There’s a problem with this latest underwear bombing, and it’s not that this poses some sort of significant threat against the people of the United States. Logistically speaking, and I say this in a strictly hypothetical sense as someone who is highly trained in planning and executing military operations: I wouldn’t build a bomb halfway around the world (especially Yemen) and then transport it to its target destination. Any half decent terrorist is going to steal it locally. Several news organizations mention the bomb is using PETN, which sounds really fancy until you learn that it’s actually the main ingredient in Semtex, a general use industrial explosive used by mining and demolition companies all over the world. Which is convenient, for a terrorist.

It’s what any competent insurgent would do. Take it from someone who’s actually fought these guys face to face in their own backyard. They know how to operate effectively. Even without the TSA, it takes years of planning and training to pull off a significant attack like September 11th. What’s worse is that the TSA is taking this opportunity to tell the public how safe it is, that their full body scanners would have detected this one. We know, TSA, your body scanners can detect if a woman is 3 days pregnant! Flying in commercial aircraft is still safer than driving on the highway by an order of magnitude.

Let’s not get caught up in the hype. The CIA found a bomb in Yemen, which is just surrounded by all sorts of warfare, poverty, and conflict, and we’re supposed to believe it’s headed to the US? I don’t buy it. The BBC states that the gentleman dispatched by Yemen-based Al-Qaeda was, in fact—drumroll, please—a double agent. So he’s undercover and volunteers for an assignment where he can take a single bomb back to the US as a “foiled plot?” Shit, in Iraq my squad once found about 30 artillery shells rigged as IEDs, and that wasn’t even the biggest find that week. Hell, a single suicide vest wasn’t a big find. An underwear bomb would have been a joke. Twenty underwear bombs would have been downright hilarious.

Go ahead. Put it on, faker.

U.S. District Judge Robert Blackburn has ruled the Stolen Valor Law unconstitutional. Wait, what? In an unprecedented display of “Freedom of Speech”, the Judge dismissed Rick Strandlof’s charges under the stolen valor law on July 17th. This is insulting.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the case, Mr. Strandlof was a US Marine. Annapolis graduate. Survivor of the September 11th attack on the Pentagon. Three tours in Iraq. Purple Heart. Silver Star. Or so he claimed…Standlof has led an interesting life (more here), but in 2007 he emerged as an outspoken leader in the community of Colorado Springs for homeless vets, backed a number of Democratic candidates for state senate and house seats, and was staunchly against the war — meeting with Iraq Veterans Against the War. But he never saw how terrible war is firsthand. He even campaigned with Hal Bidlack, a retired Air Force officer who ran for Congress. Mr. Bidlack was actually in the Pentagon on September 11. What nerve.

Fast forward to 2010.

The Stolen valor Act makes t a crime to impersonate a “war hero” or claim to have a service medal that one does not, punishable by up to a year in prison on each offense. Judge Blackburn claims that this is now unconstitutional. Specifically, under First Amendment rights.

Wait a second.

Slander is illegal. Defamation is illegal. The very definition of defamation is making false statements about someone else in the public domain, such as print or other publications. So… how is it not illegal to make false claims about oneself, especially something so highly regarded as war medals?

I’m biased. I admit that. I’ll tell you why, and no one except my family and fellow Marines knows this about me. On November 25th, 2006, I was shot by a sniper. The bullet grazed my carotid artery, scared the living shit out of me, haunts me in my sleep. Here’s a picture from later that day. I didn’t consider it serious enough to seek medical attention, so I stayed on patrol and finished the mission. I was frightened like you wouldn’t believe, but I owed it to my men to stay. It was my duty.

November 25, 2006

Due to an inconsistency with my PCR — Personnel Casualty Report — and the wording of the order that awards Purple Hearts to service members, I was denied a Purple Heart. Yep, that’s right. I was shot in Iraq and never received a Purple Heart. Whatever the wording is, there’s the picture, judge for yourself.

It is a crime for me to put on a Purple Heart. That’s right. Because I am still in the Marine Corps, technically, in the Individual Ready Reserve, it’s a crime for me to wear a Purple Heart without having been awarded one. Yet, here’s a Judge stating that it’s unconstitutional to do the same to a civilian?

