U.S. Marine Corps Cpl. Andrew McAllister, with Combined Anti-Armor Team 2, patrols in Nawa district, Helmand province, Afghanistan, Oct. 28, 2009. Marines with 1st Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment are deployed with Regimental Combat Team 7 to conduct counterinsurgency operations with Afghan National Security Forces in southern Afghanistan. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Cpl. James Purschwitz/Released)

From a story in Marine Times on the new rules of engagement in Afghanistan:

Army, Marine and Afghan National Army troops experienced the effect of McChrystal’s tighter rules directly Sept. 8, when their small outpost in Ganjgal, in Kunar province near the Pakistan border, was blindsided by insurgents.

Three Marines and a corpsman died that day, and a soldier, 41-year-old Sgt. 1st Class Kenneth Westbrook, who was shot through the mouth and neck, died Oct. 7 at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington. An embedded reporter with McClatchy News Service, Jonathan Landay, reported that “U.S. commanders, citing new rules to avoid civilian casualties, rejected repeated calls to unleash artillery rounds at attackers dug into the slopes and tree lines — despite being told repeatedly that they weren’t near the village.”

This sort of thing, like when the Air Force announced it might ‘buzz’ enemy forces instead of bombing them, is ridiculous. Back in June, when new policies regarding fighting near Afghan civilians was announced, I wrote:

Isn’t this the equivalent of deciding that police will not chase criminals so that bystanders won’t get hurt, then publicizing the rule?

It’s bad enough that US troops under enemy fire won’t always get the support they need because of a new policy. But to announce that policy simply invites the enemy to take advantage of it.

Put simply, us being nice to locals won’t work while the bad guys are running around free being mean. First you have to beat down the insurgents as best you can. Then you have to secure the area. Then you make friendly.

No, I’m not advocating that we simply blow up any and all who are even suspected of being insurgents. But we should be prepared to fight to the utmost of our ability. If not, we should get out.

The cynic in Murdoc wonders if we’re going to see the ROE continuing to become more restrictive until we reach a point where even ardent supporters of the war throw up their hands and say “since the rules won’t let us win we should just quit.” It’s already happening in a lot of places.

And I wonder how much of that is intentional.

GOP sweep: Big governor victories in Virginia, NJ

Independents who swept Barack Obama to a historic 2008 victory broke big for Republicans on Tuesday as the GOP wrested political control from Democrats in Virginia and New Jersey, a troubling sign for the president and his party heading into an important midterm election year.

Conservative Republican Bob McDonnell’s victory in the Virginia governor’s race over Democrat R. Creigh Deeds and moderate Republican Chris Christie’s ouster of unpopular New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine was a double-barreled triumph for a party looking to rebuild after being booted from power in national elections in 2006 and 2008.

That’s great, kid. Don’t get cocky.

Cross-border insurgents flood Afghanistan

The expansion of Islamic extremist groups across the Afghanistan-Pakistan region is “the worst I’ve seen it,” with Afghan insurgents receiving help from Iranian operatives and “very possibly” freelancing Pakistani intelligence agents, as well as a small but growing number of “deadly” foreign fighters, said Maj. Gen. Mike Flynn, director of intelligence for Gen. Stanley McChrystal’s headquarters here.

“I wouldn’t say it’s out of control right now, but this is a California wildfire and we’re having to bring in firemen from New York,” said Flynn, who has been tracking Islamic extremism for at least eight years in postings as director of intelligence for Joint Task Force 180 (in Afghanistan), Joint Special Operations Command, Central Command and the Joint Staff.

The U.S. intelligence community estimates that 19,000 to 27,000 insurgents are operating in Afghanistan, a roughly tenfold increase from 2004’s estimate of 1,700 to 3,200

Flynn adds

“When it started to really show again, I believe, was probably somewhere between 2006 and 2007. And we just flat missed the signs. … [W]e were in the middle of that period of time when we were losing in Iraq, and I just think people weren’t paying attention enough, and certainly not listening to the leadership out here at that time.”

Obviously, some of the “people” who were “not listening” well enough were in the Bush administration, which supports the idea that the campaign in Iraq hurt the campaign in Afghanistan. But remember that Nancy Pelosi said, in mid-2005, the the war in Afghanistan was over.

