Moderator, Greyhawk of Mudville Gazette; Andrew Exum of Abu Magawama, Bill Nagle of Small Wars Journal, Bill Roggio of The Long War Journal
Greyhawk: In 2004 I deployed on my first deployment, there were far more many reporting from down-range. There are fewer now and they are a national treasure. When the DFAC was hit in 2004, 7 milbloggers were associated and blogged about it; you could read about it within 24 hours. Even before that was "Two Slick's Forum." He found info about how a unit was readying to deploy to Iraq, focus was on Colonel HR McMaster. Slick said, "This guy was a professor of mine at West Point, a leader in the first Iraq war. This guy is a difference-maker." Amidst all the noise, that signal was lost. A year later, it was a phenomenal success story amid the mess of 2005/2006 Iraq and set the groundwork for the Anbar Awakening and the Surge. I ran the letter of Iraqi mayor praising the work of McMaster's unit and I asked what had we done right. That news was overwhelmed by the bombing in Samarra, but milblogs were reading it. Used to be that was what you got from milblogs if you were looking. That has changed, now.
As my 2007 deployment ending, was contacted by someone who wanted to start blog to counter Eason Jordan. "You know, I'd love to but I'm about to redeploy and I don't know how long that will take." It was a small blogger, who was Bill Roggio and is now a panel member. How did you get from there to here?
Bill: Started blog in early 2004 just to talk to friends and family who asked me about military and foreign affairs. In February of 2005 I was enraged about Eason Jordan's statement. It's one thing to say that sort of thing to your friends, but as a president of CNN he had responsibility to back up that statement. Gathered a group that put together a website and hammered away at him, demanding evidence. Eleven days later he resigned. AP quoted our statement and it went worldwide. I'd have rather he come out with the tape of what he really said, but that wasn't until a year or two later when it wasn't a story.
Blogosphere is political and I was labeled a conservative/rightwinger because I held him to account, but we never covered politics. I refocused on Iraq and Afghanistan, embedded in Fall of 2005, leave of absence that eventually cost me my job. Since then been to Iraq four times, Afghanistan once, first blogger embedding with Canadians. Was there for some of the big stories like the Awakening, etc., and WaPo has published my photos on the front page. I'm proud of some things we've done to sponsor others to cover the war. We've broken stories, done some real reporting. One of the things I'm most proud of is when Iraqi army launched campaign against the Mahdi army we were the only ones who said it was a good thing, we'd seen it coming for six months as the divisions were being formed. Media finally did a mea culpa, though it took some organizations almost a year to admit it had succeeded.
Greyhawk: In early 2006 got an email from combat vet about armor for the troops, which was a big issue. He went on to publish an OpEd in the NYT, Andrew Exum.
Andrew: Background in Army Rangers, fellow at Center for New American Security, studied in Beruit and starting blogging. Currently working with HR McMasters on policy regarding Middle East. Iraq and Afghan war has brought both top-down and bottom-up innovation in the military/government. Top-down is COIN manual. Bottom-up is tactical leaders on the ground operating differently out of self-preservation, which will drive promotion pipelines and doctrine. One of the big stories when we look back on this is how online websites allowed platoon/company-level to drive what happened. It's exciting to see how these debates have been carried out in realtime via Small Wars Journal, etc. Buddies email each other, "Here's something we tried that's working. It might help." New young people are driving defense policy development now, a new generation. It's an exciting process to see, and I'm just proud to be a part of it. It's been a privilege to watch. You can see the way we are fighitng the wars better because of the conversations we've had.
Greyhawk: 2007 I'm getting ready to go back to Iraq. Surge had been announced in January, I blogged how it was being accomplished by simply expanding the deployments to 15 months. Got an email from a guy from Small Wars Journal who sent me a link to a post that said, "Don't confuse surge with strategy." It was by Dave Kilcullen. I was amazed.
