[Credo]

The US Armed Forces has taken down several metropolitan areas besides Paris. Mexico City, Richmond VA, and Seoul. All three were accomplished by annihilating the opposing army - something that is pretty done now in Baghdad. Oh yeah what about Kuwait City? Vicksburg? Atlanta.

It's not going to be easy but I think the Brits have the right idea in Basra. The center of gravity for the Iraqis is the people's fear of the Regime. Once that is gone, the ballgame's over.

[Rockitz]

It's not going to be easy but I think the Brits have the right idea in Basra. The center of gravity for the Iraqis is the people's fear of the Regime. Once that is gone, the ballgame's over.

Agreed. I said something similar in paragraph 2 of post #15.

[Rockitz]

Dohhh! Make that 17 instead of 15.

[B-Chan]

Perhaps you could choose a better set of examples. In Atlanta and Vicksburg, the Union forces burned everything to the ground and starved the populations into submission. The people of Vicksburg were eating riverbank clay and starved mules towards the end.

And of course we simply burned Tokyo and Dresden to the ground.

Blockading a civilian population is not a humanitarian way to end a war. Effective? Yes -- but not humanitarian. We may not have the luxury of choosing which approach we use against Baghdad.