Why I’m Utterly Disgusted Obama is Sending 130 Military Personnel to Mt. Sinjar
After I watched this Fox News report last night, I just dropped my head in utter disgust when I heard Obama has sent 130 military personnel to “assess the situation” on Mt. Sinjar in Iraq — and once again heavily reiterate that they’re not there for a combat role.
First of all, why do you send a company-sized element of “military planners” to assess the situation? From where I sit I can tell you, a bunch of folks are trapped on a mountain starving and thirsty surrounded by bloodthirsty barbarian Islamic terrorists. How’s that for an initial assessment?
As Fox News reports, “The Pentagon sent additional military planners to Iraq on Tuesday to figure out a way to rescue and relocate the tens of thousands of religious minorities trapped on a mountain by Islamic militants, senior U.S. officials said. A senior U.S. official told Fox News that 130 military personnel have arrived in Irbil for the job.The troops will work with State Department officials and USAID to develop plans to help the Yazidi people, a religious minority displaced on Sinjar Mountain. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel formally announced the deployment in remarks to Marines at Camp Pendleton, California. “This is not a combat boots on the ground kind of operation,” Hagel said.”
So I just have to ask, did we send these “military planners” over in business suits with briefcases? Message to Hagel and Obama: there is combat going on in that area of operations — not workplace violence and not man-caused disasters. So if you deploy a member of the U.S. military into a combat zone I would presume they are carrying personal weapons — therefore, if they are shot at, their boots are “on the ground” and since shooting is the simple definition of combat, then they have “combat boots on the ground.”
Unless of course Hagel and Obama sent them over there, told them to wear loafers and not shoot back! Well, I know Marines and Army Special Operators and they will fight, preferably hard. Sadly it is as Alexander the Great once quipped, “I would not fear an army of lions if led by sheep, I would fear an army of sheep if led by a lion.” All I hear from the White House is “baa baa baa.”
Obama administration Deputy National Security Adviser Benghazi Ben “Talking Points” Rhodes told Fox News on Tuesday that both an airlift mission and an operation to create safe passage for the refugees to leave on their own are among the options being considered. This would be important, he said, to avert an act of “genocide.”
An operation for refugees to leave on their own? Yup, and where-in-the-heck, Benji, do you think they’re going? This is the level of abject incompetence and absurdity occupying leadership positions in the Obama administration.
Here is what the Obama administration should do, and should have been done some time ago:
- Designate a unified Commander for US operations in Northern Iraq. Establish an AOR (area of responsibility), AO (area of operations), and AI (area of interest).
- Designate an Operational name and concept with the defined task/purpose of enemy orientation of destroying ISIS and their logistical support bases. And also declare this a coalition effort with the Kurdish Peshmerga Army with the end state of restoring stability in Kurdish controlled areas and eliminate ISIS threat.
- Establish an Air Operations Task Force out of Kirkuk AB in Kurdish-controlled area along with Special Operations task force — stop telling everyone about campaign promises, blaming Bush, and what you don’t want to do — the enemy has a say.
- Establish a TAOR (Tactical Area of Responsibility) around Mt. Sinjar and place USSOCCENT (US Special Operations Command Central) in charge. Their mission is to secure Mt. Sinjar, organize the indigenous personnel and establish extraction zones.
- Conduct strikes against ISIS forces surrounding Mt. Sinjar and within the surrounding TAOR, establish a security zone, utilize AC-130 gunships, F-16s, A-10s, and Attack Helicopters in order to establish a safe zone around Sinjar Mountain.
- Two Courses of Action; utilize HLZs (Helicopter Landing Zones) to extract the personnel in a massive air operation and implement SEAD (Suppression of Enemy Air Defense) strikes to open up an air corridor or use US Air Force CCT (Combat Control Teams) to establish temporary landing strips for C-130 or C-17 aircraft to do hot engine unload and extractions.
- In concert with “Operation Sinjar Rescue” launch a strong counter-offensive operation against ISIS positions precluding their ability to reposition forces towards the Sinjar TAOR.
If it were me, that would be my initial intent and guidance to Pentagon and CENTCOM planners. I certainly would not be off playing golf.
We currently have nearly 250 military “advisors” in Iraq. My concern is not with the training or assisting of the Iraqi Army or political solutions and reconciliations. My intent is to send a clear message to Islamic terrorists — we will kill you. And in closing, I would have no problem stating that we are not looking to take prisoners and ship them to GITMO. There will be no prisoners. They will all be killed. ISIS needs to be destroyed.
Needing to send 130 personnel, enemies of the ISIS, to assess the situation is idiotic. I'm sitting in the USA, i...