The enemy gets a vote
Trump, his minions, and propagandists know nothing about military strategy and their idiocy could cost us immeasurably.
Even cadets know better than Trump
When I was a young first year cadet at West Point I had to take Military Science. It’s standard instruction for future military officers even those in Reserve Officer Training Corps. You learn things about the nature of the Army, its mission, the different branches, military customs, and more. Eventually, you turn to tactics and strategy as you study the lessons of the past and current approaches.
I would use those lessons in my long Army career.
In 1999, when I was a fresh faced Major, I was assigned to the Army’s 3rd Army Headquarters at Fort McPherson in Atlanta. The unit is the Army headquarters for all of our forces in the Central Command area of control.
I was an Operations Officer and was assigned as the first director of the new “Future Operations” shop. We had discovered at that point that there was a gap between Current Operations, the next 24 hours of things, and Plans, which covered the next operation outwards of 96 hours or more.
Simply, everything we did today would shape the next 36 to 72 hours and there was a gap in planning for that.
Key to that period in my life of work was the simple idea that the enemy gets a vote. Everything we do led to something else. It’s really just a twist on the laws of physics. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.
In military tactics that means that for every action I took, say an attack on a city; a deep strike by my bombers; or moving forces into position for an invasion; the enemy would react to that in some way. If I fly into their territory once, they will move anti-aircraft batteries to cover that gap. They would reinforce the city I was moving to take.
They would counter-attack.
My job was to look at our current operations, the plans we were working towards, and examine all of the intelligence of our enemies movements, and then recommend to the Commander what we should expect and do in the next 36-72 hours to work towards our objectives and defeat the enemies counter moves.
Sounds easy, right?
Friends…it was not.
Iran gets a vote
I tell this story because we just attacked Iran’s nuclear sites with U.S. stealth bombers and missiles. The very same evening Donald Trump declared a triumphant victory and he was echoed the next morning by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, who in an embarrassing act of public fellatio praised Trump for boldly ending Iran’s nuclear ambitions.
Little noticed was a bit of hedge from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Caine, who noted that the full Battle Damage Assessment (BDA) was not completed and there was not a sure way to say their nuclear programs were destroyed. On top of that, neither discussed what counter attacks we might expect, although we have been told U.S. forces and diplomatic missions in the region are being warned to expect retaliation.
Iran is being pummeled by Israel and has lost a lot of its missiles and ability to strike the region, but, they maintain a Navy with submarines that is a power in the Persian Gulf . They could easily close the Straits of Hormuz where 30% of the world’s oil passes through daily. Their parliament recommended this action to the Ayatollah.
We now hear the President of Iran is flying to Russia to coordinate next steps and Putin sidekick Medvedev had this to say yesterday,
"The enrichment of nuclear material — and, now we can say it outright, the future production of nuclear weapons — will continue," Dmitry Medvedev, now the deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia, said in a Sunday X post.
"A number of countries are ready to directly supply Iran with their own nuclear warheads," Medvedev said.
Iran has been helping Russia in their invasion of Ukraine with drones and other weapons. They are allies and building nuclear weapons for Iran in Russia leaves them untouchable. It’s almost impeccable logic now for Iran to quickly acquire a nuclear capability.
No one is attacking North Korea, are they?
On top of that, while weakened, Iran still has allies and subordinate terror groups across the region and even rumored to be in the United States, although this is completely unconfirmed publicly. Those surrogates can do a lot of damage to U.S. citizens and facilities across the Middle East, or even here.
So, while the Trump Administration is all but dancing and expecting us to “rally around the flag,” instead we see deepening fear of a larger war and what comes next. That fear and concern is reasonable.
While snap polls are not entirely trustworthy, this one this morning from YouGov is well…yikes.
Trump Administration officials from J.D. Vance, to Rubio, and Hegseth took great pains yesterday to make it clear that our goal was a surgical strike to end Iran’s nuclear program and not a wider war or ‘regime change.’
Then Donald Trump did his thing within hours.
Yes…you are reading that right. MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN!
Now we wait
We wait for Iran’s ‘vote.’ I am thinking of the thousands of military families waiting in fear to see what happens next. I have friends in the region right now and know they are concerned about what could happen in the coming days, weeks, and months.
According to Reuters this morning it could come very soon.
The United States believes Iran could carry out retaliatory attacks targeting American forces in the Middle East soon, although the U.S. is still seeking a diplomatic resolution that would see Tehran forgo any attack, two U.S. officials said on Monday.
One of the officials, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity to discuss the assessment, said Iran's retaliatory attack could happen within the next day or two.
Perhaps it will be that soon. But, Iran has proud roots of over 2,500 years, a long memory, and more patience than the fickle Americans. I know from my own time in Iraq that the mindset of the regions natives are one that is willing to play a long game. They will take their time.
I hope it will be something symbolic that doesn’t escalate things similar to when Trump ordered the killing of Revolutionary Guards Commander Sulemani and they struck one of our bases with several missiles. Several dozen U.S. service members were wounded with Traumatic Brain Injuries but there were no deaths.
For our sake, I hope that’s the end of it. But, I am a realist and know that Trump does not think strategically and believe this is only the first move in what will be a very dangerous path for our nation. He has opened a Pandora’s Box that his rotted brain simply can’t comprehend.
While I have had MAGA blowing up my DM’s and mentions across social media insisting that Donald Trump hasn’t declared war on Iran, it’s obvious to the people that caught the bombs that he has.
Bombs dropping on your country tend to make people think they are at war.
I hope we aren’t taken down with him.
Thank you for this insightful information. Also, just wanted to say, I LOVED “in an embarrassing act of public fellatio”….. brilliantly worded!
It has seemed since late January that there could be NO better time to attack America (in any manner) than now, and for too many reasons to list here.
But it hasn't happened. Who has that power? I'd guess, only Putin. And I'd guess (or did until a few days ago) that he basically said, "Just wait. Even if America doesn't tear itself apart, attacking them will grow easier over time."