Fog of War: Are Your Family's Affairs in Order?

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Photo credit (edited), fair use

Regarding daily practice of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), by which I search for at least one undesirable event for use of the ABC model and unconditional acceptance, I recently discovered a Reddit source, an X source, and a Substack source which all address the same topic.

A letter purportedly by United States (U.S.) Marine Corps Lieutenant General Leonard F. Anderson IV to Marine reservists (an expeditionary, warfighting organization designed to augment and reinforce the active duty units of the Marine Corps in their expeditionary role) says:

Marines,

Our Nation is in a consequential moment. Global events are shaping our nation’s security, and we must be ready.

I ask you directly: Are you truly ready to deploy, fight, and win? Are your skills sharp, your standards high, and your gear prepared for immediate movement? Is your desert MARPAT readily available, is your gear packed and ready to pick up and move, or is it stored away in a corner of your home? Are your family’s affairs in order? When the call comes, readiness will be assumed, not questioned. Your readiness is not a declaration; it is a daily commitment.

This is not a theoretical exercise. Our forces are currently engaged in operations connected to Iran and are positioned to preserve stability in the Western Hemisphere. Our enemies get a vote, and a mass mobilization could become reality. We are operating in this environment now. History demands our readiness today, tomorrow, and every day.

Your preparation for combat is forged in your daily actions, your training, and the seriousness with which you handle every responsibility. We are measured not by our intentions, but by what we can do right now.

Check your readiness. Tighten your standards. Prepare your family. Our nation expects a disciplined, capable force ready for immediate action. That force is Marine Forces Reserve. That standard begins with, and must be held by, you.

I served with Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children (i.e., the U.S. Marine Corps) from 1996 to 2007, in an enlisted capacity, so allow me to crudely translate that letter for the layperson: Dear Marines, get yourselves and your families ready, because we’re sending you off to die in Iran.

Anytime I was asked if my family’s affairs were in order or advised to prepare my family for immediate action, it was understood that the Corps was ready to cash the proverbial blank check to the sum total of my life that I’d prewritten upon enlisting in the military.

Sometimes that check is never deposited, other times it bounces, and occasionally it’s paid in full. For example, I served with a fellow Marine Security Guard in Rio de Janeiro, Brasil who upon discharging from the Corps joined the U.S. Army Reserve.

He made it through his entire Marine Corps enlistment relatively unscathed, only to be killed when a weapons cache exploded in Afghanistan while serving in the reserves. Now, it appears as if my fellow brothers and sisters in the Corps are about to have their proverbial checks cashed.

Of course, I’m aware that the aforementioned letter by Lieutenant General Leonard F. Anderson IV may be a fabricated artifact of propaganda. After all, there’ve been many such fabrications regarding the fog of war, about which one source states:

The fog of war is the uncertainty in situational awareness experienced by participants in military operations. The term seeks to capture the uncertainty regarding one’s own capability, adversary capability, and adversary intent during an engagement, operation, or campaign.

Military forces try to reduce the fog of war through military intelligence and friendly force tracking systems. The term has become commonly used to define uncertainty mechanics in wargames.

When undergoing U.S. Marine Corps Recruit Training at Marine Corps Recruit Depot San Diego in 1996, I was taught that the fog of war regarded both intentional and unintentional confusion related to uncertainty. For instance, disinformation can deliberately deceive one’s enemies.

Regarding signals intelligence (the interception and analysis of foreign electronic signals), U.S. forces have historically communicated intentionally false information which was intended to be captured by enemy forces, as to trick enemy militaries into following a course of action.

Similarly, misinformation can inadvertently mislead one’s allied forces. Concerning signals intelligence, U.S. forces have retrospectively been unintentionally confused regarding uncertainty. This can occur when miscommunicated location data is transmitted to allies.

Given the intentional and unintentional confusion relate to uncertainty that contributes to the fog of war, I’m not entirely certain of any information I encounter concerning the U.S. and Israel-led aggression against Iran and other Middle Eastern entities. I simply have no perfect knowledge.

Neither do you! Thus, it may be that the U.S. is now encouraging Marines to get their family’s affairs in order, advising them to prepare their families for immediate action. If so, I suspect there will be unquenched bloodlust for U.S. and Israeli politicians who perversely desire war.

Oh, wait. I think the current disinformation regarding violent action by U.S. and Israel in the Middle East is being called an operation, conflict, hostilities, or anything other than the ostensible terrorism currently occurring, as noncombatants have already been targeted.

One day, the fog of war will clear. Marines, are your family’s affairs in order? Are they prepared to bury you while rationalizing the wrongful invasion and occupation of Iran with the slaughtering of civilians in the meantime? I encourage you to re-read the aforementioned letter.

Are you so ignorant (lacking knowledge, education, or awareness) that you’ll be willfully duped by the ‘we’re sending you off to die in Iran’ tone of the Lieutenant General’s purported message? If so, what will be said about you by U.S. President Donald Trump?

Regarding the first round of U.S. military deaths concerning the Iran war (or conflict, or operation, or hostilities, or whatever euphemism is currently favored), Trump stated that “sadly, there will likely be more before it ends. That’s the way it is—likely to be more [U.S. deaths].”

Apparently, oh-fucking-well, you gotta die…for reasons. Maybe it’s for honor, courage, and commitment. Or, perhaps the words of the late Major General Smedley Butler better explain it. In a 1935 short book entitled War Is a Racket, Butler issued the following declaration:

And let us not forget the bankers who financed the great war. If anyone had the cream of the profits it was the bankers. Being partnerships rather than incorporated organizations, they do not have to report to stockholders. And their profits were as secret as they were immense. How the bankers made their millions and their billions I do not know, because those little secrets never become public – even before a Senate investigatory body.

Marines, are you ready to die for the military-industrial complex that holds a blank check to the sum total of your life? You may die, but hey, “that’s the way it is,” right? Are your family’s affairs in order? Because the fog of war is thick, and so are the excuses used for Iranian conflict.

If you’re looking for a provider who tries to work to help understand how thinking impacts physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral elements of your life—helping you to sharpen your critical thinking skills, I invite you to reach out today by using the contact widget on my website.

As a psychotherapist, I’m pleased to try to help people with an assortment of issues ranging from anger (hostility, rage, and aggression) to relational issues, adjustment matters, trauma experience, justice involvement, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and depression, and other mood or personality-related matters.

At Hollings Therapy, LLC, serving all of Texas, I aim to treat clients with dignity and respect while offering a multi-lensed approach to the practice of psychotherapy and life coaching. My mission includes: Prioritizing the cognitive and emotive needs of clients, an overall reduction in client suffering, and supporting sustainable growth for the clients I serve. Rather than simply trying to help you to feel better, I want to try to help you get better!

Deric Hollings, LPC, LCSW

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