-Caveat Lector- WJPBR Email News List [EMAIL PROTECTED] Peace at any cost is a Prelude to War! Hack's Weekly Mail, 2000-09-27 1) Hack's Column: WAR-FIGHTERS OR WAITERS? 2) Hack's *Price Of Honor* Book Signings In Georgia This Month 3) PAX AMERICA STRIKES AGAIN -- A US diplomat in Asia sounds off 4) How to Contact Soldiers For The Truth 5) How to Unsub, Change email addresses, Write to Hack --1-- WAR-FIGHTERS OR WAITERS? BY DAVID H. HACKWORTH Hang on for breaking news: An Army report has concluded that American paratroopers are overly aggressive. Tell this to former enemy soldiers from Germany, Japan, North Korea, North Vietnam and Iraq. They'll say "old news" and show you their scars. Having led paratroopers in combat, I can assure you the baddest and most aggressive warriors that ever slogged through the Valley of Death are soldiers who drop from the sky. Famed paratroop leader James Gavin said if a man will jump out of an airplane, he'll fight. And fight they will. The renowned paratrooper aggressiveness is a combination of the nature of the beast, unit spirit and a lot of hard training. Now this same trait has gotten one of the proudest parachute units in our Army -- the 504th Parachute Infantry Regiment -- in a world of pain because members of that outfit "beat and manhandled" ethnic Albanians while in Kosovo. Of course, what's not reported is that these warriors from the outfit the Germans called "the devils in baggy pants" were shot at, booby-trapped, grenaded, stoned and manhandled by the ethnic Albanians before our troopers finally did an eye-for-an-eye on their attackers. Nor does the average American know that a few months before the 504th deployed to Kosovo as peacekeepers, they'd been preparing to assault into that foul swamp to get up close and nasty with the Serbian army. Along with the rest of the 82nd Airborne Division, the 504th trained for that mission following the time-honored axiom of American paratroopers: "Take no quarter. Give no quarter!" As luck would have it, instead of fighting their way into Kosovo, they were sent over there -- with almost no special training -- as warm-and-fuzzy peacekeepers. But just because there was a change in mission, their warrior ethic and fighting skills didn't suddenly get left behind at Fort Bragg, N.C. And this underscores the problem the U.S. military has these days as its forces RoboCop their way around the globe: how to switch fighters into peacekeepers overnight. How to go from kill-or-be-killed to directing traffic in snake pits like Bosnia and Kosovo and doing Meals On Wheels around the rest of the world. Warrior training is ingrained; it's like a correct parachute-landing fall. You hit the ground on the right points of contact without thinking. You operate on total automatic. You must in order to avoid the bone doctor or a body bag. How many World War II and Korean vets still take cover when a car backfires? How many Vietnam vets automatically scan for tripwires and mines when hiking in the woods? You can't make a Rottweiler into a golden retriever in two or three lessons. Nor can a few weeks of peace training convert battle-prepared warriors into cherubic choirboys. There just isn't enough time in the annual training cycle to have it both ways. In fact, there's barely enough time to turn untested soldiers into combat warriors. When the 504th Parachute Regiment deployed to the Gulf in August of 1990 as the tip of the spear that was eventually stuck into Saddam Hussein's vaunted Republican Guard, it was nowhere near good-to-go when it hit the ground in Saudi. It took five months of tough desert training to get up for the lethal game. Here was a unit that in 1989 had 365 days to get it together for war at Fort Bragg, yet it still wasn't ready when the whistle blew. In 2000, there's even less time for combat training because of the President Clinton-mandated and Gen. Hugh Shelton-approved sensitivity and Consideration of Others training. When the Canadian Airborne Regiment ran into 504th-type troubles in Somalia, its government resolved the issue by deactivating one of the finest units in the Canadian Armed Forces. That shouldn't happen here, even though Lt. Gen. Dan McNeill, who commanded the division when these incidents occurred, certainly won't take the heat for his boys or resign in the now totally politically correct Army. But he should at least tell the yo-yos running the Pentagon that race horses shouldn't pull plows and war-fighters can't be Brownies. I'll bet my old jump boots that if General Gavin still commanded the 82nd, he'd tell the Pentagon where to put its investigation that will further reduce the seriously endangered warrior ethic. Or -- for sure -- he would've walked. *** © 2000 David H. Hackworth Distributed by King Features Syndicate Inc. http://www.hackworth.com is the address of David Hackworth's home page. Sign in for the free weekly Defending America column at his Web site. Send mail to P.O. Box 5210, Greenwich, CT 06831 --2-- Hack's *Price Of Honor* Book Signings In Georgia This Month On 9/29 -- Fort Bennings Army Base Book Signing at the Fort Bennings Main Exchange, Building 9230 in Fort Benning, GA from 11 AM to 1 PM. Fon is (706) 687-0384 and the contact is Mr. Andrie Nourie, Sales Area Manager. On 