The most elaborate war game the U.S. military has ever held was rigged so that it appeared to validate the modern, joint-service war-fighting concepts it was supposed to be testing, according to the retired Marine lieutenant general who commanded the game’s Opposing Force.
That general, Paul Van Riper, said he worries the United States will send troops into combat using doctrine and weapons systems based on false conclusions from the recently concluded Millennium Challenge 02. He was so frustrated with the rigged exercise that he said he quit midway through the game.
Retired Ambassador Robert Oakley, who participated in the experiment as Red civilian leader, said Van Riper was outthinking the Blue Force from the first day of the exercise.
Van Riper used motorcycle messengers to transmit orders, negating Blue’s high-tech eavesdropping capabilities, Oakley said. Then, when the Blue fleet sailed into the Persian Gulf early in the experiment, Van Riper’s forces surrounded the ships with small boats and planes sailing and flying in apparently innocuous circles.
There's more in the article.
This is outrageous and is a perfect example of a bureaucracy protecting itself at the expense of those who are sent to do the job.
General Van Riper seems almost prophetic:
This is exactly what Van Riper feared would happen. “My main concern was we’d see future forces trying to use these things when they’ve never been properly grounded in any sort of an experiment,” he said.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."- General Sir Charles Napier
old article from the slam forum. it's validity was doubted.
This day is Fantastic!
Myers Briggs: ENTJ
Political Compass: -3/-6 DOOMerWoW
"I really hate it when the guy you were pegging as Mr. Worst Case starts saying, "Oh, I was wrong, it's going to be much worse." " - Adrian Laguna
I don't doubt it at all. There's been too many stories since before Vietnam of the ineptitude of much of the top brass.
This story was also reported on last September in the Guardian.
While I disagree with the Guardian's editorial policies, their reportage is fairly good, if somewhat slanted.
Like I said in an earlier thread,. Rumsfeld is beginning to look like Robert McNamara.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."- General Sir Charles Napier
If you want a good expamle of the Army buearuacracy in action watch the movie "Pentagon Wars". Its about the creation of the Bradley fighting vechile.... im sure watching it will give anyone in the armed forces goose bumps when they realize that this is the system that their lives depend upon. (the army bureaucracy, not the bradley)
Devolution is quite as natural as evolution, and may be just as pleasing, or even a good deal more pleasing, to God. If the average man is made in God's image, then a man such as Beethoven or Aristotle is plainly superior to God, and so God may be jealous of him, and eager to see his superiority perish with his bodily frame.
Who's the more foolish, the fool or the fool who follows him? -Obi-Wan Kenobi
"In the unlikely event that someone comes here, hates everything we stand for, and then donates a big chunk of money anyway, I will thank him for his stupidity." -Darth Wong, Lord of the Sith
It was based off a non-fiction book of the same name written by the Colonel played by Cary Ewles in the movie- naturally, it amalgamates many bureaucrats into a few key people, make things a lot funnier, etc etc, but the Bradely program was still a fuck-up of the first order.
it's validity was doubted
Validity of the test, or the article? Because that article's story was repeated all over the place, and Van Riper *did* leave in disgust.
IRG CommandoJoe wrote:You mean that movie was actually non-fictional???
Its pretty close to the actuall fight over the Bradley....even today in an even fight they would probably earn the name "Purple Heart Boxes" in a hurry, but then the Marder or the BMP series is just as dangerous....
This story is old news, the Army regularly riggs its wargames exercises, and commanders who are inventive and creative are rapidly shot down by the 'impartial' referees. Despite what we all want to believe , the Army is not nearly as 'professional' as they would have you believe. the infighting between services , and within each services command structure can be more vicious that the worst capitol hill politcal fight.
3rd Impact wrote:What was this thing about the Bradley IFV? I never heard anything about that before.
Just took almost 20 years and about 14 billion dollars to get it to the troops- in original, unupgraded form, mind you- there was nothing to justify that exorbitant cost.
It's as decent an IFV as any other now- none of them will be resisting much on the modern battlefield, mind you (adjust for how old the weapons are on the other side, however).
The plan devised by that wargame is no longer valid, regardless of if it was rigged or not. Franks held out for more troops - part of the reason for the delay - in a rather extensive fight with Pentagon officials. That's why we have 250,000 troops committed instead of 100,000. This war is being fought at least partially conventionally thanks to him and we can applaud him for his determination.
The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth. -- Wikipedia's No Original Research policy page.
Van Riper's case is an old one. It was being circulated as early as late summer or early fall of 2001.
Certain of this "prophetic" strategist's suggestions were wrong. In the wargame, mind you, he managed to sink numerous American fighting ships by deploying land-based missiles and speedboats packed with suicide bombers.
We took what we could from the simulation and then reorganized.
Don't have anything to add here other than General Van Riper was my Scoutmaster when I lived in Camp Lejune.
"The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."
