Professional Military Incompetence, Part 2

Hello everybody!

Having ‘spent’ the Part 1 to outline some of examples for what kind of massive mistakes are done, and what kind of opportunities missed in ‘every-day studies of contemporary military experiences/history’, lets check the issue of why are they done.

To make it easier for many, and because military-related experiences of the following kind are a ‘tad too touchy’, let me offer you one example from the civilian life: I think it’s an excellent example – not only for the topic on hand, but also because it’s going to explain almost everything that’s going wrong with our societies. In civilian affairs, in economies, and thus – unsurprisingly – in armed forces, too.

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‘Recently’ had a chat with a professor at a certain notable US university. The gentleman in question was (and remains) both delighted and frustrated. Delighted, because he’s discovered our @War books about so many of ‘minor’ wars fought since 1945. Frustrated, because he would like to study (on his own) and to let his students study so many topics we’re studying (in our books).

But, he can’t.

Please, don’t jump to any kind of conclusions. Especially not like that he’s forbidden to study. No, it’s not explicitly prohibited (whether by his superiors and/or so-called ‘peers’, and then, for example in form of some kind of ‘written order’), but…

To quote his words, the modern-day (civilian) academia is dominated by (quote) snobbery, prestige and gatekeeping, and there is absolutely no freedom to address topics without strictly sticking to the ‘pre-conceived lines’. Indeed, such behaviour is (quote), simply unthinkable.

Even if, the procedure of ‘independent reviews’ (of future publications, foremost ‘books’, but also different ‘research papers’) is a (quote) vicious circle one cannot avoid: a procedure flatly killing any promising project covering anything else but what I am going to call ‘Topic A’ (see: usual, widely published topics).

Why? Not only is there ‘resistance’ against researching and discussing anything else than ‘Topic A’, but, these ‘independent reviews’ are run so that they often delay a book/study/research paper – i.e. the mass of projects - by no less than 6-7, even 8 years.

(And yes: it’s really that much.)

One of results is that the academia is entrenched in its usual Topic A – be these the 173^rd discussion of the underwear of Maria-Antoinette, the 32^nd discussion of the digestive system of earthworms, or the 2,179^th discussion of the Battle of Cannae, you name it – and that to the degree where it ‘knows’ only ‘such’, ‘mainstream’ topics like the ‘Topic A’. Sure, there is often a handful of people who can discuss, say, the ‘Topic B’ (a small number of ‘less-well-known affairs’) in serious fashion. But, beyond that point, they can’t discuss anything else, and they are refusing to discuss anything else – because they are ah so cool to know the ‘Topic A’, are masters in it, and that’s ‘their field’.

This is reaching such proportions that there are no ‘peers’ qualified to run these ‘independent reviews’ – of ‘Topics C to Z’. And, hand on heart: how shall people who are specialised in the ‘Topic A’, perhaps in the ‘Topic B’, but have no trace of clue about the Topic C….might have heard the Topic N exists… but certainly have never heard about the Topics Y or Z – review any of these and say, ‘OK, this is good to publish’ or ‘nah, that’s rubbish’?

What a surprise, the mass of those who are trying to research and publish about such like ‘Topic N’, are giving up before they even start, and those who might be interested in Y or Z are not even thinking about trying…

Oh, and if this is still not enough, then add such factors like predilections, prejudices, racism (yes, there’s still a lot of it, so also ‘even’ within the academia), religion etc.

Now think of it: when there are 26 letters in the English Alphabet, and the academia is ‘all the time researching just 1,5 of these’ - how many ‘other letters’, other topics remain entirely unknown?

How many experiences and advices are never researched at all?

How many valuable lessons - lessons that could save us ‘billions’ in money, and (more importantly) so much ‘blood’ - are ignored?

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The overall results of this are as ‘surprising’ as they are plain obvious, and clearly visible in every-day life, in how our economies (especially corporations) work, in the politics in particular. Unavailingly, the resulting ‘system’, the indoctrination in thinking solely within very confined space, is mirrored in our armed forces, too. The way the academia is behaving is exactly the same way the economy and politics are behaving, not to talk about the military academia and thus the armed forces. Indeed, each of these ‘levels’ is ‘filtering’ the information supplied by the academia: the academia is read by think-tanks, think-tanks are advising the politics and armed forces, and the media is then copy-pasting resulting statements after only a bare minimum of cross-checking (if any) – and reporting (intentionally) without an idea about the backgrounds and context. What a surprise then, if the mass of military theoreticians is thus ‘missing’ and ‘ignoring’ the mass of valuable experiences from so many of recent wars: they can’t know about them.

