On January 28, three American soldiers were killed in an attack on their base in Jordan, underscoring a cold truth: Pax Americana is over. Russia and Ukraine are two years into the first great European ground war since 1945. North Korea continues missile testing and initiates artillery duels across the DMZ with South Korea. Next door, China is calculating when to swallow Taiwan. Japan, watching its neighborhood deteriorate, is rearming after nearly 80 years of determined non-militarization.
In the Middle East, the lethal January 28 attack was only the most successful of dozens since October. Iran and its proxies have been targeting other American bases, along with our warships, and are disrupting one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world. Meanwhile, almost nuclear-armed Iran and the definitely nuclear-armed Pakistan are in the opening stages of a border war. Israel is in a pitched battle with Iran-backed Hamas while bracing for a possible war with Iran-backed Hezbollah.
This would be a difficult strategic environment for competent, serious-minded senior commanders. For the Biden administration, it’s nothing short of a series of potential catastrophes. Nearly every strategic decision it has taken, every signal given and priority announced has advertised weakness, indecision and distraction.
The military’s prime value to the Biden DoD seems to be as a social engineering laboratory. It has made a concerted effort to inject “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion,” (DEI) into almost every facet of military life with mandatory training, a DoD-wide “Equity Action Plan” and a “Leadership Stand-Down to Address Extremism in the Force.” In 2022, when he was Air Force Chief of Staff, the current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Charles Q. Brown ordered a “diversity and inclusion outreach plan” and set “aspirational” goals for the branch’s officer recruiting, including a gender representation of 64% male, 36% female, and a racial breakdown of 67.5% white, 13% black, 10% Asian, etc. That year the Navy was concerned with “Pride Month” celebrations and introducing its first transgender “ambassador.”
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No wonder there’s a recruiting nightmare facing the services. Of the five branches, only the Marine Corps and the Space Force (the two smallest with the lightest recruiting burden) met their active duty enlisted recruiting goals for FY 2023. The Army, Air Force and Navy fell short. Only the Marines (barely) met its numbers in every recruiting subcategory.
Of course, success is the best recruiting tool, but the Biden administration’s only significant military operations have been its long overdue and (so far) ineffectual counter attacks on Houthi pirates in Yemen, and the disgraceful bugout from Afghanistan. The latter was a disaster. Remember the president’s opening joke, saying the Taliban was not “the North Vietnamese army” and under “no circumstance” would we see people clinging to the skids of helicopters wobbling off the U.S. embassy roof.
Instead, we saw abandoned allies hanging from the landing gear of C-130s. We left U.S. citizens behind. We provoked the deadliest attack on American servicemembers since 2011 and gifted the Taliban $7 billion in military equipment – some of which is no doubt being used against our interests. None of the architects of the disaster resigned or were fired. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin was working to finalize the Pentagon’s climate change initiatives during the evacuation, so perhaps he didn’t realize the extent of the disaster.
More recently, Secretary Austin’s failure to inform either his next-in-line or his president of one or both of his hospitalizations meant duties and powers weren’t properly delegated and left the U.S. chain of command missing a crucial link while servicemembers were in harm’s way. When the DoD can’t even properly transfer power to the Dep Sec for a routine medical procedure, we should be very worried. Austin said he took responsibility for the episode, but he’s still in office. This administration isn’t big on accountability.
There is a reckoning for all this amateurism. Unfortunately, our servicemembers are paying for it. While the Biden State Department sends Iranian mullahs millions of dollars as a carrot to restart President Obama’s nuclear agreement, Iran is using its stick against U.S. soldiers and sailors.
Beyond nearly 40 missile attacks against military and commercial ships in the Red Sea, Iran and its stand-ins have targeted our outposts in the Middle East. On October 19, rockets and drones hit Iraqi bases housing U.S. forces. On December 8, the U.S. embassy in Baghdad was rocketed, and on January 19, a number of U.S. troops were wounded in a rocket attack on Al Asad Airbase in Western Iraq. On January 11, off the coast of Somalia, two Navy SEALs were lost while boarding a ship carrying armaments for the Houthi terrorists. And on Jan. 28, Iranian backed forces killed three U.S. servicemembers and injured approximately 30 more during a drone attack on Tower 22 in Jordan.
We live in serious times. Our warriors are professionals who do serious work – life and death work – every day. When they succeed, they do so without accolades. If they fail, they do it without excuse. America owes them a high command as serious and professional as they are. The Biden DoD isn’t it.
Michael P. McKeown is a former high-ranking official at the Department of Homeland Security and an internationally recognized anti-human trafficking expert.
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