Operation Eagle Claw Failure

On September 11th 2001, the United States was hit with a devastating blow when four commercial airplanes were hijacked by Al-Qaeda terrorist who deliberately crashed two of the planes into the World Trade Center complex, and a third plane into the Pentagon. The fourth plane, headed for Washington D.C., instead crashed in Pennsylvania. Nearly 3,000 lives were lost on this egregious day. In response, President George W. Bush waged the controversial “Global War on Terrorism” which turned out to be a self-inflicted wound for America, bleeding still today. Bush’s highly-criticized decision was inconsistent with the strategic principles of war.

This paper was written by Dr. Richard L. Kugler from the National Defense University, Center of Technology and National Security. Operation Anaconda was a success, but taught many lessons for modern-era force operations and defense transformation that deserves to be remembered (Kugler, 2007). Even though the battle plan was complex and sophisticated, it was not followed by the Afghan forces, which left US ground troops to do the battle alone. US forces had to replan the battle at a moment's notice.

Carter’s biggest failure was indeed the Iranian Hostage Crisis that lasted up until the preceding president’s first day in office. In November 1979, Islamic militants who were supporters of the Ayatollah took-over the American Embassy in Tehran, taking 52 Americans

Intelligence gathering and collection in the United States has significantly increased over time. This paper examines how intelligence reporting and pre-mission planning was crucial to the success of the United Nations involvement at The Battle of Inchon during the Korean War. By examining how intelligence played a role in this battle, you will be able to understand why it is important to gather and collect intelligence prior to every mission executed. Intelligence collection should be the baseline for all military operations. Inchon Landing has an ample amount of actionable intelligence; collected and disseminated appropriately we will discuss how it played a role in a low probability mission accomplishment to the last great amphibious assault in history. This paper provides detailed explanations on why The Battle of Inchon was a success and what could have been the outcome had it gone the other way.

This investigation determines to what extent American foreign policy, within the years 1953-1982, caused the Iranian embassy siege. Furthermore, it questions the role that the Carter and Kennedy administrations had in furthering the American agenda within Iran. In order to assess the role American influence played, this investigation evaluates the relations between the Carter administration and Mohammed Raza Pahlevi during his tenure as Shah. Carter’s Middle-Eastern foreign policy is examined to gain further insight into the influence that the United States had over Pahlevi. Also, the role that the televised address from

Using the damage and wreckage behind, they bolstered together a propaganda campaign to prove their cause to the world. In light of the tragic events, good came about. The failure of Operation Eagle Claw led to the creation of the United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). A review committee known as the Holloway Commission convened to improve U.S. special operations. (The Origins of Air Force Special Operations 2009) provided us with two major changes that came about to pave the road for future special operations. First, the DoD would establish a Counter Terrorism Joint Task Force. The CTJTF would consist of special operations members from all services. Here, they are to plan, train, and conduct operations together under joint doctrine. This change brought about the symmetry and cohesion between the services needed to conduct future high risk operations in denied territories. Secondly, a Special Operations Advisory Panel (SOAP) was established. This panel consists of high ranking officers and retired personnel well versed in special operations. They review and evaluate high risk missions and provide an independent assessment. If created, SOAP could’ve identified that the wrong helicopters were being used for the mission and chose the correct iron for the mission. To date, several operations have been successfully completed under extreme odds due to the lessons learned from Operation Eagle

(Check out the Fisher article) President Bush made many claims about Iraq possessing WMDs, and these claims were able to strike fear into the American public.  Because the people relied on his information, even though it wasn’t credible, he was able to get enough popular support to send military forces into Iraq, without the full approval of Congress (check this fact?) he used an old resolution that allowed him to go to war.  (Pollack article). Also, there was lack of information sharing between the CIA and FBI because competitors don’t like to share info.  The CIA also contributed to intelligence failure because it distorted info and chose specific reports to support their decision and didn’t actually give congress the correct info. The UN also went in and made reports but gave unreliable info based on fabrications and outdated info. The administration tainted intelligence by cherry picking through the information that they wanted.  They would intentionally choose channels that would give them the information they wanted, most notably the

