That was then:
Maj. Gen. Buford Blount III, the U.S. general in charge of troops in Baghdad, said that violence against U.S. forces appeared to be random incidents by irregulars loyal to Saddam and that overall security in Iraq's capital is improving.
And this is now:
BAGHDAD, May 29 -- After an attack today that left another U.S. soldier dead, the commanding general of U.S. forces in Iraq acknowledged that "the war has not ended" and signaled the start of a new military push to root out what he described as die-hard supporters of Saddam Hussein.
Lt. Gen. David McKiernan said he was considering plans that would send troops from the Third Infantry Division, which fought its way into Baghdad on April 9, against an armed Iraqi resistance that has killed five U.S. soldiers this week.
These are not criminal activities, they are combat activities," McKiernan told an afternoon news conference. "We're going to address those activities by applying every resource available to us. The war has not ended, that's a point I need you to understand."
What a difference a couple of days can make!
McKiernan should consider himself lucky -- at this point, his problem appears to be confined to the "Sunni belt" -- the stretch of the Tigris and Euphrates valley that stretches from Baghdad north towards what is rapidly evolving into independent Kurdistan.
The Sunnis -- the traditional ruling class of Iraq for over a thousand years -- are the big losers so far in our New Iraq®. They were the cornerstone of Baath movement, and even more so of Saddam's regime. Saddam's hometown, Tikrit, is about as close to the capital of "Sunnistan" as you'll find.
Sunnistan was also the last area occupied by the coalition forces, thanks to the failure of Mr. Wolfowitz's Turkish general friends to do the expected and force Turkey's civilian government to clear the way for 4th Division to enter Iraq from the North. I talked about the potential long-term implications of that failure here.
But the 4th Division is in Sunniland now, and, according to Gen. McKiernan, part of 3rd Division is about to join them -- rather than heading back to the states in June, as many of the troops (and their wives and kids) had expected. Naturally, they're kinda pissed about that. I don't think we'll be seeing any Bush photo ops with those guys for awhile.
U.S. military officials said elements of the Third Infantry Division are already on their way to Fallujah, a city 30 miles west of here where four U.S. soldiers were killed Tuesday in an ambush.
I believe they used to call that a search-and-destroy mission.
We may have to get used to the term again. In fact it looks like the Sunni belt may be turning into what the Mekong Delta was for many years in Vietnam -- Indian country, a place where the Americans owned the day and the Viet Cong owned the night.
Of course, as the neocons never get tired of reminding us, Iraq is not Vietnam. (Afghanistan isn't Vietnam either, in case you were wondering.) High technology has given U.S. counter-insurgency tactics a punch they didn't have in Vietnam (or in Somolia, for that matter).
Or at least, that's what we may be about to find out. Can technology make the difference between a quick sweep and a long, grinding guerrilla war that sends a steady trickle of body bags back to the United States? I'm not sure how optimistic to be about the field test after reading this little gem tucked away in the back of a Wall Street Journal story (p A6) on Tuesday (the same day, ironically enough, that Gen. Blount was talking about "random incidents"):
For years the Army's annual computer-simulated war game has focused on fighting a major war. This year, however, forces didn't face any single simulated enemy. Instead, they juggled military actions in the Middle East, Southeast Asia and the Caucasus, while monitoring unrest in Latin America and Africa.
In the simulated Southeast Asia conflict, set in 2015, a radical Islamic separatist group, supported by funds from the Middle East and the drug trade, seized large parts of a country allied with the U.S. Those parts of the country became breeding grounds for terrorists. The U.S. forces swooped in quickly. They appeared to drive the enemy from the capital within days and then mounted attacks on rebel strongholds elsewhere.
As soon as U.S. troops left the capital, however, the rebels there -- many of whom had simply taken off their uniforms and melded into the city of five million -- re-emerged to storm the parliament, the government television station and the airport. When U.S. forces counterattacked, these guerrillas once again slipped into the shadows.
"We were never able to set up the conditions to make these disaffected people fewer in number. We won and then we found we owned this nighmarish place," says retired Vice Adm. Lyle Bien, who played commander of U.S. forces in Asia.
The experience left a few, such as Adm. Bien, believing that the best course of action would have been not intervening at all. "We're developing a force that makes it almost too easy to intervene," says Adm. Bien. "I am concerned about America pounding herself out."
