But What Does That Mean?

Realize – 'boots on the ground' requires an INVASION, based on the pure size and scope of the necessary force, the territorial size of Iran, the size of the population, not to mention the terrain, avenues of approach, basing rights, etc.

The narrative is coming from many circles, from the political-left and right. But, most of all it comes from the ignorant -- the clueless who have no concept of what 'boots on the ground' means or entails. It’s just an easy and simple narrative to throw out there try to make you believe President Trump is going to put U.S. military forces on the ground in Iran. They really believe it.

Yes, we put 'boots on the ground' in a lot of countries since WWII. Certainly, we all know the consequences of the largest efforts -- Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. All failures because they were intended to do 'regime change', topple a government, and of course -- 'nation building', the “NeoCon’s forever war community’s” second favorite phrase after regime change.

At the time of getting involved -- with 'boots on the ground' in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq, all were relatively large nations with populations of 25 to 40 million. In contrast, Iran is twice the size with a population of over 92 million.

No one is asking the right question – TO DO WHAT? Nor do they have the answer. Because they are looking to disparage and attack President Trump … for something he certainly hasn’t done and more so something he is totally against.

What's their mission? What's their objective? What is the end state?

In Afghanistan, we deployed 110,000 troops and in Iraq we deployed over 160,000 troops. Looking at Iran would require 300,000 - 400,000 troops, at least.

It would require OCCUPATION, that’s called an OCCUPYING FORCE and it means OCCUPYING territory -- holding ground and terrain, which involves multiple-levels and intensity of combat. Do any of you who are irresponsibly pushing the 'boots on the ground' narrative understand that? The answer is NO!

Operations -- Next is the type of operation to get in country – what is the entry force? What is the size? What is it composed of? How is it employed?

Is that being discussed right now? I can assure you, if it was, it would be leaking like a sieve from the Pentagon, the State Department, the intelligence community and U.S. Central Command. It would also be a complete 180 from everything President Trump has said. He ran for President on and against the Iraq invasion and on the 20 years of 'boots on the ground' in both countries.

So, to do ‘regime change’ or ‘nation building,’ or both, would require our forces to have to “fight our way in” while trying to hold ground, secure towns and cities, and move to secure and occupy Tehran and all the other major cities in Iran. I’m starting to actually see a requirement of 500,000 plus troops.

Is it an amphibious landing from the Persian Gulf?

Is it an airborne operation?

Is it a ground operation, with entry points from Iraq, Turkey, Turkmenistan? By the way, Iran controls two thirds of Iraq.

Or would we require some combination of all three? All are “forced entry operations” whether by air, ground and or by sea. Would we get access from any of the nearby countries to commence operations from those respective countries? The answer is no. Which means it would probably be a combination of airborne and amphibious operations. That would by extremely difficult. In both cases, what would the on the ground reception look like once our forces crossed into Iran?

Next question: What and where does the “logistics tail” and support mechanism start and what does it look like? It would obviously have to be predominantly seaborne. Where will they operate from? Where is the debarkation of equipment positioned? How does that effort begin, and what does the method of sustainment look like?

With a logistic tail – logistics lines, comes the requirement for security. What is that force size? Realize, on average, the distance from the Persian Gulf to Tehran is well over 800 miles. By contrast, the distance from Kuwait to Baghdad was 435 miles, which the U.S. military had to implement and secure in the 1990-91 Gulf War (Desert Shield/Desert Storm) and then again in 2003 for Operation Iraqi Freedom, and had to be sustained and maintained in some way, shape and form for the next 20 years.

When does the mobilization of 300,000-500,000 troops start? Is there deliberate planning being done on that right now? Where do these forces come from – are they available, when do they move, when are troops going to be called-up and put on orders to deploy?

When are we going to start seeing the TPFDD (Time Phased Force Deployment Date) planning? Where are Planning Orders and subsequent Deployment Orders, signed by the Secretary of Defense, with the necessary coordination for movement and synchronization of the movement of forces and equipment to be conducted between the Office of the SecDef, the Joint Staff, the Services and the appropriate Unified Commands, such as U.S. Transportation Command, of course the Combatant Command – U.S. Central Command (USCENTCOM)? That’s just inside the U.S. and we haven’t even addressed the myriad diplomatic, political issues, the legal aspects -- JAG/LOAC/Overflight, Basing Rights, SOFA and most importantly, Congressional Hearings and debate.

In the meantime -- thousands of warfighting assets; M1 tanks, Bradley, Strikers, trucks and resupply vehicles, helicopters, close air support, transport, fighter aircraft, security apparatus, ammo/munitions, fuel, water, rations, medical, communications, intelligence systems, and other support assets, must be added and coordinated into the mix. When does this happen and who moves all this equipment and when does this all start? Much of the equipment must be moved commercially overland in the continental U.S. to U.S. ports, put on commercial ships to be disembarked and maintained in a deployment location. Have the necessary contracts been signed? Has the Commander-in-Chief given the order for that to happen?

My point is, obviously no thought whatsoever has been given to what is really at stake and what 'boots on the ground' really means! The 'boots on the ground' crowd just throw out the narrative.

President Trump is NOT going to put boots on the ground, let alone conduct ground force combat operations, regime change and nation building in Iran.