Anabasis II: The Anabasising
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I am hearing not great things about the prospects of a US ground invasion of Iran, which is to say I’m hearing that we might invade Iran:
The Pentagon has ordered about 2,000 soldiers from the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division to begin moving to the Middle East to give President Trump additional military options even as he weighs a new diplomatic initiative with Iran, two Defense Department officials said on Tuesday.
The combat forces would come from the division’s “Immediate Response Force,” a brigade of about 3,000 soldiers capable of deploying anywhere in the world within 18 hours.
The contingent includes Maj. Gen. Brandon R. Tegtmeier, the division commander, and dozens of his staff members, as well as two battalions, each with about 800 soldiers, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters. More of the brigade’s soldiers could be sent in the coming days, the officials said.
Taken together with some 4,500 Marines already en route to the region, the deployment of the elite Army forces brings the total number of additional ground troops dispatched to the war zone since the conflict started to nearly 7,000, and marks a new escalation in the conflict.
Okay so I want to be clear that we just need another 3000 or so to make Pete Hegseth a legend… Anyway, I am struggling to understand the operational logic of a ground operation designed to open the Strait of Hormuz. As you’ll see from the map above the…um… round part of the land surrounding the Strait is controlled by Iran. Iran can launch of variety of kinds of attacks into the Strait that are sufficient to make shipping extremely risky. 10000 troops do not seem to me to be sufficient to control the territory surrounding the Strait in a way that could prevent Iranian attacks. Moreover, introducing ground troops would add an additional point of vulnerability in the troops themselves, who would require secure logistical lines and extensive air support in order to ward off Iranian ground attacks. I’m guessing that there are plenty of Iranian generals who even now are salivating at the prospect of bringing American paratroopers and Marines under direct artillery fire. It is possible, I suppose, that Israel and the US are still of the view that the Islamic Republic just needs on (more) swift kick in order to collapse. If that’s the “plan,” let’s just say that I am far from convinced…