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"While we hope reason and negotiation can insure peace, only wars have proven to create or preserve it." - Victor David Hanson
A commentary directed at those professing disdain for the "slow" progress of the war:
We have been at war for 1 week. Here are some timelines to ponder:
| WAR |
Length |
| American War for Independence |
7 years (1775 - 1783) |
| World War 2 |
7 years (1938-1945) |
| Korean War |
3 years (1950 - 1953) |
| Vietnam War |
14 years (1961 - 1975) |
| Afghanistan War |
6 months to defeat Taliban Government: (October 2001 - March 2002: US troops still there by choice) |
This war is not a movie. If you want dashing battlefield drama, read
"The Charge of the Light Brigade" by Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Now for reality: Classic teachings on war from Clausewitz and Sun Tzu.
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The aim of war in conception must always be the overthrow of the enemy; this is the fundamental idea from which we set out.
Now, what is this overthrow? It does not always imply as necessary the complete conquest of the enemy’s country.
All that theory can here say is as follows: that the great point is to keep the overruling relations of both parties in view. Out of them a certain centre of gravity, a centre of power and movement, will form itself, on which everything depends; and against this centre of gravity of the enemy, the concentrated blow of all the forces must be directed.
General Carl von Clausewitz: On War
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Generally in warfare, keeping a nation intact is best, destroying a nation second best; To march over a thousand li without becoming distressed, march over where the enemy is not present.
Therefore, the best warfare strategy is to attack the enemy's plans, next is to attack alliances, next is to attack the army, and the worst is to attack a walled city.
Laying siege to a city is only done when other options are not available. Sun Tzu ~490 BC
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The overall political requirements of this war are to minimize Civilian Iraqi and Military Coalition casualties. Protect Iraqi civilian life or lose the peace. Minimize body bags returning to the baby-boomer populated United States or risk losing the war. I have said before - Saddam's only chance is to defeat the will of the American people as the Vietnamese did decades ago. The Center of Gravity for Iraq is Saddam's Regime protected by the Republican Guard. Tommy Franks sent the 3rd Infantry to meet the Republican Guard formed outside of Baghdad. In order to fight the battle he chose, Franks' orders were to get to the Republican Guard. The march was in the western Iraqi desert - where the enemy was not. The troops have found and fixed the Republican Guard. Blessed by remarkably severe sandstorms following the exhaustingly rapid advance, the army is now able to consolidate and protect its logistic train, rearm, refit and rest. Relentless airstrikes are pounding the Guard and keeping them fixed. The last thing Tommy Franks wants is for the Republican Guard to retreat into Baghdad.
Additional troops are following on as planned - being interpreted by some that reinforcements are needed because the warplan is in peril. That is nonsensical hyperbole. The 4th Infantry heavy division is en route to the battlefield as are the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment from Fort Carson, Colo., followed by the 1st Infantry and 1st Armored divisions from Germany, as well as the 1st Cavalry Division from Fort Hood, Texas, and the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment from Fort Polk, Louisiana.
If that is too long for some, accept reality. This is not entertainment. Sun Tzu also said: "One who knows when he can fight, and when he cannot fight, will be victorious." It is incredulous to say (as we hear on mass media reports) that because the pace has slowed we are having problems. The pace was rapid because the 3rd Infantry used Sun Tzu's dictum: "To march over a thousand li without becoming distressed, march over where the enemy is not present." Now the 3rd is where it wants to be. The pace has slowed because the real battle now begins. Victory does not go to the one who reaches the flag 1st. Victory goes to the one who reaches it alive.
Having used this lightening advance north, the Marines and British simultaneously began the job of controlling southern Iraq. According to plan the ports have been taken and are rapidly being de-mined. Humanitarian aid shipments already arrived today, not to mention military. Basra is surrounded and Iraqi forces there are slowly being closed into smaller and smaller areas. The British want to avoid urban warfare as much as Franks does. Some of the US Marines continue north, some are with the British. Reports earlier today of troops leaving Basra in a counterattack turned out to be troop repositioning. The best thing for the coalition would be Iraqi troops leaving the urban centers, where they could be destroyed with air power, avoiding civilian casualties. The US with the Kurds control the north. Again, the population centers are points of resistance, but are not militarily significant. The Western desert "SCUD BOX" and airfields are under US control.
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Henry Kissinger said tonight: "We own the North, West and most of the South and are 50 miles from Baghdad."
After 1 week, we control the air and 85 % of Iraq. There is no valid argument that the war is "bogged down," or that there are any significant problems with the warplan. |
Understanding Saddam: Fedayeen Saddam In order to keep his population and his troops in the field under control, Saddam has sent the fanatical Fedayeen Saddam butchers into Basra. Maintaining form as a ruthless Stalinist dictator, these loyalists kill, torture and terrorize to maintain control. Troops who will not fight are killed. Civilians who protest or flee are killed. These terrorist thugs share in Saddam's butchery. They are famous for beheading women. Where is the NOW protest about this? Their murderous complicity keeps them loyal to Saddam. Without the regime, the Fedayeen will be tried and killed for crimes against humanity if they are not first killed by the Iraqi people. This is how Saddam operates. Look at his behavior in 1979, when he assumed power:
On July 16, 1979, President Bakr resigned, officially due to health problems, but in reality a victim of Hussein's thirst for power. Saddam took over.
Saddam called a major Baathist meeting on July 22, 1979, where various family members and other Hussein devotees urged that the party be "cleansed". Hussein then enjoyed a cigar at a private table in the auditorium as a list of names was read. Those on the list were escorted out of the auditorium by armed guards. After all the names were called, Saddam spoke to those left - who had just escaped torture and certain death. Saddam praised them for their loyalty and rewarded them by assigning them to firing squads to shoot those members who had been taken out of the auditorium. The remaining Ba'athists joined Saddam in blood, carrying out the murders and saving themselves.
A high-ranking member of the Revolutionary Command, the head of the labor unions, the leading Shiite member of the Command, and twenty others were then systematically and personally killed by Hussein and his top party officials.
During the next few days, 450 other military officers, deputy prime ministers, and "non-party faithful" were rounded up and killed. This purge insured Hussein's consolidation of power in Iraq.
For generations, Saddam has kept control by applying torture, murder and fear. This has served him well.
He uses the same methods in this war. |
