Why on earth didn't we seal the place off before taking a week to amass equipment and telegraph our punch?
a) we spent a LOT longer than a week preparing for this, they've known it was coming for a long time.
b) we let a lot of civilians leave (so they wouldn't be hurt in the fighting); terrorists could possibly use that as cover to escape
I'm willing to bet that we anticipated this and had a plan for detaining or tracing terrorists. Our intelligence community may be "tagging" some of these guys in hope of following their communication and gaining information which will allow them to catch some big fish.
We have been talking about this since April
US Promises Overwhelming Response to Iraq Killings Reuters via Yahoo! ^ | April 1, 2004 | By Luke Baker and Khaled Yacoub Oweis
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. troops on Thursday promised an "overwhelming" response to brutal killings in the Iraqi town of Falluja and vowed to hunt down those who shot, burned and mutilated four American contractors.
Marines took positions on the outskirts of the restive town west of Baghdad where insurgents ambushed the contractors on Wednesday.
"Coalition forces will respond," the U.S. army's deputy director of operations Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt told a news conference. "They are coming back and they are going to hunt down the people responsible for this bestial act.
"It will be at a time and a place of our choosing. It will be methodical, it will be precise and it will be overwhelming."
Excellent point, they should have used the three C's
It may be something called the "Principle of the Objective". Our primary objective in Fallujah is to establish an Iraqi Government presence (to include police and military) in Fallujah, so that elections can take place. Then we will move on to the next "hot spot" (Ramadi?) and repeat the process over again. The trick is to put the Iraqi Government in control of these cities, not the terrorists. Killing the "insurgents" and capturing terrorist ringleaders (who are probably being tipped off by agents within the Iraqi Government anyway) is a bonus. Ultimately, when the terrorists have been denied their safe havens, the Government of Iraq, and the Iraqi Army, will have to deal with insurgents, terrorists and other malcontents.
for the same reason we didn't seal the Mexican border after 9/11....whatever the hell that is.
Because we play the Politcal Correctness game that allows OUR soldiers to get killed. Come On, GW. Let our soldiers go for it next time w/o any warning to the enemy.