Naming Military Operations 17 Mar @ 10PM

I had always wondered about this, and today I read an article on it that I though you might enjoy.
Today at the wing staff meeting, I got to watch film of our good guys blowing up the bad guys.  I LOVE watching those videos.  In one, our bomb hit two guys known to be bad guys.  The plane tracked them for FIVE HOURS until they were out in the clear and they would not hit anything else.  Then, about an hour later, they saw a guy stumbling around the bomb site.  They were 99% sure it was one of the guys they had just hit, but since they did not have eyes on that particular individual 100% of the time, they erred on the side of caution and let him go.  Don't believe it if the news says we are indiscriminant.  They are beyond careful.

An operation by any other name
By Lionel Beehner

I've always found the code-naming of U.S. military operations a puzzling and somewhat pointless exercise.

Some names are inspiring (Operation Noble Eagle), others less so (Operation Productive Effort). Some sound lifted from a bad '80s action flick (Operation Haven Denial), others literally are lifted from a bad '80s action flick (Operation Red Dawn). Some, like the 1983 invasion of Grenada, channel a mad man's diary (Operation Urgent Fury); others, like our 2006 southern Afghanistan invasion, sound vaguely kinky (Operation Mountain Thrust). Even the operations given foreign names, such as Operation Tawakalna Ala Allah (roughly "God help us"), do not inspire confidence.

I am reminded of this ritual because the Pentagon just renamed the Iraq war. Operation Iraqi Freedom is now — drumroll, please — Operation New Dawn. I understand the rationale to suggest we are now in the winding-down phase. A "new dawn" suggests the worst is well behind us. Yet, oftentimes this nicknaming ritual — first adopted by the Germans during World War I — is just a clever way of putting a kinder, gentler face on war. It is as much a public relations gimmick as it is a means of preserving operational security or boosting morale.

Take the 1989 invasion of Panama, originally called Operation Blue Spoon. It was renamed Operation Just Cause because the previous title did not "underscore the purpose of the operation and inspire the forces and the people back home," according to a 1995 report released by the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The New York Times, in an editorial titled "Operation High Hokum," mocked the name change, saying that "sometimes the margin between necessity and excess can be thin indeed, as reflected by the code names for military operations."

Code names originate partly from a Pentagon computer that spits out random word combinations, partly from midranking officers lobbing suggestions, which then must go up the chain of command for approval. Some are kept quiet, for security reasons, yet others become part of the popular vernacular (Operation Desert Storm).

There are classics of the genre (Operation Barbarossa — the Nazis' 1941 invasion of the USSR), as well as duds (the computer-generated Operation Blue Spoon). They range in their Winston-Churchillean bravado, though, as the British leader once quipped, they should never imply "overconfident sentiment," yet nor should a mother have to say that "her son was killed in an operation called 'Bunnyhug' or 'Ballyhoo' ."

Sure, Operation Iraqi Freedom sounds nobler than Cobra II, the name given to the ground invasion and spinoff of the World War II operation to liberate France (proving that the Pentagon, like Hollywood, is fond of sequels). Former commander Tommy Franks wanted to call the campaign Operation Desert Freedom, writes Spencer Ackerman in The Washington Independent, but "then someone thought that the rest of the Arab world would take 'Desert Freedom' to mean 'The Americans are invading here next' and thought better of it."

Maybe the code-naming of future military operations should be thrown open to the public or put to a vote. That might lend the ritual a refreshing air of honesty. Operation New Dawn might be renamed Operation Hit The Exits, or Operation Get Outta Dodge (although let's pray Operation Mountain Thrust is not renamed Operation Keep On Thrusting).

There is nothing wrong with code-naming wars to garner public support. But it should not serve as bureaucratic window dressing for fiascoes such as Iraq.

An administration that wisely tossed the "war on terror" term into the dustbin of nomenclature history should know better.

Lionel Beehner, a freelance writer, is a member of USA TODAY's board of contributors.
Posted at 12:15 AM/ET, March 17, 2010 in Beehner, Forum commentary, Military issues - Forum
Permalink