Clever Moments In Self-Promotion

WaPo reporter Thomas Ricks calls for the shuttering of West Point and the other service academies.  It will never happen and it will double-never happen with Obama as President.  Presdent McCain could have pulled off this domestic visit to China, but his doing so was probably a triple-never.

However!  It gives us an excuse to mention that Ricks' book on the Surge, The Gamble, is a must-read.

Comments

[Danube of Thought]

I haven't seen Ricks's piece (perhaps someone will link to it), but it's been a concern of mine for a long time that proposals to do away with the service academies will at some point gain traction.

From time to time some congressperson or other has proposed doing away with the Marine Corps on efficiency grounds.

Good luck with all of that.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Narciso linked it over at the bottom of the 90 percent thread,

Since we have a new thread on it, I'll bring over my comment.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Oh, I don't think he's lost his mond, but I dont think he has a clue about the utility of having four years of exposure to military traditions as opposed to the 90-day wonder officer courses. He's right that the service academies aren't particularly striking intellectually, but mistaken that a PhD from a better school is a better qualification for an officer.

Looking at his Foreign Policy bio, I don't notice that he's ever served in uniform.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Crap, I even copied over the typo I didn't see 'til just now.

[narciso]

Tom, some points for posting that link, right about the time you posted this. Ricks
really screwed up, when he jumped the gun, declaring the war a "Fiasco", of course
"Stalemate" wouldn't have sold as many books would it. He didn't notice the Anbar
Awakening or consider the idea that a counterinsurgency strategy was being perfected at Ft. Leavenworth under Petraeus's watchful eye. He fell for the Iraq "Civil War" meme, as well which helped
undermine the effort, and lead to the Democrat's taking power in 2006. I see more than one copy in the local library, I say pass

[Pofarmer]

This is kinda what I figured.

How Obama actually delayed pirate rescue
SEAL team deployment stalled 36 hours, hampered by limited rules of engagement

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=95451

Posted: April 18, 2009
11:45 pm Eastern

© 2009 WorldNetDaily

WASHINGTON – While Barack Obama is basking in praise for his "decisive" handling of the Somali pirate attack on a merchant ship in the India Ocean, reliable military sources close to the scene are painting a much different picture of the incident – accusing the president of employing restrictive rules of engagement that actually hampered the rescue of Capt. Richard Phillips and extended the drama at sea for days.

Multiple opportunities to free the captain of the Maersk Alabama from three young pirates were missed, these sources say – all because a Navy SEAL team was not immediately ordered to the scene and then forced to operate under strict, non-lethal rules of engagement.

They say the response duty office at the Pentagon was initially unwilling to grant an order to use lethal force to rescue Phillips. They also report the White House refused to authorize deployment of a Navy SEAL team to the location for 36 hours, despite the recommendation of the on-scene commander.

The White House also turned down two rescue plans offered up by the Seal commander on the scene and the captain of the USS Bainbridge.

The SEAL team operated under rules of engagement that required them to do nothing unless the hostage's life was in "imminent' danger.

In fact, when the USS Bainbridge dispatched a rigid-hull inflatable boat to bring supplies to the Maersk Alabama, it came under fire that could not be returned even though the SEAL team had the pirates in their sights.

Many hours before the fatal shots were fired, taking out the three young pirates, Phillips jumped into the Indian Ocean with the idea of giving the snipers a clear target. However, the SEAL team was still under orders not to shoot.

Hours later, frustrated by the missed opportunities to resolve the standoff, the commander of the Bainbridge and the captain of the Navy SEAL team determined they had operational authority to evaluate the risk to the hostage, and took out the pirates at the first opportunity – finally freeing Phillips.

The G2 Bulletin report was authored by Joseph Farah, founder and editor of WND, and a veteran newsman with extensive military sources developed over the last 30 years.

The full report is available now exclusively at Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin.

Editor's note: The following is adapted from an exclusive report in Joseph Farah's G2 Bulletin, the premium, online intelligence newsletter edited by the founder of WND. You can access the full report by subscribing to G2 Bulletin for $99 a year or $9.95 per month for credit card users.

[narciso]

Maybe he did lose his mond, we know exactly what you mean, thanks Charlie for the acknowledgement. There is something about a certain meme he's been pursuing after his initial book on the Marines, which inspired
Nathaniel Fick at Dartmouth, into becoming a Marine, who was characterized as a fool in the HBO adaptation of Evan Wright's
"Generation Kill", which would seem to argue that meme. His follow up the novel Soldier's Duty, which presaged some Kabul type quagmire, provoking a revolt along a portion of the officer corps, seems to presage the feeling he would take to Iraq. This has been the meme of reporting and consequently fiction about war, at least since Joseph Heller's take in '61 with
"Catch 22" that there is no point to it. The shortlived FX series, "Over There" follows the same template, as does the recent novel by Nicholas Kulish. So consequently an institution that considers the profession of arms a noble one, stands in the way, of such a vision in "The Age of Aquarius".

[Danube of Thought]

"Phillips jumped into the Indian Ocean with the idea of giving the snipers a clear target. However, the SEAL team was still under orders not to shoot."

