Article

2007-01-09 Iraq

Major battle on Hafia street in Bagdhad.

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Posted by 3dc 2007-01-09 09:32|| || Front Page|| [3 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Go git 'em! Kill 'em, smash 'em, rout 'em then kill them again!

Posted by DarthVader">DarthVader 2007-01-09 09:55|| 2007-01-09 09:55|| Front Page Top

#2 Hummm interesting statement, that On Sunday eight Iraqi soldiers were killed and six others were wounded when they ran out of ammunition during a firefight with insurgents.

There's that Iraqi logistics problem sticking it's head up again.

Posted by Sherry 2007-01-09 10:13|| 2007-01-09 10:13|| Front Page Top

#3 Logistics, and fire discipline too, most likely.

Posted by Glenmore">Glenmore 2007-01-09 10:15|| 2007-01-09 10:15|| Front Page Top

#4 S: There's that Iraqi logistics problem sticking it's head up again.

I suspect it's more of a corruption problem.

Posted by Zhang Fei 2007-01-09 11:58|| http://timurileng.blogspot.com]">[http://timurileng.blogspot.com] 2007-01-09 11:58|| Front Page Top

#5 OK, this is MNC-I's purview and there's more I don't know than I do know, but I cannot understand how this did not turn into a nearly 100% obliteration of the bad guys (it doesn't sound like it did).

This area is right in the heart of Baghdad, even adjacent to the IZ in part. We should have a QRF big enough and mean enough to engulf and completely annihilate anything like this. There should only be one objective: capture or kill every single bad guy. Encircle the area, and detain every single military-aged male for testing, separation, interrogation. Use as much force as needed to minimize friendly casualty risk - collateral damage is too bad ... or perhaps a very useful side-effect that illustrates to the local non-combatants which side to join in the longer run.

Martial law? Complete cordons of large areas? Evacuation/displacement of civilians? MaSS Detention of MAMs? Disruption of business? Hello? It's a friggin' war. Make it feel, taste, and look like one. That such a thing can even happen is testament to the failure of warfare-without-war as a strategy.

How can an insurgency have a "stronghold" in the middle of the capital? No excuses about Maliki obstructing actions against Shi'a - that's not the case here.

Yet the odds are our top priority was to restore "normal" life in the area ASAP. Handing out leaflets about compensation for damage instead of responding with the equivalent of "tell it to the Ba'athist colonel and the AQ emir of Haifa Street, pal" when the local adult males come angrily complaining about the destruction.

It's almost to the point where I'm getting a little frustrated with all this ..... (!!!!!)

Posted by Verlaine 2007-01-09 12:43|| 2007-01-09 12:43|| Front Page Top

#6 So are a lot of the rest of us.

Posted by Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-01-09 13:24|| 2007-01-09 13:24|| Front Page Top

#7 Verlaine

The NY Times printed a map of Sunni and Shiite strongholds, with mixed areas showing which sect is taking over various neighborhoods. What is happening is: Sunnis are grabbing the south river lands, to the airport. A small Christian section is located near the Green Zone. Baghdad University will fall into Shiite hands. Baghdad will look like Israel and the occupied Arab dominated lands.

Should the US be on constant patrol, trying to stop every act of violence? It can't be done, and should not be tried. No US administration is going to defend ethnic cleansing. However, tacit approval is obvious. I opposed Clinton on his mindset against demographic shifting of belligerent minorities. The Clinton War on Serbs was the stupidest conflict that the US ever participated in.

Drawbacks. The Sunni Triangle has minimal oil resources. These are in Kurd and Shiite areas. The Wall Street Journal and other morons believe that playing the Shiite - self-flagellating freaks - card will yield US security. I believe that once Baghdad is ethnically divided, then Sunnis will wage total war against Shiites. It is only the mixed neighborhoods that prevents that from happening now.

Again: the US has had mutually beneficial relations with fundamentalist Sunnis; the US has never had anything but belligerent relations with Shiite Islamofascists. Therefore: play the Sunni Card, after Shiite power is neutralized.

