MILITARY MOTIVATION – Página 2 – Conflictos Modernos

Modern Allied Urban Warfare against the Insurgency.

Introduction.

The American and European troops are prepared to fight against a regular military enemy provided with a masses army. Or even more modern, of the IIIrd generation, with more elaborated technologically means and better trained men, to support the lonelinesses and tensions of the awaited current battlefields. Definitively, his «way», his action space, is the direct and opened clash in presence of a great profusion of probable enemy targets. His instrument is the attrition, the destruction of the aims that the enemy presents and could be detected and acquired in all the depth of his march or assault deployment. The last two enemy echelons, nowadays increasingly remote or deep, are reached by the longe range support aviation or with the ballistic or autonomous missiles of medium range.

Resultado de imagen de Russian Ordnance fire in Middle East

Which is here the role of the man? To detect and confirm the enemy targets, to try to fix them, if it is about a patrol or a small combat unit and to call his «ordnance» in order that it devastates them. Only his elite units, always scanty and, therefore, exceptional and precious, are formed in the nearby infantry fight using only his organic means.

In Iraq and in Syria the islamist bases are always in the cities and populations more favorable for the activity of his different bands. And they are surrounded or permeated by military local and foreign forces. Already initiated the war, the North American intelligence intercepted a memorandum of 17 pages written by Abu Musad al-Zarqawi, former chief of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, to Osama bin Laden. In it he was expressing his worry for his survival: «In Iraq there are not mountains where we could shelter, nor forests in whose thickness we could hide. There are spies eyes everywhere. Our backs are exposed and our movements are realized in view of all». And this geographical military space is similar in Syria.

The Action of the military Forces against the current Insurgency.

In the books on the guerrilla warfare, it is discused of the tactics of the siege to the military fixed or semipermanent positions. The guerrillas, deprived in the first phases of an ideological armed revolution (communists, of fight against the foreign occupant) of enough military capacity, have their guidelines to attack the mentioned military positions.

Resultado de imagen de Russian Ordnance fire in Middle East RUSSIAN REACTIVE ARTILLERY IN SYRIA

In the zones not dominated by the guerrillas, but bordering the areas under his control, it is where develops the fight of those for removing the military enemy. Seeking to also control these areas and to realize in them his ideological indoctrination of the populations. The guerrilla bases only can grow in space or increase his number, when the military enemy moves back. Or when his positions (advanced positions, barracks) are submitted to a more or less nearby and ferreous siege. That must be continuous in his effects: that is to say, controlling the approximation and exit routes of those. To threaten, harass, check and to attack in its moment the surrounded forces. And the reinforcement and supply columns of that come to help. Using limited attacks, ambushes and traps and registered fire bags.

In the regions infected by the guerrillas, not necessarily occupied by them, the military positions are protective, extensive and few fortress. His garrison is high. The military set evokes there a blind, awkward and low mobile bunker. The military men realize from them special forces operations of reconaissance and against guerrilla positions and of march to the combat on targets of zone, at charge of strong columns. To occupy and then defend them, according to the capacities of the military forces. In this, the commitment and moral of them is decisive.

Resultado de imagen de Bombing in Middle East GOVERNMENT CARPET BOMBING IN SYRIA.

In the irregular war against the bands of the Islamic State, the armed forces and his auxiliary ones use in his operational strategy, some of Mao Ze Dong’s 10 military principles to direct the tactics of the Chinese guerrillas and semi regulars. Those were enunciated by Mao on December 25, 1947 in his speech before the Central Committee of the PCC. Let’s see, in not necessarily original order: 1) To attack first the isolated and spread enemies and later the stronger enemy forces. 2) To take first the small villages and, finally, the big populations. 3) Not to fight combats, if you are little prepared for, nor present combats in which the victory is not sure. 4) To concentrate always for each combat forces absolutely superior to those of the enemy. 5) To destroy the enemy while it moves and is more vulnerable. 6) To use the intervals between campaigns to rest and to regroup and to train the troops…but not allow that the enemy have a pause, not even a breather. 7) Take first the populations low defended. And, when the conditions are favorable to us, those with medium defenses. And wait to increase our advantages, to assault the better defended cities.

This operational strategy outlined by Mao, using simple, didactic and efective procedure, is of a low military level. As corresponds to an insurrection that had to grow, to develop and to spread. And that was employing rural uncultured forces and was arming itself principally with the enemy captured weapon. Mao said that he «had a call option in the weapon of the British arsenals».

IRAQI TANK WITH SHIA BANNER…

But this same orthodox operational strategy of the weak rebel against the strong military, is that are going to use the Allied forces, agglutinate and supported by the USA and Russia (in Syria), to attack an islamist insurgency, entrenched in his urban bases. And keeping the massive, repeated and overwhelming employment of the modern air and ground heavy fire on the rebels. So much in the battles and combats that appear, as for the wear and interdiction of the islamist positions, his facilities and movements.

Seeking as strategic aims to defeat the rebels and to occupy his bases or positions. That would be finally select for a policeman’s labor. Bases that are the only hard, definite and static aims, which the guerrillas have. With a qualitative difference with the diffuse, evasive, fleeting and slippery aims that the guerrillas offer in movement. Bases that are directly attacked, using the military forces (to those that is supposed better trained and equipped and, at least, equally motivated, that the rebels) and his enormous power of direct and indirect fire.

Resultado de imagen de german anti partisan operations RUSSIAN PARTISANS.

The military and social problem that exists here is that the Allied rebel Arabic groups, the Kurdish peshmergas and the Iraqi military men and his loyal militias, lack the military virtues of the National complete armies. And they have acquired not military habits on the preservation of his men in combat. Avoiding them at any price the mutilation and the death. In It have influenced decisively the religious and social origins of the different «allied» soldiers groups and his interests and divergent aims, at times even antagonistic, within these two civil wars. Social elements and parameters contaminated, spurious and, even strange, before the concept of the Umma or community of faithfuls of the same god, Allah.

IRAQI SHIA MECHANIZED ARTILLERY AGAINST ISIS

They follow for it this operational strategy of going very little by little, first occupying the weakest islamist positions that surround and defend the biggest. Devastating with the heavy fire from the distance the islamist disclosed positions, which are intermingled with with the houses and refuges of the civilians. Because the war they do, so much the Americans as the Russians and all his allies, in the urban fighting areas that are the islamist occupied populations of Iraq and Syria. And the prolongation of the war, the major time that they will use to obtain his military aims, preserving his men in the combat, the civilians will pay it. With his blood, with the destruction of his material means and buildings and with his massive displacements, seeking to save already only the life and without knowing who will receive and help them.

