Charles Sulka commentary on “Our Armies Become Pussycats”, an essay by Martin Van Creveld posted on the Fabius-Maximus web site (07-18-2015)
In this essay Van Creveld is suggesting that the West’s armies can never win its wars because they have become too ‘soft’ — ‘softies’, so to speak, because they exhibit professionalism and restraint in war. To prevail in the wars of the future, the West’s armies would need to become more like the fanatics and savages they face in Islamic lands, the presumed battlefield of (some/most/all) future wars. What Van Creveld is suggesting is a particularly insidious idea. For if the West’s armies were to become like the Mohammedans’, Western society would come to reflect such barbaric values (and sometimes it seems that we’re well on the way as it is….)
Van Creveld sees the situation from the Israeli perspective — the perspective of the pariah state of Israel, the invaders and occupiers of Palestine, hated by its neighbors and surrounded by its enemies. The situation is bleak for these ‘aliens in an alien land’; without the support of the west, (viz., America), Israel would be in a hopeless situation. (Many feel that it is, anyway, even with America’s support, and this essay by Van Creveld has undertones of this fatalistic view.) From Van Creveld’s perspective, it is not surprising that he would want to see an American military better equipped psychologically to oppose and defeat the Islamacists, Israel’s eternal enemies. An American army devoid of conscience, reduced to savage brutality, could better wage war against the Mohammedans, and thus could better serve Israel’s purposes in the Middle East.
The problem is, Israel’s objectives in the Middle East are unrealistic in the long run — Israel’s plight *is* hopeless, as any thinking person can see. Israel’s plan is to lure America, its only friend and ally, into the quagmire of perpetual war in the Middle East — a war America and the West have no business getting involved in, and a war the West cannot possibly win. Invading and occupying the vast stretches of inhospitable Arab lands is a losing proposition, something only fools would even consider.
Israel knows that the current American government — the government that it can so easily manipulate — is just such a government, a government of fools. But this may not always be the case. The colossal depredation of the American economy (by the agents of Israel, the banksters) and mismanagement of the institutions of democracy by the neocons (also agents of Israel) has led to a dire situation here in America. The situation is so bad that economic and social collapse is predicted by many thoughtful analysts. But there might be a silver lining to this cloudy future. Economic and political collapse could lead to widespread reform in the American political system. The New America which rises from he ashes of the one destroyed by The Enemy Within will probably be much more democratic, much more circumspect in its affairs, and much more constrained in its foreign policy. A reformed, democratized American government might not be so anxious to waste its dwindling resources on hopeless foreign military adventures and send its children off to fight and die in the deserts of the Middle East. This might prove to be especially true as the need for Middle Eastern oil declines. The New America might just say, “To hell with Israel, that’s not our fight” as, indeed, it is not.
There is no ‘winning’ a Middle Eastern war, because it is a ‘holy war’ in the Islamacists’ homeland. The only realistic approach to the relentless expansion of Mohammedanism is a policy of containment … following the general recognition that we are, indeed, caught up in a ‘holy war’, an idea which America as a nation is a long way from coming to terms with. Van Creveld is right when he says the armies of the West are not prepared to fight a holy war. We should be thankful that American soldiers are not willing to cut off the heads of our adversaries, torture prisoners, defile corpses, incinerate women and children with incendiary munitions, and slaughter innocents as are the Semitic tribes of the Middle East (Jews and Arabs are both Semites and both are guilty of horrific atrocities.) If we, as a society, lower ourselves to the level of these Semitic tribes, we become like our adversaries … we become the loathsome creatures that they are.
In his writings, Van Creveld makes some accurate observations about the growing problems caused by women in the military. He makes the case for the proposition that the military is no place for women. In short, we don’t *want* the military to be ‘feminized’. Moreover, women — being smaller, weaker, and more emotional — make lousy soldiers. Denial of the obvious natural differences between the sexes leads to misguided policies that weaken the national defense and waste more of taxpayers’ money. Such policies serve no useful purpose. Instead such policies promote a misguided concept of gender equality — something which we should all be thankful does not exist.
Figuratively speaking, God and Mother Nature conspired to give man and woman complimentary natures: different, and definitely not ‘equal’. Men and women’s natures are complimentary, in some ways as different as night and day … and this is how it should be. Mother Nature does not make mistakes, even if God’s handiwork sometimes gives one pause (Republican presidential candidate and insufferable blowhard Donald Trump is seen by many as proof that even He can make mistakes. Bear in mind, however, that in His infinite wisdom He might have intended Donald Trump to be *comic relief* for a nation facing existential struggles, sent to remind us of the danger of not thinking for ourselves, but instead taking politicians’ bullshit seriously.)
In this essay Van Creveld points out that women rarely see combat, yet, proportionately speaking, far more women than men suffer from the debilitating mental condition known as PTSD.
