An NPR article that military retention is suffering.
After finally stabilizing under the Biden administration, it is reversing course again. While it is more than the war in Iran (Hegseth’s leadership purge, DEI rollbacks, attacks on Venezuela ships, and NG deployment to cities), the war is bringing the issue to a head.
Regarding callers to the GI Rights Hotline:
Galvin says nearly all the callers he talks to mention the bombing of a girls school in Iran on the first day of the war, which killed at least 165 civilians, many of them children.
And it’s not just grunts that want out:
“People with really accomplished careers, people in very elite jobs, people who are in Special Forces, people who are Top Gun fighter pilots, physicians, surgeons. … Our highest-ranking CO client right now is a major in the military,” he said.
It’s become obvious that renaming the Department of Defense was not just a symbolic change. I think the fallout is that we will find out just how much of our volunteer military draws a red line between defending the US and naked aggression.
This Bulkwark article makes the case that empowering Iran to control the Strait of Hormuz will up-end the policy of open seas across the globe.
The secret of sea power—the secret Mahan exposed to the world in 1890—was that naval power wasn’t the its real measure. The true source of sea power was peaceful commerce and trade, not in lethal strikes or daring descents and raids.
The US might be motivated to cede control of the strait to Iran (and Oman) as a way of getting out of the war on the false assumption that it won’t affect the US because we don’t make heavy use of the strait. What happens if other waterways follow suit?
.. and to take up the OP’s “and Elsewhere” invitation, what would happen if, to exploit the situation, and to test the fraying bindings of NATO, Putin was to send a mechanised battalion a mere few hundred meters across the border into central Narva, Estonia?
Or the strategists around Xi Jinping determine that there may be a limited window of opportunity to annex Taiwan between now and the end of the 45/47 presidency while the US administration focuses on the American hemisphere, leaving the Asian hemisphere and European hemisphere to whichever strongman wants hegemony?
Just my opinion but I think even without the help of the US, NATO absolutely claps the cheeks of Russia in any theoretical conflict. That is of course unless the US gets involved on Russia’s side. In any case, I’m pretty sure the reason why Europe hasn’t donated their best equipment to Ukraine is because they know they might still need it. And Ukraine has done incredibly well at showing the world how to grind the Russian juggernaut to a halt using, guts, glory and surplus donations of hardware. A military that was purpose-built for fighting the Soviet Union will be pissing in the Moskva in no time. We saw proof of concept for this with Prigozhin’s single day rebellion, which made it about halfway to Moscow basically unopposed.
This may well be true.
I have doubts at Russian capability to fight on a two front war.
But this scenario is about probing the political defenses as much as the boots on ground ones.
The question really is, in the event of an attack on a fellow NATO member, under Article 5, would the US make even a nominal contribution to the defense or simply refuse to be involved?
If the former, then the combined forces marshalled might escort the Russian forces back across the border without a shot being fired, the strategic aim of the incursion being completed. If the latter, then Putin has achieved one of his primary aims i.e. the functional dismantling of NATO even if formal dissolution requires Congressional approval.
Since the U.S. has ended negotiations already, what is the next step?
The Strait isn’t open; ships are tiptoeing through it. I wound think that this means that Trump can’t just disengage.
So does he escalate the war? Send in ground troops? Or keep flying sorties, risking more downed aircraft? At some point, the stockpile of high tech missiles is going to need to be replenished.
I predict that we see some more bombing, then a lull, then a misguided invasion of ground forces. It will surely be ongoing come November, when midterms arrive.
Apparently next step is to ALSO block the strait! Presumably to block Iranian or Iranian friendly ships from transiting.
It’s an idiotic strategy to be sure, so it’s right up the Trump/Hegseth alley. I assume that he means to spike the world price of oil again and tank the stock market to:
A: profit off insider trading
B: force the rest of the world to do something or suffer economically.
Essentially, Trump is now threatening the entire world, using the US military. He’s showing that he’s just as much an asshole as the Iranians.
They could go through with today’s threat to intercept ships that pay the new Iranian toll. An unprovoked attack on some Russian or Chinese vessels would be a show of strength that would be certain to end well, no chance of that one backfiring . /s
As far as I know, the USN will typically send a smaller ship, a boat even, maybe covered by a helicopter, with a boarding crew. I imagine a ship approaching our warships would be warned to shove off and failing to follow instructions might result in the USN opening fire.
A similar amount of ammonium nitrate exploded in Beirut, Lebanon in 2020, generating the third largest non-nuclear, man-caused explosion in history, estimated at 1.1 kilotons of TNT. Buildings up to 2 miles away suffered major structural damage.
The US Navy won’t be able to blockade many ships if they have to approach them as if they were all floating megabombs.