MG Pittard to lead Iraq force
Military.com says that Major General Dana Pittard has been chosen to lead the latest operation in Iraq. If his name sounds familiar, he was in public opinion hot water about two years ago while he was post commander at Fort Bliss when he wrote on his blog that suicide is a selfish act after attending one of his troops’ funeral.
Anyway, Pittard is an Armor officer and he’s going to command a special forces-manned unit.
The troops have already set up a joint operations center to “serve as a fusion center where information that’s coming in from the various teams can be consolidated and it can be analyzed,” said Army Col. Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman.
Warren declined to say whether the JOC was in the “green zone” on the grounds of the U.S. Embassy or elsewhere in Baghdad.
The troops at the JOC will take at least two weeks to conduct an assessment of the situation on the ground, the capabilities and needs of the Iraqi forces, and the status of the militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
Much of the intelligence for the JOC will come from the 30-35 manned and unmanned flights the U.S. has been conducting over Iraq, Pentagon officials said.
Once the assessment is concluded in 2-3 weeks, the intention was to open a second JOC at a location yet to be named in northern Iraq, Warren said.
The article goes on to announce that the Iraqis are buying old Cold War jets from Russia to compensate for the snail’s pace of the delivery of US jets that were agreed to months ago but haven’t materialized.
“We shouldn’t have just bought U.S. jets, we should have bought British, French and Russian jets to provide air support. If we had air support, none of this would have happened,” Maliki said of the ISIL advances.
At the Pentagon, [Army Colonel Steve Warren, a Pentagon spokesman] said that the U.S. was attempting to deliver the first two F-16s “as quickly as possible” and the rest would arrive on schedule in the fall.
Yeah, I’m sure the ISIS folks will hold off for another four months just to accommodate our delivery.
Retired Marine General James Conway says that ISIS has shot their load;
“The worst is over,” Conway said.
“The ISIS (as ISIL is often also called) are probably surprised themselves with their degree of success.”
But “they will not mess with the Kurds, they will not be able to take Baghdad and they can’t go into the south where the oil fields are because it’s all Shiite territory”.
I hope the ISIS guys are listening to the pros.
Category: Terror War
We used to call him General Rittard. I never actually disagreed with what he said, but boy did Bliss really start to go downhill faster after division arrived on Biggs. All those millions wasted on solar panels, a constantly malfunctioning security system, exponential increase of dog-and-pony factor with NIE, and building Kamoul Jabbar.
#DontMakeUsCallThatFatFuckJohnGiduck doesn’t seem to drive fear into the enemy either. There must be a way to teach them how to use twitter and then we can hash tag our way to victory.
This fuck was my brigade commander during OIF II. None of us could stand him and we were grateful that we (2/2 inf)were so far from the flagpole that after the begining of the deployment he really only travled from fob warhorse to our fob normandy when someone died. Rumor mill had it that after our deployment he got popped for dui on and off post but the paperwork got lost. Supposedly he also kept our bde sgm locked inside the fob. Anyone who was on Warhorse for OIFII can tell you about CSM Foreman and his snipeing people in the chowhall for uniform violation.
That’s odd a lot of us had no problem with him at all, SGM Foreman on the other hand was another story. Never heard about the DUI charge.
I didnt hear about the dui rumor untill after the brigade colors had been cased and he had moved on to his next job. I also heard fromDuke 5s driver that the CG ripped him a new one for not pushing straight into Najaf right away when we got down there and he gave a lame excuse that he felt that everone was tired after the movement to get there
He is the very model of a modern Major General.
Nice Gilbert & Sullivan reference.
“Anyway, Pittard is an Armor officer and he’s going to command a special forces-manned unit.”
How does that even happen. If the guy isn’t in their chain of command he was just suddenly retasked outside of his field?
General officers don’t really have a branch.
While they don’t have a branch, picking this guy to lead an “unconventional” unit is setting them up for failure. Regardless of how awesome he was or how terrible he was, that’s not a good thing.
This is either someone hooking their buddy up so he can get third star for being the “Neo-Leonidas” or someone’s purposely trying to derail this mission from the get go.
I could go either way, though I’m leaning towards the “my buddy needs a third star…” though.
Me too, especially after considering the melanin concentration in the MG’s skin.
I guess Obama, et al, didn’t hear the part of MLK’s speech that had the, “…content of a man’s character, and not the color of his skin…” words in it.
