The United States Army is the smallest it has been since 1940, the year before the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and sunk the majority of the American fleet in an act of perfidy that launched the US and the world into a global war that killed millions and changed the course of civilization.
[Frame of reference: US 1940 population 132,000,000; currently 340,000,000.]
The American fleet was considered the most potent American military arm and the only one that could project force over the horizon into the Pacific, so the Japs plotted to take it out and did.
Weakness attracts aggression.
USS West Virginia and USS Tennessee burning after Jap attack on Battleship Row at 7:48 AM, 7 Dec 1941
Yes, dear reader, but it gets far worse.
1. The Army (and most other military services except for the Space Force) has failed to meet its recruiting goals for three fiscal years and the future does not look better.
Whatever the Army is currently doing now is not working.
2. To make matters worse, the Army and the Marines together kicked out the equivalent of an entire division (15,000 men) of seasoned warriors over vaccine policy.
When your Army is less than 450,000 men, you cannot afford to dismiss a division’s worth of seasoned warriors.
3. In a recent Rand Company study more than 54% of Americans of parental age would discourage a young person from enlisting in the Army.
4. The same Rand Company study indicated that respondents who self-identified as Democrats were even less likely to encourage a young person to enlist in the Army.
5. The same Rand Company study indicated that persons who had actually served in the military were far, far more likely to encourage a young person to enlist.
As you can see, the fewer Americans who serve, the fewer likely to encourage service. It is a vicious circle.
We did this to ourselves with bad policy and ill-conceived notions.
In January 2012, then President Obama and Defense Secretary Panetta abandoned what had been US strategy since World War.
General Martin Dempsey was the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs at the time of this policy shift.
The existing policy — called the “two war policy” — commanded that the US would at all times be ready and able to fight and win two major regional conflicts.
This policy guided the Congress and the Pentagon as to force structure, capabilities, planning, and funding.
This policy shift damns us to know that the current US force structure should not be considered capable of fighting a war v Russia in Ukraine/Europe while simultaneously coming to the aid of Taiwan.
That, the prospect of war in Europe and Asia, is, unfortunately the threat we currently face coupled with a restive and dangerous Middle East and a rising tide of terror.
If you can refute this, tell me how I have it wrong, please.
Wake the fuck up, America. This shit is real.
There are a number of additional reasons why the US is unable to meet its recruiting goals and to stand up an Army capable of meeting the real world threat.
1. The Nation has lost its collective respect for the nobility of military service. This is the result of an overwhelming assault on the values that motivate and inspire young men to serve.
Fighting age men and women in American society today have no sense of service to anything greater than their cell phone and their social media accounts. We allowed this to happen.
2. American youth has gotten soft and is generally unable to serve.
In World War II when induction centers tested the physical fitness of potential draftees, more than 90% were physically fit sufficient to serve in the combat arms.
During the Vietnam War Era, that number was 65%.
1960s La Sierra High School physical fitness class
Currently, that number is less than 15%.
Schools did this to us by cancelling gym class and de-prioritizing physical fitness at every level. It is reversible.
3. Since the Obama administration, the Army has identified and promoted general officers into positions of senior leadership based on criteria other than their ability to plan for, fight, and win America’s wars.
These generals have promoted subordinates in their own mold.
4. These woke generals have focused on programs and initiatives that have nothing to do with winning wars, but are driven to achieve social objectives that fail to meet the real world threat.
The military is not a social petri dish.
5. There are only two criteria within which any military decision should be framed:
Does this action/program increase the lethality of the American military?
Does this action/program safeguard the lives of our warriors in combat?
6. Needless to say — former woke/political Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Milley’s fixation on white rage does not meet those standards nor does the mindless head game of pronouns and the silly fixation on transgender soldiers and abortions.
7. There is zero accountability in the military for failure — talking to the generals who failed to fashion a winning strategy in Afghanistan over two decades and the generals who oversaw the feckless and incompetent withdrawal from Afghanistan.
For God’s sake, man, the Taliban were a third rate light infantry and we had air supremacy, unlimited firepower, and overwhelming intelligence. Who answers to America for this failure?
Here’s an action plan:
1. Let’s start by electing political leaders who have respect for the military and who will write and fund policy consistent with the real world threat out there.
It is time to end the eleven year experiment with weakness and return to the two war policy.
Why? Because that is the realpolitik threat out there, amigos.
2. We need to reignite the nobility of national service by creating a program that demands every young person spend three years of service to the Nation. It is time to re-institute a “smart” draft.
Our Army should at a minimum be 3X larger than it is currently.
3. Grammar, middle, and high schools need to re-institute physical fitness programs that will provide men and women physically capable to serve in the military.
4. Let’s institute a results oriented accountability based on outcomes rather than wokeness.
5. Let’s stop trading with our enemies. Since the US has sanctioned Russia, we have not missed anything that comes from that hideous shithole.
BTW, there is massive cheating and leakiness in that sanctions regime. Let’s tighten that up, shall we?
6. Let’s stop pretending China is a civilized country. It is not. Let’s stop trading with China.
Let’s do business with our friends. Let’s near shore our imports and let’s friend shore our manufacturing. Let’s bring home all strategic manufacturers.
Everyone with a brain knows this is the smart play; let’s just do it. Now.
7. Let’s use access to the US economy as a weapon. It is the world’s biggest and best economy — do not give our enemies free access to trade and take our dollars home to turn them into weapons with which to kill us.
8. Let’s see the world as it really is and not through cracked, rose, woke glasses.
We are far beyond a simple crisis, amigos. We are falling freely and we are no longer capable of fighting and winning two regional wars. This is very dangerous territory and our enemies are circling.
I know this stuff. I am the product of a military family. I have a direct connection to the Greatest Generation. I am a student of history. I can see it. I went to Virginia Military Institute. I served as a combat engineer. I went to the best military schools.
I am disgusted with how we go about our business as if there are no consequences. This is Europe 1939.
Wake the fuck up and smell the coffee before you taste the borscht and the chow mein, America.
See you on the ramparts. God bless America.
