As the United States finds itself once again providing special operations and fire support to a host nation fighting an enemy bent on its destruction, the same psychological pressures and realities faced by Reeder are being confronted by both coalition personnel as well as all manner of people either captured or occupied by the Islamic State. New craters. Old volcanos. And as we continue to pour support into this fight, there comes with it the same human costs that responsible decision makers and leaders would do well to understand.
#Reviewing The Lost Mandate of Heaven: The American Betrayal of Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam
The Lost Mandate of Heaven: The American Betrayal of Ngo Dinh Diem, President of Vietnam is a must read for policy-makers, and is extremely worthwhile for the military and other governmental agencies. It contains lessons that may assist in stopping a conflict before it starts, or to help manage it once conflict has begun.
#Reviewing Success and Failure in Limited War
Strategic performance is strongly affected by the state’s information management capabilities. Top policymakers must have the ability to understand the environment in which they are acting (outside information) and how their national security organizations are behaving in that strategic environment (inside information). Strategic risk assessment is based on an understanding of the opponent’s strengths and weaknesses, the challenges and opportunities present in the international environment, and the capability of the state to act in a purposeful way along multiple lines. Without sound outside and inside information, risk assessments will suffer, as will the quality of strategy.
#Reviewing Success and Failure in Limited War
In the Information Institution Approach, Bakich gives critical importance to whether or not key decision makers have access to multi-sourced information and whether the information institutions themselves have the ability to communicate laterally. When information is multi-sourced and there is good coordination across the diplomatic and military lines of effort, Bakich predicts success. When information is stove piped and there is poor coordination, he predicts failure. Where the systems are moderately truncated, Bakich expects various degrees of failure depending on the scope and location within the state’s information institutions.
A Millennial’s Perspective on the Legacy of Vietnam
The last American combat troops left Vietnam in 1973, twelve years before I was born and 42 years ago as I write this. No millennials, as my generation is called, lived through the Vietnam War. For most of us even the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union happened too early in our lives to resonate politically. My generation’s perspective on Vietnam is shaped entirely through textbooks and movies. Through those lenses, the Vietnam War seems to be one of the most costly political and strategic blunders in United States history.