The generals in Iraq -- and their civilian masters back home -- perhaps can console themselves with the thought that only the Sunnis are on the warpath.
The Kurds, for the moment at least, seem content with our semi-official support for their de-Arabization campaign in the North, and don't mind making a few token noises about a federal Iraq if that's what the Americans want to hear.
The Shias, on the other hand, are agitated. A smallish crowd demonstrated in the streets of Baghdad Monday, carrying white coffins and vowing to turn themselves into suicide bombers at any moment.
This sounds bad, but by Middle Eastern standards I don't think it's all that threatening -- maybe 3 on a civil strife scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being Saddam's reign of terror and 10 being a truck bomb at the Marine barracks.
The Shias are waiting for something -- what I don't know. Maybe it's the old divide and conquer bit, with the various Ayatollahs vying to use the Americans against each other. Maybe the Iranians are keeping a leash on their factions, until they see how the policy debate plays out in Washington.
I don't have a clue, and I suspect our proconsul, Paul Bremer, and his increasingly isolated squad of colonial civil servants don't either. Bureaucrat Man better hope that whatever is keeping the peace with the Shiites lasts, because it's the difference between the current very bad situation and a California-sized Lebanon -- with a Chicago-sized Beirut at the center of it.
But the question I keep wondering about is this: How could anyone ever convince themselves a quagmire like this wouldn't happen in a place like Iraq?
Someday, maybe Tom Friedman will enlighten us . . .
Guerrilla tactics render technological superiority nearly moot.
Wow. Musta been one hell of a party.
Everything was fine until I ran out of beer. Then it got ugly.
It may be a strategic silence (don't interfere when the enemy is shooting themselves in the foot) but I'd like to get some sense that they have their own plan for withdrawal.
I'm not too big on strategic silence -- in politics, it's usually a euphemism for cowardice.
A former CEO of Coke was once quoted as saying that when you see a competitor in trouble, you should stick a garden hose down his throat.
Which does kind of sum up my feeling about the GOP.
Yep, guerilla warfare, something we never did handle very well given we have a military geared for a Soviet era invasion of Europe.
Best bet,declare victory, leave and give the U.N. $10 billion for Iraqi rebuilding and let them handle it. We've demonstrated total incompetence in handling even basic infrastructure rebuilding and our hamfisted tactics just make it worse.
If Democrats are smart they'll let this festering boil grow on Bushco until he can't hide it anymore and lance it 04.
Gosh, I hope Iraq keeps BushCo so busy they can't afford to invade the neighbors.
Shit! My friend Mike is in 3rd Division. God damn!!
Hi
Take a look at how the Brits are involved - just about everything so far in Iraq has been copy of UK practice learned in N Ireland.
The capture of Baghdad was an exact copy of the strategy used to capture Basra
The new policy of putting more foot patrols on the street - British policy from N Ireland.
Now they moving British forces up from Basra to 'assist' the US in peace keeping operations - I suspect its going to be something of a training role.
"How could anyone ever convince themselves a quagmire like this wouldn't happen in a place like Iraq?" Well, what should we expect from the same people who were lauding Enron as the best run company in America?
Everything was fine until I ran out of beer. Then it got ugly.
Just make sure there's always a seat at the bar and a cool one in the fridge for the regulars. It'd be a shame to lose a great hangout like the Whiskey Bar to "Flaming Moe's Syndrome."
The war will be over when General Franks SAYS it is over, and of course everyone know's that Franks is, uh..., oops...
Looks like a lot of 19 year old kids get to die for fearless leader once again. Is it too early to start drinking?
Is it too early to start drinking?
Nah, it's almost JUNE, ferchrissake.
The new policy of putting more foot patrols on the street - British policy from N Ireland.
Now they moving British forces up from Basra to 'assist' the US in peace keeping operations - I suspect its going to be something of a training role.
Yeah, but Northern Ireland wasn't that much of a success - occupation-wise.
Simply amazing. Of course, this is precisely what some of us (gee, that includes myself) predicted was going to occur.
Is it hypocrisy or incompetence?
I vote for both, with an edge to incompetence -- how can you expect a President who doesn't the slightest bit about running his own country to successfully rebuild somebody else's?