What if Strandlof was claiming he was a U.S. District Judge? What if Strandlof claimed he was an Apple employee, strutting around in front of an Apple Store helping customers? What if he was impersonating a police officer? Are these instances of free speech as well?

As you may surmise, I am pissed. Seriously angry over here in Colorado. For three years I have tried unsuccessfully to get my Purple Heart, which I feel has been earned. Hell, one of my best friends gave me his second Purple Heart after he was awarded it in formation after our deployment to Iraq. He earned his first one in Afghanistan. Three years, two Presidents, four state Senators, and a handful of Marine officers I have pleaded to.

Judge Blackburn, and Mr. Strandlof, I hereby present to you an honorable one finger salute. You know the one. It’s insulting to me, to every Marine, to every service member what you’ve done here. To state that it’s “freedom of speech” to falsely wear a medal that we’ve all buried friends in… words are inefficient to express the outrage.

That is all.

Poppies in Afghanistan

Up to a third of Afghanistan’s poppy harvest this spring? Dead. Killed by a mysterious disease wreaking havoc on the country’s primary source of income. The Taliban’s public relations strategy will say that the U.S. has introduced this disease to destroy the farmer’s crops, even though US forces have significantly decreased efforts against the poppy harvest. The Taliban PR machine is fast and efficient, and while the US and NATO investigate the cause of the blight, Afghan farmers are quick to lay blame.

This doesn’t bode well for public image.United Nations officials state that the disease is a natural occurrence. One of the major causes of the disease spreading so fast is the same that caused the Irish Potato Famine to be so widespread. Monoculture farming. Of course, the Taliban may see the price of raw opium skyrocket due to the lack of production. According to the executive director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Antonio Maria Costa, prices have already boosted nearly 60%. The disease is expected to wipeout nearly 2500 tons of opium primarily in Helmand, Kandahar, and Oruzgun provinces.

If the Taliban propaganda effort is successful, along with the boost in opium prices, President Obama’s counterinsurgency plan in Afghanistan may suffer severely. With poppy farmers already being placated by the US letting them continue to produce, even the thought of a secret, mysterious disease campaign may be disastrous. The major rule of counterinsurgency is to befriend the people. We should know, the Marine Corps wrote the book on counterinsurgency, The Small Wars Manual.

It remains to be seen how exactly this crop disease will affect the war, though officials are confident it will not return next year. That’s when President Obama has planned to begin the withdrawal of US troops in Afghanistan.

Peter Bollinger | Popular Science Magazine

Former Marine Colonel Roosevelt Lafontant first pushed the idea of a Marine space plane in 2002. Long a sci-fi fantasy, it’s becoming a reality, sooner than you think. With the Air Force launching a space plane this week, the Marine Corps has issued a ConOps, or Concept of Operations regarding a space-bound aerial drop platform for the Marine Corps.

It seems I got out of the Corps too early. That’s uber-badass.When the United States wants to go into a country, it needs permission from surrounding countries to use their airspace. Recently, with the turmoil in Kyrgyzstan, we see a problem. We had an airbase in Kyrgyzstan. Personally, I’ve spent about two weeks there when I headed in and out of Afghanistan in 2005. It’s a transient base, and a logistics center for troop movement.

Well, with a coup going on, that was disrupted.

Country’s airspace, per United Nations law, extends 50 miles above that country. Hence the reason spy satellites are able to fly all over the world. The US, therefore, needed strategic allies such as Turkey, Germany, Kyrgyzstan, Kuwait, and other nations, in order to get our troops there. Well, what if Marines could fly up in space and come down wherever they wanted?

Sign me up for that gig.

I learned something while I was deployed. When the command came out with a ConOps, that meant some serious shit was going down. All the logistics of the mission have been figured out, and it is execution time. Of course, I’ve only seen these at the company and battalion level, and it was serious business every time we got them. Large operations only.

Currently, the Marine Corps can land a BLT, or Battalion Landing Team, a Marine Expeditionary Unit, with tanks, artillery, a battalion of infantry, Amtracs, and all the supplies and logistics, anywhere in the world, in 96 hours. Anywhere.

The Pentagon’s goal with the new program is 2 hours.