Again, bear in mind that at the time he jumped the SEALs weren't yet on the scene, so at least this part of the report is misguided.

Also, I'd be interested to know whether the ROE that initially prevened lethal action were something new from Obama, or whether they have been in place for quite a while. I just don't know.

[Blue]

"This is no knock on the academies' graduates. They are crackerjack smart and dedicated to national service. They remind me of the best of the Ivy League, but too often they're getting community-college educations."

Sounds like a good argument for community-college educations.

[Pofarmer]

Again, bear in mind that at the time he jumped the SEALs weren't yet on the scene, so at least this part of the report is misguided.

Are you sure? Anybody wanna get out the dry erase markers and do a timeline? d;o)

[Pofarmer]

Also, wouldn't a destroyer operating on anti-piracy patrol in pirate infested waters have SOME sort of a detail on board for situations such as this?

[Danube of Thought]

I've read the Ricks piece now, and it's so subjective that it's hard to know how to respond. Example:

"I've been told by some commanders that they prefer officers who come out of ROTC programs, because they tend to be better educated and less cynical about the military."

I have no doubt that "some" commanders may feel that way. How many? Are they themselves ROTC graduates? So Petraeus has a PhD from Princeton--well, he's also a West Point graduate. Pete Dawkins (the most famous among many, many others) was a Rhodes Scholar. Ricks points out that 3 of the past 6 JCS Chairmen have not been from the academies, but that doesn't tell us what we need to know: how many ROTC officers entered the stream 30 years ago, as opposed to how many academy graduates (I don't know, and haven't been able to find the comparable numbers even for today).

One thing I think very few ROTC officers would dispute: an academy graduate if fully prepared to hit the deck running the day he/she reports to his first duty station, and the many, many fine ROTC grads still take 2-3 years to catch up.

Another thing you get from the academies is an officer who at least presumptively tends to stay for the long haul, whereas for many ROTC is a scholarship for which one pays with a four-year hitch. It would be nice to know the retention rates for the two sources.

In short, I think Ricks's article was quite tendentious, and not particularly informative.

[laura]

A couple of years back I read a great rundown of the liberal arts portion of the Academies curriculum, Especially the Naval Academy and WEst Point. They follow a rigorous Western civilization humanities program that used to be required at every ivy league before diversity and relative worth became the norm. No wonder they are threatening to someone like Ricks.

[narciso]

Yes I forgot about that aspect, I recall that Victor Davis Hanson, the well known classicist, did a stint lecturing at Annapolis, dangerous counter revolutionary material to consider. He has another great piece at Pajamas Media, about relativism and the Obama approach to world events

[laura]

I have an 18 year old who will be going to Hillsdale after a gap year, believe me we worked hard to find a school that met the criterion for a true liberal arts education.

[Danube of Thought]

"Are you sure? Anybody wanna get out the dry erase markers and do a timeline?"

I'm pretty sure. I went back and looked at the contemporaneous news accounts, and it seems pretty clear that the hostage jumped late Friday night, whereas the SEALs didn't arrive until dusk on Saturday.

I don't know what sort of detail might be added to the normal ship's company when patrolling this area, if any. Every US warship has a landing party, equipped with and trained in small arms, but not snipers. I think specialized snipers were definitely called for in this fairly unusual circumstance. Also keep in mind that until the kid came aboard, it would have been necessary to take out four pirates simultaneously instead of three, which greatly compounds the difficulty.

[whiskey]

Spot on, Ricks being an Ivy guy finds an institution that allows mostly middle/working class kids an advancement through the Military a massive threat.

All American and Western politics for that matter is the struggle between the decadent elites, mostly SWPL yuppies, Gays, Women, and the alliance of non-Whites on the one hand explicitly organized to keep down and prevent the rise of working-middle class Whites.

The military and specifically the academies employ and advance mostly White working-middle class men, and as such provide a threat to SWPL Yuppies and Gays, Women for national leadership. Thus the institutions must be crushed.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Po, that's exactly the same story DoT poted here.

You might want to go back and examine the following comments for some of the internal contradictions, like the fact that the timeline doesn't jibe with other accounts with more direct sourcing.

[Danube of Thought]

I'm not sure I understand Ricks's beef against education at the academies. It's been close to fifty years now, but there is no doubt in my mind that I received a classic liberal education--history, philosophy, mathematics, foreign language, dipomacy, and English, all overladen with tons of engineering courses, and all very rigorously taught. I have no idea how many of my profs had PhD's, but I guarantee no course was taught by a graduate assistant either. (How many Jesuit educators have doctorates? Does it matter at all?)

Graduate courses at civilian institutions are widely available to academy grads (my brother got a masters in international relations from George Washington U.).

The whole thing is kind of puzzling to me.

And by the way, minorities and women are now very well represented at all the academies.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Also, wouldn't a destroyer operating on anti-piracy patrol in pirate infested waters have SOME sort of a detail on board for situations such as this?

Some sort, yeah, but the supply of SEALs and snipers is pretty limited.

[boris]

"minorities and women are now very well represented at all the academies"

Even if they look like minorities and women they aren't real minorities and women.

They're military pod people doncha see ... brainwashed, indoctrinated and dehumanized.

