[WhiskeyPapa]

This is no way to make war. The most elementary fact about war, that you learn in your first week of lectures at staff college, or can pick up for yourself by reading half a dozen decent books of military history, or just by talking to veterans, is that battles are won by speed, audacity and surprise. Gentle reader, in the administration's movement towards engagement with Iraq, do you see speed? Do you see audacity? Do you see surprise? Do you even see any sign that our government is capable of those things? I sure don't.

Well, this "speed, audacity and surprise" thing certainly applies once you cross the line of departure.

Before that, some careful planning, deception, and logistical build-up is important too. Think of the D-day landing. They planned that literally for years, and it ultimately worked, not that they showed much speed ,audacity or surprise after they hit the beach.

But they DID get strategic surprise on the Germans and that may have been decisive.

And we need strategic surprise.

Referring again to D-day, tactical surprise would find the sentries asleep as you approach the beach, operational surprise would keep the SS panzer divisions from deploying the first day, and strategic surprise would keep 200,000 German troops in the wrong part of France for six weeks. The latter two did happen.

Right now, the war is in the shadows. We don't and shouldn't know what exactly is happening on a lot of levels.

Walt