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Actually, I agree with just about everything in your post. The only thing I would disagree with to any degree, and even then not all that much, is allowing long range *strategic* decisions to always trump tactical considerations. Sometimes they must, of course, but when the *raison d'etre* of troops in the field is always what some diplomat back in Washington thinks will be their appropriate "winning of hearts and minds" role, I think we have a problem. There are times for both the carrot and the stick in Iraq by our forces; I just happened to believe Fallujah was an instance where we need to use a little more stick. Others disagree, which is fine, but the bulk of them, like Super-secret Agent-man, resort to childish insults to express that disagreement. As you said yourself: *I don't come here to freerepublic to insult or to be insulted.* Neither do I, but there's been a lot of that going around.
Not on your part, however; thank-you for a civil tone to your reply.

*As for jihadees dancing in Fallujah. They even danced in the Fallujah soccerfield claiming victory even as they buried several hundreds of themselves. I guess, they would still be dancing even if a third of the population was killed off.

They are nuts.*

Absolutely agreed.

*I appologize for my rambling thoughts.

Cheers*

Not rambling at all; I found them concise, to the point, and on topic. Thanks for the post.

Sincerely, AJC

Thanks for your post.

I must admit that I am not particularly happy with what is going on at the moment. I am even going to go so far and state that I think the long term strategic objective might have been better served by a devastating military action in Fallujah.

But, I am in a little flat in Oslo, so for the moment I see no other choice than to trust the decision makers who have a "slight" intelligence edge compared to me and my CNN feed. And using my limited analytical ability based on the scarse information available, I think the course being pursued seems promising, and can save lives on both sides and help achieve the main objective to boot.

I just watched Rumsfelds presser from the Pentagon. He still stated that the four red lines put down by the US WILL be observed. If not by the new fallujah brigade, then by the Marines.

That is somehow heartening. Certainly Rumsfeld would be better off not making such statements if he did not intend to follow through.

Cheers.