Let’s see a historical example of the action of counterinsurgents forces, in high unfavorable conditions for them. The German forces antipartisans in the USSR always tried not to be forced by the guerrillas to the passiveness of the garrison or the escort. In his manual of «War against the Bands» they were establishing that “the initiative must be always ours. Even if the commander only has a small force at his disposition, he must not show failures in his resolution. If it is possible, every action of the bands must be answered».

The Germans not only were prevented in his operations against guerrillas by a men’s habitual inferiority. But, also, for the heterogeneous quality that they were having. His antipartisans troops were consisting always of variable combination of forces of diverse origins and qualities: borders troops and German troops of security and policemen; security troops of his Allies in the front of the East, specially Italians and Rumanians; and a high-colored mixture of Allied «Russian» forces of security and of self-defense, sometimes, insafe. The hard core of the units were the Germans. The posts did not have homogeneous troops. In them, the men’s qualities were intermingled, in order that mop or novice was encouraging by the presence of the strong, and in him was removed the thoughts of weakness or desertion.

Resultado de imagen de german anti partisan operations LIGHT ARMORED VEHICLES GIVING SUPPORT TO AN ANTIPARTISAN OPERATION IN RUSSIA.

Before the inability to provide troops and security to his rearguard in the whole territory conquered to the USSR, at the west of an imaginary laid out between Leningrad and Stalingrado, the Germans had to select very well the points of garrison. These rarely had more than one platoon of counterguerrilla forces. In addition, it was thinking that with 4 or 5 men, the post could be defended for a time. While, others, in 1 or 2 patrols, were going out to chase the partisans in the nearby villages, to monitor the vital line of communications or to support other positions. When new units were created or if there was a temporary «surplus» of antipartisans forces, there were formed reconnaissance and combat patrols. Something like reconnaissance in force patrols, to locate and harass the guerrillas. When it was necessary to realize an offensive major action, against a guerrilla threat or the location of an important bands concentration, even there were temporarily brought troops from the forward line (of the operational zone), for the assault and destruction of that one, generally looking for his siege and annihilation.

It is true that the German results were limited. And also it is true that the principal operational aim of his antipartisans forces was fulfilled. The lines of supplies were kept reasonably opened from Germany, Poland and Romania up to the rears of the German forces and his allies in the East. And the flow of men, armaments, equipments, supplies and goods that received was constant. To allow the gigantic effort of war against the almost inexhaustible resources of the USSR. Millions Soviet prisoners were sent to the Reich and towards there there came back countless units and men of the Wehrmatch, in his continuous rotations.

The Ambushes against military Patrols and Units.

Introduction.

One of the principal tasks of the military men of the International Forces in Support of the Security, deployed in the Southwest of Asia, in the countries menaced by the islamist terrorism, is the motorized patrolling by the dusty ways that interlace the zone of influence of their barracks. These areas almost lacks Tarmac roads. When there exist they are not a great thing. The caps of asphalt have between one and two fingers of thickness; and the heats soften them and pot-holes and bubbles are easily formed. Usually, this is not an aggressive patrol. It is an exhibition, routine and of visual and logistic link patrolling, between their principal and secondary positions and with the nearby population centers.

When the military men think that there can be problems, they receive the support of the air observation. They are reconnaissance not manned planes (the UAV, in his initials in English), whose use spreads in these asymmetric conflicts. They can detect (in ideal conditions) at 5 thousand meters if a person is armed. The Americans use the Predator model (which is armed also) and the the Searcher (without attack capacity), being able both to operate up to 350 km from his base.

Resultado de imagen de Guerrillas sunníes JAISHALADL SUNNIS IRAQIS GUERRILLA POSING…

In some cases the rebels and bandits have dared to attack some of the military marching columns. Fighting from fixed and spread, hasty fortified positions, forming a fringe like a half moon or crescent, which was embracing the march way. Their problem was that the rebel weapon were of tense fire and so their fighting positions were in the forward slope. So, the armed light armoured vehicles with foreign infantry, could combat profitably with the guerrillas in their reinforced fox holes, small trenches and folds of the ground. In effect, their targets acquisition and machine-guns fire control systems, were allowing them the selection and the precision of their fires against the punctual targets of the irregular rebels. And were forcing them to move back and to hiding in the near hamlets.

There are more others cases in which the rebels use the explosive handcrafted artifices (in English, «improvised explosive devices») in the ways crossed by the military men in patrol. They usually place them setting off from the villages, as their improvised forward base, and taking advantage of the concealment and the protection of the nights. There is a high afraid to these artifices, already famous from the postwar period of Iraq. Because they are unexpected, unpredictable and hard to detect. Also, are enervating (the mental perspective of a possible, though improbable explosion, burdens much more than the real probability of the hurts in the attack) and they put the men in the passive defense and in the wait, knowing that active measurements to avoid them are not taken.

Resultado de imagen de improvised explosive devices

The explosive hollow charges that form the majority of these artifices, attack the “low guts” of the military foreign vehicles, their most vulnerable and less protected part. Down there, they cannot carry the reactive charges of repulsion or a multiple layers “shield” with ceramics, like the hulls of the main battle tanks. It is calculated that the Afghan Taliban and the members of the ISIL rebels can place and activate during a year, more 10 thousands of these handcrafted mines. Some correspondents call the artifices, the most effective weapon of the insurgency. Though they are, in their operational set, like an immense minefield; but that are not simultaneously placed and super widespread, improbable and without being covered by the enemy fire.

The Technologies and Tactics to eliminate the Danger of the Ambushes and Explosive Traps in the Tracks.

There are several, the passive or reactives and the actives, assuming that the initiative and the aggressiveness, against worse prepared and trained rebels, is with the military men. They all are «defensive». Since the Department of the War passed to be named long ago of the Defense, everything is “defense”.

Between the passive ones can be to increase the visual recognition of the tracks, observing protuberances and changes of color that should not correspond, in the soils of those. The «travel times» of the columns would diminish a lot. It is necessary to cross those more slow, looking at the soil and looking over the horizon, searching also for careless observers, not very distant. They do not use too much cable activators. These are expensive and weigh, and the rebels are in isolated zones and their logistics is weak and complicated.

The devices are activated generally by the pressure of the vehicle or by a transmitter of a given frequency and range; it can serve an opening doors device. With their frequency inhibitors, the military men try to offset the radio waves of the probable frequencies in the zone. Being the most expensive and complicated transmitters, that with more range, power and frequencies range of use. It is the game of the cat and the mouse. The problem arises when the guerrillas of an area receive a transmitter activator that uses an unforeseen frequency.

