Stalingrad on the Tigris

Washington Daily News ^ | December 5, 2006 | Greg Dority

[Jomini]

This from today's WDN editorial page. The Stalingrad analogy is timely on many levels to include the long supply lines and difficulty of the urban battle. It would have been interesting if a comparison of von Paulus' request for withdrawal from the kessel and the American generals call for a pull back now had been examined.

Regardless of the decisions made, the status quo unlikely to remain in Iraq. God bless the American military in the difficult days ahead. If there was ever a time for a leader to stand up and rally the mission, this is it.

J

[dirtboy]

The Stalingrad analogy is timely on many levels to include the long supply lines and difficulty of the urban battle.

Sorry, but it is a royally asinine comparison. Stalingrad was a battle of annihilation between two large and organized armies. The US faces no such enemy in Iraq.

[redgolum]

Horrible comparison. 4th generation warfare doesn't result in encirclement. If it did, we would probably like it, as we would be able to take them out.

[LS]

I find this nonsense. We are slaughtering these people in record numbers, and even the mullahs have to be wondering how many more they will lose before their calls for "jihad" start to get a deaf ear. When you add to that the Iraqi army getting up and conducting its own operations; and the incredible carnage that the NATO forces are unleashing in Afghanistan, a more realistic comparison would be Omdurman, 1898. And we are the Brits.

[A Balrog of Morgoth]

It's pap.

[ClearCase_guy]

US casualties are currently around 3000. But, apparently we this close to losing 250,000.

The Stalingrad analogy strikes me as silly for a wide variety of reasons.

[sono]

Stalingrad on the Potomac seems more apt.

[Steve_Seattle]

The Stalingrad analogy is a very shaky one, which is not to say that things in Iraq are looking good.

[saganite]

Whoever wrote this tripe has absolutely no understanding of the battle on Stalingrad but obvioulsy hopes no one else does either.

[Enchante]

"Various scholars have estimated the Axis suffered 850,000 casualties of all types among all branches of the German armed forces and its allies: 400,000 Germans, 200,000 Romanians, 130,000 Italians, 120,000 Hungarians were killed, wounded or captured. In addition, and as many as 50,000 turncoat Soviets were killed or captured by the Red Army. According to archival figures, the Red Army suffered 478,741 men killed and 650,878 wounded (for a total of 1,129,619). These numbers; however, include a wide scope of operations. Also, more than 40,000 Soviet civilians died in Stalingrad and its suburbs during a single week of aerial bombing as the 6th and 4th Panzer armies approached the city; the total number of civilians killed in the regions outside the city is unknown. In all, the battle resulted in an estimated total of 1.7 million to 2 million Axis and Soviet casualties, making it by far the largest in human history."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Stalingrad

[The Blitherer]

4th generation warfare doesn't result in encirclement. If it did, we would probably like it, as we would be able to take them out.

"They've got us surrounded? Good. That means we've got targets in every direction."
-Chesty Puller

Just seems relevent. ;-)

[A Balrog of Morgoth]

That overwrought analogy about the supply line really got me.

Apparently, the Zhukov-wannabees at WND think Iran is willing to go to war every state in the Gulf, because that's what will happen if they shut down Hormuz.

[Tijeras_Slim]

The analogy falls apart. Neither side is fighting as either the Soviets or Nazis did. One because it can't, the other because it won't.

[Just mythoughts]

Hmmmmm, could it be that 'stalingrad' (stalin) ideology is what is really in play?

Anybody remember who lost out on billions of oil contracts with the the downfall of Saddam?

[vharlow]

This guy obviously hasn't noticed that the most frequent victim of attack in Iraq these days is other Iraqi's. He must not be very up on our military if he thinks we could be cut off there without supply lines. He must be very young.

[elhombrelibre]

As people reach for historic military analogies, this one is a stretch beyond the beyond. Really, it's just too silly for serious considerations.

[The Blitherer]

The analogy falls apart. Neither side is fighting as either the Soviets or Nazis did. One because it can't, the other because it won't.

Really good point.

[Tijeras_Slim]

Thanks.

[Virginia Ridgerunner]

This piece is ridiculous on so many levels. First and foremost, at Stalingrad, the Germans were locked in bitter large-scale combat with a well-organized and well-led Soviet combined arms army numbering, the hundreds of thousands, not a rabble of gutless terrorists.

[atomic conspiracy]

This is ridiculous. The murder gangs cannot even face an American squad in open battle without being massacred, the idea of a battle of annihilation is simply a moronic fantasy by the terrorists and their increasingly desperate supporters.
I should point out that this insane analogy has cropped up before, leftists like George Galloway frequently used it during the Battle of Fallujah, but it was the terrorists who were surrounded and destroyed.