Take A Jarhead To Lunch

Geopolitics: Assuming the leaks are correct and the troop decision has been made the market’s attention will turn to the perennial question: will the good guys win in Afghanistan? The answer: Yes, because in the years ahead most of the hard fighting will be done by the Marines, not the Army. Conditions are much tougher in Afghanistan than Iraq and it is going to take longer to sew it up there. It is a good thing that McChrystal instinctively turns to the Marines over the Army for the sharp end of this spear. Fuel has to be trucked hundreds of miles through mountain passes filled with missile toting bad guys in Afghanistan. Soldiers sleep in the dirt in Afghanistan, not in heated and cooled buildings like in Iraq. Frankly, there are conditions on this battlefield that are beyond the capabilities of the US Army.
Put bluntly, the Marines are better than the US Army. Put another way, the US Army is the second best army in the world. Thank God America has the very best and second best armies in the world because we’re going to need both of them, but mostly the varsity team: USMC.
Not only do the Marines produce better soldiers in the field than the Army, it has better people throughout the whole chain of command. Consider the Army Major who went on a killing spree in Fort Hood. The guy had Al-Qaeda on speed deal and screamed, “Allah Akbar!” like a Taliban before firing. That sort of thing would never happen in the Marines.
That’s why USMC has been winning all the big battles so far in the Long War. Iraq turned around after the Marines won in Fallujah because conditions there were too hot for the Army. And today the Marines are in the middle of bad guy country. They are your best friend. The person who you think is your best friend cannot keep your portfolio from crashing. Only the Marines can do that. So take a jarhead to lunch. Do something to show your appreciation.
And the Marines are commanded by a savvy Commander-in-chief. I have been saying that Obama’s track record was nearly flawless in geopolitics until he caved in on settlement building with Israel. I have rethought my position. Obama was right to cave. The original policy of forbidding all settlement building in the West Bank and East Jerusalem would have been more than effective, it would have been hyper-effective; a fully functioning Palestinian state would arise in a couple years if Netanyahu froze all settlement building. Game over. No Likud PM will want to be at the helm when a Palestinian state is formed. Israel will have to hold an election and put a dove in office before that can happen. But Obama has hit on the path forward that will eventually produce the new independent state and take the Long War off boil. And talks are on hold until there is a settlement freeze, which enrages the doves in Israel. So Obama hasn’t caved that much. He is just playing smart poker. Now the issue of settlement building will dominate the next Israeli election.