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To: LS
The number you DON'T see---and it's almost impossible to find---is the number of terrorist/"insurgents" being killed.

It's difficult to find for a couple of reasons - first, because guerillas must attempt to hide casualties to create the illusion of victory, and second, because a profoundly hostile press sees the maintenance of this illusion as an expression of political power.

In fact, the entire idea of using Iraq as flypaper for international jihadists has proven very effective, and is in my opinion the critical weakness of the entire concept of jihad - they must fight under disadvantageous circumstances and the foot soldiers don't mind casualties. Unfortunately that's also a recipe for a protracted and disproportionately bloody conflict such as the one we see before us. The locals into which the guerillas blend take awhile to realize that the people ostensibly fighting the outsider are outsiders themselves without their interests at heart. This realization was only spottily achieved in Vietnam but is being achieved with astonishing success in Iraq.

In purely military terms the Iraq intervention itself has been an astonishing success - ground gained, objectives realized, and especially kill ratios. The fight, as in Vietnam, is in the political arena and the playing field is very slanted against success there. Bush will not be in office in 2009 but the current occupants of editorial boards will remain. These are not accountable to the voters, and only the market can correct them. And what I think we see is a struggle and a race between their ability to manipulate the market and the market's ability to manipulate them.

67 posted on 03/10/2006 9:43:09 AM PST by Billthedrill
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To: Billthedrill
Good points. In my forthcoming book, "America's Victories: Why the U.S. Wins Wars and Will Win the War on Terror," I liken your "flypaper" to "Ulundi in the Air," the strategy used by the U.S. in WW II to put bombers up as a way to force the Luftwaffe to come out and fight. Even if they had the temporary tactical advantage, as the Germans did for most of 1943, it was still a losing strategy for them because they could not replace pilots as fast as we could.

Likewise, the further down the jihadist ranks you go, you lose a) commitment (meaning more turncoats, delivering more information) and b) skill (de facto, the guys coming in late aren't as professional or skilled as those who were on the team at the beginning. Again, there is a certain inexorability of the math.

See "America's Victories" here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1595230211/qid=1139423812/sr=1-18/ref=sr_1_18/104-7528812-1819936?s=books&v=glance&n=283155

68 posted on 03/10/2006 9:49:05 AM PST by LS (CNN is the Amtrak of news)
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