[boris]

"wouldn't a destroyer operating on anti-piracy patrol in pirate infested waters have SOME sort of a detail on board for situations such as this?"

"Some sort, yeah, but the supply of SEALs and snipers is pretty limited."

Once the hostage was in the water probably shouldn't need dead eye snipers to take out the 4 left on the boat.

[boris]

That incident probably did change the ROE though. Obama was looking at an outraged public if it turned out his orders prevented the Bainbridge from acting to rescue Phillips during his escape.

After that Obama knew he had to make Phillips' survival first priority or risk his own political survival. Hence the seals and change in ROE.

[dick]

When I was in the service back in the days of JFK I was lucky enough to serve under 3 officers who were grads of the service academies as well as officers who were ROTC. Give me the service academy grads every time. I found that if you did you job well then you were just fine in their book and there was very little trying to show how big they were. Not so true of the ROTC grads. Huge difference between the two in my view.

[Pofarmer]

Once the hostage was in the water probably shouldn't need dead eye snipers to take out the 4 left on the boat.

Especially considering that all you really would have needed was probably suppressive fire and not hit the Captain.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Once the hostage was in the water probably shouldn't need dead eye snipers to take out the 4 left on the boat.

If I point out that was the time when the reports were of the Bainbridge being 300 yards away, and that taking out four guys at 300 yards before they could shoot Phillips would be a helluva shot, I'll get accused of dissing the military again. But I qualified Expert marksman three years running and went to All State in my ROTC rifle team, and I sure as hell wouldn't want to have to try it.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Surpressing fire would be easier, true enough.

[JM Hanes]

"In fact, when the USS Bainbridge dispatched a rigid-hull inflatable boat to bring supplies to the Maersk Alabama, it came under fire that could not be returned even though the SEAL team had the pirates in their sights.

Many hours before the fatal shots were fired, taking out the three young pirates, Phillips jumped into the Indian Ocean with the idea of giving the snipers a clear target. However, the SEAL team was still under orders not to shoot."

It seems that the inaccuracy here could easily be that of attributing these first two ventures to the SEALs as opposed to onboard Bainbridge crews. While that might well put the accuracy of the narrative as a whole into question, it would certainly iron out anomalies in the timeline. Would SEALs ordinarily be used to make a supply run? While I assume Captain Phillips would have no way of knowing whether SEALs were onboard or not, he certainly could have jumped ship with the idea that someone could take a clear shot at the pirates or attempt a rescue. IIRC, the pirates did not follow him into the water, but shot at him from the boat, which suggests that there might conceivably have been sufficient reaction time for some sort of initiative from the Bainbridge had they been empowered to proceed on their own. The lack of any reaction seemed surprising to me, although I certainly had no basis for drawing any conclusions about that.

I may be too willing to extend the benefit of the doubt, but it's mostly because this version of events accords with my jaundiced view of Obama at almost every level, not least of which is hesitating to take action before figuring out how to extract maximum political advantage from the circumstances. There was another brief mention in the MSM about some grumbling among Bainbridge officers which disappeared in later reports. There was no explanation of why the Navy refrained from taking action for so long, or of why the SEALs were not dispatched sooner. There was also the as yet unexplained emphasis on Obama's having twice approved taking action. That's a baffling assertion which sounded like it came directly from the President's press office to me at the time. That's actually the only source which would be available though, no? The officers on deck would certainly not be making independent reports to the media, would they? The question mark is the reliability of a source selling this as an exclusive, but perhaps an intel specialist would be one of the few with contacts who could pass the story along.

It's a puzzlement!

[Pofarmer]

If I point out that was the time when the reports were of the Bainbridge being 300 yards away

I had remembered it as "less than 200 yards" and yes, that extra hundred yards is a heckuva distance.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

JM, I was a collection guy instead of an analyst, but I do know in general that it's the reports that tell you what confirms your prejudices that you most want to check.

[narciso]

True Charlie, but considering we've been inundated with reports that echo the reporter's prejudices, shouldn't we check those first, Anyways here's Victor Davis
Hanson's latest

[PaulL]

If I recall correctly, Charlie, and I'm sure that I do, you didn't want anything tried in re to the pirates. Everything was hare-brained and stupid and impossible under your no-can-do attitude.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

If I recall correctly, Charlie, and I'm sure that I do, you didn't want anything tried in re to the pirates. Everything was hare-brained and stupid and impossible under your no-can-do attitude.

Then you don't recall correctly. I said that a particular scheme was hare-brained.

Go check it, then come back and apologize.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Here's what Jerry Pournelle, famous lefty, has to say about the report:

Which purports to tell an inside story about the piracy incident and Obama's performance. I have no way of verifying any of the statements made, and I don't see any source data. It's unlikely that those who do know will have much to say.

Reagan famously delegated control of this kind of event to the on the scene commanders. I have no evidence that Obama did not do much the same thing, although this purports that he did not.