(edit: probably not a battalion, however. Maybe a squad of 12 Marines at first!)

The Marine Corps is known as America’s 911 force. A Space Marine capability would be a complete paradigm shift in the way warfare is conducted. This is a game changer, for sure.

I know it’s been about a month or so since I have posted. I’ve been working hard on the book, and here is the official status update. As you can see here, I’ve finished the cover design. I designed it all myself with the input of a few authors I get together with every month.I have just finished chapter 16 out of about 20, I think. Total, I’ve rewritten my combat journal once, then twice, and now a third time, making sure everything is right, the stories are as accurate as I can get them, and learning how to write. I’ve finally found my “voice”, and am happy with the style of my writing.

When I finish the manuscript, I am hiring a professional editor to go through everything and help me make this the best possible book it can be. It would be a disservice to everyone I served with if I were to rush it to printing.

I haven’t found an agent willing to sponsor me and get the book published by a large professional publishing house. So, I have started my own publishing-on-demand business called Cerberus Press. We are up and running, and I am going to publish my own book. I am also offering our services to other authors, so if you know anyone who wants to self-publish and doesn’t like the costs of large vanity presses, email me at Mark@Cerberus-Press.com for a custom quote. I offer low cost services, including graphic design for the cover and interior, at extremely low industry rates. My royalty rates for authors are high as well.

Anyways, it has been a long, hard road to get here.

I can’t wait to finally get it in print. I have been writing solid for about two years now on this project. Little did I know when I started my combat journal in September of 2006, that it would come this far. At the end of the deployment it turned out to about 300 pages worth of text, and I figured I already had a book. Boy, was I wrong! Like one of my veteran writer friend says, “There is no good writing, only good rewriting.”

Thanks everyone for your support so far, I can’t wait to see what everyone thinks about the book. I am confident in it.

What do you think about the cover?

Soldiers inside a cave complex captured by a Pakistani offensive

After a long offensive in the federally administered tribal areas of Pakistan, Paki forces declared that they had seized a large network of caves in the Bajaur tribal area—a final militant holdout. This network of caves is just four miles from Asadabad, where I was stationed in 2005. While there are strongholds remaining along the border, at a press conference Maj. Gen. Tariq Khan stressed the tactical importance of this victory.

Around 75 militants were killed. These included Egyptians, Uzbeks, Chechens, and Afghans. Personally, I heard rumors of intelligence reports in 2005 that stated the Chechens were responsible for accurate sniper fire. Let me go ahead and conjecture that Chechens are also responsible for the accurate sniper fire in Marjah as well. The Taliban are a multi-national terrorist group, merely based in Afghanistan.

Nearly 450 militants surrendered near the 150 caves used in the complex in Damadola. They were stocked with supplies, blankets, pillows, and food. However, the bulk of Taliban fighters is believed to have fled the area in the weeks prior to the offensive—including most of the Taliban leaders.

A Pakistani spokesman stated that higher echelon Taliban leaders are hiding in Orakzai tribal agency and the Tirah Valley, where the Pakistani Army has some presence. Expect an offensive there within the coming months. Seizing Damadola was key because it is believed to have been a nerve center for Taliban operations, and if so, will siginifcantly obstruct the Taliban’s command and control facilities, as well as their ability to make war, at least until they are reorganized.

I have to wonder how this complex was used five years ago when I was deployed to Asadabad. We took incoming rocket fire every other day from Pakistan, from the very direction these caves were in. We responded with artillery fire, but it kept coming. We knew they were using caves, but hoping to catch some of the militants out in the open.

It’s no wonder, then, that the Taliban were able to summon massive forces outnumbering us three and four to one—sometimes even more than that, though support was close—whenever we would attempt to find their leaders. In a definitive fight during Operation Whalers, a company sized force of Taliban ambushed my platoon of just 38 Marines. The militia commander, Ahmad Shah, who is now dead, was responsible for the attack against the Navy SEAL team including Marcus Luttrell, who wrote his book Lone Survivor based on those events.

During the battle, Shah was seriously wounded and flew—yes, in a helicopter—to Pakistan. His son was killed in the battle. I wonder if he was perhaps flown to these caves?

