"the U.S. army has truly, and accurately been "decimated" in Iraq. "

[donsu]

http://www.buzzflash.com/mailbag/05/01/mai05022.html

-snip-

"The 1400 Americans killed in Iraq and the 10,000 American casualties are the equivalent of a full division of our Army -- and we only have ten active divisions. "

The above statement is from Senator Kennedy's Jan 27 speech. The dictionary defines the word "decimate" to mean to reduce by 1/10th.

Therefore, the U.S. army has truly, and accurately been "decimated" in Iraq.

R. Jackson
-snip-
-------------------------------


the 1400 dead and the 10,000 plus injured have been reduced way more than 1/10th.

shame on us all.

[mopaul]

1. 'Decimation', the Roman act of killing every 10th soldier to punish them

all. how like rome we've become

[demnan]

2. Especially with Caligula there

in charge.

[mopaul]

3. Caligdubya

he went mad with his own power and ego, and was killed by his own guards. if only.....

[Ironpost]

9. That would be a dream come true. n/t

[NormanConquest]

13. I prefer to call him Commode-us

A megalomaniacal tyrant who fancied himself as a gladiator...even appearing in public in gladiator outfit.

[mopaul]

20. did commode-us land on an aircraft carrier?

look, i'm a fighter pilot cause i have the suit on. bush's been compared to several emperors, nero, caligula, commode-us, and bigus monkus.

[lectrobyte]

21. or as I like to call him, "Little Boots" nt

[brainshrub]

4. How much is a "division"

Do divisions all fight? Are there "telecommunications" divisions or "engineering" divisions?

How many divisions do the Marines and navy have?

I'm obviously not military, anyone care to help me out here?

[pnorman]

5. It seems to be about 15,000

which is close enough to that figure. Here's what I just Googled: http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR1211/

pnorman

[atreides1]

7. Here's a little information

An Army combat division is usually made up of between 10,000 to 17,000 troops.

It is divided into 3 combat brigades, an artillery brigade, a support brigade, and an aviation brigade.

The army currently has 10 active divisions and the Pentagon insists that we can fight a two front war. This is a load of crap, especially when you take into consideration that the US Army had 60 divisions during WWII, along with the 5 divisions that the USMC had.

That's 65 US divisions to fight a two frnot war that lasted at least for the US from 1941 to 1945.

The navy doesn't have divisions, unless you count the marines, which is not a seperate service but a part of the US Navy. At this point in time the marines have the equivilent of at least three combat divisions.

[DistantWind88]

14. The Marines

Are not part of the Navy. They are part of the same Department, but count as a separate Branch of the military.

[Devil Dog Dem]

23. Marines aren't part of the Navy. And, they fielded 6 divisions in WW II

Not 5.

The Marines are indeed a separate service, co-equal to (but smaller than) the Navy, Army, and Air Force. Both the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Marines are part of the Department of the Navy (as are thousands of civilian employees) but the U.S. Navy leadership is nowhere in the Marine Corps' chain of command.

Semper Fi

[atreides1]

25. You're Right

Sorry about missing that 1 division.

[Devil Dog Dem]

26. No sweat. How about the other point I made?

Man, that is a good way to pick a fight with jarheads!
That, and calling them soldiers.

[atreides1]

27. Replied To That as Well

When I said "You're Right" I was also referring to the other point as well.

Never referred to a Marine as a soldier, even when I was in the Army.
I remember calling them a few other names, but not soldier.;)

[Devil Dog Dem]

28. I'm sure you did. And we probably even understood some of them, . . .

that didn't have too many syllables!

Semper fi!

[atreides1]

31. Yes

I tried to keep it simple.

Take Care

[jmowreader]

15. How the Army division works

The Division is the Army's basic combat force. The Marines have three divisions, and they're configured similarly. The Air Force has no divisions, and the Navy is set up in more of a task force configuration--they choose the number and kinds of ships they send to an action depending on what kind of action it is.

There are six kinds of divisions, and they contain from 10,000 to 22,000 troops depending on the kind of division it is:

Infantry
Light Infantry
Mechanized Infantry
Armored
Airborne
Air Assault

An Infantry Division is based on footsoldiers--men who walk everywhere they go. In reality, an Infantry Division that's called an infantry division is no more; all of them have been converted to some other kind of formation.