Colonel Beckwith told me about the failed hostage rescue in Iran; I believed his story, so I have some evidence that Jimmy Carter did not delegate authority to local commanders, but in fact insisted on being involved all the way down the line. I have absolutely no evidence regarding the current situation. The pentagon scuttlebutt I have heard gives Obama good marks on this incident.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

I think Hansen nailed this:

And the result will be soon, as Sarkozy presciently saw, a general sizing up of the Obama two-step. They will either believe that we are weak, and cannot stand in the way of their illiberal agendas, or believe that Obama is somewhat sympathetic to their anti-capitalist, anti-democratic scenarios, or believe that he is a true multiculturalist who believes in the “Post-American world”.

[JM Hanes]

You'll get no argument on that from me Charlie! The exclusivity of Farah's report is really problematic, IMO. Even if he is considered generally reliable, he is still a single source and inaccuracies in re SEALs is not encouraging. Assuming the timeline we're aware of is accurate, such mistakes are ones that someone actually on board at the time would not have made -- meaning that this story is one or more steps removed.

[Gmax]

w
hy dont we do away with Harvard and Yale? What purpose do these serve? At least the service academies graduate first line officers. What is the outproduct of Harvard that is indispensable?

[JM Hanes]

Charlie: In case it's not obvious, that was no argument on the distortion factor of prejudice.

[PaulL]

JM:

I don't think it's safe to assume the timeline is accurate. As was said elsewhere, accounts of the timeline are contradictory.

But, having to get permission from Washington and ROE interfering with an operation--that has the ring of truth to it from society's common experience and observation.

[PaulL]

Charlie,

If I remember correctly, you thought the situation would change when the pirates got hungry and tired. When I told you that I read that food had been provided them, you did not believe that was the case.

As far as I recall, your only "plan" was to starve them out. Such a "plan" was not sensible considering we were indeed regularly sending them food.

So what did you advocate?

Do you really think that the Navy couldn't defeat four pirates until several days had passed? Or do you think it more likely that they were waiting for permission to act from Obama?

[Charlie (Colorado)]

So what did you advocate?

That the people on site knew more than we did, and the hare-brained schemes remained hare-brained.

In the intervening time, they went from being 300 yards away and drifting toward shore, to being 30 yards away and under tow.

Do you really think that the Navy couldn't defeat four pirates until several days had passed.

No — if you look back, I noted that, if we didn't care if Phillips got killed we could take care of it any time. (Search for the phrase "pink mist".)

If we did care about keeping Phillips alive — which I did, even if you didn't — and we cared about not risking SEALs lives unnecessarily — which I did, and hopefully their superior officers did — then time was on our side, and risky schemes didn't make sense.

[DrJ]

why dont we do away with Harvard and Yale? What purpose do these serve?

Oh good heavens. These are private institutions; they can do whatever they want (and largely do). So who is it that should shut them down?

[Pofarmer]

then time was on our side, and risky schemes didn't make sense.

I think the reason they were finally forced to take action, is that time was no longer on our side, and, it really never was. Pirate "reinforcements" were having to be held at bay by warships. At some point there was going to be a very unfortunate accident. This should have been handled much more swiftly.

[boris]

Regardless of assumed generalities, the fact that the hostage was able to escape but was recaptured while the US Navy stood by helplessly changed the ROE equation.

That looks exactly like Carteresque Fluffy Bunny incompetence in a situation where perception is political reality. After that there would be no question that the hostage is rescued ... or else.

So that's a given. Next question ... what are the odds that helplessness was imposed from above? IMO nowhere near close to even.

[PaulL]

I agree with you that the people on site knew more than we did.

Phillips's life was in grave danger the entire time he was with the pirates. There is no evidence that the pirates were cool, calm, and collected. They could easily have acted out of emotion, out of hopelessness, fear, rage, whatever, and shot Phillips, regardless of the fact it would be wasting their sole bargaining chip.

So I don't think we had time on our side. If you were the hostage, wouldn't you have rather gotten killed in a failed rescue scheme than have been shot by the pirates after, say, another week of similar circumstances? knowing that there were many rescue opportunities available but that weren't tried because they weren't 100% certain and/or because Washington lawyers couldn't agree on the legal niceties.

[Danube of Thought]

There were many, many SEALs aboard Bainbridge by the time of the rescue--I believe it may have been as many as forty of them. In any event, there were far more than necessary if the only option under consideration was to take them out with snipers. I have read some reports that there were two separate rescue plans in the works at the time the pirates sealed their own doom by agreeing to be taken in tow. I have no idea what those plans entailed, and it may be that we will never know.

[PaulL]

Charlie,

Was the Iranian hostage crisis handled successfully, considering that our embassy people survived?

[Charlie (Colorado)]

If you were the hostage, wouldn't you have rather gotten killed in a failed rescue scheme than have been shot by the pirates after, say, another week of similar circumstances?

Not nearly as much as I'd have preferred not getting dead at all.

Phillips looked pretty happy to see his family.

[Chris]

What is the outproduct of Harvard that is indispensable?

Posted by: Gmax | April 19, 2009 at 02:23 PM

Who will (mis)manage our financial institutions if we do that? Seriously, guys like Jeff Skilling aren't simply born, they're the product of HBS. Ditto Frank Raines. Normal (little) people aren't in possession of that sense of entitlement.

That's a broad brush I used but I've got nothing on Janeane Garofalo and Nancy P. I denounce myself for those counterproductive thoughts and will now say three Hail Barrys.