If you’re interested in that battle, there is a book out by Ed Darack entitled Victory Point, in which I make a small cameo or two. It’s a fascinating read on the history of the area, command and control issues with coalition forces, and the striking outcome of the six day battle.

I for one am proud to have my part in the history of the area, and am very happy to see that the Taliban have been routed form this area. The trick now is to maintain that ground, and capitalize on the momentum ganed form this operation.

I finally watched The Hurt Locker last night. I was sorely disappointed. For a movie that has been receiving awards left and right, I expected more. A lot more.

Let’s start with the portrayal of the Explosive Ordnance Disposal tech, Sergeant James. He’s a cavalier, reckless, careless, adrenaline junkie. He disregards all safety, tactics, techniques, and procedures, to just walk up on IEDs, brazenly clear buildings, and save the day. Bullshit.EOD technicians are carefully selected. The job has the highest requirement for ASVAB scores to get in, plus technical scores and testing. Besides that, EOD techs are put through a rigorous process to receive a TSCI clearance. That means Top Secret Compartmentalized Information. What that basically means is that you have a clearance above Top Secret. The information you know is compartmentalized in your department, so that even people that have a TS clearance aren’t cleared to know it. For example, how to disarm nuclear weapons.

During this process there is a background check and a character check. You see a clinical psychologist, and your family, friends, neighbors, teachers, etc—are all interviewed about your character, your history, your performances.

An idiot like this character would not make it through. Not even close.

Let’s move on past character flaws. Let’s talk tactics. In the beginning of the film, while using the robot—which looked like the MKII Talon?—the tactics were solid. Risk the robot, not the soldier. They only moved on the IED when the robot failed. Of course, I would have just put the wheel back on the trailer with C4 on it, so I wouldn’t have to walk up on the IED. That’s just me.

During that scene one of the characters states, “four blocks of C4—about 20 pounds worth of explosives”. What? Don’t they even have Wikipedia in Hollywood? A basic search would find that each block of C4 is only 1.25 pounds of explosive.

The IED factory. First, on their way out of the base, there’s no escort. It’s a court martial offense to leave the wire with less than six men on a patrol. What would happen if their Humvee broke down? Of course, a nice MRAP drives by in this scene, which, in 2004 where only driven by EOD techs.

Okay, so the grunts have called EOD to remove ordnance from a factory. Yet when they get there, the grunts tell them that no one has entered the building. What? How do you know there’s explosives inside? Then the three techs enter and clear the building. No way. EOD does not clear buildings. They’re not trained for it. That’s what the grunts do. Besides, the size of that building necessitates a squad sized element to clear it.

Of course, once the building is clear and they see the dead kid, the “body bomb”, they leave James inside. Alone. GTFO. There’s no way you would EVER leave a man on his own in Iraq. Or in any war zone for that matter. That’s a death sentence. So after EOD heads out of the building and he disarmed the kid bomb, the mental health officer gets killed. No, not killed, vaporized. As it turns out, in real life, people don’t vaporize. You find body parts. Everywhere. You get covered in them. It’s horrific and I prefer not to go into the details.

Next up, there’s a complex daisy chained IED that James finds. He pulls up all six or seven shells by pulling on the detcord connecting them all. Well, each 155mm round weighs about 100 pounds or more. It’s a little hard to believe that skinny ole Sergeant James can pull up 600-700 pounds while wearing his bomb suit.

Next up, the drinking. I don’t know what unit doesn’t find it odd that there’s screaming, fighting, and carrying drunk soldiers back to their bunks. Someone doesn’t find it odd that there’s screaming and yelling? It’s a war zone. I’m going to start wondering what the hell’s going on.

So James is mad about this kid, so he jumps into the guy’s truck, heads outside the base, alone, and goes renegade on us. Now I’m screaming at the TV, the producers, the filmmakers, and everyone involved. Nothing like that would ever happen. Do you know how much his head is worth? He would have been snatched up, delivered to the insurgents, and his beheading would have been shown on Al-Jazeera. End of story. Then, when he comes back, the soldiers don’t report him? Some idiot heads outside the wire on his own, I would have reported him because his stupidity puts everyone else at risk. Not that he hadn’t been putting everyone in danger beforehand.

