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Busy With Afghanistan, the U.S. Military Has No Time to Train for Big Wars

1 year ago
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David Wood
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David Wood
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We have learned through painful experience that the wars we fight are seldom the wars we planned.
-- Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates, Feb. 1, 2010

Just after a cold, rainy dawn, a U.S. Army battalion under the command of Lt. Col. Charles B. Smith took up positions along a low Korean ridgeline with orders to stop the enemy tank columns racing toward them. The Americans were lightly armed draftees assigned to peacetime occupation duties in Japan. They'd never trained for major combat. But they wore the uniform of the most powerful nation on earth.

They expected a short skirmish: When the enemy saw who they were dealing with, the soldiers told themselves, they'd turn tail and flee. But the North Koreans who came lunging at them were not deterred that July morning in 1950. The GIs held out valiantly but finally shattered, stumbling into a retreat so hasty that they left their dead and wounded behind.

The painful story of Task Force Smith is once again being told amid growing anxiety that the United States is so focused on today's missions that it has neglected to prepare for what may come next.

The risk of being unready for major combat operations is partly a matter of choice: Defense Secretary Robert Gates has directed the military to focus its time, resources and energy on winning the counterinsurgency struggle in Afghanistan. That's the kind of conflict the United States is likely to be entangled in for the foreseeable future, according to current Defense Department plans.

It is also true, senior officials acknowledge, that the armed forces lack the time to train for and equipment to fight a major conflict that might ignite from friction with Iran, say, or China, or deal with a completely unanticipated crisis that requires American forces to quickly intervene -- like Korea, 1950.

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"There's a belief that the president of the United States can pick up the red phone and order forcible entry operations'' like the 2003 invasion of Iraq, said Army Maj. Gen. Dan Bolger, who commands the Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, Louisiana. "But that takes practice, and we don't get a lot of practice.''

Since 2003, the Army and Marines have focused almost exclusively on learning and conducting counterinsurgency operations, which rely heavily on language and cultural knowledge and the ability to work with local police and tribal elders. But commanders have increasingly fretted that their troops have lost skills that the military used to practice all the time: fast-paced "kick-in-the-door'' attacks across a border, with armor columns, intelligence and logistics support coordinated with artillery and air strikes.

With the drawdown of troops in Iraq, the Pentagon finally is able to begin rebuilding its strategic reserve, the battalions and brigades and equipment normally kept on standby for sudden crises. But the continuing demands in Afghanistan, where the Pentagon is sending 25,000 fresh troops in the coming months, leaves virtually no time for anything but Afghanistan-focused training.

Moreover, the two wars have seriously depleted stockpiles of combat-ready vehicles, weapons, communications equipment and other gear. So, even if troops had time to practice big-war operations, they don't have the stuff to do it with.

"At a certain point,'' said a frustrated Bolger, "you can't do more with less.''

In the past year, for instance, only one unit, the 3rd Brigade of the 82nd Airborne Division, was able to break from counterinsurgency to practice an air assault to seize an airfield, a critical maneuver that would come at the start of a major combat operation. "It was a new set of challenges,'' the division commander, Maj. Gen. James Huggins, said in an interview.

Before 2001, dozens of Army and Marine Corps battalions cycled each year through the three major ground combat training centers, mastering high-intensity maneuvers with tank and armor formations, artillery, attack helicopters and fighter-bombers in grueling battles that went on day and night for weeks.

But with Iraq and Afghanistan demanding different kinds of skills, the training centers were converted into mock villages of Iraqis or Afghans, where troops could practice searching cars at checkpoints, chatting with the local "mayor,'' and walking foot patrols with native troops.

That only one unit was able to break away from this counterinsurgency training "gives you an idea of how close to the margin we are,'' said Bolger.

The Army training centers at Fort Polk and Fort Irwin, Calif., each have one exercise scheduled for 2011 to train troops in what the Army calls "full-spectrum operations."

"We are trying to get back to full-spectrum operations,'' Army Secretary John McHugh said in an interview. "That is difficult given the high operational tempo we continue to face. ... We are rapidly deploying troops to Afghanistan and even the troops in the [reserve] pool are scheduled to go.''