[PaulL]

Danube,

Can you tell me how snipers work in general? Do they keep the target in their scope constantly, ready to fire at any given second? Or are they just in "ready" position? How often are snipers rotated? That is, every hour do they get a break, or every four hours, or what?

[Charlie (Colorado)]

In any event, there were far more than necessary if the only option under consideration was to take them out with snipers.

Let me know when you find the guy who said the only option under consideration was taking them out with snipers.

[DrJ]

What is the outproduct of Harvard that is indispensable?

How about the forty-three current and former Harvard faculty members who have been awarded Nobel Prizes? These are not all in basket weaving.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Was the Iranian hostage crisis handled successfully, considering that our embassy people survived?

Compared to them being killed? Um, duh?

[Charlie (Colorado)]

DrJ, I think you've fallen for another one of those "modest proposals."

[PaulL]

Compared to them being killed? Um, duh?

Well, Charlie (Plains GA), that's where I couldn't disagree with you more.

[DrJ]

Chaco, sure, but I do tire of painting all the Ivies with such a broad brush. I've no personal stake, mind you, but there truly are outstanding people in departments that are important to me.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Well, Charlie (Plains GA), that's where I couldn't disagree with you more.

Ah. So you think it would have been better if the hostages had been killed.

You want to expand on that?

Try a little role playing: the hostages have just been killed consequent to your orders, and you have to explain it to their family.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Chaco, sure, but I do tire of painting all the Ivies with such a broad brush. I've no personal stake, mind you, but there truly are outstanding people in departments that are important to me.

Oh, I agree, I just suspect that the point is that the Ivies — not to mention really good schools, like Duke — are as questionable as the Military Academies.

[PaulL]

Iran: I would've laid waste to their entire country if necessary. Khomeini's theocracy would have ceased to exist.

I can't tell you how many people told me in 1979 and 1980 that we should turn Iran into a parking lot.

[JM Hanes]

Charlie:

HIndsight arguments, especially when none of the snipers missed their marks, are easy to make. In light of your view on the Iranian hostages, how is your position different from saying that hostage rescues should not be undertaken without absolute certainly that no one but the hostage takers will be killed?

[JM Hanes]

Charlie:

You may have called it a harebrained idea -- but it's pretty clear that's the kind of mission that SEALs are trained to undertake. It's also entirely possible that Phillips could have been killed any time in the interim before the second option was ever even possible. Ditto for all 400 of the Iranian hostages. You are simply posing false, retrospective choices.

[DrJ]

[T]he Ivies... are as questionable as the Military Academies.

Different purposes, though. The academies serve the interests of the military, and there is no real analog to that for a private school.

My own view is that if the military is happy with their schools, then let them be. The aren't that expensive a line item.

[Gmax]

These are private institutions;

Au contraire, under the Obama doctrine if you take Federal money, you get federal rules. NO place in academia that I am aware, survives without massive amounts of Federal money, in the guise of student loans, and student aid grants.

To your comment about Nobel prize winners, sure some of those are in the hard sciences and thus pretty brilliant folks, but heck remember we are talking about shutting down the service academies, as their outproduct can come from elsewhere. Why cant these brilliant folks teach at State run institutions? Wouldn't it be more "equitable" for the masses to have access to their brilliance?

Do you at all get the slippery slope here?

[DrJ]

Well, I'm not in the position to evaluate whether the product is available elsewhere or not. I doubt it, but that is the military's call.

On the "slippery slope" argument, I just don't buy it. Student aid is available from many sources, and most of the Ivies could do away with undergraduates entirely if they wanted to (Dartmouth would have issues with it). UCSF did, and Berkeley has talked about it (though both are public of course).

Still, the academies are public institutions, and the public can shut them down if they so choose. I personally think it is silly, but the right is there. You can't do that for a private one.

[Daddy]

The cheap way to answer Rick's sugestion that we get rid of West Point is to ask who is the only other man in American History interested in getting rid of West Point? Benedict">http://www.si.umich.edu/SPIES/stories-arnold-3.html">Benedict Arnold.

But a more thought provoking way of thinking about this, now that we are aware of what the incoming Freshmen Classes of Princeton">http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20E12F63F5A11728DDDA10A94D9415B898FF1D3&scp=7&sq=princeton%20poll&st=cse">Princeton thought of Adolf Hitler in 1938 and 1939, is to ask what would have been the result of a similar poll of incoming West Point Cadets entering that Institution in 1938 and 1939. If the answer is out there, I expect that Adolf Hitler does not top the list by 3 to 1 over Albert Einstein, and that in my view, is at least as strong an argument for maintaining West Point as any other I can imagine anyone making.

As a former military officer who came in through the 90 Day wonder Program at Pensacola, I can agree that in my experience each of the 3 options; Academy, ROTC, and 90 Day BootCamp, produced Officers of quality, with each having some strengths and weaknesses not immediately apparent in the other options. But I find Rick's suggestion that we shut down West Point and farm it out to ROTC programs at institutions like Princeton, based simply on Ricks informal BS sessions with some officers who happened to like ROTC boys better than Academy Grads to be idiotic. We have got to begin to base questions vital to the security and well being of this Nation on stuff more substantive than word of mouth popularity contests.

