Posted on 05/25/2004 2:08:15 PM PDT by ambrose
What have we seen out of Fallujah since this conflict?
Well, evidently it's mayor came out and said that reconstruction contractors should come back. I'm sure they're just lining up!
I believe it comes down to killing inplacable insurgents, or allowing them to constitute the authority of Fallujah, and set the example for other wannabes. We chose to let the insurgents win.
We will pay for this over and over and over....Islamofascists learn, and here they learned it is profitable to face us down in cities.
Also, it is inaccurate to compare Fallujah to Dresden. There were probably not enough remaining fighters to require the razing of the city. A few thousand more, by most accounts. Had we creatively engaged them, destroying the town was not necessary.
Dresden, as you may recall, was a fire-bombing in which maximum civilian casualties were expected. My neighbor was a little girl evacuated to the hillsides outside Dresden, and watched the city and its inhabitants (including her parents) incinerated in a firestorm. That was not the prospect for Fallujah at any point.
The author claims Fallujah is for all intents and purposes a rebel town. B.S. How many "rebel towns" can Americans drive downtown and meet with mayor? This is taking a rather creative, humane solution to a vexing problem and portraying it as a defeat. Another journalist working for the enemy.
Where did the bad guys go?
You may want to read this thread.
IT is true in politics too. When Dick Morris was hired by Jesse Helms and Trent Lott he did what it took to re-elect Jesse and Trent. When he was hired by Clinton he did all he could to elect and re-elect Clinton. He is a player not an ideologue.
There were undoubtedly many players in the Saddam army. They will play for the insurgents if that is their only choice, but they will play for our military if they are given a chance.
We, on the other hand, are like baseball fans. If we are an Indian fan we can't imagine rooting for the Yankees. Players don't think like us.
There is not much new in this. When Patton took over Germany at the end of WWII he used many officers from the NAZI army to run the US portion west Germany. It was no problem. When Hitler was in power the officers played for him. When we were in power the same officers played for us.
Some of the NAZIs and some of the Iraqis are ideologues.. but many are not.
But if we get players who want to play for us, they can blow a so called holy Mosque to bits with all the insurgents inside. They can do it and never raise an eyebrow.
When the hard core insurgents know that other Iraqis will kill them no matter where they are, they tend to surrender.
The typical Iraqi terrorist is about as tough as Saddam. When they know all is lost they will be as docile as Saddam was upon his capture.
An therein lies the true test of the theory....
WILL the Iraqi police/military fight to the death --- the militant Islamists -- or will they see Islam as their common link to the Islamists, and a stronger link than to the new Iraqi "democracy"??
At present, there is more evidence that the New Iraqi "Police/Miliary", will shrink from the task......without MASSIVE support from Coalition forces..
Semper Fi
By Tony Perry, Los Angeles Times
Mark him well. What did you expect from the LA Times?
read later
"Dresden, as you may recall, was a fire-bombing in which maximum civilian casualties were expected. My neighbor was a little girl evacuated to the hillsides outside Dresden, and watched the city and its inhabitants (including her parents) incinerated in a firestorm."
"That was not the prospect for Fallujah at any point."
It should have been.
THAT is the $64,000 question. We may be able to exercise a certain level of control over Falluja by bullying the Iraqi gendarmes into doing our bidding. That may be sufficient for the task at hand, which is < cue the chorus > putting an "Iraqi Face" on the problem until real power transfer takes place.
Col. Peters is right, American Soldiers in the here and now are the creme de la creme. While I don't think the bombing of Dresden is analagous, who am I to argue with the highest caliber of men on the ground, right there? They used their heads, and because of that they will prevail. I'm surprised at the ex-Saddamites backdoor knockings though. Just goes to show you Tzu was right, the faster you can incorporate the vanquished into the realm of the new order the better your chances of a quick success, and while I've never been to War, I don't think War provides for success should the effort drag on and on.
I respectfully disagree with your analysis. We won't pay for it if we are not there. Most of these people are not Islamofascists. They were just people in a city...defending their city. Same as you would do if a foreign army invaded your city.
There were only a few hundred foreign terrorist types there, by the Marines own estimate. The rest were simply Fallujah citizens thinking that they were protecting their city.
This area was so unstable even Saddam Hussein wouldn't enter.
As long as it was the commanders on the ground making this move (and not the State Dept.), I'm for it.
Too many keyboard warriors on this site that want to nuke everything.
Some of our troops had entered a city and were progressing toward a mosque when they were confronted by a very large and very noisy crowd barring their path. It looked like it was going to turn ugly, then the platoon leader order his men to point their rifles toward the ground and knell down on one knee.
Right away the crowd calmed down and our people found out that there were bad guys up ahead.
I thought that was one of the most remarkable scenes I had ever witnessed. We have some remarkable people fighting this war.
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