Disquiet Grows in U.S. Military Over Buildup

A profound disquiet is growing within the U.S. military over the pace and size of the U.S. buildup in the Persian Gulf, with an increasing number of officers expressing fear that the huge mobilization has created an unstoppable momentum toward a bloody and perhaps unnecessary war.

More than a score of interviews with senior and mid-level active-duty military officers, many of them directly involved in the current gulf operation, reveal widespread unease over the deployment and the ever-shifting rationales cited for it.

The officers consented to be interviewed on condition that they not be named, citing the threat to their careers if they openly criticize their leaders. But in the interviews, the officers exhibited a remarkable candor in discussing their reservations about the current operation.

Some of their fears were given voice last week by two former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who testified before Congress that the Bush Administration appears to be rushing into conflict without giving economic sanctions sufficient time to work. The current chairman, Gen. Colin L. Powell, bitterly dismissed the former chairmen’s complaints as the carping of two retired officers criticizing from the sidelines.

But their concerns are shared by many current military officers, who raise questions about both the strategic basis for Operation Desert Shield and a large number of technical and tactical issues raised by the deployment.

The doubts within the professional military came into sharp focus after the Nov. 8 decision to virtually double the size of the U.S. expeditionary force. Military officers immediately recognized that a force that size could not be sustained indefinitely in the region and that there are not enough remaining troops in the armed services to provide a rotation pool.

“The second-phase buildup set a lot of people back on their heels, made them really worry about the goals and the mission of this operation,” one Army colonel said. “There is great discomfiture among the senior leadership in the Army, and I’m talking about the two- and three-stars who are actually planning and running this operation. There’s a feeling that we’re going too fast with too much without really knowing where we are going.”

Another officer said that the new deployment creates an irresistible momentum toward offensive action that has not been endorsed by the multinational military coalition on the ground and certainly not by Congress or the American public.

“You really can’t sustain that level of forces,” the officer said. “It forces a decision. A lot of us feel we’re on a log rolling toward the falls.”

Retired Air Force Gen. David C. Jones, who served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from 1978 to 1982, told the Senate Armed Services Committee last week that the current situation is eerily reminiscent of the summer of 1914, when the great European powers began mobilizing their armies against perceived or manufactured threats.

“Each side’s reaction to the other’s growing force levels and troop movements became in itself the rationale for a war and a terrible slaughter that followed. There are disturbing parallels as we escalate our force levels in the Middle East,” Jones said.

“My main concern with this latest scheduled reinforcement isn’t that we might choose to fight but rather that the deployment might cause us to fight, perhaps prematurely and perhaps unnecessarily,” he concluded.

On a more concrete level, officers cited concerns about the quality of the reservists being sent to Saudi Arabia by the tens of thousands. Two officers who have worked extensively with reserve and National Guard units said that they found the bulk of the citizen-soldiers to have been “woefully deficient” in training.

Even the proficient reservists are being put under enormous strain by being activated for overseas duty on an open-ended tour. The services never adequately anticipated the morale problems that such deployments would create, these officers noted.

Other officers said that they are worried about the apparent assumption by senior civilian leaders that a large and potent military force can somehow guarantee rapid victory. “Nobody ever plans for a long war,” one field-grade Army officer said.

Another problem cited by experienced officers is a lack of capability to clear land mines. The Iraqi force in Kuwait and southern Iraq has laid hundreds of miles of mine fields to protect its defensive fortifications. The Army has never placed a high priority on mine-clearing technology and hardware, and U.S. combat engineers in the region have little gear designed to breach these obstacles.

Current plans call for the Air Force to clear the mine fields with extensive bombardment, but no one is sure whether that will work. One engineer said that Army “sappers” will still have to walk the mine fields with metal detectors, a costly and time-consuming task.

In addition, a military intelligence specialist said, the United States has few officers who speak Arabic and an inadequate number of analysts who are familiar with the Middle East.

Also, one electronic warfare officer questioned how well sophisticated battlefield radars and electronic jammers will work in the desert environment. This officer, a major, said that U.S. forces should be able to overcome difficulties with these weapons.

“We may be able to surmount our toys,” he said. “But they certainly will fail. It may not be fatal, but it’s a concern.”

Another potential problem is how to seize and restore oil fields contaminated by Iraqi chemical or biological weapons. The job would be difficult enough, one engineer noted, if the Iraqis merely blew up the wellheads. But if the fields were contaminated, it could be weeks before firefighters could even get in to begin extinguishing the blazes.

There also is broad concern about how well the entire force has been trained. Retired Lt. Gen. William Odom testified recently that the Army has not practiced large-scale tank maneuvers, and others have warned that the Marine Corps is being miscast as a ground army rather than as the amphibious assault force it is designed to be.

A number of thoughtful officers, several with experience in Vietnam, expressed concern about the effect of the military buildup on alternative scenarios for ending the gulf standoff. President Bush may have backed himself into a corner from which it is easier to fight than retreat, they said.

One Army officer wondered what lies at the end of the war, even if it is relatively short and produces an “acceptable” number of casualties, which now seems to be defined as fewer than 3,000 killed.

“How do we disengage? If (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein is eliminated, you’ve got a hell of a mess. No one knows what happens if we create a power vacuum. It could be another Lebanon,” the officer said.

Adm. William J. Crowe Jr., immediate past chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress last week: “Put bluntly, Saddam’s departure, or any other single act, I’m afraid, will not make everything wonderful. . . . Even if we win, we lose ground in the Arab world and generally injure our ability to deal in the future with the labyrinth of the Middle East.”

Finally, many officers said they are worried about the future of the U.S. armed forces as an institution. Recruiting has dropped drastically in the last three months; the Army is falling 30% short of its recruitment goals, whereas four months ago there was a waiting list of inductees.

The reputation of the military, too, is on the line.

The one incontrovertible lesson learned in Vietnam was that if the public does not support a war, it should not be fought, said one officer.