The crucial moment: US must defeat elite Iraqi troops

Guardian Unlimited (U.K.) ^ | March 25th, 2003 | Julian Borger in Washington

[Sabertooth]

[Sabertooth]

((((((growl)))))

[merrin]

If they try to retreat into Baghdad, I wonder if we might be able to draw them out with a propaganda campaign accusing them of cowardice?

Would their professional discipline win out over their Arab sense of honor?

[dodger]

This need not be a classic armored engagement. The Allies basically own the skies. The RG's should be decimated from the air even as we write.

[struwwelpeter]

Rummy's Afghan War redux was a bit optimistic. Thank God Gen. Franks convinced him to allow what few heavy divisions he now has.

Imagine if they'd tried doing this with SF on horseback again.

[Torie]

The perp culture loves human shields against a superior foe. Try some other tactic.

[oceanview]

i have to believe they cannot move. they are entrenched in defensive positions. if they start assembling to move, we can decimate them from the air. are their defensive positions such that there is no way to flank them and get to the city without going directly through them?

[merrin]

Someone (Dan Goure on MSNBC, I think) talked about possible flanking movements getting our guys between the RG and the city.

[denydenydeny]

In some areas, there may be no option but to move into the Iraqi suburbs on foot, an experience which is likely to provide a bitter foretaste of the battle for Baghdad proper, where Saddam's best troops, the Special Republican Guard, are waiting.

You can just see The Guardian getting all lubed up over the prospect of American dead.

[rotorhawk]

If they are used at all, US troops will not know it until they are unleashed at them at the gates of the capital.

Won't matter because they will be in MOPP4 before they go in. This has been drilled already.

This guy is all over the map and is transposing his own fears on some professional concerns because he doesn't understand (and is probably too lazy to learn) how we conduct business. I really hate when these journalists or reporters speculate rather than report.

[kylaka]

Unlike the republican party in the United States of America, the republican guard in Iraq will be decimated.

One or two surprises and a flanking action does not win a war.

The rest of the republican guard defending Bagdad are relatively fixed positions. Like Saddam, those folks are dead, shortly.

How long this action drags on, depends on how much we allow them to scatter into Bagdad with any weapons.

I don't think they will live to eat breakfast tomorrow.

What I'd like to know is why Saddam named his best troops Republican anything.

[Experiment 6-2-6]

All I can say is that it's a good thing Iraq doesn't have submarines, 'cause we're gonna need that armor that's shipping into Kuwait via the Red Sea... Guess Saddam, if he was alive, would have realized why the Russkies built so many subs..

In truth, we would be in a world of hurt if we had to deal with diesel electric submarines. I, for one, am extremely glad Iraq never acquired any..

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

OFFICIAL BUMP(TOPIC)LIST

[ApesForEvolution]

Oh yeah, BIF, Turkey can go straight to hell. Islamotrash bottom feeding butt-pluggers.

[WOSG]

my guess is CNN came up with that name to embarras BAush 41 ...

you listen to Aziz and it is "Socialist and Arab nationalist forces are in control ..."

[maestro]

They will use Ba'athist Darwinist-Pavlov Sociology/Psychologies and...

....... Gen. Giap ........'war' techniques/Chinese Proverb...

garmented/uniformed in religous terms.

ie. to use our cultural justice ideas against us by using their cultural justice ideas against us.

(In The book,...the 'Animal Farm'of the 'Farm' was a ZOO.)

(Psychiatrists NOT needed)

The 'Farmer' was a VETERINARIAN.

:-(

[Sabertooth]

Won't matter because they will be in MOPP4 before they go in. This has been drilled already.

Seen these?

