[nathanbedford]

There will be no reckoning in Fallujah in terms of disarming and neutralizing the insurgents. There will be an Arab deal just as there was at Tora Bora.

How are you going to judge who is an insurgent? The Bathist general certifies the place pacified and the real bad guys exfiltrate to murder elsewhere. The Marines are withdrawn after the administration claims victory resulting from its policy of vietnamization, opps I meant Irakization, and the insurgents renew their control of Fallujah, now in league with our denazified Baathist general.

Meanwhile, the world looks at pictures which show America humiliated and exposed as a paper tiger at Fallujah and a torturer of prisoners instead of a liberator.

I do not like the pictures any more than you do but I am not willing to dismiss their undeniable power when they do not fit my world view.

[Polybius]

There will be no reckoning in Fallujah in terms of disarming and neutralizing the insurgents. There will be an Arab deal just as there was at Tora Bora. How are you going to judge who is an insurgent? The Bathist general certifies the place pacified and the real bad guys exfiltrate to murder elsewhere.

The Baathist General is under the command of a U.S. Marine Colonel.

Fallujah is completely surrounded by Marines and a five foot high berm built by field engineers.

Nobody is getting out of Fallujah that the Marine commander does not want to get out.