“An important role in all this is played by military women and feminism generally. In every known human society (even, as far as we are able to judge, in some animal societies) since the world began, whatever treatment was considered suitable for males has been seen as too harsh for females. Conversely, to be treated like women was perceived as the most humiliating thing men could undergo. By insisting on gender equality the way they have — even putting in place “equal employment opportunity officers” charged with hounding any man who dares “offend” a woman — Western armed forces have dragged their men’s pride through the mire.
The more so because, as the distribution of casualties shows, it is the men who do practically all the fighting. At the same time they have often confronted women with demands that were too much for them. The proof of this particular pudding is in the eating. Proportionally speaking, far more female than male soldiers are said to suffer from PTSD.”
(Note: the accuracy of Van Creveld’s comment about the incidence of PTSD has not been checked by me. If true, it is a powerful statement on the suitability of women to military roles in general and combat roles in particular.)
(C. H. Sulka 07-20-2015 15:15 -0500)
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Fabius Maximus website
Martin van Creveld: Our armies become pussycats, part 1
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Summary: The revolution in military affairs continues, silently and invisibly. Our hardware-obsessed military and its fanboys see only tools while the nature of war itself evolves. Previous posts looked at the increased role of women and children. Here Martin van Creveld looks at another fundamental change.
Pussycats – Part I
By Martin van Creveld
From his website, 21 May 2014 (Here with his generous permission)
For several decades now, Western armed forces — which keep preening themselves as the best-trained, best organized, best equipped best led, in history — have been turned into pussycats. Being pussycats, they went from one defeat to the next.
True, in 1999 they did succeed in imposing their will on Serbia. But only because the opponent was a small, weak state (at the time, the Serb armed forces, exhausted by a prolonged civil war, were rated 35th in the world); and even then only because that state was practically defenseless in the air. The same applies to Libya in 2011. Over there, indigenous bands on the ground did most of the fighting and took all the casualties. In both cases, when it came to engaging in ground combat, man against man, the West, with the U.S at its head, simply did not have what it takes.
On other occasions things were worse still. Western armies tried to create order in Somalia and were kicked out by the “Skinnies,” as they called their lean but mean opponents. They tried to beat the Taliban in Afghanistan, and were kicked out. They tried to impose democracy (and get their hands on oil) in Iraq, and ended up leaving with their tails between their legs. The cost of these foolish adventures to the U.S alone is said to have been around 1 trillion — 1,000,000,000,000 — dollars. With one defeat following another, is it any wonder that, when those forces were called upon to put an end to the civil war in Syria, they and the societies they serve preferred to let the atrocities go on?
By far the most important single reason behind the repeated failures is the fact that, one and all, these were luxury wars. With nuclear weapons deterring large-scale attack, for seven decades now no Western country has waged anything like a serious, let alone existential, struggle against a more or less equal opponent. As the troops took on opponents much weaker than themselves — often in places they had never heard about, often for reasons nobody but a few politicians understood — they saw no reason why they should get themselves killed.
Given the circumstances, indeed, doing so would have been the height of stupidity on their part. Yet from the time the Persians at Marathon in 490 B.C were defeated by the outnumbered Greeks right down to the present, troops whose primary concern is not to get themselves killed have never be able to fight, let alone win.
One would think that, aware of the problem, the politicians and societies that so light-heartedly sent the troops to fight under these circumstances would do everything in their power to compensate them in other ways. For example, by allowing them some license to enjoy life before a bomb went off, blowing them to pieces; making sure that those put in harm’s way would be given a free hand to do what they had to do; allowing them to take pride in their handiwork; celebrating them on their return; and giving them all kinds of privileges.
Was it not Plato who suggested that those who excelled in war on behalf of the republic be given first right to kiss and be kissed? After all, in every field of human activity from football to accounting it has always been those who enjoy what they do who do it best. Conversely, in every field those who excel are those who enjoy what they are doing. Is there any reason why, in waging war and fighting, things should be any different?
Instead, far from honoring their troops or even showing them respect, Western societies have done the opposite. During training and in garrison, they are surrounded by a thousand regulations that prevent them from doing things every civilian can do as a matter of course. That includes, if they are American and not yet 21 years old, buying a can of beer and drinking its contents.
On campaign they are bound by rules of engagement that often make their enemies laugh at them, prevent them from defending themselves, lead to unnecessary casualties, and result in punishment if they are violated. Anybody who openly says that he took pride in his deadly work — as, for example, the legendary, now retired, four-star U.S Marine Corps General Jim Mattis at one point did — will be counseled to shut up if he is lucky and disciplined if he is not.