Potential disaster: if US troops are forced to perform according to the recently released Counter-Insurgency Manual, then 80% of field troops will be on constant mobile patrol. Forget disaster; that would be a catastrophe. Massive intelligence operations, followed by commando actions and air bombardment would work a hundred times better. Manuals like that prove the old adage: those than can, do; those that can't, teach.

Posted by Sneaze Shaiting3550 2007-01-09 14:25|| 2007-01-09 14:25|| Front Page Top

#8 CNN Video, breathless reportage [long sprint from the hotel bar]

Posted by RD 2007-01-09 16:26|| 2007-01-09 16:26|| Front Page Top

#9 So long as the Sunnis are wholly owned subsidiaries of the formerly ruling Baathists and the Saudis, playing footsie with them isn't going to help in either the short or long term.

Posted by trailing wife 2007-01-09 17:33|| 2007-01-09 17:33|| Front Page Top

#10 The part that really pisses me off is that I am going to have to apologize for failing my Brother when he returns from Bagdad.

All I know about his duty is that he is working with the Ministry of Defense, but if I combine that with what I already know about the man he is, its enough to tell me that he knows what needs to be done and whom it needs to be done. I already know full well that he has the will to do it. Success or failure will not be from a lack of will on the part of Americas soldiers. It will depend on the will of Americas civilians.

I have failed to help build the stateside support necessary for them to carry out the mission. Every civilian in the country owes an apology to every single one of this Nations soldiers.

Apologizing to strangers is easy, looking my brother in the face after that won't be.

Time is running short for our leaders to be leaders. There is no excuse for any President -especially the lame duck variety - to play politics with a war.

Posted by Mike N. 2007-01-09 17:54|| 2007-01-09 17:54|| Front Page Top

#11 Why lookee here, I just found the Sunni Card.

Posted by Shipman 2007-01-09 18:46|| 2007-01-09 18:46|| Front Page Top

#12 Mike N. - Thank you for putting into words what I've been feeling. My heart is breaking at the thought of what lies ahead for the brave souls serving. I wish I could believe that the likes of Pelosi and Reid and their ilk aren't aware of the consequences of their actions, but I think they know. They have to know. I'll never forgive them.

How can we ever apologize enough for what some in this country are allowing to happen?

Posted by GOPGirl 2007-01-09 19:45|| 2007-01-09 19:45|| Front Page Top

#13 GOP,

I'm not so sure America SHOULD forgive itself. I know I'm likely never going to completely forgive myself. Because I shouldn't.

Family, friends and total strangers are putting their ass on the line for me right now. What am I doing to support them? I'm on the the internet. That equals precisely zero.

We can send our troops all the cookies they can keep down, but sending cookies isn't the make it or break it effort. (Not that we shouldn't send cookies)

Posted by Mike N. 2007-01-09 20:06|| 2007-01-09 20:06|| Front Page Top

#14 Sneaze:

Sunni resistance to the new order must be broken. If Sunni barbarism, both before and after March 2003, has irretrievably condemned the Sunni Iraqi community outside Anbar and areas of the north where they predominate, that's unfortunate, but there it is. While smashing Sunni rejectionism should have been the first priority (AQ gets swept up in the process - not the reverse, as the campaign plan seemed to assume), it's still the priority.

There is every variety of thug, opportunist, and local big-shot that is part of the picture on both the Sunni and Shi'a sides, but islamofascists aren't big factors as far as I can see. For the most part, it's a thousand variations on "It's All About Me". For Sunnis, that's blood-on-their-hands,no-futre-in-the-new-Iraq/criminal enterprises/a few committed wahhabi kooks/oh shit, our decades of oppression and recent years abetting barbarous terrorism has a price. For Shi'a, I think there are even more variations, only one of which would be your islamofascists.

Don't know about mutually beneficial ties with Sunnis of any stripe in the past - within Iraq, at this point and since 2003, Sunnis have been the key adversary and have succeeded in wrecking a vulnerable, flawed strategy.

I've always thought we should focus on basic security until that is accomplished (not total or perfect security). Depending on the location, economic development and improved governance and democracy can be parallel, lagging, or "on ice" elements. Our program for the Abu Ghraib neighborhood at this point should bear little resemblance to our program for Najaf, and so on.