Also, the deals Pakistan made with Taliban and associated groups in 2005-2006 must have had a huge impact. With relatively safe havens to retreat to, not only did the militants and terrorists get a chance to survive that they might not have had in Afghanistan, they got better opportunities to recruit more members. The serious problems that Pakistan’s inability/unwillingness to deal with the tribal areas near the Afghanistan border rarely get much coverage. In my humble opinion, those deals have cost us a lot.

Blackfive povides History Lesson – The Iraq Surge

Not-So-Secure Border Initiative

The $3.7 billion spent so far has bought a patchwork of sub-par technology that often can’t tell a terrorist from a tumbleweed.

Cameras and radars mounted on tall poles can be so shaken by the wind and blinded by the rain that they don’t see clearly. The radars report intruders where there are none. The cameras have trouble seeing and then transmitting images back to human monitors.

When it was begun in 2006, the Secure Border Initiative – called SBInet – was supposed to be completed early this year. But by the time that due date rolled around, the estimated date of completion had slid out to 2016.

This whole issue has always been a joke. I’ve certainly never been convinced than anyone calling the shots is at all serious about actually securing the border.

The new Block 1 SBInet needs a 70% identification rate to be deemed acceptable. That means that three in ten illegal crossers can get through unseen and it’s good enough.

That’s not the definition of “good enough” that I’m familiar with.

It’s clear that no one currently in power is going to do anything meaningful about this. That means different people need to be in power.

Obama Wins Nobel Prize in Part for Confronting ‘Great Climatic Challenges’

Look. We all know that the Nobel Peace Prize has as much to do with the real world as the Oscars have to do with film making. At least the Oscars are awarded for things that have already been done, rather than things that someone has said they’re going to do in the future but haven’t really moved on yet.

Really, I guess I don’t see how this does anything but strengthen the comparisons of Barrack Obama to Jimmy Carter.

Kids from the Ron Clark Academy sing a song promoting health care reform on CNN:

Should Murdoc be troubled by this or just embarrassed?

UPDATE: IRS Made Errors in Stimulus Payments to 400,000 Taxpayers

Via Instapundit who writes BUT DON’T WORRY, THEY’LL HANDLE HEALTH CARE JUST FINE

House, Senate negotiators fund second F-35 engine

U.S. House and Senate negotiators defied a White House veto threat and agreed on Tuesday to include $560 million in the fiscal 2010 defense authorization bill for an alternate F-35 engine, several sources familiar with the talks told Reuters.

President Barack Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates have repeatedly said they oppose funding for the second F-35 engine, which is being built by General Electric Co and Britain’s Rolls-Royce Group Plc given mounting pressures on the U.S. defense budget.

But administration officials issued more cautious statements on Tuesday, which several sources said signaled that the White House was easing off its veto threat.

Murdoc has long been in favor of the alternative engine in principle and is glad to see that, once again, the F136 appears to have survived.

Note: You probably saw the Blogad advertisements for the GE/RR F136 program running on this site recently. Those were purchased normally as standard Blogads, and Murdoc Online has received no compensation for writing this post or for supporting the F136 program. If, in the future, Murdoc receives an F136-powered F-35 Lightning II Joint Strike Fighter in appreciation for his efforts, he will be sure to disclose it in order to remain compliant with new FTC standards.

You know you’re scraping bottom

White House Regroups on Guantanamo

Even before the inauguration, President Obama’s top advisers settled on a course of action they were counseled against: announcing that they would close the facility within one year. Today, officials are acknowledging that they will be hard-pressed to meet that goal.

The White House has faltered in part because of the legal, political and diplomatic complexities involved in determining what to do with more than 200 terrorism suspects at the prison.

Duh. All these idiots in the press and running for office and voting for hope and change went on and on and on about this. Close it down. How hard can it be?

Well, it ain’t easy.

I like this part:

[White House Counsel Gregory B.] Craig said Thursday that some of his early assumptions were based on miscalculations, in part because Bush administration officials and senior Republicans in Congress had spoken publicly about closing the facility. “I thought there was, in fact, and I may have been wrong, a broad consensus about the importance to our national security objectives to close Guantanamo and how keeping Guantanamo open actually did damage to our national security objectives,” he said.

Ah. So it’s Bush’s fault that this rube didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.

Speaking of rubes, I wonder how all the Obama voters are feeling about this.