So What Is Operation Jade Helm Really All About?

BY Herschel Smith
8 years, 10 months ago

We’ve only briefly touched on Operation Jade Helm and what it really means.  There are far better analyses (via Mike Vanderboegh) than any I have provided, and the reader is recommended to study those articles.  Mike Vanderboegh also has an analysis that’s worth studying in detail.

Of the claims I have seen, it is obvious that every ridiculous piece of disinformation from the 90s has been resurrected for this one, including the old hoary “rail cars with shackles” canard. Personally, were I a militia unit commander in the Jade Helm Area of Operations, I would take the advice above and have my folks — in civilian clothes — follow, watch and learn. Monitor, to the extent that it is possible, their movements. Observe their tactics. Document them. After-action analyze what you learn. I doubt very seriously if you will be able to monitor their communications, but much can be learned — especially by your friendly sources within local law enforcement in the AO — about what is happening.

Try to remember that all this disinformation-driven hysteria does is discredit your position. IT IS DESIGNED TO DO THAT. If the PTB can use things like this to convince serious people who might otherwise be our allies that we are all just a bunch of Alex Jones loons, then they have shaped the future battlefield in unseen ways that are to their advantage. Keep calm, watch and learn. Vocally (and loudly) object in local political venues about troops training amongst the population. It is dangerous. It is unnecessary. And training accidents certainly happen. One day, somebody is going to screw up and fly a Blackhawk into a crowded elementary school. Raise these very real objections with your local authorities, especially your county sheriff. BUT DON’T BUY INTO THE HYSTERIA. IT IS DESIGNED TO DIVIDE YOU FROM YOUR NATURAL ALLIES, THE MEN AND WOMEN WHO TOOK AN OATH BEFORE GOD TO DEFEND THE CONSTITUTION. Indeed, for the purposes of Leviathan, if Alex Jones didn’t exist already, they would have to invent him.

Well, perhaps.  But I take a slightly different view of things.  I think this is indicative of an evolution in military strategy.  In order to understand the way I see this operation one has to go back to Dr. David Kilcullen, the heralded “Jedi Master” of counterinsurgency who advised the now defamed General David Petraeus on COIN and stability operations in Operation Iraqi Freedom (regarding which I have some pictures of the news coverage outside the federal courthouse taken in Charlotte during a lunch time walk when Petraeus’s lawyers were plea bargaining his case – and I will share some thoughts in the future about manly discipline).

One also must remember that the tilt towards collectivist thinking isn’t just being driven from the civilian rule of the military.  The officer corps – especially that of the Air Force, Navy and Army, with the Marine Corps lagging far behind in post-modern thought – has become increasingly liberal.  Witness the teaching at the Army War College by professor Steve Metz if you doubt me.  So the officer corps has been looking for a new mission since China, Russia and other possible near-peer states are such friends and allies with us now!  David Kilcullen provides that new mission for them, even in the absence of his champion Petraeus.

Kilcullen supplies his vision for the future to us in redacted form from several years ago.

This era’s unprecedented urbanization is concentrated in the least developed areas of Asia, Latin America and Africa.  The data shows that coastal cities are about to be swamped by a human tide that will force them to absorb—in less than 40 years—almost the entire increase in population absorbed by the whole planet, in all of recorded human history up to 1960. And virtually all this urbanization will happen in the world’s least developed areas, by definition the poorest equipped to handle it—a recipe for conflict, crises in health, education and governance, and food, energy and water scarcity.

Rapid urbanization creates economic, social and governance challenges while simultaneously straining city infrastructure, making the most vulnerable cities less able to meet these challenges. The implications for future conflict are profound, with more people fighting over scarcer resources in crowded, under-serviced and under-governed urban areas.

[ … ]

The food security effects are equally severe, as pollution from coastal urbanization imperils fish stocks, and peri-urban areas surround city cores whose infrastructure is scaled for populations far smaller than they now support. This newly settled peri-urban land was once used for farms, market gardens and orchards, but as cities expand into this space, the distance between the city core and its food sources increases significantly. Food must now be produced further away and transported over ever-greater distances, increasing transportation and refrigeration costs, raising fuel usage and carbon emissions, exacerbating traffic problems, and creating “food deserts” in urban areas.

[ … ]

The three megatrends of urbanization, littoralization and connectedness suggest that conflict is increasingly likely to occur in coastal cities …

[ … ]

The implications for civilian agencies of government are equally obvious—the ability to expand social services, city administration, and rule of law into peri-urban areas are clearly important …

Right now I know what you’re thinking.  You’re thinking, “Kilcullen has recommended a focus on littoral and urban stability operations, and Operation Jade Helm is anything but littoral and urban.”  Yes, but you have to see the bigger picture.  Kilcullen also recommends a strong emphasis on meeting community needs, community engagement, and coupled operations between the armed forces and constabulary forces – wherever might be the area of operation.

And that last part is important.  Kilcullen doesn’t recommend for or against any particular engagement, he is merely pointing to trends.  Those trends and recommendations involve not regular warfare and large unit operations on the field of battle, but a focus on stability operations using all means at your disposal, including civilian assets and police.