A broken Sunni will to resist/spoil would yield instant and wondrous benefits on the Shi'a side of the divide. I'd expect a major sorting out at that point - and islamofascists wouldn't stand a chance. I'm not aware of any sign that the key Shi'a political groupings with strong ties to Tehran in fact support the Iranian political model, or in fact don't oppose it. It's about Iraq, not Iran. And in the absence of a continuing Sunni menace to their security, I think the Shi'a political landscape would be far from scary in terms of our interests.

Mike, I completely sympathize. In fact, while I lack a relative in the sandbox, I feel exactly the same burden and obligation - if I'm going to be back here, the least I can do is try to advance the cause on the civilian, political level. But I find the prospect daunting. The electorate has been abandoned by the administration for years: 24/7 negative news, exaggerated negative news, outright distortion, amazing slanders and morale-killing cheap-shots from one side of the political aisle, punctuated only now and then by limp and vague assertions of bland themes by the WH.

Just today, had another in the endless string of anecdotal confirmations that many, many non-political common-sense voters who were basically supportive of the war have been driven into pessimism and impatience by the combo of a difficult situation and no education, motivation, or analysis from the government.

I hope I'm surprised, but I expect little from Dubya tomorrow. Politically, the long build-up to the announcement of a new Iraq strategy almost dooms anything short of an unlikely dramatic departure to be considered yet another incremental adjustment. So even if there's good substance, the WH has once again shown the leaden political touch that will diminish the positive impact of anything they do.

Wars are typically a mess, from all angles, and in fact this one may even be less of a mess than the average - hard as that is to believe from the perspective of the here and now. So my frustration may be over-done. But the past and current sacrifices, and the stakes, make it hard to take the longer view of an unworthy opposition and an artless leadership wrestling for the steering wheel.

Posted by Verlaine 2007-01-09 20:31|| 2007-01-09 20:31|| Front Page Top

#15 Verlaine,

I do agree that being spoon fed little nuggets about the new plan most likely dooms it to be anticlimactic.

If someone gives me a couple of spoonfuls of oatmeal and then makes a grand unveiling of a bowl containing more oatmeal, only this time with sugar, I'm not going to be impressed. The pessimist in me says we're going to get nothing more than some sugar for the this bland oatmeal of a war the country is in, but part of me is hoping that the "strategerist" realizes that he is flat out running out of time to get something done on the single most important issue that his Nation has faced in decades or will face for decades to come.

There is two things that keep me guessing. First, is the fact that he couldn't possibly have intended Iraq to be the last military engagement on his watch. Iraq had less terrorists than Detroit for Christs sake. If he wanted Iraq to be the last mission, he's even dumber then the KOS kids think he is. Second, and much less important, is that the Whitehouse has pulled off a pretty impressive political move. When we would normally be hearing all about the democrats new agenda, (especially the vaunted first 100 hours) we aren't hearing a peep. Its all about the new plan. He's stolen a considerable amount of thunder. At least Rove still has some seeds anyway. I would be more positive about something genuinely new happening if Dick Cheney wasn't still the invisible man. For all I know the country could be without a Vice President at this point.

Posted by Mike N. 2007-01-09 21:18|| 2007-01-09 21:18|| Front Page Top

#16 Shipman. You asshole. Don't ever post the Sunni card again. I damn near died. I swear, I couldn't inhale for at least 90 seconds.

Posted by Mike N. 2007-01-09 21:21|| 2007-01-09 21:21|| Front Page Top

23:49 tipper
23:44 JosephMendiola
23:35 JosephMendiola
23:25 JosephMendiola
23:12 Laurence of the Rats
23:09 JosephMendiola
22:44 Barbara Skolaut
22:40 Elmert Crosh5077
22:31 Barbara Skolaut
22:27 doc
22:26 Barbara Skolaut
22:19 Barbara Skolaut
22:15 CrazyFool
22:12 Alaska Paul
22:12 Barbara Skolaut
22:04 Alaska Paul
22:02 Laurence of the Rats
21:55 Asymmetrical T
21:52 Captain America
21:50 Alaska Paul
21:44 Mike N.
21:41 Alaska Paul
21:29 Mike N.
21:28 Pappy