U.N. allowed Iraqi purchase of agent usable for weapons
			Posted by kattracks On 11/06/2002 12:10 AM PST with 12 comments Washington Times ^ | 11/06/02 | Bill Gertz The United Nations overruled U.S. government objections and allowed Iraq to buy a specialty chemical that U.S. intelligence officials say will boost Baghdad's chemical and biological warfare agents. Top Stories • GOP regains control of Senate• Democrats can't avenge 2000 result• Vote watchers get wish but not results• Sharon dissolves parliament      A large quantity of a chemical known as colloidal silicon dioxide was ordered by the Iraqis in August 2001 and held up by the U.S. government because of concerns about its use.     However, the United Nations approved the sale and it was shipped to Iraq last month, said Hasmik Egin, a U.N. spokeswoman.     Colloidal silicon...
Iraq takes delivery of powder used in chemical arms
			Posted by kattracks On 11/17/2002 10:52 PM PST with 35 comments Washington Times ^ | 11/18/02 | AP ASSOCIATED PRESS     Iraqi scientists know how to make chemical weapons that can penetrate military protective clothing, and Iraq imported up to 25 metric tons last month of a powder that is a crucial ingredient to such "dusty" weapons.     Iraq told the United Nations the powder was destined for a pharmaceutical company. A former weapons inspector says that company was ordered by President Saddam Hussein before the 1991 Persian Gulf war to work on chemical and biological weapons.     The powder, sold under the brand name Aerosil, has particles so small that, when coated with deadly poisons, they can pass through the tiniest gaps in...
Iraq can make chemical weapons that penetrate U.S. protective gear
			Posted by RCW2001 On 11/17/2002 2:48 PM PST with 18 comments Associated Press ^ Published Nov. 17, 2002 ARMR18 WASHINGTON - Iraqi scientists know how to make chemical weapons that can penetrate military protective clothing, and Iraq imported up to 25 metric tons last month of a powder that is a crucial ingredient to such ``dusty'' weapons.Iraq told the United Nations the powder was destined for a pharmaceutical company that a former weapons inspector says was ordered by President Saddam Hussein before the 1991 Persian Gulf War to work on chemical and biological weapons.The powder, sold under the brand name Aerosil, has particles so small that, when coated with deadly poisons, can pass...

[Carry_Okie]

Interesting problem.

I'm no military guy at all (as you know well). Still, one has to ask: Can the 3rd ID swing north around the west side of Baghdad on the strength of a ground supply loop to those Western air bases and let the 4th come up from behind or is that just too much mass for C-5s to handle? It isn't a long turn-around. Is there too much RG up there for them to handle alone with the 101st? Why not clean out the rest of Iraq and leave Baghdad for last with the two-front attack originally planned?

[ez]

The last time American troops were involved in large scale urban warfare, they were in Vietnam, fighting for the city of Hue during the 1968 Tet offensive. The shock at the consequent number of American casualties helped bolster opposition to the Vietnam war.

Full Metal Jacket was based on this urban sweep and clear operation.

[Victoria Delsoul]

The risk they are taking was evident yesterday, when Apache helicopters were forced to withdraw, riddled with bullet holes, from a "hornet's nest" of defences around the Iraqi capital. They face another potentially serious problem. The race to Baghdad has left their long supply line from Kuwait unprotected, and officers are privately complaining that the US defence secretary Donald Rumsfeld's insistence on carrying out the offensive with only one heavy armoured division has left the supply columns dangerously exposed to guerrilla attacks.

In line with Mr Rumsfeld's push to "transform" the US military, by making it less dependent on heavy armoured divisions, and more on air superiority, special forces and non-conventional warfare, the 170,000-strong combat force in Iraq is a third of the size of the one used to achieve the lesser task of freeing Kuwait in Desert Storm 12 years ago.

"I'm hearing from friends of mine in the Gulf they're just furious now," said Ralph Peters, a retired army intelligence lieutenant colonel. "Traditionally when we do this kind of hyper-velocity attack, you need to give the troops a rest after four or five days and you have a fresh division move in up the lines." He insisted there was no doubt that the coalition would ultimately succeed but argued there were not enough troops to properly secure lines of communication back to bases in Kuwait.

Oh gosh, I'm very nervous about this. I'm confident of the outcome, but I pray we don't get anymore POWs or dead soldiers.