Posted on 09/03/2002 12:58:29 AM PDT by kattracks
Edited on 05/26/2004 5:08:20 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
September 3, 2002 -- WAR is never something to be entered into lightly. But the latest argument put forward against an American intervention to overthrow Saddam Hussein is a military one that seems at best ill-informed, at worst a kind of gleeful and irrational pessimism.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
It makes good headlines and PR which is Saddam's first line of defense.
As to a military strategy, I'd equate it to a hunter setting a big bear trap on his front porch and then daring the bears to come and step in it.
Humanitarian war?
Show America the truth...
Let's have the TV networks broadcast, 24/7, for about 2 weeks, all the films of people leaping, falling, or being blown out of the Towers...
...all those "bags of blood"- that weren't bags at all, but the piteous wreckage that happens when a flesh & blood person hits cement at terminal velocity...
...do that, and Americans won't be bothered much by "collateral damage" to our enemies.
Yes, Saddam might refuse to let his civilian population leave, preferring to use them as human shields.
All these 'attack Baghdad' discussions assume that Saddam will be in Baghdad. Doesn't he have many 'palaces' and bunkers spread over the countryside? Why would he hole up in the one place he knows we'll look?
What did the Iraqi people have to do with the WTC/Pentagon terrorist attacks?
1. He will continue to develop the means and the where-with-all to deliver bio and chem weapons.
2. He will soon have nuclear weapons.
3. His shaky Arab neighbors will provide him more and more deference as he thumbs his nose successfully at the rest of the world.
4. The UN will provide him more and more support and the US more and more hatred. They only tolerate the US because of our strength. 5. He will be more and more successful in shaking down the rest of the Arab world for funds.
6. He will become the de facto leader of over 1 billion Muslims.
7. With nuc weapons developed and available in his back pocket his adventurism will increase and eventually will know no bounds.
8. He will assume control of possibly 50% of exportable oil. (Not necessarily ownership but fascistic control) 9. He will end up using those nucs, bio, chem weapons. 10. Write off Isreal
11. The 911 attack on us will resemble a tea party compared to what he will make happen here.
A do nothing decision carries orders of magnitude more risk.
I have always maintained that Saddam wanted us to kill all those conscript soldiers he had out in the desert in Southern Iraq. He had a huge standing army after the end of the Iran/Iraq war, and there was no way he could let these trained soldiers out of the army without destabilizing the country. That many trained soldiers unemployed and at loose ends would be impossible for a despot to control. He could not afford to keep them and he could not just kill them outright. There are some things that even Saddam can't do.
So what is Saddam to do? Simple. Just have your enemy kill them for you. And we accomodated him, in spades.
But as soon as we started getting to soldiers that Saddam wanted to keep, the war ended. It is at that point that we will start the next war. No freebies this time. Doesn't mean we shouldn't do it. It just means that we we should not expect to Iraqi conscripts lined up like toy soldiers in the desert waiting to be smashed.
Also from article:
Yes, Saddam might refuse to let his civilian population leave, preferring to use them as human shields. But it would be hard to do so for long. (And the Geneva Convention suggests the responsibility for civilian deaths in such a situation falls on the party who turns them into human shields.)
Oh puhleeze! Does anybody think for one second that the US would not be blamed for every death from starvation and deprivation that would occur if we laid seige to Bagdad? The whole World would lay blame at our feet. Geneva Convention suggests...., yeah right.
Yesterday on FR a long thread put the lie to the Time's claim that the White House has concluded that it needs no congressional authority to attack Iraq. The truth is the exact opposite. The White House already HAS such authority in the form of Senate Joint Resolution 23, which passed, and which was posted in full on FR yesterday.
BTT.
Congressman Billybob
I agree. It's ALWAYS more costly to wait rather than handle the problem now. Time to cock 'em and lock 'em!
You want connections?
The Sudan-Iraq-Afghanistan Alliance: and the Russian connection (America's enemies unveiled)
Earlier US airplane hijack plot first uncovered in Philippines: police
And this:
And this:
The main reason is that these "palaces" are huge complexes which Saddam has denied any inspection access - ever. Probably a number of them house his WMDs, labs, munitions, etc. Maybe we'd get lucky and get Saddam himself - a "two fer" not to be missed.
Which is why a good attacker never plays against the strengths of his opponent. In 1990-1991, Iraq prepared defences similar to those that worked well against Iran the previous decade. Had we made a frontal assault, the casualties would have been a lot more than they were. However, we hit them where they were'nt, and got behind the Iraqi forces. At one point all that stood between the main army and Baghdad was a couple hundred miles of road.
So when your enemy plans to lure you into urban warfare, you don't take the bait. As other posters have mentioned, you lay siege. While this avoids military casualties, it takess time and, in today's climate, will have political costs.
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