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Wretchard is wonderful, as always.

What I see as the main problem with this strategy, however, is that there has been no clear indication to either the Iraqis or the American people that this was at our choosing. Muslims go with the "strong horse," but so do Americans, and the fact that so many Freepers could get so hysterical about this indicates to me that communication was not very good.

Most Americans support our actions in Iraq and feel we are winning. The leftist press, of course, hates it all, and knows that the way to get its program front and center is to undermine support for the war, as it did in Vietnam. If Americans had felt we were winning in Vietnam (which we were), they would have supported it. But instead all we got from the press was losses, deaths, and enemy bragging, which effectively undermined civilian support.

One thing I don't think we have sufficiently learned from Vietnam is that war is fought on the television screens of America. The inclusion of embedded reporters early on made me think that we might have learned this lesson, but in the last few months, we seem to have unlearned it.

This administrations lack of communication skills can't be real. They were the best right up through the invasion. I could never understand why we left the Iraqi TV going, and why we leave Al Jazeera going, but I finally figured out that we must be using it somehow. Don't know how exactly, but the whole military not doing anything? No.

The misinformation and confusion surrounding this Fallujah thing HAS to be deliberate.

If it's keeping US off balance, it's has to be keeping the enemy off balance. I've learned to just be patient.

the fact that so many Freepers could get so hysterical about this indicates to me that communication was not very good.

Some Freepers are extremely well educated. That doesn't stop you from living in the last century.

A very inciteful post.

If indeed, in the face of all televised appearances to the contrary, this is actually and American victory, it certainly has not been sold as such.

Worse, we are now vulnerable to charges very difficult conclusively to refute, that we have buggered out and tried to manipulate appearances to cover a defeat. Suppose there is a period of quiet and then another incident. Do we send the Marines back in? If so, then much of the world will say the policy has failed and most of the bad guys have escaped. If we do not send them back in, the world will say not only did the policy fail but the whole deal was a sham.