9/30 -- Walden Book Store, Peach Tree Mall, 3507 Manchester Parkway, in Columbus, GA from 2 to 6 PM. Fon is (706) 322-7287 and the contact is Ms. April Millet. --3-- PAX AMERICA STRIKES AGAIN A US diplomat in Asia sounds off: "In this position I got the up close look at the imperial staff at Pacific Command. While I have my troubles with them, my main concern was the colonial approach they take with the Asian nations. It really seems to have gotten worse under ADM Blair. This will explain it: When President Estrada of the Philippines visited Hawaii last week, one of his stops was at PACOM headquarters. During the meeting, ADM Blair put up a list of military equipment that the US has provided the Philippines over the years. Then he put up a list of the equipment that is still operational. ADM Blair told President Estrada that that the Philippines will not get any more equipment from the US until the Philippines learns to take care of what they already have been given. Basically, you had a US flag rank officers lecturing the head of state of a US treaty ally. I could have understood his approach if he was talking to the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, but he was addressing the head of state. This is in the best tradition of the ADM Dewey when he sailed into Manila Bay and paid the Spanish $20 million to surrender to the US. As it has been said, "We stole the Philippine independence fair and square." There are a couple things troubling this: 1) I know this is not the US State Department or US Embassy position in regard to the Philippines. Pres. Estrada worked very hard to get the Visiting Forces Agreement passed in the Philippine Senate and he succeeded. The Philippines also stepped up to assist the US in East Timor when it was not in their national interest. The Government of the Philippines has worked hard with the US and there is no restriction on the US providing equipment to the Philippine Armed Forces. 2) There are many US defense contractors who are very actively marketing their equipment to the Philippines. Having a US ADM lecture the Philippine President is not helping them. The Philippines has been suffering from the same financial problems other Asian countries have been going through. However, they are going to modernizes their Armed Forces and this does not put the US companies in good standings. The other thing that the PACOM staff fails to recognize is the Armed Forces of the Philippines is the way they are because we trained them to not care about maintenance. The maintenance, logistics, and purchase of equipment was done by JUSMAG while the bases were here. We told them to take care of the internal security operations, we would continue to provide the equipment and logistical support, and the US would take care of the external security. This was funded by the bases compensation money and as a result we neglected to develop or train the members of the Armed Forces of the Philippines in maintenance operations. Now the PACOM staff believes the AFP should be like they want them to be, instead of how we trained them to be. The way to move them to be a more responsible Armed Force in maintenance operations is engage them, not withdraw from them. Another plan that ADM Blair has that is causing great concern in all the Asian countries is his desire to go away from bilateral exercises to multilateral exercises. All the bilateral exercises are based in treaty obligations and the Asian countries are reluctant, for a number of reasons, to participate in multilateral exercises. ADM Blair is forcing the countries to combine exercises under a multilateral operation that is not sitting well with the Asian nations. They say their treaty does not call for multilateral exercises but bilateral exercises. The multilateral exercises will probably be beneficial, at least to the US, but it should be handled in treaty negotiations and not forced on the countries." --4-- Visit Soldiers For The Truth online at http://www.sftt.org to see what they and their current projects are all about. You can make a secured-site donation to them via credit card there, or their mailing address for checks is Soldiers For The Truth POBox 63840 Colorado Springs, CO 80962-3840 *COPYRIGHT NOTICE** In accordance with Title 17 U. S. C. Section 107, any copyrighted work in this message is distributed under fair use without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for nonprofit research and educational purposes only.[Ref. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml ] Want to be on our lists? Write at [EMAIL PROTECTED] for a menu of our lists! ****************************************************************************** ******************* A vote for Bush or Gore is a vote to continue Clinton policies! A vote for Buchanan is a vote to continue America! Therefore a vote for Gore or Bush is a wasted vote for America! Don't waste your vote! Vote for Patrick Buchanan! Today, candor compels us to admit that our vaunted two-party system is a snare and a delusion, a fraud upon the nation. Our two parties have become nothing but two wings of the same bird of prey... Patrick Buchanan <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. 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