So yeah, it’s Homie needs a third star, I suspect …
he’s not really the far outside his field… I checked his bio, he was in Desert Storm plus two deployments for OIF, the second in charge of the NATO training mission of the Iraqi Army at some level or another. He’s also been involved in training up units for deployment to Iraq at TRADOC, and is currently deputy CG of US Army Central. Aside from not being from an SOF background, he seems to be pretty qualified for the task, if managing a force far below his paygrade.
Personally, I’m reserving my judgment for a while until we start hearing how things are developing under his leadership…
I forgot to mention, probably because it’s just trivia, but there are a handful of officers with SOF backgrounds, in general, and Special Forces inparticular, who also served as armor officers. Wayne Downing started as infantry and commanded the Ranger Regiment, JSOC, and SOCOM in the ’80s and ’90s but also held commands of an armor battalion and brigade. Additionally, the former CSA Peter Schoomaker was always in armor assignments when not serving with Delta Force, all the way up to being DCG for operations for the 1st Cavalry Division, post-Desert Storm. Like I said, trivial, but not far fetched than an armor officer would have experience in special operations.
So, is that Marine General saying we should be surprised if ISIS advances further south, takes Baghdad, drives back the Kurds, etc.? I think I remember we were “surprised” when ISIS overran northern Iraq, took Mosul, kicked the Iraqi Army’s ass while being outnumbered 50:1, etc. Anybody notice a recurring pattern?
General Conway may be wrong, but he is a retired infantry officer and former Commandant (Gen Amos’s predecessor actually), so he isn’t to far removed from the battlefield.In the book The Iraq War, General Conway is described as “big, buff, well read and well educated…..he represented all that was best about the new United States Marine Corps, which General Al Gray as the commandant had set up.” He commanded I MEF in Iraq twice.
I personally respect the man, and will listen to what he says. He is also not a party man, and can be pretty blunt.
Good to hear. I hope to high heaven the man is right.
Why does a force of 100-150 troops need to be commanded by a MG??
Exactly. This is a vanity tour for the MG for career advancement purposes.
Not to defend the situation because I also think it’s pretty stupid, but currently he’s got nearer to 600 guys and I get the feeling it will expand…
I knew Pittard as a Captain. He was a very fine officer then. Hope he still is.
It requires a GO because by its nature this mission is Joint, Interagency, and Combined (multinational). there is nothing magical about SF officers, plenty of them are just as incompetent as the rest.
I know Pitttard, he is smart and aggressive but also very polished. This is a tough mission, I wish him and the troops the best.
As far as the dui rumors, I have never heard that. I sure wish members of this forums would place the same rigor in proving or disproving rumors that they do in investigating posers.
In regards to the comment that ISIS has blown their wad: During their whole advancement while the Chicken Little press was screaming that our HMMWVs, MRAPs, and trucks were being stolen, I was thinking they don’t have the Lines of Communication to keep that gear running any further than the fuel on-board. It will still be a colossal waste after it’s all abandoned in the Syrian Desert of Al Anbar, but ultimately it will not strengthen the terrorist/thugs of ISIS.
I only hope he can get the job done. That being, do the assessment, defend our troops and bring them home alive. Hopefully, along with all American citizens in Iraq.
MG Pittard is in command up there because he’s also the Deputy CG for ARCENT. His day job is running the show in Kuwait so he’s already familiar with the situation and right next door with a staff working on it. The “300” that are going in are not all SF. A number of them are there to assess the warfighting functions of the Iraqi Army and probably lay the groundwork if this thing has to get bigger. This is already a multi-service mission with a growing Marine security force, Army staff and trainers, and Navy and Air Force warplanes overhead. It makes sense to put a General on the case right away.
Maj General Pittard is the real deal. Intelligent and ferocious. If allowed to fight, Isis might find themselves decapitated. But you never know what restrictions have been placed on him.
MG Pittard was my brigade commander in Kosovo 2002-2003 and in Iraq in 2004-2005. I can tell you that he was fearless and smart. He went to the sound of the guns. Real Soldiers loved him because he was a warrior. General Sanchez tried to chew him out in An Najaf because Pittard aggressively tried to kill or capture Muqtada Sadr — his superiors didn’t like that. As far as a DUI, no way — he was religious and never drank alcohol, he didn’t smoke, cuss, drink soda, or drink coffee. He was a fitness freak — most fit leader (NCO or Officer) I ever served with. I would follow him in combat anywhere at anytime.
Sure would help the USG deliver the GoI their F-16s if they would pay for them on schedule…
MG Pittard and a DUI? That is the stupidest thing I have ever heard. He doesn’t smoke, drink, cuss, hell he doesn’t even drink soda or coffee. Some of you are clueless. He is a warrior and true pipe hitters love him. Only the people who are sniveling wimps have a problem with him.