The Marine Corps is in a similar predicament. Senior Marine officers often lament that a decade into counterinsurgency operations, the Corps has midcareer officers and non-commissioned officers who have never been on a ship, let alone learned the complex art of amphibious operations, the Marines' central mission.

In an attempt to correct that shortcoming, the Marine Corps just completed its first major amphibious exercise in a decade -- by simulation. An exercise involving real Marines and actual weapons and ships is planned for 2012.

A shortage of equipment is as big a problem as shortage of time. A decade of combat operations has worn down tanks, Humvees, radios, aircraft engines and almost every other piece of gear. The Marines think it will cost $8 billion just to fix its equipment. So much of the Corps' equipment is in Afghanistan that what it has on hand for training and any crises is "seriously deficient,'' the then-commandant, Gen. James Conway, told Congress last spring. The bill to fix the Army's equipment may reach $36 billion, according to Gen. Peter Chiarelli, the service's vice chief of staff.

The Air Force is short about $2 billion a year to fix its combat aircraft, a deficit that is building year after year and significantly shrinking the pool of planes not already committed in Afghanistan that could be sent into a come-as-you-are war.

Ironically, the problem will get worse if U.S. troops and equipment begin pouring back from Afghanistan to be fixed. For instance, the Pentagon has sent 15,000 heavy-armored MRAP vehicles to Afghanistan, and an additional 10,600 are being built and rushed there to protect troops against IEDs.

All those vehicles will have to be overhauled when they return, a daunting task for Mark Sheffield, a senior official at the Letterkenny Army Depot in Chambersburg, Pennsylvania, where much of the work will be done. "We have no history of what parts will be needed'' for these relatively new vehicles, Sheffield said in an interview. "The big question is whether the supply chain will give us the parts.''

All these problems are reason for a decisive shift at the Pentagon, according to an outside bipartisan task force chartered by Congress to challenge current Defense Department planning. The group, co-chaired by William Perry, who was defense secretary under President Bill Clinton, and Stephen J. Hadley, national security adviser to President George W. Bush, said in a report issued earlier this year that Gates had "focused too greatly on the short-term'' threats and not enough on big-war challenges.

Those challenges could come, their report said, from the rise of new global superpowers in Asia -- India and China -- and the continued struggle for power in the Persian Gulf and the greater Middle East. But it documented "a significant and growing gap'' between the U.S. military's current capabilities and "the missions it will be called upon to perform in the future'' and warned that a failure to correct these problems is "not acceptable.''

Aside from new thinking at the Pentagon, what is needed is more money, the independent task force concluded, an urgent recommendation not likely to be welcomed next month by a new Congress elected to slash, not increase, federal spending. But fixing war-damaged equipment and modernizing ships, aircraft and vehicles can't be done simply with the budget efficiencies Gates has ordered, the report said. It will require "immediate and long-term'' investment.

"The potential consequences for the United States of a business as usual attitude ... are not acceptable,'' the task force said. "We are confident that the trend lines can be reversed, but it will require an ongoing, bipartisan concentration of political will in support of decisive action.''
Filed Under: Afghanistan, Military, Analysis
Tagged: Afghan war, army, combat, combat readiness, counterinsurgency, defense, defense budget, defense department, equipment, marines, troop training, war korea
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204 Comments

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Fearless Leader

To ussocomfrtbragg the only way to motivate that bunch of juvenile delinquents down there more is for the president to issue an order that duffle bags will not be inspected on the way back from a deployment and that there will be an amnesty to register any souvenirs you bring back. I know a lot of you guys and in some cases I spent a lot of time taking little walks in the woods with many of your fathers a lush tropical climes. Be seeing you all the next time I am up Fayetteville. Watch your mouths and respect your elders. Remember age and treachery always beats youth and enthusiasm.

January 03 2011 at 9:18 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
jtabor

Well, by the military's own admission, we will not have an adversary equal to us until about 2020 and probably later than that. While we should take care to prepare for other contingencies, the War on Terror is what is consuming our time and money.

