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What was Operation Anaconda
Operation anaconda analytical essay
Operation anaconda analytical essay
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The war in Afghanistan sparked numerous operations conducted by the U.S. military and its coalition forces. One of the most influential operation until today was Operation Anaconda. Fought in the Shahi-Kot Valley during early march 2002, it was the largest American battle since the Gulf War, and their first high altitude battle ever encounter. The goal of the Operation Anaconda was to eradicate the remaining Taliban and al Qaeda foothold within the eastern region of Afghanistan. Although, originally intended to last three days, Operation Anaconda lasted seventeen days instead, with seven days of intense battle. The U.S. operation Commander, Major General Franklin Hagenbeck, schemed the “hammer and anvil” plan in order to achieve his objective. However, this plan …show more content…
Kugler (2007) claimed that, “Operation Anaconda was an outgrowth of earlier events during the war in Afghanistan.” One of the main event he exposed in his case study, which according to him set the stage for Operation Anaconda, was the battle at Tora Bora. Located in in the mountainous area of eastern Afghanistan, Tora Bora was a caved complex, where U.S. authorities believed to be Osama Bin Laden safe haven. The plan were to use minimum U.S. troops and relied mostly local Afghan troops in order to secure the area and capture all High Value Targets (HVT). Dr. Kugler (2007) briefly explained that, the operation turned out to be a failure from the point of view of U.S. and coalition forces, since most HTVs including Osama Bin Laden and al Qaeda leaders successfully escaped during the operation. The successful escape of these key leaders was in part due to the lack of necessary amount of troops needed to block all escape routes, and to the lack of experience from the local Afghan troops, the Pashtun militia. Chairman Kerry (2009) stated in his report to congress that, “the decision not to deploy American forces to go after bin Laden or block his escape was made by Secretary of
The award-winning novel by Stephen Ambrose, Band of Brothers: Easy Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne from Normandy to Hitler's Eagle's Nest, discusses one of the greatest examples of mission command in the form of 1st Lieutenant Richard Winters and his role in the Brecourt Manor Assault. This battle is a textbook example of how to fight against a superior enemy force that outnumbered the unit by four times as much. Facing overwhelming odds with just 16 paratroopers against over 60 German Soldiers, 1LT Winters nevertheless prevails and succeeds in achieving his objective while minimizing casualties to just three Soldiers lost. Looking back further into the American Revolution, the Battle of Bunker Hill on the American side is one of the earliest examples of Mission Command under the command of COL William Prescott.
In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001, the United States was incredibly eager to strike back at the nations thought to be responsible for this horrific tragedy. These attacks were quickly attributed to the terrorist group al-Qa’ida, led by Osama bin Laden, and to the Taliban-run government of Afghanistan, which had provided sanctuary to al-Qa’ida. In response, Washington approved a covert plan led by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) to directly attack those responsible in their Middle East safe haven. Initiated on 26 September 2001 with the approval of the warlords of the Afghan Northern Alliance, with whom the CIA had formed an intelligence liaison relationship, Operation Jawbreaker resulted in the fall of the Taliban regime, the killing and capture of a significant amount of al-Qa’ida leadership, and elimination of a terrorist safe haven by early December 2001. Moreover, the Taliban’s collapse denied al-Qa’ida a pseudo-nation-state partner, serving to reduce the organization’s sanctuary to areas residing along the Pakistani border. Operation Jawbreaker, one of the first post-9/11 covert operations carried out by the United States in support of its national security interests, had proved successful. Word of the operation’s swift success astounded those back in Washington; dubbed the CIA’s “finest hour,” it signified the first of many victories by deposing the Taliban’s control of Northern Afghanistan.
Operation Anaconda was an offensive operation conducted by Coalition Forces during the first invasion of Afghanistan. It was the last major operation to take place during the campaign (). While the operation was successful, there were many arduous battles that had to be fought in order to secure victory. One of these battles in particular stands out due to the sheer number of difficulties and setbacks that occurred during the engagement. This battle has become known as the Battle of Roberts Ridge. For the purpose of this Battle Analysis the Battle of Roberts Ridge will be analyzed with regards to the characteristics of an offense, in particular Surprise, Tempo, and Audacity.
As the incoming brigade commander, LTC (P) Owens, I see the critical leadership problem facing the 4th Armored Brigade Combat Team (ABCT) is the inability or unwillingness of Colonel Cutler to lead and manage change effectively. In initial talks with Col Cutler and in reviewing the brigade’s historical unit status reports, the 4th ABCT performed as well as can be expected in Afghanistan, but as the onion was peeled back there are numerous organizational issues that were brought to the surface while I walked around and listened to the soldiers of the 4th ABCT, in addition to reviewing the Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) report. One of the most formidable tasks of a leader is to improve the organization while simultaneously accomplishing
The fight on Hamburger Hill took place during Operation Apache Snow, the second part of a three-phased campaign intended to annihilate North Vietnamese Army (NVA) bases in the treacherous A Shau Valley. Five infantry battalions were leading the attack under Major General Melvin Zais, Commander of the 101st Airborne Division. Three units were American (the 1/506th, 2/501st, and 3/187th Infantry) and two came from the 1st Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) Division (the 2/1st and 4/1st ARVN). Colonel Joseph Conmy, Commander of the 3rd Brigade of the 101st Airborne, controlled and lead the main effort of the attack. His plan called for each of the five battalions to "air assault" into the valley by helicopter on 10 May 1969 and to search its assigned sector for enemy troops and...
