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The Colonel’s Corner

~Comment by the Colonel~

Turkey is a NATO member but acts like an enemy of the West. Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, seems to see NATO membership only as a good way to get economic benefits. Since Hamas’ attack on Israel when they killed 1200 civilians, Erdogan has spoken in favor of Hamas and against Israel—quite the opposite of virtually every other NATO member. I truly don’t understand how any person with any kind of human values can support attacks by military forces on civilians—which is what Hamas has been doing for generations—but never with as many casualties as at the beginning of this war. And Erdogan says that Israel’s end is near. And he said that, “Hamas is not a terrorist organization; it is a liberation group, mujahideen waging a battle to protect its land and people.” Turkey is supporting and training Hamas fighters.

Turkey’s role in NATO is preventing Russia from reinforcing its Black Sea fleet through the Bosphorous cand Dardanelles Straits against Ukraine. And Turkey is threatening NATO member Greece, seeking to regain lands it lost after WWI. It’s clear that Erdogan is playing both sides in this time of attacks and death and has no desire for peace in the region. Turkey is an enemy we’ll have to deal with sooner or later.

The Smiling Ranger – This book is a series of short, mostly funny, stories of my time in uniform (it’s for sale at FrontlinesOfFreedom.com): I was thinking about… my time in Vietnam. I had little experience with a .45 caliber automatic pistol before arriving in country as a second lieutenant, but I quickly found one and carried it along with my rifle. The pistol was WWII vintage and badly worn. It jammed so often I really didn’t consider it reliable. When I’d loan it to a trooper who was going into a tunnel, I warned him that often it was good for only one shot.

After my first Vietnam tour I was assigned to Fort Campbell, KY, where I assumed command of an airborne rifle company. My assigned weapon was, yes, a .45 pistol. It might have been the same one I’d left in Vietnam. It rattled when I fired it, the parts were so worn. Then the division was ordered to deploy to Vietnam, so we all had to qualify with our weapons. For the life of me, I just couldn’t hit all those bulls-eyes with my old rattley weapon. When qualifying with a rifle, the shooter shot at a silhouette, but with the pistol it was a bulls-eye target. After about a hundred tries I finally barely qualified. I deployed with my company to Vietnam—wearing that old pistol. That’s why I own only revolvers today. (I have since been converted and own a Glock and a Sig Sauer today, along with my revolvers.)