Great minds think alike, Tom Burka. This is from the April 22nd file at Charen Watch:
"Dream on. Bush sneers at the American people who have no health insurance or jobs, who breathe foul air and drink contaminated water. He laughs at ripped off investors while he guts the SEC. He snickers at electoral reform and states in dire fiscal trouble. He gets drunk and lies about choking on a pretzel while our kids need textbooks. Who in the hell actually expected Bush to care or be minimally competent about the people of Iraq?"
Yeah, but Northern Ireland wasn't that much of a success - occupation-wise.
Uhhh... I think that was the point.
It'd be a shame to lose a great hangout like the Whiskey Bar to "Flaming Moe's Syndrome."
You're a funny guy, Matt Davis. I was thinking the same thing. At least Billmon doesn't expect the regulars to clean up the place afterwards. Can I get a bloody mary please?
this is precisely what some of us (gee, that includes myself) predicted was going to occur.
Heh... I think it was hilarious that Hannity and the rest of the crows after the fall of Baghdad were immediately bashing liberals about predicting the so called quagmire that was in fact a huge military success. It's easy to win an argument when you misrepresent the opponent's argument. Everyone here knows that the quagmire was what happens after the invasion which is showing to be more and more undisputable.
I will now leave you all with some brilliant Quagmire quotes from The Family Guy.
Quagmire: Hey Meg, 18 yet?
Meg: No
Quagmire: Hey Chris, how are you?
Chris: Well, I'm glad..
Quagmire:Alllll riight(walks away)
Quagmire sees a cheerleader tied up in a bathroom stall
Quagmire: Dear diary: Jackpot!
Quagmire: Baby, if I could rearrange the alphabet, I'd put 'U' and 'I' together.
Peter: I'm gonna go microwave a bagel and have sex with it.
Quagmire: Butter's in the fridge!
Quagmire: Here's to the Drunken Clam (a bar), where they don't ask for proof of age and neither do I.
Quagmire: Baby, you must be a Parking Ticket, cause you got Fine written all over you!
Quagmire: How old are you?
Girl: 16
Quagmire: 18, awwwright.
Girl: Mom!
Quagmire: I like where this is going!
I think it's not incompetence, exactly, but an extreme echo-chamber effect. Neoconservatives come out of a culture where you shout down or dismiss out of hand opposing points of view, rather than argue against them, or try to figure out who's right. This administration is said to value "loyalty" above all else, and it's a peculiar sort of loyalty -- not an effort to make your boss successful, but a slavish devotion to the already-agreed-upon Truth. Anyone who speaks inconvenient truths or who even tries to get less-optimistic possibilities considered to ensure success is likely to find themself not only canned, but to have substantial effort devoted to destroying them professionally.
This is great for keeping the troops in line and pushing your program through, but disastrous for finding out if your program is actually going to do what you think.
Perhaps the most egregious example of this yes-man echo chamber is Rumsfeld's setting up his own intelligence office at the Pentagon, with a mandate to find intelligence to support what he'd already decided was true, rather than trying to find out what really *was* true. I'm an engineer, I know a little about feedback and control systems. If you're not looking at the road, and only listening to people who tell you that the road is where you want it to be, pretty soon you'll end up wrapped around a tree.
So yes, I do think there are plenty of people in the administration who honestly believed that the Iraqis would lay rose petals at our feet, welcome Chalabi as their freely elected leader, cheer as Republican-donor contractors rebuilt and ran all their public services and industries at a profit (not to mention the spontaneous uprisings to replace most other repressive regimes in the region with Western-friendly democracies.) But only by remaining willfully blind to any evidence to the contrary.
Nice Site!
The political views got me looking.
The drinking got me posting.
[looks around for a clean ashtray]
Wow. Musta been one hell of a party.
You do stellar work, Billmon. Bravo on all those links today. You deserve them.
I'm willing to bet that every sniper attack, pot shot, and grenade launched against the US in Iraq will be met with overwhelming military force. This ain't no disco. This is $28.00 a barrel. The 'good' news is that US casualties will be 1 here, 2 there and not enough to cause an organized ruckus back home. The bad news is that this could (and probably will) go on for the foreseeable future.
I don't hear any of the Democratic candidates comming up with a "peace is at hand" alternative to the current occupation. It may be a strategic silence (don't interfere when the enemy is shooting themselves in the foot) but I'd like to get some sense that they have their own plan for withdrawal.