In the end, the professionalism and expertise of all the operators involved in operation Anaconda had prevailed and the mission would be considered a success. Mulholland assessed the performance of his men. “We put these small groups of highly trained, very dedicated professional unconventional warriors…into an alien country…and destroyed al-Qaeda and the Taliban in his backyard, in his stronghold.”23
The Battle of Takur Ghar was a short but intense military engagement between United States special operations forces and al Qaeda insurgents fought in March 2002, at the top of the Takur Ghar Mountain in Afghanistan. The Battle proved to be the deadliest entanglement of Operation Anaconda, an effort early in the war in Afghanistan to route al Qaeda forces from the Shahi-kot Valley and Arma Mountains. The battle saw three U.S. Helicopters landing on the mountain top, each greeted by direct fire from al Qaeda forces. Although the mountain was eventually taken, seven U.S. service members were killed and many other wounded. In honor of the first casualty of this battle, Navy Seal Neil C Roberts, the battle is also known as the Battle of Roberts Ridge.
Introduction Operation Anaconda was the first major joint combat operation against the war on terror that the US was committed to winning. This operation would test our military’s readiness for joint operations against a hardened and willing adversary. The primary mission was to kill/capture Taliban/Al Qaeda forces occupying towns and villages in the vicinity of Shahi Khot in order to gain control of the valley.1 The US needed the towns, villages, mountains, and more importantly, the intricate and hard to access caves cleared of enemy fighters. Units participating in the operation included elements of the 101st Airborne Division, 10th Mountain Division, Special Operations Forces (SOF), and Coalition forces from seven nations including Afghanistan.2 With so many different nations fighting along with our own branches of military, it would test our ability to conduct joint operations on multiple levels. History On September 11, 2001, Osama Bin Laden decided to “wake the sleeping giant.”
The United States launched an operation known as Operation Desert Shield, also known as the Persian Gulf War, in August of 1990 in response to Saddam Hussein’s order to the Iraqi forces to take over Kuwait. President George Herbert Walker Bush made the decision to send American troops to Saudi Arabia to form an international coalition that would eventually turn into an operation known as Operation Desert Storm. The United States Army had not witnessed an event of such international and Homefront importation since the Cold War.
Books, L. (2010). Battles of the War in Afghanistan by Country. Washington: LLC Books. Retrieved November 05, 2010, from books.google.co.ke/books?isbn=1158057407
The 2nd Brigade of 101st Airborne Division found out in the summer of 2004 that they had to prepare for the war in the Middle East more particularly for Iraq. With Colonel Todd Ebel in Command of the 2nd Division with a year to prepare over 3,400 men and woman he got right to work. Colonel Ebel started by choosing his staff and who he thought was fit to take charge and lead this ever more complicated war. It was a huge religious civil war taking place in Iraq at the time with the Sunnis at war against the Shi’ite and after the capture of Saddam insurgency started uprising immediately. This uprising along with the uprising of Muqtada al-Sadr a key leader that had lots of violent followers that soon grew into a form of a militia called Mahdi Army which became another huge problem for the U.S. because the line between a legitamite populist movement and a huge theocratic organized-crime and terror ring was a thin one. The 2nd Brigade Infantry Battalions consisted of 1-502nd (First Strike) and 2-502nd (Strike Force) and 2nd brigade as a whole is known as the “Black Hearts”. Ebel’s mission was to deny insurgent’s access to Baghdad through his AO and as intelligence increased to uproot and destroy insurgent safe havens, while also training the IA so they could ensure the stability of the region later on. Ebel chose Lt. Col. Kunk as commander of “First Strike” 1-502nd and Lt. Col. Haycock as commander of “Strike Force” 2-502nd. By Ebel’s personality evaluations of Kunk and Haycock he decided that Kunk would work in the area that involved him being more engaging where populist centers were and work with local officials and Haycock more in the fighting areas. Kunk was in command of 3 rifle companies, 1 weapons company, 1 logistics company...
The battle I will be discussing is the battle of Tora Bora. The engagement took place in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan from December 12, 2001 to December 17, 2001. The units involved were from the CIA, numerous Special Forces groups, Pakistani soldiers and local anti-Taliban fighters. The mission given to the forces was to kill Osama bin Laden from the caves, leave the body with the Taliban and disrupt the Al Qaeda organization by removing their leader. The intent was to infiltrate the cave system, remove bin Laden and return home.
U.S. Military Commanders promised an overwhelming response. On the morning of Sunday, the 4th of April, 2004, platoons of Marines began to position themselves around the city. The following day, the fighting began and quickly intensified. This day was the start of what is known as Operation Vigilant Resolve. It was an operation set to take back control of Fallujah from the insurgents (McCarthy, 2004).
In order to see how the Johnson Admin purposefully took advantage of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution, tactics such as Lyndon B. Johnson ordering the “Operation Rolling Thunder” bombing North Vietnam by the Air Force, the first American combat troops arriving in South Vietnam in March, and by June 50,000 United States soldiers fighting in Vietcong will be evaluated.
Canada has played a vital role in international relations for the majority of its 144 year history since the signing of Confederation in 1867. Canada first participated in World War I, then World War II in 1939-1945. Following World War II, Canada was also involved in the Korean War. Canada has been primarily a peacekeeping nation. There are many questions people ask when a high income country goes to help a lower income nation such as Afghanistan. What are Canada’s motives for helping out Afghanistan? Who will benefit from Canada going to war in Afghanistan? These are some of the questions many people have. While Canada has many domestic problems of its own such as homelessness, poverty and increasing national debt, why should Canada get involved with a problem that is across the globe? Are the costs of going to war out weight the political benefits? Modernity, modernization theory and gender stratification are some key concepts that are related to Canada going to war in Afghanistan.