American troops returning from a tour undergo obligatory testing for post-traumatic stress disorder or PTSD. PTSD, of course, is a real problem for some. However, as all history shows, it is simply not true that fighting, killing and watching others being killed is necessarily traumatic. Suppose the Roman Army had dealt with PTSD as we do now; would it have conquered the world? Nor, contrary to what one often hears, is it true that historical combat was less terrible than its modern equivalents. Perhaps to the contrary, given that the combatants could literally look into each other’s eyes, hear the screams, see the spurting blood, and touch the scattering brains.
As I wrote decades ago in Fighting Power: German & U.S. Army Performance, 1939-1945, the real origin of PTSD is found in a personnel system which, for reasons of administrative efficiency, treats the troops like interchangeable cogs, isolates them, and prevents them from bonding.
Adding offense to injury, the above mentioned tests, introduced with the possibility of liability in mind, are humiliating. Wasn’t it Frederick the Great who said that the one thing that can drive men into the muzzles of the cannon trained on them is pride? Nor do things end at this point. Far from celebrating the troops’ courage and sacrifice, society very often treats them as damaged goods. Indeed things have come to the point where it expects them to be damaged.
An important role in all this is played by military women and feminism generally. In every known human society (even, as far as we are able to judge, in some animal societies) since the world began, whatever treatment was considered suitable for males has been seen as too harsh for females. Conversely, to be treated like women was perceived as the most humiliating thing men could undergo. By insisting on gender equality the way they have — even putting in place “equal employment opportunity officers” charged with hounding any man who dares “offend” a woman — Western armed forces have dragged their men’s pride through the mire.
The more so because, as the distribution of casualties shows, it is the men who do practically all the fighting. At the same time they have often confronted women with demands that were too much for them. The proof of this particular pudding is in the eating. Proportionally speaking, far more female than male soldiers are said to suffer from PTSD.
Had the system been deliberately designed to sap the fighting power of Western armies, it could hardly have been improved on. This might well make us ask: cui bono? Who profits? There are several answers. First come thousands of “mental health professionals” hired to treat the people in question. Like the female psychologist in Philipp Roth’s book, The Human Stain, who asks a Vietnam veteran whether he has ever killed anybody (firing a machine gun from a helicopter, he has killed hundreds, perhaps thousands), most would not recognize a bullet if they saw one.
Next come the corporations that produce all sorts of psychopharma (the standard method for treating PTSD is to drug the patients). Third are the media. Always eager to throw the first stone, very often they have a field day selling those suffering from the symptoms to a slavering public. Between them, these three make billions out of the enterprise.
Last not least are feminist organizations which always insist on “equality” (in reality, privilege) even if it means going over the bodies of many “sisters” and wrecking their countries’ military. Two points remain to be made. First, as their repeated victories prove, the Taliban, their brothers in arms in other countries, and non-Western societies generally know better than to follow the West on is self-destructive path. Second, societies that lose their fighting power by treating their troops in this way are doomed. Sooner or later, somebody will come along, big sword in hand, and cut off their head.
Let those with ears to listen, listen.
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Martin van Creveld
About the Author
Martin van Creveld is Professor Emeritus of History at Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and one of the world’s most renowned experts on military history and strategy.
The central role of Professor van Creveld in the development of theory about modern war is difficult to exaggerate. He has provided both the broad historical context — looking both forward and back in time — much of the analytical work, and a large share of the real work in publishing both academic and general interest books. He does not use the term 4GW, preferring to speak of “non-trinitarian” warfare — but his work is foundational for 4GW just the same.
Professor van Creveld has written 20 books, about almost every significant aspect of war. He has written about the history of war, such as The Age of Airpower. He has written about the tools of war: Technology and War: From 2000 B.C. to the Present. Some of his books discuss the methods of war: Supplying War: Logistics from Wallenstein to Patton, Training of Officers: From Military Professionalism to Irrelevance, and Air Power and Maneuver Warfare.
Perhaps most important are his books examine the evolution of war, such as Nuclear Proliferation and the Future of Conflict, The Transformation of War: The Most Radical Reinterpretation of Armed Conflict Since Clausewitz (IMO the best work to date about modern war), The Changing Face of War: Combat from the Marne to Iraq, and (my favorite) The Culture of War.
He’s written controversial books, such as Fighting Power: German and U.S. Army Performance, 1939-1945 (German soldiers were better than ours!) and Men, Women & War: Do Women Belong in the Front Line?.
He’s written one of the most influential books of our generation about war, his magnum opus — the dense but mind-opening The Rise and Decline of the State – the ur-text describing the political order of the 21st century. For links to his articles see The Essential 4GW reading list: Martin van Creveld.
For More Information
See all posts about the real revolution in military affairs, about women soldiers, and especially these… (links)
“For many soldiers, mental trauma lingers at home”.
Is post-traumatic stress disorder more common now than in past wars?
Does America have the best military in the world?
XREF:
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TITL: OUR ARMIES BECOME PUSSYCATS
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PUBL: FABIUS-MAXIMUS (.COM)
DATE: JULY 18, 2015
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