it sure the hell WASN'T the Marines, so...
Posted on 01/03/2008 5:42:13 PM PST by Kaslin
Media And War: As the battle for Fallujah raged during 2004, the world's media gave it front-page treatment — almost all of it negative. Now U.S. intelligence analysts say the media deserve some blame for the setback there.
"The outcome of a purely military contest in Fallujah was always a foregone conclusion — coalition victory," according to a report from the U.S. Army National Ground Intelligence Center.
"But Fallujah was not simply a military action, it was a political and informational battle. . . . The effects of media coverage, enemy information operations and the fragility of the political environment conspired to force a halt to U.S. military operations."
That halt, by the way, meant more U.S. troops were killed in pacifying Fallujah than necessary. The first battle for Fallujah began on April 4, 2004, and ended five days later. The U.S. had to wait six months before going back to finish the job.
(Excerpt) Read more at ibdeditorials.com ...
Could say much the same for Vietnam...
The Marines won Fallujah, handily, when allowed to.
Regards
it sure the hell WASN'T the Marines, so...
That’s foresure
“The Marines won Fallujah, handily, when allowed to”
The problem was after three contractors were murdered, burned, dismembered and then dragged through the streets, the marines were held back from cleaning out that vipers den. Whoever made the decision to hold them back bears that responsibility.
The Marines win every time … when allow to do their jobs! ;-)
I read on another thread that after the Blackwater incident, the marines were ordered to immediately assault Fallujah, bypassing shaping operations that would’ve allowed marines to evac some women and children.
I recommend to everyone the book “No True Glory: A Frontline Account of the Battle for Fallujah” by Bing West.
It covers both the military and the political/media aspects.
Just an astounding book. Mistakes were made and always are in warfare/politics, but...the quality, dedication and toughness of our forces prevailed.
Allow = Allowed
Also try to track down Vincent Foulk’s “Battle of Fallujah.”
Media, the domestic enemy, the media.
I will check it out...thx.
The whole axiom is flawed for one very important reason: we needed to concentrate the enemy to fight them.
At the beginning of the WoT, our enemy was dispersed to every corner of the planet. It would be impossible for our military to “take the fight to them” in all those nations, and they would always have many advantages. They would even be able to take the fight to our homeland.
So the best way we could fight them was if we got them to concentrate in a place where our powerful military could fight them, far away from our “soft targets”. This would turn a situation from one where we couldn’t win to one where we couldn’t lose.
Both Iraq and Afghanistan acted as “roach motels”, drawing the very best the enemy had to fight with there, to fight our soldiers. Had they been smart, they would have stayed dispersed and attacked our civilians. But they took the bait.
It is important that not all of the enemy has the fortitude to leave their native country, get training and equipment, and travel all the way to get to us. So this meant that only their very best, their top fighters, left a dozen countries to come to Iraq and Afghanistan to fight us and die. And once they are gone, it will be a long time before there are enough of them with the chutzpah to try it again.
But Iraq and Afghanistan are both large nations. So once our enemy were in country, we needed to concentrate them even more. We chose the very hostile city of Fallujah to be this place. From a given moment, we wanted every enemy fighter to head there, so that we could kill them.
We knew that they would think Fallujah would be ideal as a place to set up their emirate, as the new capital of their conquest of Iraq. The Fallujahns fully supported them and hated the US, and had a long history of making trouble for foreigners.
So we *gave* the enemy Fallujah. And from every corner of Iraq, the enemy flowed there like water. And it was the biggest and best trap laid since World War II.
Perhaps the worst mistake al-Qaeda ever made, which says a lot, in that they are masters as screwing up. And for their bad judgment, the Fallujahns were punished mightily first by their al-Qaeda “friends”, and then by the US.
And over 1,350 enemy fighters died there. A crushing defeat to their forces. Had they stayed home and made trouble, by now there could be a dozen nations in the throes of a civil war.
The US military didn’t “lose” Fallujah, it “used” Fallujah.
I do know that the msm is firmly in the enemy camp and anything that they did was to help the enemy.
I don’t know if that was planned, but it sure worked out that way. I am pretty sure the MSM intended “lose.”
Wrong.
They weren’t held back. They never intended to go out because of the Blackwater incident, and really never should have.
But in all fairness, when the USMC came in to Al Anbar province, we lost the ability to convoy or ride choppers in the daytime. I convoyed into Fallujah, had to have my SUV hauled out on flatbed and they flew me out after 5 weeks there.
The politics there didn’t help. All the ceasefires did was give them time to reload.
The Blackwater incident? Is that the three contractors that were murdered, burned, dragged through the streets and dismembered?
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