A Light Infantry Division is a small unit--10,600 troops by Table of Organization and Equipment--that is based on footsoldiers like an Infantry Division is, but it's smaller and has less heavy equipment. The intent of the LID was to be able to deploy the whole thing in 100 C-141 flights.

The Mechanized Infantry Division uses armored personnel carriers to transport its troops, and it has three brigades of infantry and one brigade of tanks.

An Armored Division is like a mechanized infantry division but it has one brigade of infantry and three of tanks.

Airborne and Air Assault divisions are basically identical to infantry divisions but they are trained and configured for insertion by parachute or helicopter.

There is also a formation called the 1st Cavalry Division. It is essentially an armored division but it contains one platoon (50 men) of horse cavalry. If a war breaks out, the horses will remain at Fort Hood as they are ceremonial.

Oops...I better define the echelons.

A handful of soldiers led by a corporal or sergeant is a Squad. (Infantry units break it down further into fire teams--two per squad each led by a corporal.) The size of a squad changes depending on the unit--an armor unit's squads have four men because a tank holds four people; an infantry squad usually contains eleven men, which break down to a pair of fire teams (four men) led by one corporal each, with a sergeant as squad leader.

A collection of squads is a platoon. You usually have four squads in a platoon, but it can be more or less--I was in a platoon that only had two squads and a platoon in a different unit that had six.

A collection of "line" platoons, plus a "service" platoon, is a line company.

A collection of line companies plus a headquarters & service company is a battalion.

A collection of battalions, plus a headquarters & service company, is a brigade.

How these battalions and brigades are configured depends on the division and the kind of unit it is. Let's use the mess hall as an example. An infantry brigade, because it fights in one area, will only have one mess hall. Artillery units will generally have one mess hall for each battalion because the artillery battalions work in direct support of each maneuver brigade. And aviation units are really unusual--they'll put one battalion's mess hall at the airfield on installations where the airfield and the barracks are widely separated, so troops can eat without driving all over post.

Now! A collection of brigades, plus the following support elements, comprise a division:

Headquarters and Headquarters Company
Cavalry Squadron
Artillery Group
Aviation Brigade
Two Medical Companies--one is an aviation element, the other is a surgical unit
One Dental Company
Military Police Company
Military Intelligence Battalion
Signal Battalion
Engineer Battalion
Air Defense Artillery Battalion
Direct Support Maintenance Battalions, one per maneuver brigade
General Support Maintenance Battalion
Two or three supply battalions
Transportation Company
Veterinary Company
Personnel Company
Finance Company
Fuel Company
Ammunition Company
Explosive Ordnance Disposal Company

There are probably others, but you get the idea--a division has to have everything it will need to fight on its own.

A group of divisions--generally three to five--together with a Corps Support Command, a Corps Signal Brigade, Corps MI Brigade and Corps Artillery Brigade form the Corps.

Back to where I was...

A Light Infantry Division contains two active-duty infantry brigades, a national guard infantry brigade, and a pared-down "everything else" to meet the 10,600-troop standard. 10th Mountain has no hospital unit; they get the wounded soldier stabilized and send him to the corps casualty collection point. It uses Cobras instead of Apaches because the number of soldiers needed to support the Cobra is smaller. And it doesn't have as many trucks, thereby cutting down on the number of drivers and mechanics needed. On the upside, you can deploy one of these units quick. In the right application, these divisions are excellent.

A Mechanized Infantry Division contains three infantry brigades mounted in Bradleys, one armored brigade mounted in Abrams tanks, two attack helicopter battalions instead of one in a lighter division, all artillery is self-propelled...mech divisions are for times when you gotta whack someone upside the head really hard.

An Armored Division is for what we once called brute force and ignorance. There are many problems on the modern battlefield that call for a proper dose of high explosives, and three tank brigades, one Bradley brigade, two Apache battalions and an MLRS battalion will solve most of those problems.

The Airborne Division (there is one) is good for stealth. It's about the size of a mech infantry division--yes, it used to have tanks but they were withdrawn a few years ago--but everything in it can be dropped via parachute.