After all of these errors, they make an almost fatal tactical error when there’s the large tanker IED near the end of the film. The three of them head away from support, split up, and start wandering through the city. Alone. All three of them. What happened to their jobs? Isn’t anyone wondering why EOD isn’t doing a post blast?

Let’s wrap this up, though I could go on and on, with one good point. The portrayal of the soldier who didn’t fire when his team leader was killed, who later gets shot by James (who suffers no prosecution for it?) was a fairly accurate character as far as the emotional and mental breakdown that men go through in combat. Of course, we don’t delve into this character too much, he is hurt and sent home so we can get back to the bravado. I for one related to this guy. The film disappointed me when it portrayed him as weak, as fearful. I think his mindset is the most common amongst combat troops. Yet, we fall back into the formulaic portrayal of the hotshot.

Sending James back to Iraq without addressing why he is the way he is, because of all the things he has been through, really does the film a disservice. It ends abruptly, when there was the chance to expand greatly on what REALLY happens to a man put through the trials of war. Perhaps a little more of the budget could have been spent fact checking, and highlighting the emotional states of the characters, letting us get to know and care about them, rather than just showing the bravado good ‘ol boy stuff.

Starkey / AP

Marines are now encountering stiff resistance in the northern part of Marjah, reports say. Three more coalition troops have lost their lives in the battle, bringing the tally to 11. While more casualties are mounting than previously, it’s still significantly less than what coalition officers had prepared for. The Taliban have also deployed new tactics. Snipers.

Taliban gunfire has always been sporadic, not highly accurate, but concentrated on the target. Now they are utilizing, for the first time in a serious capacity, snipers. Harassing sniper fire is coming very close to coalition forces, slowing them down as they advance through the north and eastern parts of Marjah. Combined with stricter rules of engagement, this makes the infantryman’s job much slower and harder.

Though the resistance in Marjah is stronger in those parts of the city, it is widely held that Taliban leaders have fled the area, leaving only ground forces behind. Officials are worried that activity in the area will pick up significantly when spring rolls around and the weather warms up.

Patrick Baz / AFP / Getty Images

First off, sorry for the delay in postings, everyone. I recently bought a house with my wife up in the mountains of Colorado, and we’ve been moving in and getting settled. Let’s get down to business.

The Marine Corps, NATO, Afghan, and other US Forces stormed Marjah this last week. My cousin is amongst the Marines serving with battalion 3/6. Semper Fi, Ryan. After using the “Shredders”, the Assault Breacher Vehicles, to clear the lane to the city, they encountered little resistance. Just before they shipped out, I told my cousin I predicted that the Taliban would run. But what comes next?The U.S. led coalition forces have encountered sporadic resistance within the ghost town of Marjah, and haven’t found the “uncountable” IEDs that Taliban leaders have spoken of in their press releases. They have discovered a significant number of IED caches of ready to be deployed weapons, however. The Taliban had plenty of warning that coalition forces were going to storm Marjah, so why weren’t they more prepared?

I argue that this is exactly what the Taliban are known for. When I fought in Afghanistan five years ago, the Taliban would flee with ease every time a Marine unit came out in force. It was only when we were isolated and low in numbers that they would attack in strength. There have been numerous insurgent-like attacks, with Taliban fighters firing their weapons at coalition forces, then disappearing int the crowds, but no showdown like the world was expecting (wrongly, I might add).

So what’s next for the Taliban? This war will continue as it has, and the Taliban will continue to survive in the face of overwhelming firepower like they have been. What we have now is a disrupted command and control structure in southern Afghanistan, as well as severely disrupted supply lines. The Taliban will run and hide, for now. They fled Marjah, and in the next coming months, watch for a reorganization of Taliban forces, then increasing numbers of insurgent style attacks in the warmer months.

In other news, a joint C.I.A. and Pakistan operation nabbed the number 2 Taliban commander in Pakistan earlier this week. Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar was the most significant Afghan Taliban figure to be detained since the war started eight years ago. He is ranked second only to Mullah Omar, and was a close associate of Osama Bin Laden’s before the 9/11 attacks in 2001.

