their marksmanship skills were sharp in order to remove the threat quickly.

But these are our allies — how can we can not drink tea with them?

The better, unasked question is: Are these our “allies”? Can Afghanistan ever be our “ally”?

Yes they are our allies and just like our own soldiers (of which there are many examples) sometimes people go bad and they kill their comrades. I am not saying to trust them all, as I never did 100% because they didn’t have US ARMY on their chest, but you have to trust them some as we are tasked with embedding and training them. Just because they are an Afghan or a Muslim does not mean they are the enemy. I have met many Afghans that I would and I did proudly fight side by side with. I have many good memories of breaking bread with them and drinking chai. I have seen Afghan soldiers killed, tortured, and wounded as a result of trying to defend their country and sometimes trying to protect and defend Americans fighting with them.

Some of these who turn on us are truly covert plants by the enemy. Some are motivated by family members, religious leaders or for financial reasons. Some are even motivated to turn on us by threats to their own family and loved ones. Afghans working for the Government of Afghanistan or with the Coalition forces keep that fact very secret because it makes them and their families a target. If the Taliban finds out that a person works with or for the coalition they have been known to kidnap family members and kill, torture or threaten to kill in order to get the “trusted” Afghan to do something bad against coalition members. Imagine if your son or daughter was kidnapped and was being tortured and the person doing it told you that they wanted you to do something horrible or illegal for it to stop. Most if not all people, would do what they kidnapper wanted if they felt there was no other way.

Now don’t get me wrong, people are allowed their opinion but unless you have walked the ground, ate the dirt and done the deed that our warriors do, then do try to come off as some sort of expert on their job. I may not like the way my airline pilot lands the plane, but I am not about to go up to the cockpit and tell him how to do it next time just because I fly all the time.