[Rick Ballard]

If you frame the situation from the viewpoint of the Kenyan businessmen running the Somali "elders" who actually control the pirates then your estimate of the probability of Phillips survival, absent intervention, should be quite high.

The Kenyan businessmen are little different than the Chavez controlled FARC scum working on the Venezuelan/Colombian border. Both Obama friendly groups recognize the very high value of a live hostage versus the very dangerous situation which pertains for those (like the Obama supporting AQ) who kill indiscriminately.

I do believe that Capt. Phillip's decision to change the game by making a very obvious escape attempt resulted in a rule change. The move by Capt. Phillips was wholly unscripted and the improv by the WH which followed allowed an interpretation which resulted in the black muslim teenagers getting their heads blown off.

I have zero problem with the SEALs good shooting and zero problem with the rule interpretation which allowed the shooting. I do have a small problem with elevating the probability of a negative outcome (the death of the hostage) to close to a certainty.

The piracy business run by the Kenyan Obama supporters in Somalia would collapse in short order if hostages were always believed to be in "imminent danger" due to a number of them having been killed indiscriminately.

[Gmax]

Have you looked at the status of the endowment funds post crash? I am not sure the Ivys could do as you say, but without a knowledge of both the total student aid handed out at say Yale and the estimated earnings off of the smoldering remains of the Yale endowment, I guess we will have to disagree without a resolution.

[Patrick R. Sullivan]

Farah's argument is obviously flawed, but once the hostage separated himself from the pirates and their craft, the navy had all kinds of firepower to unleash on the pirates. Such as this baby:

The 54-caliber (Mk 45) lightweight gun provides surface combatants accurate naval gunfire against fast, highly maneuverable surface targets, air threats and shore targets during amphibious operations. ....The Mk 45 is controlled by either the Mk 86 Gun Fire Control System or the Mk 160 Gun Computing System. Range is more than 13 nautical miles and can fire 16-20 rounds per minute.

Why they didn't fire over the swimming captain into the boat is a puzzle.

[Danube of Thought]

"Let me know when you find the guy who said the only option under consideration was taking them out with snipers."

That would be me. And I said it by way of illustrating that it was not, indeed, the only option, and that the other operations called for some larger number of people.

Now would you like me to find the guy who said the SEALs couldn't swim 300 yards?

[DrJ]

If Harvard eliminated undergraduates, they would only see a 10% drop in revenues, even counting that each UG pays full price. They could probably make up more than that with faculty layoffs.

Won't happen -- the long-term endowment would suffer too much -- and Harvard may be an exception.

[Danube of Thought]

"Why they didn't fire over the swimming captain into the boat is a puzzle."

We don't know where Phillips was in relation to the lifeboat and the ship. The closer he was to the line between them, the more dangerous it would have been to open fire with any weapon available. If he were out of the line, then a .50 caliber machine gun would have done quite nicely, even at 300 yards. But they would have had to react mighty quickly.

It's my understanding that the snipers are ready with their eyes on the scope for long periods of time--it's a job that requires enormous patience.

Incidentally, for those interested there's a fine book called "One Shot, One Kill" about the legendary Marine sniper, Carlos Hathcock, who was credited with 93 confirmed kills in Vietnam.

[Geezer]

To further muddle the waters off Somalia I came across this article by Theo Spark mentioning the involvement of the USS Boxer and the SEAL team. The LUN feature is beyond me so forgive me for the addy:
www.theospark.net/2009/04/what-really-happened-to-pirates

[Gmax]

Faculty layoffs? Now you just did that to see if you could get me to smile, didn't you!

[larry]

He's right that the service academies aren't particularly striking
intellectually, but mistaken that a PhD from a better school is a
better qualification for an officer.
Looking at his Foreign Policy bio, I don't notice that he's ever
served in uniform.
Posted by: Charlie (Colorado) | April 19, 2009 at 11:18 AM

Posted by: Danube of Thought | April 19, 2009 at 12:37 PM
Ditto. USAF Academy, '62. My class as juniors placed third to all seniors in the country average score on graduate record exams. (MIT and Stanford were 1 & 2) Two of my classmates were Rhodes scholars
and tens of others got prestigious scholarships out of 298 graduates. I'll put that up against any poopy head Ivy League school.

[DrJ]

Faculty layoffs? Now you just did that to see if you could get me to smile, didn't you!

Sure! There's *no* way that would happen. Unless, my goodness, women's studies would have to carry its weight financially! (Don't get me going on that -- I battled with these sorts of idiots in another life.)

FWIW, I sat in on some fluid mechanics classes at Edwards AFB many years ago. It's not an academy, but the instruction was very good. Much more applied than I was used to, but they covered the material well.

[Gmax]

BTW Spengler has gone public with his identity and background. Hugh Hewitt has the link.

[Cecil Turner]

The 54-caliber (Mk 45) lightweight gun . . .

I've watched 'em shoot those things from overhead. Trust me, you don't want 'em shooting these anywhere near you. (But I'm told they're pretty accurate . . . for an artillery piece.) A .30 cal or .50 cal MG with a decent gunner, now, no sweat at 300 (or 500) yards.

