DEPARTMENT OF ANTHROPOLOGY THOMAS RANDRUP PEDERSEN university of copenhagen FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES faculty of social sciences UNIVERSITY OF COPENHAGEN · DENMARK PHD DISSERTATION 2017 · ISBN 978-87-7209-046-7 THOMAS RANDRUP PEDERSEN SOLDIERLY BECOMINGS A Grunt Ethnography of Denmark’s New ‘Warrior Generation’ SOLDIERLY BECOMINGS · A Grunt Ethnography of Denmark’s New ‘Warrior Generation’ New of Denmark’s Ethnography · A Grunt BECOMINGS SOLDIERLY SOLDIERLY BECOMINGS A Grunt Ethnography of Denmark’s New ‘Warrior Generation’ PhD Dissertation 2017 | Thomas Randrup Pedersen SOLDIERLY BECOMINGS A Grunt Ethnography of Denmark’s New ‘Warrior Generation’ Foreword Department of Anthropology Faculty of Social Sciences University of Copenhagen Submitted: August 2017 Supervisor: Birgitte Refslund Sørensen Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Copenhagen Soldierly Becomings A Grunt Ethnography of Denmark’s New ‘Warrior Generation’ PhD dissertation by Thomas Randrup Pedersen This PhD is funded by the Danish Council for Independent Research | Humanities (FKK) (grant no. 0602-02345B) Copyright 2017. Text and images: Thomas Randrup Pedersen ISBN 978-87-7209-056-6 (ebook) ISBN 978-87-7209-046-7 Printed by SL grafik, Frederiksberg, Denmark (slgrafik.dk) 2 3 4 5 Only human Once upon a time, I wore the Queen’s uniform. It was a few years after the end of the Cold War. In the Danish Armed Forces, my enemy still went by the name of Ivan. He did still come from Russia, and conscription in Denmark was still for eight months. I was a conscripted private. Yet, no one had forced me into the military. I had been giv- en a choice. I could do military service either in the Danish Defence or in the Danish Civil Defence. Alternatively, I could become conscientious objector and do communi- ty service. I chose the former. I was curious, even adventurous. I wanted to try my strength on the armed forces. I wanted to get to know the military world from inside the fence. I was given a second choice. I could join the army, navy or air force. I chose the latter and became an airman, or ‘flyer’ (‘flyver’), as members of the air force are nicknamed. In retrospect, I do not wonder so much about why I signed up for military service in the first place as why I decided to join the air force. After all, as conscript, it is not exactly as if one gets to fly anything. Perhaps I was just not as adventurous as I like to think. Perhaps I somehow deemed the navy, let alone the army, to be just a little too adventurous, a little too strenuous. After all, as the saying goes: ‘The Army sleeps un- der the stars, the Navy navigates by the stars, and the Air Force chooses their hotel by the number of stars’.1 Yet, I also suspect Hollywood and, by implication, the Pentagon (cf. Robb 2004) had a finger in the pie. After all, back then in the early 1990s, I did still have a young Tom Cruise fresh in my mind as ‘Maverick’, the heroic US Navy Jet Fighter Pilot in Tom Scott’s Top Gun (1986). Scott’s action drama not only became a box office success, but also a very successful military recruitment video: the numbers of young men who joined the US Navy in the hope of becoming navy aviators went up by a staggering 500 per cent (ibid.). Perhaps I should not have been so surprised to learn that, among those of my three classmates who joined the armed forces after up- per-secondary school, two signed up for the Royal Danish Air Force like me. At the end of my military service, I was given a third choice: I could seek enlist- ment either in the Royal Danish Air Force Officers Academy or in the Danish Interna- tional Brigade. The former held out the promise of my becoming a leader, the latter a peacekeeper. A military officer? Why not? After all, my father once served in the army as a second lieutenant, and when I was playing war as child, did I then not always want 1 In Danish, ‘Hæren sover under stjernerne, søværnet navigerer efter stjernerne, og flyveåbnet væl- ger hotel ud fra antallet af stjerner’. 6 7 to be the commander that the other kids would follow through thick and thin? A Contents peacekeeper? Why not? After all, war was waged as close to home as the Balkans, and when I was playing soldiers as a child, did I not then always want to protect the weak Foreword | Only human 3 and the wounded? Eventually, I rejected both options. Perhaps my courage failed me, or perhaps I did not want to break my mother’s heart. Perhaps my convictions were Tables | Maps and figures 10 closer to those of the dove than to those of the hawk. Perhaps I simply reckoned that I Abbreviations 11 was too weedy and too impractical to ever truly become a competent officer or peace- Acknowledgements 13 keeper, let alone a ‘true warrior’. Instead, I took the decision to deploy to Uganda with the Red Cross Youth and lat- Prologue | Highway adventures 21 er to enrol in academia within the discipline of social