Also the columns might be harassed by registered mortar fire during the stops that they were doing to confirm or to eliminate some possible artifice, as some of them might be simulated.

Resultado de imagen GENERAL VALERIANO WEYLER.

Another way would be to move out of the tracks, cross-country running. For the wheel vehicles, this not always is possible. And, in addition, their wear of the pieces and the consumption of fuel increase very much, as also the march schedules. At the same time, it diminishes the comfort and increases the weariness of the travelers in missions of long range and routine patrolling.

That it is not said that it is impossible or very difficult to do. Since this was what the general Valeriano Weyler did, to frighten the Cuban mambises of the surroundings of the ways and tropical paths. On February 10, 1896, the general was taking charge of the government of Cuba and of the headquarters of the Spanish army deployed in her. The president of the Cabinet, Antonio Cánovas del Castillo, restorer of the Bourbon monarchy, was supporting the politics of keeping the colonial domination in Cuba, up to «sacrificing the last man and the last peseta». And named Weyler for the mentioned positions, in substitution of the general Arsenio Martínez Campos, the peacemaker of the war from 1968 to 1978. Which this time failed in bringing positions over with the armed rebels.

Imagen relacionada GENERAL ARSELIO MARTÍNEZ CAMPOS.

The Cuban guerrillas, in this new war, were taking advantage of the concealment of the “manigua” (tropical jungle) and his nearness to the ways, to harass with rifle fire the Spanish columns and to cause them some falls, without getting involved in a fight. Weyler prompt designed the tactic of rejection the enemy. A reconnaissance with combat capacity was going suitably forward to the Spanish columns in march. It was moving by the jungles (autochthonous bushes) that were surrounding the routes of march, without moving away too much from the paths. The “mambises” or Cuban armed rebels, forming variable and scanty harassment forces, were this way raised from their ambushing positions and drove away from the principal Spanish forces.

Particularities of the mountainous zones and their inhabitants.

The mountainous areas of the geopolitical region of the Southwest of Asia are specially dangerous for the foreign military units of any size in maneuver. The spurs of the heights are frequently crossed by wadis or seasonally dry riverbeds of brooks and springs. In them it can conceal a group of men. That will not become visible until his opportunity of harassment by the fire arises, from rapidly reinforced and camouflaged positions, of the military units. Or have an encounter skirmish with some military group that comes out to the hollow without precautions.

Also it is easy to approach some rocky outcrop, adorned or not by a small thorny bushes, without detecting any enemies patiently crouched down behind it. That will attack the carelessness soldiers, using their knives or cutlasses. Even, when the men return to the principal way, after establishing and keeping a defense position to secure the march of the principal column, giving them the back.

The tribes who live there have as characteristics in their identity and customs, the belligerence and the intertribal brawls. The most important and widespread are the etnia pashtun and the baluchis.

The surprise, which is an effective multiplier of the «specific combat capacity» of a given unit, is constantly and systematicly employ by the irregular fighters. This way, it happens that, «in this wide, ocher and arid valley, they have never attacked us», because the mountains that frame it are at 300 or 400 m. in the horizon. Well, today they are going to attack you with short bursts (2 to 6 shots) of machine gun with bipod, when you advance gullible and spread in that dull and known valley. Without bothering for establishing the march security with pickets, which protect the principal column. And offering multiple small targets to the tenacious, thoughened and poisonous enemy.

Military Tactics in the counterinsurgency fighting.

Finally, some specific tactics and techniques exist for the fight against irregular rebels, that can be used here. It looks to keep the initiative, the creativity and the law of the action in our side. It is a question of the independent employment of light infantry small units (at first, type plattoon or section) in reconnaissance and attacks tasks of the enemy bands.

For the defense of the own communications, they can be used aggressively against the bands that scourge or that hinder them (the artifices are like more spread and selective mines). For example, they can advance and conceal in a sector where the terrorists or local bandits bands are active. In the night, when those are usually placing in the tracks their explosive artifices, they will attack thoughtlessness them (with the maxim surprise and for the major effect). This demands of all the men of the patrols and units: formation, motivation, commitment with the mission, specific training, initiative, creativity, self-sufficiency, sobriety, patience, serenity, alert of the senses, silence and quietude.

An advantage that will multiply the combat capacity of the military patrols, resides in that these bands usually neglect their security in what they think that it is their rear. As soon as a combat has taken place with the rebels, the patrol must be extracted or return to his barracks. To rest, report or brief, return to train, to be equipped and to move to another sector, when it be appropriated, in another mission.

Epilogue.

Any ambush that turns out to be effective involves a failure, a deficiency, a carelessness in the security of the attacked. The routine of the actions; the softness of the men; the sufficiency and conceitedness of the direct and top commands; the scanty formation of the soldiers; the insufficient motivation of all the military men and his lack of commitment with the tasks or missions. They constitute serious departure faults to the creation and the maintenance of an effective march security. In the reconnaissance and of combat patrols and in the movements of the units and small units.

And, though the security does not appear frequently in the «lists» of the principles of the war, specially in the most short, the security has come to remain. And the failure to keep this principle will concern in major or minor degree and extension the efficiency of other «companions or partners principles». Since the whole of the principles forms a holistic, synergic, concurrent and convergent group, on the military actions. Defining all simultaneously the «what to do» in the war or in the armed conflict.

WARFARE IN THE INFORMATION AGE.

Introduction.

The appearance of the IT treatment of the information supposed a revolution in the capture, production and transmission of the existing or caught information. Whose possibilities and transcendency are still far from know, even in his scope and his limits. The information generated in a battlefield or an operations theatre of is enormous, ephemeral in diverse times, almost immeasurably and fluid. The latter quality is fundamental for the production of the intelligence. That is the information caught by the units and sensors of all kinds and that is digested or prepared by the specific organs (G2, S2 and agencies of intelligence), to create a sufficient, effective, opportune and constant intelligence. That is used by the «advanced users» or commands in the different levels of military action (tactical, operative and strategic).

Since it could not be otherwise, in view of the brief exposed scheme, the IT industry soon found an enormous area of activity and possibilities in the military field. And the high military commands, often in «ad hoc» prepared meetings and coctails, received from the manager directors and chairmen of the branch corporations, animated, brief and exciting presentations of the enormous performances that might give to their units of all the branches, the designed, elaborated and installed softwares and hardwares by these vanguard technical companies. The battlefield or the operations zone (the area, the enemy and I), known, conveyed and controlled in real time by my men!!!

