1, 2, 3, 4… Everyone Hates the Marine Corps

 

Welcome back to the Scuttlebutt.

 

Have a seat, have a beer, and let’s talk.

 

There’s a certain group of “intellectuals” and “Military experts” that just absolutely despise Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children.  

 

Colonel Douglas Macgregor USA Ret is at least in good company, Truman (who knew about the US military only what he learned as a reserve army officer activated for WW1) despised the Corps and tried to kill it.  Eisenhower, who was a DAMN fine strategist and a good politician (yes at the SHAEF headquarters, you’re not really a general, you’re a politician) also wanted to kill them.  Now we have this git, who from his bio has what looks like about 23 minutes worth of combat experience, and a lot of controversial opinions.  He wrote a book that proposed making the army into something that sounded like a big version of the Marine Corps recommending “the Army restructure itself into modularly organized, highly mobile, self-contained, combined-arms teams that look extraordinarily like the Marine Corps’ Air-Ground Task Forces”.  

 

Now he’s been appointed as a senior advisor at the pentagon… after being turned down for command at the battalion level three times and told to retire. Whether he actually has any pull on the “we need to get rid of the as he put it: “Under-utilized Superfluous Military Capability” or not is anyone’s guess… My bet is he doesn’t last long in this position.  If Trump doesn’t find enough votes to overturn the rig of the system (I say find because they seem to keep finding entire voting machines worth of votes that never got turned in, in GA, they also found a crapload of ballets in AZ, and NV… all in all, it’s awful questionable.) 

 

Anyway, if Trump is out, I promise his political appointees in the funny five-sided building are done, and this goof was appointed by the acting Sec Def after Trump fired the old one… If his patron the acting Sec Def is gone, so is he.  If Trump manages to pull this out, I don’t expect this guy to last much longer, because what he lacks in combat experience, he more than makes up for in a record of pissing off those in positions of power over him… Something that doesn’t give you good career prospects in President Trump’s regime.

 

I find it funny that the people that want to get rid of the ONLY SERVICE that constantly meets and exceeds its recruiting and retention goals are alumni of the service with a reputation for not only not being able to attract and maintain a decent force, but the group that is the military force of last resort… IE if you can’t get in anywhere else, maybe the Army will take you.  After having two ex-sons-in-laws who were Army, we have a saying around this mess-decks.  There’s stupid, and then there’s ARMY stupid.  Really, I think the Army is just jealous that the Department of the Navy has the best ground force, in spite of being underfunded and given Army castoffs.

 

On to other Military issues:

 

I see where a US Destroyer, the USS John Finn, just shot down an ICBM.  NOT BAD.  Look, it’s hard enough to hit a target moving at Mach 20 from a stationary platform on dry ground.  Doing it from the deck of a moving, pitching ship is an added layer of difficulty.  The SM-3 Block IIA missile that did the deed was originally designed for theater range missiles like the Russian SS-20 or the Chinese DF 25 and 26 (copies of the SS 20, frankly) and more to the point, the North Korean RD-B Musudan, the KN-17 or the Iranian Shahab-5  All of which are far slower and less capable than an ICBM.  The real credit however goes to the control system: the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System.  This is the real son of “Star Wars” and Ronnie RayGun would be proud.  BZ!

 

The Navy is still pushing the 500 ship fleet, even though Sec Def has been shown the door, which I’m grateful for.  Look, you can build a shitload of tanks in a year. A hell of a lot of fighters, or bombers. But it takes about four to six years to build one ship, and we just don’t have a lot of shipyards.  Gearing up an army battalion (yes they’ll be green, yes you’ll lose troops to green stupidity) is a matter of a few months.  Ships aren’t built that fast, you go to war, and fight the first couple years of it, with what you have already afloat, or on the ways about to be launched.  Our only real threat on the waters right now is building ships like there’s no tomorrow.  If we don’t get our shit together there may not be one.

 

And finally, I will grudgingly give a tip of the hat to an Army puke.  The secretary of the Army, Ryan McCarthy ordered Arlington to hold the annual “Wreaths Across America” event, after they tried to cancel it.  I’ve walked Arlington, if you can’t “Social Distance” there, you can’t do it anywhere.  I’m glad to see someone not cave into the frightened Karens on this.  It’s about time.

 

And speaking of time, it’s time I finished this article. So until next time, take care, keep your head on a swivel, and keep your clothes and weapons where you can find them in the dark.

 

Until next time I remain,

Yours in service.

William Lehman.