If you don’t already have one, order your copy of ‘The Smiling Ranger’ today or one for a friend.

~~~

*We should all be proud Americans; despite our current challenges and differences, we live in the best and freest nation in the world. Let’s end all the name calling and appreciate each other and our nation, even if we don’t all agree on everything. Good Americans come in many flavors.

Military History

In the last half of February, we fought the First Barbary War, we fought the Japanese in the Philippines and Iwo Jima, and Navy Lt. Edward O’Hare became the war’s first flying ace, and the First Gulf War began.

On 16 Feb 1804, during the First Barbary War, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur led a military mission that famed British Admiral Horatio Nelson called the “most daring act of the age.”

In June 1801, President Thomas Jefferson ordered Navy vessels to the Mediterranean Sea in protest of continuing raids against US ships by pirates from the Barbary states–Morocco, Algeria, Tunis, and Tripolitania. American sailors were often abducted along with the captured booty and ransomed back to the US at an exorbitant price. After two years of minor confrontations, sustained action began in June 1803 when a small US expeditionary force attacked Tripoli harbor in present-day Libya.

In October 1803, the US frigate Philadelphia ran aground near Tripoli and was captured by Tripolitan gunboats. We feared that the well-constructed warship would be both a formidable addition to the Tripolitan navy and an innovative model for building future Tripolitan frigates. Hoping to prevent the Barbary pirates from gaining this military advantage, Lieutenant Stephen Decatur led a daring expedition into Tripoli harbor to destroy the captured American vessel on February 16, 1804.

After disguising himself and his men as Maltese sailors, Decatur’s force of 74 men sailed into Tripoli harbor on a small two-mast ship. They approached the USS Philadelphia without drawing fire from the Tripoli shore guns, boarded the ship, and attacked its Tripolitan crew, capturing or killing all but two. After setting fire to the frigate, they escaped without the loss of a single American. The Philadelphia subsequently exploded when its gunpowder reserve was lit by the spreading fire.

Six months later, Decatur returned to Tripoli Harbor as part of a larger American offensive and emerged as a hero again during the so-called “Battle of the Gunboats,” a naval battle that saw hand-to-hand combat between the Americans and the Tripolitans.

On 19 Feb 1945, during WWII, Operation Detachment, the Marines’ invasion of Iwo Jima, was launched. Iwo Jima was a barren Pacific island guarded by Japanese artillery, but to us, it was prime real estate on which to build airfields to launch bombing raids against Japan, only 660 miles away.

We began applying pressure to the Japanese defense of the island in February 1944, when B-24 and B-25 bombers raided the island for 74 days. It was the longest pre-invasion bombardment of the war, necessary because of the extent to which the Japanese–21,000 strong–fortified the island, above and below ground, including a network of caves. Underwater demolition teams (“frogmen”) were dispatched just before the actual invasion. When the Japanese fired on the frogmen, they gave away many of their “secret” gun positions.

The amphibious landings of Marines began February 19. As the Marines made their way onto the island, seven Japanese battalions opened fire on them. By evening, over 550 Marines were dead and 1,800 wounded. The capture of Mount Suribachi, the highest point of the island and bastion of the Japanese defense, took four more days and many more casualties. When the American flag was finally raised on Iwo Jima, the memorable image was captured in a famous photograph that later won the Pulitzer Prize.

On 20 Feb 1042, during WWII, Lt. Edward O’Hare took off from the aircraft carrier Lexington in a raid against the Japanese position at Rabaul–and minutes later became America’s first flying

ace. In mid-February 1942, the Lexington sailed into the Coral Sea. Rabaul, a town at the very tip of New Britain, had been invaded in January by the Japanese and transformed into a huge airbase. The Japanese were now in prime striking position for the Solomon Islands, next on the agenda for expanding their ever-growing Pacific empire. The Lexington’s mission was to destabilize the Japanese position on Rabaul with a bombing raid.

Navy fighter pilot Lt. Edward O’Hare was attached to Fighting Squadron 3. As the Lexington left Bougainville, the largest of the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific, for Rabaul, ship radar picked up Japanese bombers headed straight for the carrier. O’Hare and his team went into action, piloting F4F Wildcats. In a mere four minutes, O’Hare shot down five Japanese Betty bombers–bringing a swift end to the Japanese attack and earning O’Hare the designation “ace” (given to any pilot who had five or more downed enemy planes to his credit).

Although the Lexington blew back the Japanese bombers, the element of surprise was gone, and the attempt to raid Rabaul was aborted for the time being. O’Hare was awarded the Medal of Honor for his bravery–and excellent aim.

On 22 Feb 19442, President Franklin Roosevelt ordered Gen. Douglas MacArthur out of the Philippines, as the American defense of the islands collapsed.

When the Japanese invaded China in 1937 and signed the Tripartite Pact with Germany and Italy in 1940, we responded by, among other things, strengthening the defense of the Philippines. General MacArthur was called out of retirement to command 10,000 American Army troops, 12,000 Filipino enlisted men who were assigned to our forces, and 100,000 Filipino army soldiers. MacArthur radically overestimated his troops’ strength and underestimated Japan’s determination. The defensive strategy for US interests in the Pacific required MacArthur withdraw his troops into the mountains of the Bataan Peninsula and await reinforcements. Instead, MacArthur decided to take the Japanese head on–and he never recovered.

On the day of the Pearl Harbor bombing, the Japanese destroyed almost half of the American aircraft based in the Philippines. Amphibious landings of Japanese troops followed. By late December, MacArthur had to pull his forces back defensively to the Bataan Peninsula. By 2 Jan 1942, the Philippine capital of Manila fell to the Japanese. A message arrived at Corregidor on February 20, ordering MacArthur to leave immediately for Mindanao, then on to Melbourne, Australia, where “You will assume command of all US troops.” MacArthur finally obeyed the president’s order in March.

On 24 Feb 1991, after six weeks of intensive bombing against Iraq and its armed forces, US-led coalition forces launched a ground invasion of Kuwait and Iraq. On 2 Aug 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait, its tiny oil-rich neighbor, and within hours had occupied most strategic positions in the country. One week later, Operation Shield, our defense of Saudi Arabia, began as US forces massed in the Persian Gulf. Three months later, the UN Security Council passed a resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq if it failed to withdraw from Kuwait by 15 Jan 1991.

At 4:30 pm EST on 16 January 1991, Operation Desert Storm, a massive US-led offensive against Iraq, began as fighter aircraft were launched from Saudi Arabia and off US and British aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf. All evening, coalition aircraft pounded targets in and around Baghdad as the world watched the events transpire on television footage.

Operation Desert Storm was conducted by an international coalition under the command of US General Norman Schwarzkopf and featured forces from 32 nations, including Britain, Egypt, France, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait. During the next six weeks, the allied force engaged in a massive air war against Iraq’s military and civil infrastructure, encountering little effective resistance from the Iraqi air force. Iraqi ground forces were also helpless during this stage of the

war, and Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein’s only significant retaliatory measure was the launching of SCUD missile attacks against Israel and Saudi Arabia. Saddam hoped that the missile attacks would provoke Israel, and thus other Arab nations, to enter the conflict; however, at our request, Israel remained out of the war.

On 24 Feb, a massive coalition ground offensive began, and Iraq’s outdated and poorly supplied armed forces were rapidly overwhelmed. By the end of the day, the Iraqi army had effectively folded, 10,000 of its troops were held as prisoners, and a US air base had been established deep inside Iraq. After less than four days, Kuwait was liberated, and a majority of Iraq’s armed forces had either been destroyed or had surrendered or retreated to Iraq. On 28 Feb, President George Bush declared a cease-fire, and Iraq pledged to honor future coalition and UN peace terms. One hundred and twenty-five American soldiers were killed in the Persian Gulf War, with another 21 regarded as missing in action.

COMING UP ON FRONTLINES OF FREEDOM

On the weekend of Feb 17-18, former Space Force Lt Col Matt Lohmeier will discuss the challenges our military faces. Then the former Chief of our Border Patrol will discuss the southern border. General Chris Petty will present the Battle of the Month.

And on the weekend of Feb 24-25, David Horowitz will discuss why our military may become disloyal. Former DEA Special Agent Vann Winn will discuss drugs in our nation. Diane Raver will review the Movie of the Month.