The Air Assault Division (once again, there's one) is like an airborne division but they use helicopters to insert the troops. They also practice a technique called the Artillery Raid: put a 105mm howitzer and some ammo in the back of a CH-47D helicopter, fly it behind the enemy lines, land with the ramp facing the enemy, shove the gun out, lay it, fire a mission, shove the gun back into the helicopter, and leave. I am going to assume that the Artillery Board called in the sergeant major who thought up this little maneuver and proclaimed him crazier than a shithouse rat.

[DistantWind88]

16. Of course, starting this year, none of that is accurate any more

The Army has made the Unit of Action it's basic fighting force. Divisions will no longer perform that function.

[jmowreader]

17. True, true

And as soon as we run Rumsfeld and Bush off, maybe we can get the division back to where it should be--war has changed dramatically in the past 200 years, but the division concept is still valid.

[DistantWind88]

18. I'm not so sure

The UA concept seems to make a lot of sense in today's world. Faster, more mobile units that can still be tasked-organized into large formations when/if needed. We'll have to see how it plays out.

[AllegroRondo]

29. Dont forget the Division Band!

every division has one!

and, yes, they do go to combat with the division. Their combat mission varies depending on division, but its usually DTOC security (guarding the General's HQ).

and, yes, they take their instruments with them to Iraq.


(former Army musician here)

[Name removed]

6. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[noamnety]

10. decimate isn't a stretch at all

It's not an overstatement if it fits the dictionary definition, which this does.

Not sure if the same claim could be made about the "insurgency" (I prefer the word opposition, since - again, by definition - the US troops were the insurgents in Iraq). From what I've read, the number of "insurgents" has gone up because anti-american sentiment has done wonders for their recruitment goals.

[TR Fan]

12. No it's not a stretch, it's just plain wrong.

In the calculation of 1/10th, the following assumptions and variables are incorrect:

1. As noted, a division consists of 10,000-17,000 personnel. The calculation assumes the minimum, which is probably not correct

2. The calculation assumes that everyone who has been wounded has not returned to duty. This is clearly incorrect

3. The denominator of the calculation accounts for only (the minimal) number of U.S. Army personnel. However, many of the dead and wounded are Reservists, Guards, and Marines (and potentially Air Force and Navy). In order to calculate an accurate percentage, the totals of these forces would be required to be added into the denominator

edit: to add other services

[noamnety]

22. That's a fair point

The wounded are from all services, yep, and he does seem to be talking about only the army.

Slightly less than half of the wounded (roughly 4600) have returned to duty. But more than that number have deserted (5500), so it's kind of a wash.

[AllegroRondo]

30. But that only counts combat casualties.

there have been over 20,000 troops that were non-combat injured or ill enough to require moving them out of Iraq.

[arcane1]

11. I don't know about the insurgency, but...

the civilian population has been decimated and then some

[Ganja Ninja]

8. The PNAC is feeling a draft.

PNAC -- the folks who wanted "a new Pearl Harbor" -- is feeling a draft

Seven years ago, no one was paying any attention to a small conservative think tank called the Project for a New American Century, also known as PNAC. So it didn't make any headlines when the band of influential neocons -- with ties to Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, Jeb Bush and the usual supporting cast -- wrote a letter to then-President Clinton in January 1998, requesting he take military action to remove Saddam Hussein from power.

It also didn't make news in September 2000 when a PNAC report said the American people wouldn't support a strong military without "some catastrophic and catalyzing event – like a new Pearl Harbor."

Then, a few months later, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and Jeb Bush's brother took over the government. A few months after that, there was "a new Pearl Harbor," called 9/11. And just a year and a half after that, Saddam Hussein was removed from power militarily.

So now we know that when PNAC talks, we should listen.

And on Friday, PNAC talked. The think tank released a letter to congressional leaders saying that American can't meet its global obligations without 25,000 additional troops. They don't say where the troops will come from. Will we look back on PNAC's Jan. 28 letter a couple of years from now and say, "We should have felt a draft coming on"?

http://www.pnionline.com/dnblog/extra/

[MISSDem]

19. Did anyone read Tom Friedman's column in which he

said that Bush and Company are "itching" to invade Iran but can't because they know they don't have the troops to do it?

[frictionlessO]

24. Have linky to that Friedman article??

I'd be interested in reading it... thanks!