So does Operation Jade Helm include preparations for constabulary operations on American soil by the U.S. armed forces?  Of course not, at least as far as you and I know.  You will never hear anything about such a notion, and even the leaders of the operation will not have been told that.  It’s more subtle and insidious than that.  It involves an evolution in thought to that of irregular, urban, constabulary operations rather than conventional war-making.

While it might be popular to suppose that the U.S. learned the right lessons from Iraq and Afghanistan and will never be involved in such military (mis)adventures again, that’s simple childish thinking.  We will, somewhere and somehow, and it just might be on American soil.  The evolution in thought Kilcullen has pressed doesn’t need Iraq or Afghanistan.  It merely needs a willing listener, and the U.S. armed forces are willing indeed.

And so are U.S. LEOs.  The SWAT teams just love to be coupled with the CQB experts with the Army and Marines in mock exercises.  And the experts in the so-called “social sciences” love to be called upon by the military to lend a hand in community stability (witness the participation of civilian anthropologists in operations in Iraq, more frequent than most readers know).

Finally, take note that the DHS is interested in biometrics.

April 28, 2015 – The Office of Biometric Identity Management (OBIM) of the Department of Homeland Security has posted a request for information (RFI) to get industry information regarding current and near future technologies to store, match, and analyze biometric data.

OBIM will use this information to provide customers with important data regarding immigration violators, criminals, and known or suspected terrorists and supports immigration management and border security decision makers.

Supporting national security and public safety as well as enabling operational missions across DHS mission areas, OBIM’s biometric identification and analysis services help government and law enforcement decision makers determine whether individuals pose a risk to the United States and whether those individuals meet the requirements for a specific government benefit or credential.

Folks, listen to me.  This is right out of the Marine Corps play book for Fallujah in 2007.  Unadulterated and unmodified, straight out of the Marine Corps play book.  Biometrics.  When the U.S. government is interested in biometrics and they begin discussing “terrorists,” watch out.  That means you.

So I don’t look to the “disinformation of the 90’s” for what’s happening with the DHS.  I am looking to more recent history and trends for politics and warfare I am seeing in the military thinkers I watch.  Alex Jones is a clown who wants to make money.  But Operation Jade Helm concerns me for reasons completely unrelated to him.

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Comments

  1. On May 10, 2015 at 11:30 pm, Daniel Barger said:

    The .mil is famous for the ‘train the way you will fight’ mindset. So much so that for the fun in the sandbox they built entire fake arab villages in places like Kuwait and the Mojave desert Ft. Irwin
    so they could ‘train the way you will fight’. Now….they are training in places like Dallas and Ft. Lauderdale to fight people like the citizens of Dallas and Ft. Lauderdale…..so logically that would indicate they are planning to fight in American cities against American people…..like Dallas and Ft. Lauderdale. Whether or not those in the loop know something specific is of course conjecture.
    What is NOT conjecture is they really are training for the purpose of controlling and quelling civil unrest in places like America….and no place is as much like America as AMERICA.

  2. On May 11, 2015 at 8:58 am, MattBracken said:

    My take: Operation Jade Conditioning

    https://westernrifleshooters.wordpress.com/2015/03/24/bracken-operation-jade-conditioning/

  3. On May 11, 2015 at 9:44 am, Blake said:

    I think Jade Helm is the logical extension of SWAT Teams.

    People are used to SWAT Teams operating in the US. Since the public is used to SWAT, time to take it to the next level.

  4. On May 11, 2015 at 9:59 am, Ned Weatherby said:

    There has been plenty of time for someone in power to explain the Fort Lauderdale corralling and removing “practices.” Why hasn’t that happened? Like Daniel said above, they train for what they intend to do. Are their foreign littoral targets that are as much the same as the ones here that training in Dallas would be similar? And why the need for police to train with military, if the intention isn’t for police to be involved with military? U.S. Military certain isn’t considering using U.S. civilian police overseas. Many reasons to be concerned over this one.

  5. On May 11, 2015 at 5:07 pm, MattBracken said:

    No worries, Ned, I got it right off the bat.

  6. On May 11, 2015 at 9:34 am, DogMan95 said:

    Brackens comments are spot on. This is a “conditioning” exercise. And despite your dislike for Alex Jones looney “style”, he too has said it’s conditioning. Plus, everything he rants about usually comes true in 12-18 months. I think we need more crazy people liker Alex and Michael Savage getting us to ponder every imaginable outcome. The biggest single fact is that more and more people don’t trust our Federal government….where are those darn missing emails anyway?

  7. On May 11, 2015 at 3:06 pm, Pat Hines said:

    Those living in the areas where this “training” took place, or is taking place, are in a good position to observe tactics and equipment in some cases. Most, if not all, of the communications will be encrypted, that’s a give away that you’re hearing Opfor communications, all of which can be DF’ed. Look up Roanoke DF equipment plans. There are computer apps to automate the DF operation.

  8. On July 23, 2015 at 12:42 am, Theresa said:

    I think the American people have been lied to and double crossed so much by this government. it has become really confusing to discern who is telling the truth. I think that might be the plan of the enemy or the government,( same thing) or the public. If we lose perspective in what is truth and what is not, how are we to survive. I don’t really know if the government is doing this Jade Helm thing or if somebody in the public is trying to stir up confusion so we will be deceive. There are people are paid to go out of their way to cause havoc. there is so much evil going on in this world it makes it hard to believe who is who, but one thing I do know is that I can trust God

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