The Support of the military Information Systems.

It is not the case that these new technologies allow to elaborate a complex and integrated weapon system. This already existed before the information age and the electronic existing advances allowed his creation. For example, the AEGIS defense system for ships against aircraft, warships, missiles and submarines was designed, created and installed for the first time in 1973. It is equiped by destroyers and even frigates (in a simpler model) of the USA and his allied nations. And this way they are called the «shields or defenders of the Fleet». In effect, every «naval group» centred and escorting an aircraft carrier and every «naval combined force of strategic projection», rely on several ships provided with the AEGIS system. This consists of a powerful radar of several megawatts of power, capable of catching and continuing up around 200 potential targets, placed at distances of up to 350 km to the installed system.

The caught information goes to a computer center that reports to a decision center. Which arranges the launches of missiles depending on the mission of the group or naval force and the estimated danger generated for him by the target. The system is installed in front of the armoured control center of the ship. That gives the final permission for the launch of the missiles. These are arranged in rows of vertical silos (habitually, are four with 4 missiles each one) placed in the front cover, in the part that was occupying the conventional artillery. The silos are re-fed from the interior of the ship with other missiles after the launches. The missiles are propeled by solid fuel, which allows that they should be smaller than the land launched. And the adjustment of the system is studied for the destruction of the enemy ballistic missiles.

Resultado de imagen de warfare in information age

The activities that the military men realize in action in front the enemy are numerous, varied and some of them are complex. And all of them demand a sufficient attention from the controls and men. Let us see some of the most significant. Regarding the movement in the ground: to advance, to stop and to move back; so much running as walking, crawling or incorporated, and doing it by jumps or in zig zag. Regarding placing and valueing the environment, hostile or not: to observe, to detect, to process, to decide, to transmit or not the results and to act. Regarding the form of fight (rejection or attack): to hide, to cover and to be protected, to change position, to define well evasive detected targets, to receive the orders of the immediate chief, to attack them with deliberate, rapid, etc. fire, (if it is a question of an infantry). Regarding the communication with his “group” (team, weapon, squad, section): to receive orders and information, to send information and orders, to spread information. And they carry out all this under the uncertainty, the lack of comfort, the tension, the loneliness, even of his companion or buddy, and the fear … The constant and repeated sometimes audio-visual information, that is communicated by the modern digital systems can relieve this physical and psychic load of the soldiers? So to achieve it, would really be of great help for them.

Resultado de imagen de warfare in information age ARE THEY LOOKING, DECIDING OR FIGHTING?

Resultado de imagen de warfare in information age IS IT USEFUL HERE?

To all that, it could join a flood of information, insignificant in this moment for his mission or his immediate action. This can generate an increase of the needs of the attention capacities of the military men. Through the more important senses, the sight and the ear. And to originate a diversion of his effective available attention (if there is), towards external not fundamental or neutral stimuli of the images and the conversations. The system is going to transmit them a clearer and detailed information of the targets, even defining some more ephemeral or veiled. But it will not give them information about the intentions and the mental conditions of the different located enemies and their group. Though the system is served with probabilities, previous experiences, alogarithms and reliable estimations…

A practical Application.

In the new model of fighting, the attacking force would be kept simultaneously dispersed, communicated and informed in real time and looking for and attacking the enemy. It would be the supposed advantages of the swarm and his concentric and simultaneous assault, which would count now with the knowledge of the ground and the enemy, thanks to the multiple sensors and systems and the real, caught and transmitted information (not intelligence) to the units of the force.

Are similar in capacity all the units of the force? Then we are demanding from them that each one acts as a «polyvalent» fraction of the unit, without specializing them. With what they will probably have some specific, quantitatively insufficient capacities. Are specialized the units of the force? Then they will have to rely on the simultaneous concurrence, in the defense and the attack, of several units. That should complement between all the necessary functions of this tasks «group». And if the enemy electromagnetic countermeasures work against the wireless communications and is established a communications «silence»? And if we now do not have the telephony circular network of the unit and do not possess double couriers for the transmission of “parts and orders” to the chief and from the chief?

And if the enemy deploys in the same way as us? So we would come to a general clash of weak individual forces against enemies weak forces individual. As the great units spread out for his fighting form. Clash that would be solved by multiple partial and isolate combats, using the attrition. They would be like the singular combats of champions and leaders, which happened in other times. And would gain those who were finally keeping a major number of valid units. It would be a clash won by pure material wear of means: men, military means and expensive and sophisticated IT material, almost without transcendent application.

THE NO “COMBAT AVAILABILITY” OF THE FORCES IN THE DEFENSE.

A variant exists of deficient or useless «combat availability» of a military force. And it happens when exists the «entrusted«, the «satisfaction» of the commands in the real state of alert of that one. Without assuming or to appreciate the failures in it.

The Development.

We know that the high limit of a characteristic or property is very difficult or impossible to reach. Some of them are the «total destruction» of the enemy and the absolute «public security» in a population or in a society. If you monitor the great public sites, airports, parks, they would attack a church or a mosque…There are always plenty of potential objectives and not enough security forces… But what is exigible and necessary is that the commands optimize the use of the received military resources, which always are insufficient, in the tasks at their charge. With it they will have made all the humanly possible for fulfilling them. Since the optimization of those is equivalent to his «good employment » and to everything what this involve.

The variant of the deficient «combative availability» that we treat, arises in the defense. And it has several possible origins and reasons. This way, we have the deficient organization and deployment of the security zone. That will allow in major or less measured its secret, patient and multiple penetration by enemy groups. That will not have to possess necessarily sappers’ training. Also the dominant positions near the more or less permanent and important position of the forces, must be garrisoned by advanced detachments of, at least, a squad.

The approximation routes to the forces, from certain distance, must be registered by the mortars, the artillery and/or the aircrafts of support. In some sections ambushes can be established and, in others, obstacles and barriers covered by the own fires. Other sectors can be provided with cameras and sensors. The thermal and acoustic airborne sensors can track and detect small enemy units in the different phases of their approximation march to the combat. The intelligence should facilitate trustworthy reports, with sufficient information and updated with the enemy intentions and plans in our zone and their development.

Resultado de imagen de soldados indisciplinados THEY ALSO COULD BE IRREGULARS.

In the irregular war, the enemy is in the habit of reconnoitre, at least initially and also in fluid conditions of fight, by observation. It is important to locate and eliminate these «reconnaissance positions», which will never be fixed, but alternative and ephemeral. The own patient observation is the way. And bearing in mind that, if the exigency is intense, every 30 minutes must be substituted the observer, Because he looks, but already he does not see. If additional means exist for it and as complement, it is necessary to use the patrolling against the armed or not native marauders, in the way of reconnaissances and attacks with limited aims.