Freeman Teague Jr. effectively expresses the importance and complexity of communication. At one time the U.S. Army defined communication as the exchange and flow of information and ideas from one person to another; it involves a sender transmitting an idea, information, or feeling to a receiver (Clark, 2015). Throughout this paper we will expound on key communication failures that were exposed during Operation Anaconda. The overall verdict is that Anaconda’s outcome was a success, but its original plan was a resounding failure. Many things contributed to the failure, but this paper will focus on the communication aspect.

The President and Joint Chiefs of Staff needed to come up with a tentative plan fast for the American population who were upset with the hostage crisis not being

The United States Army (USA) is known for having a superb command structure and it has been in use for over 240 years. The Army exercises command at three levels, strategic, operational, and tactical. This determines who is in charge of any given operation at any given time; whether an Army or joint operation. It also establishes a chain of command in order for information and order to reach the intended target. However, that did not happen during the first day of Operation Anaconda as everything that should have gone well, did not. And while the operation did achieve its goal, there were failures due to the lack of command and control, relationships, and trust. These are all necessary for a successful

In late December of 1979, Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) troops began streaming into Afghanistan by the thousands, marking the beginning of what would turn out to be a 10-year attempt to support the Afghan Communist party that had taken power (Britannica, Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, 2015). This paper demonstrates failures by the intelligence assets of the United States of America(U.S.) regarding the U.S.S.R.’s invasion of Afghanistan. The U.S. did not have a good understanding of the U.S.S.R.'s early involvement in Afghanistan; additionally, they failed to understand that by giving training and aid to the Afghani insurgency, they were forcing the U.S.S.R. to commit to military occupation, and

Development of the operation that took place in Iran was successful on the surface and is a very interesting study in the dynamics that are involved in covert action. Some would say that the dynamic actions that took place were 80 percent luck and 20 percent persistence. In looking at the operation closely, you can find that there was much more than luck that existed. The events that

SNC failed to properly calculate the azimuth. During SNC’s five paragraph order SNC briefed incomplete and incorrect information during the Orientation, Situation, and Mission paragraphs. During SNC’s Administration paragraph he stated “nothing has changed” and failed to provide any additional information. SNC failed to brief the location of key personnel. Due to these inaccuracies and omissions the content of the order did not make sense. During enemy contact SNC displayed difficulty controlling the squad and left a fire team unemployed. The two fire teams who rushed towards the enemy position became overlapped and SNC neglected to correct the deficiencies of the squad’s dispersion. SNC lost mission focus and expended valuable time

The United States (U.S.) have always considered the Soviet Union as a strategic national security interest. At the end of the Cold War, the Berlin Wall fell, communism power lost its grip, and U.S. and Soviet Union relations were no longer strained. During the mid to late 1980s, the U.S. faced a new challenge of an emerging Middle East power, Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait. General Colin Powell was Chairman, Joint Chief of Staff (CJCS) when the U.S. was under the intense pressure of leading coalition forces into the Gulf War. Realizing this was an opportunity for the U.S. to turn away from old polices, he tackled strategic decisions under the Goldwater-Nichols Act that shaped the post-Cold War. This paper will focus on how Powell through his career

That day German ships arrived at Toulon to take over the base and seize France’s ships in an operation referred to as Operation Lila57. Operation Lila failed, however, because Admiral de Laborde, who served as the commander of the fleet, followed Admiral Darlan’s order to sink any ships that Germany or Italy attempted to take hold of.58 As a result, a total of seventy seven ships were scuttled.59 Some of the ships that France loss were submarines, battleships, cruisers and destroyers.60 Although the French confirmed that they could uphold their promise months after Operation Catapult through their actions at Toulon, there was no way Churchill could have foreseen it. France’s word was not enough. To Churchill, it was critical that Britain make