There’s a chance that this capture, along with the success in Marjah, could cripple Taliban command for an uncertain duration. It’s now time to exploit the victories achieved recently, and pursue and eliminate as many Taliban as possible before the turnover date established by President Obama.

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab in custody - courtesy EPA

(EDIT: See my post on the 2012 underwear bombing here)     On Christmas Day, 2009 Nigerian citizen Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab got on board a flight bound for America. He had a bomb in his shorts. The bomb consisted of an unkown amount of PETN, or pentrite (pentaerythritol tetranitrate for all you sticklers), and some sort of firing device, like a blasting cap. He exposed a fatal flaw in the American Airline security system. Let’s discuss.PETN is a common explosive used in detonating cord, commonly called primacord or detcord. PETN has an R.E. Factor of 1.66 (relative effectiveness factor. Important for safe distance calculations, not so important for underwear bombs). In comparison, TNT is the standard for R.E. Factor at 1.00, and C4 has an R.E. Factor of 1.34. This all deals with the speed at which the substance burns, and therefore explodes. PETN burns at roughly 7,000 to 8,000 meters per second.

So here’s the issue. We’ve all been to the airport since the 9/11 attacks, and seen the security implementations designed to mitigate the chances of a terror attack. These include metal detectors, explosives detection devices, and even the “puffer” the machine that puffs air at you and then samples the debris that is embedded within your clothing, hair, and skin. All staffed by inexperienced “specialists” who get paid about $8.50 an hour. I don’t know the type of security precautions they use in Amsterdam, where Umar boarded the plane, but I will assume they are comparable until further information comes along.

Many of the more conservative Americans will embrace (not publicly, of course, because we have to be sensitive and politically correct!) racial profiling of Muslim people. This is ignorant and ridiculous. The majority of Muslim people in the world are not violent of hateful towards Americans. Besides, this Abdullmutallab was a Nigerian. He’s not Arab. Racial profiling wouldn’t have caught him.

Abdulmutallab's underwear bomb, courtesy ABC News

On the other hand, the last guy to bring PETN aboard an aircraft was Richard Reid. The shoe bomber. This guy was American! So the current policy of randomized searches is a better tool. Yet, I’ve been selected a number of times for randomized screening. In uniform. Excuse me, Sergeant Perna, will you please remove your shoes, open your bags, and come to us to a private screening room? Your bag tested positive for explosives.

Well of course it did. I just got home from Iraq. My laptop bag is covered in cordite form indirect fire attacks.

Not that I don’t understand the necessity for such searches.

Let’s talk more about Umar. This kid had an active U.S. Passport with a few stamps on it. He’s been to the U.S. multiple times. He comes from an affluent family in Nigeria. His posts on an internet chat board mostly dealt with teenage angst regarding his popularity and the opposite sex. Typical. He doesn’t fit the profile of a terrorist. Or does he?

When I was in high school, my junior year, our rival school, Columbine, was attacked by two young boys, my age, dealing with the same issues I was. The media was quick to blame their parents, video games, psychological instability, music, TV, and everything that could have possibly influenced these boys.

How do we mitigate the risk of terror attacks when they come from anywhere?

Stand by for Sergeant Perna’s terrorist awareness plan. Carry your own weapon. Concealed. Everywhere. My .45 caliber 1911 with +P brass jacketed hollow point ammunition travels with me to protect myself, my wife, and my fellow Americans who travel disarmed. The last terror suspect, Najibullah Zazi, was arrested very near to my apartment in Colorado. Last year, I left a Walmart just minutes before a criminal stole a police officer’s taser and electrocuted the crap out of her. Fortunately, we’re moving to the mountains where everyone owns a firearm.

Some of you might say that this is a right-wing, gun-toting, wild west idea. Sure it is. I’m a conservative when it comes to national defense, and a liberal when it comes to social and cultural policies. The mountain community we are moving to, however, has a higher rate of firearm ownership than urban communities in Colorado. It also has one of the lowest crime rates in the state. The violent crime rate for Gilpin County is 0.04%, which is outstanding.

Besides, when the shit hits the fan, who would you want protecting your family? A police officer, while altruistic and good natured, who is firing his firearm outside of the range for the first time? Or a combat hardened Marine or soldier who draws down and thinks to himself “business as usual”?