Let’s remember that the correct security must prevent that our forces could be beaten by the fire of the enemy infantry weapons. Also, detecting the enemy, tactical surprises from him are avoided to those. And that the presence and/or the action of our forces in this zone, including the advanced detachments, have as a specific task, to win the sufficient time, in order that the forces that have advanced and deployed them, could reach the right «combat readiness» to reject the enemy. And for all this, the security is a irrenounceable part of our total “combat readiness”.

But, also the most experienced veteran or professional units can be «surprised» by the appearance in force of the unexpected enemy, in an assault against them. And it happens when they are entrusted or satisfy with a deficient security. That is another face, less evident and defined as such, of her not or insufficient own “combat availability«.

An Example from the Western Front in the Second World War.

On June 10 of 1,944, soon after the midnight, 2 º battalion of 29 ª division of infantry of U.S.A. was prepared to pass the night. The men had traveled approximately 25 Kms. during the last 20 hours. The executive official of the battalion, commander Maurice Clift, chose a zone formed by two meadows surrounded by hedgerows, in order that the troops were happening the night in the open. The men entered them and were left to fall down against the terraces of the hedges. So tired they were that nobody bothered to come untied the rucksacks and the personal equipment. The majority of they remained slept at once. Some few paid attention to the noise of a few engines coming closer, but they thought they were American vehicles.

They were actually German tanks and trucks belonging to 352 ª infantry division. Not known by none of two rivals, the Germans had been withdrawing and following the same route that the American battalion followed in its advance. When they stopped, the German explorers detected the North American movements in the meadows of encamped. The Germans advanced secretly and surrounded the meadows.

Suddenly, the Germans threw flares. Under the sinister light, almost as brilliant as the midday light, its assault cannons opened fire on the hedges against the Americans. Along one of the hedges, a platoon got up and was cut down by the German machine guns. Many Americans, scared and disoriented, were running across, looking for the meadows exit; the German infantries were knocking down them with its repetition fire. The shells of the German mortars were exploiting for all the zone of the meadows. The Americans were responding with a vague, jerky rifles fire, directed to the opposite hedges. Which could reach both the Germans and their own men in their strolling.

Resultado de imagen de soldados indisciplinados WASTER SOLDIERS.

«It was terrible”, a survivor was indicating general Cota. «We had crawled more than 90 ms. out of the field, when we listened from behind, a shouting of our men. I thought that the Germans were launching a bayonet charge against them».

The commander of 2º battalion, lieutenant colonel William Warfield (ironically, camp of war), had his command post in a farm close to the highway. Warfield tried to establish a defense, but it was in vain. The officials who threw out the house towards the field, were brought down rapidly. A German shouted in English towards the command group: «Give up, give up!». «Of giving up, certainly not!», roared Warfield. He tried to lead a small group towards the meadows where his men were, but turned out to be dead immediately.

The battle extended about 20 minutes. The battalion had 150 casualties, including 50 dead, slightly more than one third of its effective. Little before dawn, a gravely injured young lieutenant who was reporting to his division commander, general Charles Gerhardt, was falling down suddenly on knees and was striking the soil with his fists. While was sobbing and was sorry that all his men were died and that he had left them to fall down.

The general Gerhardt got angry. «Without safety, shouted exalted. «Simply the battalion came to the field and threw to fall asleep».

An example of the modern counterinsurgency warfare.

The Bristish Complex Bastion in the province of Helmand.

Helmand is one of 32 provinces of Afghanistan. It spreads over 58.583 km ² at the southwest of the country and has a population around the million and half of inhabitants, of the pashtun and baluchi ethnias. The capital is Laskar Gah. In his Washer’s district, at the northwest of the capital, the Camp Bastion is installed. It is the principal military British base in Afghanistan. It can house between 20 and 30 thousand persons in all its facilities, British and American principally, depending on the Branch to which they belong and their missions, equipments and supplies. It occupies a total extension of 52 Km2, approximately 10 km per 5 km. It was designed to be the center of the logistic operations of the ISAF in Helmand. In addition, it is the major military British camp constructed outside their country after the II World War. Built by the British Engineers since the beginning of 2006, the Complex is placed in a desert zone and away from the populations and is provided with long clear sights in all directions.

The Camp is divided structurally in different «sections». Bastion 1 and 2 were first erected. Bastion 2 also contains the Camp Barber (USA) and the Camp Viking (Danish). Bastion 0 was added about 2010 and it houses the facilities of the external contractors. The Bastion 3 is used for the specific training of counterinsurgency. The Complex also includes Camp Leatherneck (of the USMC) and Camp Shorabak, of the National Afghan Army. Camp Bastion’s airport, which possesses two landing strips, attends more than 600 aircraft flights every day, in operations of combat, logistic and medicals. In the attached heliport are deployed the Westland WAH-6 Apache of multiple attack and the Boeing CH-47 Chinook of mixed transport. In these moments the Complex can handle and attend almost all the military and civil aircraft in use. The Complex also houses a great military campaign hospital. And large areas of this great base are protected by a nine meters high concrete wall, which spreads over a perimeter of more of 40km, inserted with special vigilance towers, with soldiers and high technology instruments.

Resultado de imagen de soldados indisciplinados SOLDIERS DRINKING IN THE JAIL.

The British base has been attacked in diverse occasions during his years of existence. The most “media” occasion has been this that we treat. In the assault were dead two Marines (of the attached Camp Leatherneck). And other nine persons, eight military men and a civil contractor, were hurt. Six McDonnell Douglas AV-8B Harrier II airplanes of the Marines Corps were destroyed and other two were very damaged. As for the logistic facilities, were destroyed three stations of fuels supply and damaged six aviation hangars not structurally reinforced.

The atack tactic of the Taliban.

The Taliban usual procedure to assault a weak defended or without spirit enemy position is this: at dawn they bombard with the fixed rocket launchers heavy fire, then they approach to use mortars, finally, the assault is realized by several independent squads, that converging advance shooting AK and RPD or PK machine gun bursts and their RPG and RL hollow charge grenade-launchers. They only fire on verified targets or from above and from below them. When they try to keep the surprise, the initiative and the confusion, to lengthen the military reaction time and to obtain a very local and temporary superiority, they act without their meager heavy fire support.

E incluso avanzan arrastrándose lenta y pacientemente. Por ejemplo, para romper un perímetro defensivo y dirigirse y atacar los hangares y aparcamientos evidentes de grandes aeronaves.

