No One Is Competent

The German invasion of the Soviet Union in WWII, codename Operation Barbarossa, was the single largest military operation in human history. On the morning of June 22 well over a hundred Wehrmacht divisions smashed into the USSR. This same army that had spent the previous years overrunning Poland, Denmark, France, Norway, etc had its sights set on the expanses of the east. Things, however, did not exactly go according to plan. What was meant to a quick lightning war would turn into one of the most brutal, slogging campaigns in human history, and one which would see the eventual defeat of those who launched it. Join us on "No One is Competent" as we examine the first 6 months of the Eastern Front and the decisions that led to it.

Operation Eagle Claw - a daring special forces mission conducted deep behind enemy lines to rescue innocent American civilians - had all the hallmarks of an action movie story. Save for the part when it failed almost immediately as it began. The demise of Eagle Claw is often blamed simply on a series of mechanical failures and pilot errors, but a closer look at the planning and execution of the operation reveals a story of an ad-hoc, rushed plan that was beset by flaws and built on overly optimistic assumptions. Join us on this episode of "No One is Competent" as we dissect the military's failed attempt to resolve the Iran hostage crisis.

On September 11th, 2001, terrorists hijacked four airliners in the US and used them to kill almost 3,000 civilians. The events of 9/11 would lead to both a global war on terror and perhaps the most expensive manhunt in human history, the hunt for Osama bin Laden. In spite of his notoriety, bin Laden's history and the mistakes made both by him and those seeking to stop his plans and eventually capture or kill him are often poorly understood by the general public. Join us for this episode of "No One is Competent" as we go through the events that lead to the deadliest terrorist attack in US history and the hunt for the mastermind behind it.

Sometimes the deadliest events in human history are ones that were not meant to be tragic. Sometimes plans laid out with good - or at least, neutral - intentions cost the lives of hundreds, thousands, or even millions of people. Perhaps no single event in modern history illustrates this phenomenon better than the "Great Leap Forward," a set of policies enacted in 1950s China that resulted in a famine of almost unfathomable proportions. Join us on this episode of "No One is Competent" as we discuss the arrogance, paranoia, cruelty, and incompetence that lead to this disaster.

The Mongols are remembered as perhaps the greatest conquerors in world history. Great nations throughout Eurasia felt the wrath of Genghis Khan and his successors as they built the largest land empire in human history. In that light, the failed attempts of Kublai Khan to subdue Japan are a stark outlier, so much so that the two Mongol defeats are commonly just viewed as being the result of poor weather and nothing else. A closer look at the events of their invasions of Japan reveals a more complicated story, however — one of folly, overreach, and naturally, incompetence. Join us on “No One is Competent” as we look at the Mongol invasions of Japan of 1274 and 1281 AD.

Popular discourse on Afghanistan is steeped in mysticism, with the land ascribed by many almost supernatural immunity to foreign invasion. The idea that Afghanistan is and has always been the “Graveyard of Empires” can result in us both ignoring the successful conquests of the region by foreign powers and failing to analyze the errors of those who were unsuccessful. While most Americans think of the war in Afghanistan as something that began in 2001, in reality the country has been in a state of armed conflict since 1979. In this episode of “No One is Competent” we’ll be looking at the Soviet-Afghan War, the USSR’s folly that set the stage for decades of violence in Afghanistan.

Based in Yokosuka, Japan, the United States Navy's 7th Fleet is responsible for patrolling some of the most economically and strategically important sea lanes in the world, making it one of the most important elements in the entire US Armed Forces. One can thus imagine the shock when over the course of about three months in 2017 not one but two 7th Fleet destroyers were involved in two separate collisions with commercial vessels, resulting in 17 deaths. On this episode of “No One is Competent” we’ll be discussing both the events behind these disastrous mishaps and the conditions that lead to them being possible.

From the rocks and clubs to swords and guns, humans have been developing weapons for about as long as we’ve existed as a species and using them in a variety of ways — sometimes competently, sometimes not. Nuclear weapons stand at the pinnacle of this quest for evermore destructive implements of death. Built with materials that can kill via the emission of invisible particles and capable of wiping out entire cities, nuclear warheads are a step above anything that came beforehand… yet these devices remain fundamentally at the control of the often clumsy hands of their creators, mankind. Join us today on “No One Is Competent” as we discuss some of the most farcical incidents involving humanity’s most dangerous invention.

The United States Army prides itself on its long record of success on the battlefield, a sentiment built on a genuine history of victories in conventional warfare. Like any military, however, the Army is not invincible, and the those instances that display its mistakes and vulnerabilities often do so in a dramatic manner. On this episode of “No One is Competent” we’ll be talking about the Battle of the Little Bighorn, an event immortalized both as one of the most famous defeats in US military history and one of the last victories of some of America’s most persistent adversaries.

In November of 2001 Rudy Giuliani was the most popular politician in America, seen as defending the nation from foreign threats. In November of 2020 Rudy Giuliani was a national pariah, charged with dismantling the democracy that brought him to power. How did Giuliani rise to glory, and how did he fall so far? Join us on this episode of “No One Is Competent” to find out.