In Iraq I participated in a mission where we drove around a neighborhood in Mosul and played loud rock n roll music. What do you think that was all about?
psychological warfare
In Iraq I participated in a mission where we drove around a neighborhood in Mosul and played loud rock n roll music. What do you think that was all about?
operation blowback phase 1: irritate the enemy
>irritate the enemy
Do those civilians know they are the enemy yet?
They did after that kek
Iraq is a lesson on how not to nation build for a nation with two (maybe three if you count Korea) successful nation building projects under its belt. I love that they insisted on doing exactly what they were careful not to do in Germany or Japan - evict and persecute every functionary of the big boogeyman evil ruling party. Baathism confirmed for worse than fascism
This was technically during "the surge."
>What do you think that was all about?
It was about your heirarchy being overpaid dickwads with no idea how to conduct COIN Ops except shit they saw and misunderstood watching 'Apocalypse Now'
these
Musical instruments are haram in islam, could be something to do with that. Perhaps they thought that Iraqis would like the music and people would turn away from islam.
Music has long played a roll in warfare, to both hype up your own troops, and demoralize your enemies. Rock and Roll works well for this purpose.
Afghanistan did just ban all music.
how do they not fall out the plane
I think they just wanted an excuse to drive around drunk while blaring music, anon.
was it Nickelback?
I hope so
Show of force
That was just your platoon leader being Mexican.
I was tasked with delivery of false diagnosis for psychiatric illness and personalty disorders to demoralize the enemy combatants and force out of the battlefield and into the counseling office.
Psy Ops sounds so cool and so lame at the same time.
People put too much stock in them.
Morale is an important thing in war, but it's going to be effected much more by the conditions on the ground than whatever 5d chess game your enemy would play. Otherwise we wouldn't bother fighting war with guns, we'd fight them with badly made memes.
In a conventional war, established nations with conventional armies contend with each other for territory. In an unconventional guerrilla war, such as the Middle East post-occupation insurgencies, we see an unconventional guerrilla force that operates covertly among the population and rural areas.
There are no officially demarcated forces, only known friends and enemies. The idea was to stamp out public support for the resistance through occupation, force, and cooperation with the local authorities and elders. The enemy themselves wore normal clothing and moved among rural cover to remain invisible and carry out spying.
Unknown until later, the local elders and police chiefs they were meeting with were covertly involved in the resistance. Meeting with US officials were arranged to lead US forces into ambushes, and many local police were also a part of the resistance, stockpiling weapons for ambushes as well.
However, there was still this idea that the public could be swayed to the occupation forces, despite the civilian deaths. Airdrops of food, handing out food, meetings with local leaders. It was an impossible war from the start. On one front, thousands of civilians killed. On the other front, trying to convince the Afghans to live under military occupation.