A characteristic of the Taliban is that they do not get involved in the defense of their positions. Once obtained the harassment of the enemy and extended the hurt, the mutilation and the stupor on the military men, they will move back. They are not so silly to wait intrepid for the heavy, precise and devastate military fire. Nor to presume of courage, in front of enemies with weapons of superior range and characteristics and capable of turning a surface target into a destruction zone. Also, there are the time and its corollary, the opportunity. The Taliban handle very well the tactical and operational times. They are masters of the patience, the waiting, the repetition of simple and easy trainings. For the important attacks they manage to use scale models of the goal. And, to penetrate in a base and attack the heavy and evident war aircrafts, only need to represent part of the perimeter, the directional location of the target and its identification, as well as the rejection fighting positions of the irruption sector.

Its execution.

Enough hours before 12 pm of Thursday, the 13th of September of 2012, the Taliban forces began to approach from several directions to the air zone of the Complex. To keep a low tactical trace, they followed dragging techniques in their advance to and through the security zone of the area. And up to there got, without being detected, 45 to 50 insurgents that, in three convergent spears of advance attacked by midnight, supported by their squad organic weapons. Not to being detected up to the beginning of the assault, also helped them the scanty combative availability of the men. And the tedious and unproductive routine of the guards and patrols, which creates the passive defense of a great protective barrack. Around 15 Taliban from two of the groups, managed to get through Camp Bastion’s perimeter and to effectively attack the air zone. Finally the attacking group was wiped out (dead and injured men and prisoners).

It was a «significant» assault, the British Defense Department declared, as the insurgents should never have come so far away. It was, admitted the ISAF, a «good coordinated» attack. Organized in three assault groups, the Taliban managed to get through the defense perimeter of the base. «They were well equipped and trained, dressing USA Army uniforms and armed with automatic rifles, grenade-launchers and explosive jackets», continued the ISAF in his communique. This mission assured that during the assault, the international troops killed 14 insurgents and hurt other one, who is arrested.

The British correspondents in Afghanistan assured that Camp Bastion has an excellent visibility from all parts and is extremely strengthened. The defense correspondent of the Daily Telegraph, who has been for more than twelve times in Camp Bastion, wrote on Sunday, the 14th: «In spite of being in the center of the most dangerous province of Afghanistan, I always felt completely sure, undoubtedly, from an assault of the Taliban. And honestly I believed that there were more possibilities of dying knocked down by a military vehicle that murdered by insurgents». The Coalition’s forces, make clear the correspondents, ask themselves how the Taliban were capable of giving this surprise attack to a strengthened and isolated complex barrack. And a spokesman, Adam Wojack, said that the Friday assault «was a sign for the Coalition that it is necessary to give much attention to the popular, local and international state of mind about Afghanistan».

On Monday, the 10th of September Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesman insurgent, declared to Reuters that the Taliban were trying to use all their resources to kill the prince Henry (also called «Harry the Nude», his name of war), third in the succession line to the British throne. After the facts, another Taliban spokesman underlined that they attacked in «revenge» for the American amateur movie which offends Mohammed. And that they choose to commit an attack against Camp Bastion, because the prince Harry was there, acting as co-pilot gunner in the Joint Air Group.

And other one of an unsuccessful army …

On Sunday, the 18th of December, 2016, the franchise of the Islamic State in the Republic of Yemen realized an assault against the barracks of the so called National Security in al-Saulaba. That is placed 20 km at north of the coastal city of Aden, at the south of the country and that is now his nominal capital. One first showy characteristic of these suicidal assaults of the EI is that from August of this year, three assaults have been realized against the same barracks. Whose commands obstinatly mantain an ineffective and deficient «combative readiness» of the forces of the garrison, to keep their security.

In the last assault, the most lethal, died 50 soldiers of the Army of Yemen, loyalist to the president Abdo Rabu Mansur Hade. Hundreds of soldiers were still in the exterior of the barracks, waiting to receive the permission to enter and to receive their pays. One thousand soldiers had acceded already in the military facilities. But the access was limited to avoid agglomerations in the courts and facilities. Then, sunni terrorist slipped between the soldiers who were waiting out. And detonated his explosives jacket. Possibly liberating the so called “detonator of the dead man”.

The security is one of so called “principles of the war». That define «what to do» to obtain militarily our aims. And though it does not appear in all the existing lists of principles, specially in the shorter ones, the security is here to remain. And of its not observance, the efficiency and the power of other accepted principles will get reduced or disabled in their application. Since the principles constitute a global, harmonic and synergic set of the procedures of the to do well, for a military operational system.

EPILOG.

The combination of the usual defense and the mobile proactive defense exercises a synergic and convergent effect, of perfection and securement of the security zone. To detect and reject the tactical surprises of the enemy and to alert the own forces of his appearance from behind horizon. And to blur him the tracing of our defense zone. Thanks to the combat and observation advanced positions and the actions from them and of the patrols and advanced detachments. That would allow the enemy to glimpse and estimate where there would be the «defense positions» in the rejection zone and where the heavy fires of the defense would preferably go, in front of the forward limit of the mentioned zone.

THE WAR AGAINST THE ISLAMIC TERRORISTS. Second Part.

(CONTINUATION)

Operational Characteristics of the Attacks with Elite Ground Forces.

Units and small units that attack with limited aims (a deep incursion, the temporal capture of a critical position, an ambush) constitute a military closed «system». This condition imposes specific characteristics on the “interfaces of action” with the enemy, which are sometimes different to those of great units, especially in the theme of available means and the time of action.

Attacks with limited aims have been operationally used along large fronts. Where the enemy’s defense lacked depth and enough reserves and was looking to minimize own wear and make use of the multiplier effect of the set’s efforts. This occurred with notable success when the forces of the 9^th German infantry Army of General Model sought to reform and consolidate its fronts in the Sychevka’s southwest zone between January and April of 1942.

The definitive characteristic of his use, adapted in these tasks, is that is used with criterion unity, by a kept and «concentric» in the result of his impulses “operational gravity center”. So that the limited efforts do not vanish in reconnaissance in force actions, in not suitable or out of opportunity sectors. It is to say, usiing unduly.

The field of action is the secret for applying freedom of action. By extending or decreasing the field of action, or by changing the field of action on the enemy, one can keep or recover the necessary freedom of action to act favorably and not simply reacting to the enemy.