[boris]

Geezer link:

On Easter Sunday night, at around 1530 I was making my hourly rounds through the hangar bay and heard four distant rifle reports and knew exactly what happened. There was an orange capsule being towed by Bainbridge. Two SEAL snipers laying prone on the fantail with Barrett .50 cal rifles pointed at the small craft.
CAPT. Richard Phillips of Vermont was swimming toward the RHIB sitting close
to the lifeboat.
When the Navy said that we want to see proof of life the good captain jumped into the water and started to draw fire from the pirates. The Snipers fired.

Seems in conflict with the current MSM version and closer to the initial version.

[Danube of Thought]

"When the Navy said that we want to see proof of life the good captain jumped into the water and started to draw fire from the pirates. The Snipers fired."

I'm quite sure this is simply incorrect. It seems clear that after the three were killed, the SEALs had to go aboard the boat to get to Phillips, who was still tied up and tied to the boat itself.

[Danube of Thought]

"Posted by: Danube of Thought | April 19, 2009 at 12:37 PM
Ditto. USAF Academy, '62."

I'm a little confused. That wasn't posted by me, and I'm not USAF '62.

[sbw]

Just read Ricks' article and found an "I've got to get something written by deadline" piece of unsubstantiated fluff:

“I've been told by some commanders that they prefer officers who come out of ROTC programs, because they tend to be better educated and less cynical about the military. “[Evidence, please. Not unsubstantiated opinion.]

“most of West Point's faculty lacks doctorates” [And doctorates can be had by credentialed morons]

“upon graduation, give them a military education at a short-term military school” [to learn what? Long term commitment or just how to salute?]

“If we want to open the minds of rising officers and prepare them for top command, we should send them to civilian schools where their assumptions will be challenged” [Challenged by closed minded, dogmatic fools that populate liberal academia?]

Yawn. Next!

[Soylent Red]

Ricks is a ma-rooooon. But I can see where these mythical officers he spoke to might get their negative attitudes.

I have a sort of different perspective on this, having gone through Army OCS at age 38 after spending some time in corporate America, and then being thrust into follow-on schools with fellow 2LTs from other commissioning sources. I mean no offense by this for all my beloved friends who are service school grads here, but this is my first hand experience with West Point grads.

One must remember that service academy grads are top achievers from high school forward (or are politically connected). Thus they are naturally bright and physically superior in most regards to the average 38-year old OCS grad. That makes military life rather simple and mundane for them. They don't really have to try very hard to do the standard battery of things expected from officers. Thus, they learn to not try very hard and to rely on their grace under pressure. Usually that works. When it doesn't, you have catastrophic failure.

They are, IMO, most acutely lacking in the kind of personal qualities that make them easy to work and collaborate with. That's understandable considering the way most of them ramp up to USMA.

Start with a very smart and athletic 13-year-old, and push him to excel in all the right places, all the way through high school (selection process starts as early as 9th grade), fostering an enormous and often fragile ego along the way. Then place him in a hyper competitive, dog-eat-dog environment for four years, all the while telling him he is being groomed to be a senior officer and influential decision-maker. Give him opportunities throughout his academy career that most junior officers will never see. At every point along the way, drill into him his "eliteness".

What you come out with is the standard know-it-all, entitled, 22-year-old amplified by orders of magnitude. All very smart, very competent. Nearly all a colossal ass pain for everyone they come into contact with. Arrogant, disdainful, cliquish. Incapable of team play unless they are the team captain, etc.

IMO, you improve the service academies curriculum as a matter of course, and not just in major course studies. Academy grads should be far and above superior in critical thinking skills, writing, speaking, and have a better than average grasp on geopolitics. Those who are going to be elite should be held to a higher standard than any other place in the county. I don't know much about curriculum at the academies, but, true story, I was in my basic course with a Pointer who, when discussing the significance of the mullacracy in Iran, said, "Yeah, and they do, like, bad things and stuff." I've crossed paths with several Pointers who were of similar intellectual quality.

Also, extend the commitment. I think the current commitment is 6 years. It was ten when I was in HS. In the old days, service academy grads were expected, if not required, to be 20 year men. When you take away the potential for a Pointer to ring knock his way into a six figure civilian job at 28, you will separate those who are are serious and care about their job from those who are looking for another bullet point on a resume.

Finally, stop treating 18-22 year-olds as princes of the manor. No other pre-2LTs get treated that way, and those of us from the Benning ghetto certainly never had any illusions of being special instilled in us. I doubt it happens in ROTC programs too.

Having vented all that spleen...

Most that I have met will do a good job, come out qualified and knowledgeable, and just need some of the brashness and self-importance corroded away by the kind words and gentle guiding hand of a veteran First Sergeant.

[DrJ]

... just need some of the brashness and self-importance corroded away by the kind words and gentle guiding hand of a veteran First Sergeant.

*snort*

My neighbor is a (former) Marine Master Sergeant. I'm sure he has done this needed service a few times, and has done it well.

The same can be said for most newly-minted graduates, btw. New PhDs are insufferable. I sure was.

[JM Hanes]

Geezer:

Here's a hotlink for your URL.

