LIB,MR BEARS said:
Canada2017 said:
LIB,MR BEARS said:
RMF5630 said:
LIB,MR BEARS said:
Canada2017 said:
RMF5630 said:
Canada,
Totally agree with every thing you said. 101st is a top notch unit. "Dope on a Rope" are one of the best in the world. : ) (Used to have a Baylor/Aggie relationship with them when I was in the 82nd... Nothing but playful respect.)
I was curious if his view of the Air Mobil (101st) capabilities versus straight Airborne (82nd), Mech Infantry (24th), Shock Troops (Ranger), Cav (6th) or straight Infantry (9th) played into the decision. My info is dated, but I think those are the Rapid Deployment Units we have or if we even think about them that way anymore. Been a long time since I have had this type of conversation. You probably guessed I am a logistics, infrastructure and mission wonk.
I know you find it distasteful that non-infantry types play a role in these decisions, so I thank you for your patience with us logistic/support infrastructure types. My heroes from WW2 were not Patton, but Marshall and Eisenhower, the people that understood how to bring the right resources, including people, to bear on a problem.
The colonel , myself and our wives rarely get that deep into such discussions.
However after over 30 years of friendship…. I have come to admire and trust the man. His opinions carry weight with me .
Bottom line….
Jan believes the 101st is a crack combat unit . Placed near the Ukrainian border to effectively enter the battle if ordered . That this is no 'training ' mission .
We didn't discuss the ramifications of such deployments as I have long known Jan is all about following orders from upper echelons.
And I have too much respect for the man to ruin a pleasant evening.
BTW your work is appreciated.
I simply have attended enough military funerals.
Don't want our dementia stricken commander in chief to bring on still more…….especially when our strategic national interests are not remotely involved.
From my non-military point of view: For decades, we have had mechanized forces in Europe because the threat came from overwhelming numbers of Soviet mechanized forces coming over the border. Today,, the threat is different so the response would need to be different and that is where the 101st would come into play if needed.
My uneducated self is fully confident that the 101st is fully equipped to be a tank killing/artillery killing machine with highly-advanced, lightweight weapons.
In the unlikely event the US sees action in this conflict, it will not be as an occupying force but as a force that kills the advance of the aggressor.
Putin should understand that, should he do anything to draw the US in, his forces will be rapidly cut down.
We are talking a Brigade here. Only so much impact on a several hundred mile front facing 200k with Armor. I am sure they are capable of anti-armor operations, but if it were me and my totally talking out the ass opinion, I would say point protection for strategic locations, maybe even Airports to secure forward re-supply.
You may be right, we still have heavy armor? (1st Armor and Cav) I am sure we still have Air and Cav, but heavy I am not sure. Below is my timeframe, we are a far cry from that!
You are probably right about securing key points. Also, we would own the air.
We owned the air in Korea, Vietnam , Iraq and Afghanistan .
Korea didn't have smart munitions
Vietnam had limited smart munitions, a jungle canopy and a >>>motivated adversary<<<.
Iraq we dominated their forces on both the ground and air.
Afghanistan had no mechanized adversary unless you want to count a Toyota T100 with a mounted weapon.
And we will own the air if the Russo-Ukrainian War expands westward. Russia cannot possibly establish air superiority over Nato territory, and cannot prevent us from establishing air superiority over Belarus and Ukraine. They have not the tactics, the equipment, nor the supply chain to compete with Nato. They have limited ability to even do CAP over Ukraine.
The bulk of our forces in Europe are in UK Germany, Greece, Turkey. Very limited numbers in Eastern Europe members. No bases of any size or strategic significance. We have largely retained the Cold War footprint - downsizing in face of reduced threat and increased strategic depth (via eastward expansion), but overall still essentially positioned for the CW scenarios in the Fulda Gap. This is of significance in the current situation.
Airborne units are typically assault units...to seize and hold bridges and airfields for limited periods of time until ground pounding units can catch up (think the movie "A Bridge Too Far"). They are also logical units to make friendly advances into new territory....like to establish a new base somewhere improved or not. Moreover, look at the link I posted above - the 101st units assigned to Poland and Romania are the logistics units....establishing the bases from which the assault units will operate. So there really is no threat to Russia YET. But establishing base camps to set up command posts is a sign of intent....that the most famed airborne division in the world is en route. And when they arrive, they would serve two purposes: to be that speed-bump - to position US troops where Russia could not plausibly invade without encountering them. And, yes, having the 101st within a few hundred miles of something important to you is cause for you to be concerned. The 101st could easily take Sebastopol. Or the Kerch Bridge. Or the ports & airfields in Kaliningrad. In the chess game of war, even though we are not involved, the movement of the 101st is something Russia cannot ignore....it changes their calculations, to force them to think about defending, if not actually defending, something terribly important to them. For a power in Russia's current position, that is a zero-sum exercise. They will have to leave something undefended to deal with this new threat.
So Russia can do bugger all about any of that. They can't stop the Ukrainian Army. They're in retreat from the Ukrainian Army, with shattered communication and supply lines. They don't have a tiger by the tail....the tiger has THEM by the tail.
And that's the point. Yes, we expanded Nato eastwards. But that was just membership. We never expanded much other than token and temporary unit deployments eastwards. Yet, Russia claimed that even the mere mention of Ukraine as a member of Nato is a threat to Russia so severe as to justify invading Ukraine. Ok. FIne, Vlad. So you contrive a Nato pretext to invade a neutral neighbor. We will respond by ACTUALLY deploying combat units into Nato countries closer to you. You see, Vlad, we didn't do that up to now because....well, we thought you could be trusted. And we didn't want to alarm you. But now we see that you cannot be trusted, so we don't give a **** about alarming you. We are going to do what we should have done 20 years ago and deploy combat units to Romania and Poland.
And if you don't knock it off in Ukraine, we might just move our military bases in Germany to Poland and Romania. Both governments have been begging us to do it, Vlad. And frankly, the Germans would be glad to be rid of all that American testosterone roaming German streets every Friday and Saturday night. But we held off. And then you went & done it....tsk tsk tsk.....
That's what's going on, gentlemen. Russia engages in unacceptable adventure on pretext of preventing deterioration of their security position.....so we are going to actually do something that deteriorates their security position. You don't like that, Vlad? Well, then pull your units back to Crimea and start negotiating. We'd be favorably inclined to bring the 101st back home. But if you keep pressing in Ukraine.....well.....we might have to make those infantry bases in Poland and Romania permanent. And bring in some M-1 Abrahms. And while we're at it, it's along way from Ramstein and Spangdahlem all the way to the Ukrainian border, quite a burden to keep those KC-130s in the air to fuel our F-16 CAPs a thousand miles from base. Sure would be easier to just close Spangdahlem and move it to Romania. We were planning to move it to Italy a couple years ago, but....you know....the security situation has changed and we need those assets closer to Ukraine. Or, you could withdraw your army from Ukraine.
Your choice, Vlad.....