«Field of action» is any «spatial-temporary-circumstantial» situation that allows for the suitable employment of an Army’s means and capacities in accordance or as part of that army’s intention. The field of action is formed by one or several «interfaces of action«, which are the very small sectors where direct contact occurs between the small units of action of each rival. Examples are when a deployed platoon attacks an enemy section, when a tank attacks infantry heavy weapons, when a section attacks by firing on an enemy’s strong position, when an engineering section opens a path in a minefield, etc.

The task is to find an optimal way in which, through successive «periods of action» applied in «fields or interfaces of action», one can gain the relative freedom of action to act and to carry out «quantum» or elementary units of the general intention. In addition, a general action can be divided into numerous partial actions to achieve in stages, momentary or minor «periods of action»; acting this way in the same «field», divided in minor interfaces of action.

Interaction in stages and situations suitable to advance one’s military means guided by the superior intention or orders is the general mechanism for applying, recovering and maintaining freedom of action in one’s favor.

A characteristic of the freedom of action is that is interactive with the enemy in the «interface of action» and is played out in fields of action that chosen by or imposed on an army. Passiveness means that freedom of action is not taken advantage of through lack of initiative. Thus, freedom of action can also have a result opposite to its intention and this can happen regardless of the type of fight engaged in, whether it is offensive or defensive.

The units had to gain combat superiority over the enemy, since obtaining a local and temporary supremacy would allow them to achieve their aims.

Essential to the mission’s conception are intelligence and simplicity. Essential to its preparation are security and training. The characteristics of the mission in action are surprise, tempo and the commitment of all the mission participants.

Simplicity allows the force to concentrate on a few related aims, using a limited number of men and means in the military closed system. If new tactics or different technologies are used, both the simplicity of the mission’s conception and the surprise of its execution will be enhanced.

On September 12, 1943, the captain of the S. S. Otto Skorzeny carried out the rescue of the Duce from his prison in the high mountain hotel Great Sasso located in the Apennines. Gliders were used to assault the position, fighting against the difficult cold draughts (these produced a delay in the arrival, as they landed at midday) and scarce sites for landing. That such a difficult assault would be attempted, higly surprised the on duty «carabinieri». The attackers took advantage of this by gaining access to the principal building while. At the same time, an acquaintance general of the «carabinieri» friendly landed with Skorzeny. Combat supremacy was rapidly achieved.

Intelligence supposes complete, up-to-date and timely knowledge of the circumstances and characteristics of the mission. Here, with so limited employing means, intelligence is facilitated by different agencies and units that intervene with the mission, even those at the level of the state. Specially the CIA, the National Security Agency or NSA, the Central Security Service or CSS, that links with the NSA, and the FBI.

Security refers principally to the stages of planning, preparation, training and, if appropriate, stage of transport or insertion. It has active and passive aspects. Giving off misleading information and concealing the force’s real intentions up until the stage of action on the objective. Each person must only know what is necessary for his actuation.

Training must be generic for actions and tactics and specific for those actions required for the mission. Independently of this, training is necessary to achieve coordinated actions among units taking part simultaneously in some part of the mission. A general rehearsal of the mission is also necessary, including its planning duration and margins for mistakes. It is also good to include some variant that represents a mistake, an unforeseen event or a loss of combat or movement capacity. And that the men train in correcting them or, at least, in neutralizing them with his effort. For example, a part of the helicopters is knocked down or lands at major distance of the foreseen in the theoretical disembarkation zone.

The final «training area» must be similar in general characteristics to the «target area». And it must be placed at safe of detections and filtrations of information (security), which onlookers and interested persons can catch. The independent variable of «time» introduces sometimes unexpected and not always welcome effects. For example, a vehicle presents problems after a number of hours of hard use, that was not foreseen in tests of «at scale» time.

Surprise supposes attacking an enemy (even if arranged in prepared defense) at a point or flank that is neglected by him at the moment, giving the attacker a favorable «interface of action» on him. It must suppose a “tactical innovation”. Though it could also contain technical differential or new elements. Examples of such “innovations” in the past are hollow load bullets or charges and flame-throwers.

The surprise is the sufficient and necessary multiplier of the combat capacity of the «small incursion force». That will allow him to compensate the scanty military resources that it has on the area. To it joins his inconsiderate and carefully applied with rapidity employment. To provoke an overwhelming effect on the enemy, achieving the temporary local superiority. As being an «isolated military system», the incursion force of will receive neither reinforcements, nor supplies. For its part, the time is not neutral, here is an enemy: because there is not more operation time. From his depletion, the unit will confront the pursuit and his annihilation…

Speed consists in firmnessly acting, ahead of the enemy, in the successive elementary «cycles of action» that define a performance or process. It also presupposes acting with opportunities and with pace (adapted speed, relative to the enemy). Remember that an action cycle includes a phase of observation, a phase of determining the situation, the decision phase and the accomplishment phase. If one’s speed is greater than that of the enemy, his actions will be in response to situations that have already just passed.

Speed also implies rapidly reaching a situation of active supremacy in combat capacity. The enemy’s reaction speed is initially very slow as he is in a stupor, trying to verify what is happening. This means his phase of determining the situation will be lengthened. Deceptive action in these moments will lengthen the time that passes and fog the determination of the situation. Ways of doing this include utilizing some of the enemy’s uniforms, equipment or language by certain parts or subunits involved in the action. Once supremacy over the enemy is attained, it must always be kept. As scanty resources make its recovery very difficult. Once supremacy in combat capacity is reached, the probability of a mission’s success increases exponentially and the vulnerabilities of one’s forces are dramatically diminished.

The commitment of men and officers and their selection qualities, lend moral and physical courage to the actions they undertake. This is necessary to overcome uncertainty, stress, mistakes, diversions, enemy actions, and to take advantage of the always fleeting opportunities. Commitment supposes full knowledge of the mission and the full, voluntary and enthusiastic support of all participants.

Execution is carried out by establishing at the level of the regiment, battalion or company a center of gravity for the common effort, which harmonizes and consolidates the «missions» of its subunits.

THE END.

THE NATO’S RAPID REACTION FORCES.

George Bush’s strategic national doctrine established after the suicidal assaults of al-Qaeda in New York at 11 of September of 2001, that the «asymmetrical wars or of IVth generation» (irregulars and with low level of military means used) with the participation of the USA, would be supported overseas and without formal declaration of war. And that they were also necessary, to remove from the American territories and those of his allies, the threats of the “foreign fundamentalist terrorism” of any origin, religion or ideology. It justified the ill-fated post war occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan. But, with a blowing up fiscal and exterior deficits and with a democratic renewed Administration, it is necessary for the USA to save in military resources.

The Strategic National Doctrine of the Americans democrats.