I ran across this bit on Obama's Decision Making there too, part of which, maybe all, I think we've seen.

I don't know anything about Theo Spark except that Jules Crittenden links to him with some regularity, although it may be mostly for tottie.

[Danube of Thought]

"If I point out that was the time when the reports were of the Bainbridge being 300 yards away..."

Take those reports with a huge grain of salt. There undoubtedly was some point when it was 300 yards away, and that fact got reported. Thereafter, it was generally taken to be a constant range, as it almost certainly was not. The destroyer had way on; the boat had little or none. The ship was maneuvering realatively close aboard the boat, and no doubt at times was closer, and at other times more distant, than that. How far away it was at the time Phillips jumped, so far as I know, hasn't been reliably reported.

[Soylent Red]

I sure was.

I started out insufferable. Graduating from things just makes me worse.

[Appalled]

The American ivy league university is just as much a citadel of group think as any service academy could ever hop to be. And if one is so minded, one can get a community college education there as much as one could get one at a service university.

It seems to me the situation we have now sounds healthy -- some folks from tye regular universities, coming from one set of experiences -- another coming fromn the service academy, steeped in the US military tradition.

Strikes me Ricks wants less diversity in training, and more folks who think like him.

[Ralph L]

When my dad was at Annapolis in the late 40's, the only elective was what foreign language to study.
In the old days, service academy grads were expected, if not required, to be 20 year men.
Pig bath! One of his roommates became brigade captain (top midshipman), left the Navy after 4 years (the commitment) and became a big wheeze at Exxon. Oddly, he married an heiress who was the spitting image of my mother in her 50's. At least one of his sons went to Harvard.

One of my co-worker's sons just left the Navy after 8 years (NCSU ROTC) and has worked a couple of months at a new Navy office on piracy in DC, as a civilian.

larry, when you were at USAF, there was a draft, so a different pool of people considered becoming officers. My father, for one.

[Gmax]

seen this? Instapundit who is rarely cranky, delivers a stinging rebuke to one of his liberal drive by posters:

That’s not the moral high ground you’re standing on, Nicholas. It’s just a big ol’ pile of crap.

Think a lefty is smart enough to know when he is getting a full on smackdown? Doubtful to me...

[Extraneus]

Gov. Perry should invite the service academies to relocate to Texas.

[Pofarmer]

How about the forty-three current and former Harvard faculty members who have been awarded Nobel Prizes?

Al Gore and Yassir Arafat have Nobel Prizes. Pardon me if I don't consider that a really high hurdle.

[DrJ]

Po, with all due respect, you comment simply is ignorant. Take out the Peace Prize, and many worthy people remain. Look, for example, in Physics, Chemistry and Medicine or Physiology.

[Soylent Red]

Pig bath!

Then I stand somewhat corrected, sir!

Gov. Perry should invite the service academies to relocate to Texas.

May come in handy, shortly.

[Extraneus]

How about economics, DrJ? Should we just give the Nobel Committee a pass because of their take on the Peace Prize? How about after they award a "climate scientist" the prize. What then?

Sorry, maybe they've awarded that one already. I used to be a physicist, but I have no regard for their prizes anymore.

[PD]

Okay, Obama and Gibbs were saying "tax cut" a couple of days ago.

Today on the telly both Axelrod and Claire McCaskill were talking about a tax cut.

I'm confused. Whose rates have gone down? Axelrod gave the "for 95 percent" line. That includes me, but I am unaware that my tax liability has decreased, although my witholding now falsely makes it look like it until next April. What am I missing?

[laura]

How about this Nobel prize winner?
LUN

[Pofarmer]

Po, with all due respect, you comment simply is ignorant. Take out the Peace Prize, and many worthy people remain. Look, for example, in Physics, Chemistry and Medicine or Physiology.

Look, I've worked with PHd's and seen the results of plenty of folks with Nobel Prizes.

Color me ignorant and unimpressed.

[Pofarmer]

What am I missing?

Nothing.

Once again, I must apologize for the blight on our political system which is Clair McCaskill. She's simply pig ignorant, although that means she fits right in in Washington.

Do you think they'll still be giving that 95% line when ALL the rates go up in 2010? How about when energy costs skyrocket because of their idiotic policies?

I don't see how they can make the 95% argument with a straight face, especially when about 50% of the total didn't pay any taxes in the first place. That's not a tax cut, that "Spreading the wealth around," Barack Hussein style.

[Pofarmer]

Whose rates have gone down? Axelrod gave the "for 95 percent" line.

Hold on, I think I've got it. See, they're gonna SKYROCKET rates on the upper 5%, therefore, you rates, in relation to theirs, will have decreased!!!!

Acceptable?

[Soylent Red]

No. Your federal income tax rates won't go up. They may even go down for 95% of the American people.

They'll just tax your lightbulbs, gasoline and cigarettes instead. You know...those little unnecessary extravagances in life.

Then they'll tax those evil corporations and slap cap and trade on them. You know...the evil corporations from whom you buy all your shit and who employ you. Er, used to employ you.

Then they'll jack around and devalue the currency where even though you have paid technically less on your federal income tax bill, your purchasing power will be reduced.

But there will be tax cuts (properly defined) for 95% of everyone.