The result is the Professional Military Incompetence I’m talking about.

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Now, what kind of effects does this phenomena – this professional military incompetence – have upon, ‘for example’, the war in Ukraine?

Believe it or not, this conflict is offering dozens of ‘brilliant’ examples.

Lets start with the start: before 24 February 2022, the mass of Western intelligence assessments have concluded that Ukraine isn’t going to survive any kind of a Russian invasion. At most, they were giving the government in Kyiv and the Ukrainian Armed Forces (ZSU) something like ‘two, perhaps three weeks’ until they collapse and get overrun by the Russians. They did this so often, so much so, and they are all so ‘leaky’ that when the FSB obtained intelligence on so many such intelligence assessments, and then informed Pudding about them, he was not only convinced it would be easy to crush Ukraine, but also extremely confident his armed forces - indeed: mere ‘special’ parts of the same - can do so without any kind of problems. And yes, in a matter of… well, perhaps no ‘three days’, but certainly two to three weeks.

In similar fashion, Western intelligence assessments have concluded that the ZSU is so ‘endemically corrupt’ – and that, principally, because the pre-war ZSU commanders were refusing to follow different of NATO advices – that, alone because ‘Ukrainians aren’t doing things the way we would do them’, it concluded the ZSU for pre-determined to get smashed by a Russian invasion. Indeed, to fall apart, with half the force running over to the Russian side.

As a consequence, the very same Western intelligence services were advising their political masters to, if they provide anything to Kyiv at all, then only arms and ammo suitable for ‘few fanatical Ukrainians’ to continue resisting the Russians in form of guerrilla warfare. And not only our corrupt and incompetent politicians – kicked and pushed by the oligarchy that brought them to power, and remains keen to ‘return to business as usual’ with Pudding – but even their advisors (incl. diverse think-tanks) couldn’t but find such ideas ‘the only solution’, perhaps even ‘great’. Because that was all they knew about such cases. Because nobody ever added the factor ‘determination of Ukrainian people’ to their assessments.

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At this point, I cannot but ‘warn’: please, make no mistake and jump to the conclusion that different populists, and especially all the Brownies* within the politics and the armed forces – whether they are named Dumpf, Orban, Fico, Farrage, or whatever, and then gangs like the RN/National Rally (of France), or AfD and BSW (Germany), or FPÖ (Austria) – might be better. They are not. On the contrary: they are worse. They not only ignore even the little valuable advice professional intelligence services and different think-tanks are providing, but they are working into the hands of such like Pudding, or his business partners. Because that’s in ‘best interest’ of their masters within the oligarchy, and thus of ‘higher national interests’, too.

(This is why I’m not only ‘careless’ but indeed ‘amused’ when, for example, Dumpf blackmails Ukraine and Europe with the cancellation of the US military aid and withdrawal of US troops. Yes, please: I want to see him converting this idea into reality - especially when all the possible US oligarchs earning literal billions from maintaining and supplying US troops in Europe, not to talk about manufacturing all the weapons to replace stocks sent to Ukraine, figure out the consequences of what that idiot is about to do… Actually: I’m looking forward for that moment.)

With other words: ‘our’ entire system of governance – (this kleptocracy and idiocracy we’ve got, but insistently call ‘democracy’, and no matter if ‘left-wing’, ‘centrist’, ‘right-wing’), and thus that of the management of our armed forces - is based on ‘information’ the quality of which is ranging between ‘poor advice’, ‘arrogant & ignorant’, ‘awful’, ‘rubbish’, and ‘fake news’.

It’s screwed up.

And that at the time the system of state control on behalf of the public, the society, was either completely subverted (USA, UK, Hungary, to name few good examples), or is on the best way to end in that condition (Slovakia, France, Germany, Austria…)

Cannot but end this part in similar fashion like in the Part 1: is it then surprising if exactly the same is happening Ukraine?

Of course it is not.

(…to be continued…)

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Brownies = comes from ‘Brown Shirts’. If you don’t know who used to wear such stuff, this is certainly the wrong blog to read.