The new political philosophy is to dedicate now those recovered resources «to build a nation here, at home». This way, the USA lowered qualitatively the bar of the exterior terror, putting during the first mandate of president Obama, at al-Qaeda as almost the only one immediate “not national violent enemy”. This salafist internationalist terrorist «network», without own territory, with her operational chiefs known, fled and not wished as guests in any normal country, is a more attainable, adaptable and manageable target for his «rapid punctual incursion» forces and means. This new “strategic national doctrine” justifies the increase of the use of the Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (not driven planes for exploration and recognition and of bombardment), spy satellites, own or local agents placed in the hostile territory, assaults by elite operational units and by small expeditionary forces and of Marine’s amphibious assault, these transported in «command and transport ships» of strategic projection with his naval escort. The deployments of dozens of thousands of military men and with his luggage and equipment for several years in an operations theater, are rejected indefinitely by the new «doctrine» of the «diminishing defense».

This doctrine spreads and concerns, through the NATO, the strategic aims of his allies and the assigned and specific means to reach them. The training with IT programs is an example of the new practices in military training. Instead of moving soldiers by the Boot Camps or the vehicles in the maneuvers polygons of the mechanized or motorized units, the NATO is developing new “online artifices” to instruct their military personnel. And, though it could not be the norm of formation or training, the project is illustrative that the Alliance adapts to the new times of «financial global restrictions» for the Armies. In this scene of diminishing resources and threats still slightly valued or made concrete, the Defense Secretaries of the NATO, assembled at the end of February, 2013 in Brussels, decided to adopt some voluntary remedies. «It is a question of seeing if our nations resign their responsibilities because of the budgetary restrictions or if we demonstrate creativity and innovation and develop the necessary aptitudes to confront the threats in joint form», said Leon Panetta, American Secretary of Defense.

An Allied highly mobile «task force» for urgent missions.

The NATO will create shortly time a «sui generis» rapid reaction force (30 years ago were calling her of «rapid deployment»), that will form 13.000 cavalry and mechanized infantry soldiers, reinforced with artillery and engineers. It will be destined to be deployed in zones of conflict that are sensitive for their «global interests». Forget the Congo, Yemen, Somalia or Syria, which are not or are insufficiently interesting. This «great unit» will be formed by the Armies of the allied countries, who will incorporate into her their brigade or regiment type forces in a rotating form and for a minimal period of six months in duty tours. The experts of the Organization will design a “training plan” for them, which will last until 2020, until all the suitable units for these tasks have taken part in it.

«My call to the Allied Governments is that they stop the expenditure cuts (in Defense), that use better their resources (that already assigned) and, once the economy recovers, they begin to invest (in Defense) again. If the cuts continue, they will have a negative impact in our aptitude to provide defense and protection to our population», warned the secretary general of the NATO, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, at the beginning of the mentioned meeting. The most drastic reduction in topics of Defense corresponds to Greece, which in 2011 diminished a 25 % his military expense, after having reduced it in 20 % in 2010. So, in 2012 his Defense’s budget was only 60 % of that of 2009. There are other four minor countries, which also have done substantial cuts in military systems, men and re equipments for the Defense: Slovenia, Bulgaria, Czech Republic and Slovakia. Below them, though also with reductions of two digits percent, is Spain, which military expense fell 11 % in 2011, after two years of very significant reductions. In general, almost all the countries save in their Armies, included the United States, which realizes the major military expense attributed in the world (4,8% of his GDP). The Chinese items, proceeding from a collectivized and directed centralized economy, are not homogeneous or comparable to ours, because many usable chapters by the Chinese Popular Liberation Army can be included in books as expenses or investments of other Chinese departments and services. But the total falls of the resources at the level of the Alliance get damped enough, thanks to exceptions as the German, who has increased the expenses in Defense in the years of this economic world crisis.

His uses, operational limitations and abuses.

The operative employment of the rapid reaction multinational forces will be as airborne or of disembarkation «detachments», supported by the tactical aviation and the national allied warships. Their action would be over «limited goals» and placed in not extensive areas and looking for an operative projection, not only tactical. Her employment would have to be in a relatively short time, due to the limitations in her combat and logistics capacities. A joint utilization of this “division (-) of combined arms” would allow to attack only one or two hostile brigades, which were isolated from their operational rears and / or deployed in areas of difficult access («bad ongoing» ground) by land. Reciprocally, his defense capacity and «resistance» are limited. Nothing of trying to appease (they also call it «to «stabilize») something similar to a «Gaza strip». That is the wasp’s nest of an network of irregular «units» of motivated and trained terrorists. Deployed in reinforced defense positions echeloned in depth. And using an unfavorable ground (a urbanized one) for the armored and / or motorized enemies means. That would be the principal resources and capacities of combat and of movement of this » special division light » (better to use the And using an unfavorable area for the armored means (not necessarily they have to be the heaviest cars of the Allies) and / or become mobile enemies. That would be the principal resources and combat and of movement capacities this light «special division» (is better to use the English meaning, in order that he does not resemble the light infantry).

The headquarters of these multinational forces, destined to act in «located conflicts», that concern the security or the interests of the Allies, will be probably in Belgium. Some great American units, which subunits might take part in his composition by turns, are the 24ª motorized division and the Marine¡s divisions. The small elite units of the Rangers, the SEAL or the battalions and the engineers’ companies, would remain detached in tactical subordination to the brigades or regiments of the Rapid Force, realizing their specific tasks in the missions and complementing those of them. The forces of rapid reaction will be able to protect an oil installation or a port and even to help to suppress riots. But they will not be able to face an insurrection or a generalized assault against a friend country. Their detachments will be always highly vulnerable to the encircle and the harassment. Their operational possibilities only might increase qualitatively if their missions are coordinated with those of a ground army which operates in the tactical or operational surroundings.

Politically, the offensive action of the rapid reaction division forces, on having lacked rooting in the peoples of his operations zones and of continuity his military intervention, will turn out to look more brutal and arbitrary. And it will be more alike a police action than a military orthodox operation. It is sure, in addition, that the neutral or hostile governments to the West in the geostrategic regions where she acts, will reject the right that the NATO has assumed, to act as gendarmes of his “partial interests” in a zones so distant from their national territories. This way, from a hypothetical military, problematic and excessively punctual and short action, the NATO appears directly as guardians of his own «new order», in an epoch of international soft and lightened action ways. Where to use the «big stick», as convincing argument for the decision and when the politics and the diplomacy have failed in obtaining a reasonable solution, it is very frowned upon by all the delicate stomaches.