Full apectrum ops. are pretty unlikely for a while. Certainly we should be cautions, but no cause for alarm yet...

December 30 2010 at 3:24 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
ussocomfrtbragg

this article is a bit of an insult to us SOCOM boys. it is also very misleading.the US special forces community still base our training on rapid deployment and large scale warfare including behind enemy lines indirect tactics. we regulary do battle simulations of flanking, and capturing airfields and bases. also if the next 'big' war we fight is against north korea or china the odds are still on our side. north korean army lacks the tactics, experience, technology , comunication and situational awareness recquired in the modern battlefied to put up a good fight besides most of the population including conscripts thinks about defecting.the PLA lack the experience and technology to also put up a good fight, i hear civilians always having a massive hype about how china is the next superpower.... but the reality is china hasnt won a war in the last 100yrs.

December 30 2010 at 9:39 AM Report abuse +2 rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to ussocomfrtbragg's comment
Fearless Leader

To ussocomfrtbragg the only way to motivate that bunch of juvenile delinquents down there more is for the president to issue an order that duffle bags will not be inspected on the way back from a deployment and that there will be an amnesty to register any souvenirs you bring back. I know a lot of you guys and in some cases I spent a lot of time taking little walks in the woods with many of your fathers a lush tropical climes. Be seeing you all the next time I am up Fayetteville. Watch your mouths and respect your elders. Remember age and treachery always beats youth and enthusiasm.

January 03 2011 at 9:18 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Hen and Goddy

as long as the missile defence and attack systems are in place and up to date. we can fight ant war.

December 29 2010 at 10:37 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
KEN STALEY

The articles referance to the Korean war is incorrect. The anti tank weapons issued to the troops at the beginning of the korean war were ineffective.Give the guys facing down tanks with pop guns some credit.All they could do was retreat and call in artillary to slow them down.Must have been a horrible experience.

December 29 2010 at 9:20 PM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply
Hen and Goddy

who says the military is not ready for wars, what practice do you need that is more than those they are getting from Iraq and afghanistan. what we need to do is keep the air defence and attack systems ever ready and keep the navy defence and conbat systems at alert and ready, update the machineries and new equipment ready. keep the infantry and marine divisions at alert and ready to land them at any part of the world at any rime. a massive air defence and attack can hold the line until the land attack groups. so what are you saying.

December 29 2010 at 6:25 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
mebecarl

For those of us who have served this country in the military, this is not news. We've been behind the eight-ball for a long time now. I could also add that we feel frustrated when we hear some government idiots proclaim that we have the best and strongest military in the world. We are spread far too thin, and we haven't won squat in any of the three countries we're involved in. In Viet Nam, we couldn't match the enemy in the jungle. In Afghanistan, we can't match (or find) the enemy in the mountains. We can't find Bin Laden. We can't find or address the flow of arms that are killing our soldiers. We are on the verge of another conflict (again) in Korea. So tell me right now.... just WHO will be siding with us?? Maybe Secretary Gates has a bunch of family members at the ready. Related stories to this one are, "Gates praises progress in Afghanistan". "White House mulls grim picture of Deteriorating Stalemate in Afghanistan". And "Plan for Afghanistan reportedly sets 2014 as end of U.S. combat mission". Any more brilliant OPTIMISTIC comments that Washington wants to BS us with?

December 29 2010 at 5:30 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
richarant

"A great country can have no such thing as a little war." (Duke of Wellington)

A lesson gone unlearned.

December 29 2010 at 1:44 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
vicbar88

I'm sure they want everyone to think that and are doing more than anyone could imagine. It's the old saying - "If you snooze, you loose" we have been burned to many times to let it happen so easily in the future!

December 29 2010 at 12:17 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
tool3line2

I find it interesting that this "doomsday" attention comes after Gates announced cuts to the defense budget. Afganistan is a waste of lifes, you cannot wage a war against believes. You can only wage war against an entire country.

December 29 2010 at 11:46 AM Report abuse +3 rate up rate down Reply

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