Greyhawk: In 2004 I deployed on my first deployment, there were far more many reporting from down-range. There are fewer now and they are a national treasure. When the DFAC was hit in 2004, 7 milbloggers were associated and blogged about it; you could read about it within 24 hours. Even before that was "Two Slick's Forum." He found info about how a unit was readying to deploy to Iraq, focus was on Colonel HR McMaster. Slick said, "This guy was a professor of mine at West Point, a leader in the first Iraq war. This guy is a difference-maker." Amidst all the noise, that signal was lost. A year later, it was a phenomenal success story amid the mess of 2005/2006 Iraq and set the groundwork for the Anbar Awakening and the Surge. I ran the letter of Iraqi mayor praising the work of McMaster's unit and I asked what had we done right. That news was overwhelmed by the bombing in Samarra, but milblogs were reading it. Used to be that was what you got from milblogs if you were looking. That has changed, now.
As my 2007 deployment ending, was contacted by someone who wanted to start blog to counter Eason Jordan. "You know, I'd love to but I'm about to redeploy and I don't know how long that will take." It was a small blogger, who was Bill Roggio and is now a panel member. How did you get from there to here?
Bill: Started blog in early 2004 just to talk to friends and family who asked me about military and foreign affairs. In February of 2005 I was enraged about Eason Jordan's statement. It's one thing to say that sort of thing to your friends, but as a president of CNN he had responsibility to back up that statement. Gathered a group that put together a website and hammered away at him, demanding evidence. Eleven days later he resigned. AP quoted our statement and it went worldwide. I'd have rather he come out with the tape of what he really said, but that wasn't until a year or two later when it wasn't a story.
Blogosphere is political and I was labeled a conservative/rightwinger because I held him to account, but we never covered politics. I refocused on Iraq and Afghanistan, embedded in Fall of 2005, leave of absence that eventually cost me my job. Since then been to Iraq four times, Afghanistan once, first blogger embedding with Canadians. Was there for some of the big stories like the Awakening, etc., and WaPo has published my photos on the front page. I'm proud of some things we've done to sponsor others to cover the war. We've broken stories, done some real reporting. One of the things I'm most proud of is when Iraqi army launched campaign against the Mahdi army we were the only ones who said it was a good thing, we'd seen it coming for six months as the divisions were being formed. Media finally did a mea culpa, though it took some organizations almost a year to admit it had succeeded.
Greyhawk: In early 2006 got an email from combat vet about armor for the troops, which was a big issue. He went on to publish an OpEd in the NYT, Andrew Exum.
Andrew: Background in Army Rangers, fellow at Center for New American Security, studied in Beruit and starting blogging. Currently working with HR McMasters on policy regarding Middle East. Iraq and Afghan war has brought both top-down and bottom-up innovation in the military/government. Top-down is COIN manual. Bottom-up is tactical leaders on the ground operating differently out of self-preservation, which will drive promotion pipelines and doctrine. One of the big stories when we look back on this is how online websites allowed platoon/company-level to drive what happened. It's exciting to see how these debates have been carried out in realtime via Small Wars Journal, etc. Buddies email each other, "Here's something we tried that's working. It might help." New young people are driving defense policy development now, a new generation. It's an exciting process to see, and I'm just proud to be a part of it. It's been a privilege to watch. You can see the way we are fighitng the wars better because of the conversations we've had.
Greyhawk: 2007 I'm getting ready to go back to Iraq. Surge had been announced in January, I blogged how it was being accomplished by simply expanding the deployments to 15 months. Got an email from a guy from Small Wars Journal who sent me a link to a post that said, "Don't confuse surge with strategy." It was by Dave Kilcullen. I was amazed.
Nagle: Our site goes way back to 1998. Dave Dilegge was working on urban strategies when doctrine was still that you bypass urban areas. He kept getting the same questions, so he put up online brochures of unclassified info that would answer 90% of questions. He and I crossed paths in 2001 and 2003. After a pause, we reincorporated it into Small Wars Journal in 2005. We're making about 5 figures a year as a 501(c)(3) with 3,000 members on discussion board, 10,000 page views a day. Weren't sure it was going to be worthwhile at first. The other forums were not anonymous, so we thought there would be a need for this. The community has been extraordinarily good, self-policing, diverse, progressive. Whoever comes up to the square gets heard.
[Sorry, my sitter is broken. I can't sit here and blog anymore. I'll let you know when the recording becomes available.]
This was a fascinating and intense discussion. I hope you'll take the time to listen to it when it goes online.
Bill, your obsession is showing. ;)