anthropology. Why? However Chapter 1 | Introduction: Target designations 33 naïve it may be, to make the world a better place; to make the much-famed difference. Chapter 2 | Background brief alpha: Old news from the ‘home front’ 53 Yet, at the same time, I did also choose both the Red Cross and academia because I wanted to test myself, to fashion myself and become somebody, not just anybody. As a Chapter 3 | Background brief bravo: Warrior nation 2.0 73 result, there seems to be a deep resonance between my own project of self-becoming Chapter 4 | Analytical incursions, theoretical positions: Soldierly becomings 95 and those of the Danish soldiers who are my interlocutors in the present study. Becom- Chapter 5 | Methodological manoeuvres: Anthropologist in arms 117 ing, it seems, is only human, however militant and warlike it may be. Chapter 6 | Terrain orientatons: Garrison Denmark, Camp Afghanistan 149 Dragoons 154 Hussars 166 ‘Vikings’ 181 The articles: Publication overview 197 (i) Get Real: Chasing Danish warrior dreams in the Afghan 'sandbox' 199 (ii) War/Law/Morality: Battling for the warrior's moral high ground in the civilianised war 227 (iii) The Willing: Danish combat troops from endurance, through edgework, to engagement 251 Chapter 7 | Conclusion: Happiness is a warm gun? 273 References 285 Appendix 1 | Denmark's military contributions to international operations since 1948 315 Appendix 2 | Order of Battle, DANCON/ISAF RC (S/SW) 319 Appendix 3 | 1st Brigade and Jutland Dragoon Regiment - organisation 320 Appendix 4 | 2nd Brigade and Guard Hussar Regiment - organisation 321 Appendix 5 | Loki, Tank Detachment and Fenrir - organisation 322 Appendix 6 | Badges and Insignia of the Royal Danish Army 323 Summary 325 Dansk resumé 327 8 9 Tables | Maps and figures Abbreviations AAA American Anthropological Association ABT Army Basic Training ANA Afghan National Army APC Armoured Personnel Carrier Maps ARF Army Reaction Force Map 1: Key field sites, Denmark 15 BRAC-T Base Relocation and Closure – Transition CF NSN Combined Force Nahr-e Saraj (North) Map 2: Provinces of Afghanistan 16 CIMIC Civil-Military Cooperation CISCEN Communication and Information System Centre Map 3: Highway One, Afghanistan 17 CO Conscientious Objector COIN Counter-insurgency Map 4: Helmand Province 18 COMISAF Commander-in-Chief of the International Security Assistance Force CSF2 Comprehensive Soldier and Family Fitness Map 5: ‘Green Zone’, central Helmand 19 DANCON Danish Contingent DDEO Danish Defence Estates and Infrastructure Organisation DDPO Danish Defence Personnel Organisation ECM Electronic Counter-Measures Figures EFP Enhanced Forward Presence Figure 1: MRAP Cougar, Fenrir, Foxtrot Range, Bastion-Leatherneck-Shorabak 1 EOD Explosive Ordnance Disposal EU European Union Figure 2: Badge Drill, 3rd Training Squadron, Bornholm 4 EW Electronic Warfare FOB Forward Operating Base Figure 3: Highway One-mugs, Danish PX, Camp Viking 22 GHR Guard Hussar Regiment GIRoA Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Figure 4: Commander’s update brief, Loki, operational zone, Camp Viking 34 HPRT Helmand Provisional Reconstruction Team HQ Headquarters Figure 5: Rotation, outbound, Roskilde Airport 54 IDF Indirect Fire IED Improvised Explosive Device Figure 6: The Army’s Monument to the Fallen in Helmand, parade ground, Camp Viking 74 IFV Infantry Fighting Vehicle IHL International Humanitarian Law Figure 7: Haircut, Loki, accommodation pod, Camp Midgaard 96 ISAF International Security Assistance Force ISIL Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant Figure 8: Target practice, anthropologist with Loki instructor, pistol range, Camp Bastion 118 ISTAR Intelligence, Surveillance, Target Acquisition and Reconnaissance JDR Jutland Dragoon Regiment Figure 9: Main gate, Camp Viking 150 JOB Joint Operating Base JROTC Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps Figure 10: Leopard 2A5 fire adjustment ranging, Fenrir personnel recording Loki, KBR Kellogg, Brown and Root Foxtrot Range, Bastion-Leatherneck-Shorabak 200 KFOR Kosovo Force MECH INF Mechanised Infantry Figure 11: Deployment parade, Loki, Camp Oksbøl 228 MEDEVAC Medical Evacuation MOB Main Operating Base Figure 12: Pull-ups, Loki, CrossFit field, Camp Midgaard 252 MoD Ministry of Defence MP Military Police Figure 13: Muzzle cover, tank gun, Loki operational zone, Camp Viking 274 MRAP Mine Resistant Ambush Protected MRX Mission Rehearsal Exercise NAAFI Navy, Army, and Air Force Institutes NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organisation NCO Non-Commissioned Officer NSE National Support Element OEF-A Operation Enduring Freedom Afghanistan 10 11 OFS Operation Freedom’s Sentinel OHW Overhead Weapon Station Acknowledgements OIF Operation Iraqi Freedom OP Operation or Observation Post This PhD dissertation is funded by the Danish Council for Independent Research | OPLAW Operational Law Humanities (FKK) (grant no. 0602-02345B).