Is the Battle Plan According to Plan? Race to Baghdad brings second-guessing (flashback)

Los Angeles Times ^ | March 25, 2003 | By Richard T. Cooper and Tyler Marshall, Times Staff

[JohnHuang2]

WASHINGTON -- As U.S. armored columns drive single-mindedly toward Baghdad, deliberately bypassing Basra and other cities in southern Iraq, they are taking a calculated risk.

The downside of the strategy is apparent: Iraqi soldiers and paramilitary fighters are finding it easier to attack U.S.-led forces bringing up the rear and their thinly protected supply trains. But the Pentagon maintains that it's all part of the plan. Like Gen. Douglas MacArthur's "island hopping" in the South Pacific during World War II, commanders chose to open the invasion of Iraq by sidestepping potentially bloody, time-consuming battles to occupy Basra, Nasiriyah and other population centers in southern Iraq — areas they considered strategically peripheral.

Instead they focused on their central goal: getting their most powerful forces — hundreds of Abrams M1 tanks, armored fighting vehicles, artillery and attack helicopters — to the gates of Baghdad in record time. The gamble was that enemy forces would not be able to mount significant attacks along the coalition's stretched-out supply lines or otherwise divert attention from the campaign to the north. U.S. and British forces rolling in behind the heavy armor that led the assault would mop up what initially seemed to be scant resistance.

But recent developments have cast a pall over the early successes. Casualties have mounted in rear areas that U.S. forces had swept through virtually unopposed. Reports of Iraqi commanders surrendering whole units and enemy soldiers melting away have been replaced by accounts of deadly ambushes, helicopters falling to earth and American POWs being paraded on Iraqi television.

[JohnHuang2]

Friday, July 18, 2003

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[AntiGuv]

I don't suppose you might include a warning - say "flashback" in parentheses - when you post these months-old articles? Perhaps it's just me, but I genuinely find these retrospectives most exceedingly jolting in the extreme....

[JohnHuang2]

Good point. Fixed.

[AntiGuv]

Much thanks! I actually would enjoy perusing these articles with the added perspective of distance, but it's jarring when it comes across as a new development & all of a sudden it's obvious that it's a flashback. Thanks again!

[JohnHuang2]

Welcome :-)