Posted by Dan Ewert : 3/27/2003 01:55:00 AM (Archive Link)
By all accounts, the war is going well, although not as well as hoped. This isn’t too surprising, but many liberals and Europeans are pouncing on it as proof that we miscalculated. What they don’t realize is that our incredible restraint is what’s keeping things from moving faster. The politics of this war have mandated that we can’t be as loose with our use of force as would be most efficient. In other words, we can’t just bomb the hell out of the enemy… doing so would increase the number of civilian casualties which is something we’re trying to avoid. The military is also being prevented from attacking mosques, hospitals and the like which is where the enemy is cowardly hiding out. It’s truly a damned-either-way situation. If we apply the necessary force for a shorter war, then we get slammed for over-zealousness. Instead, we hold back and get slammed for taking too long. When people complain that we are killing innocent Iraqis, I hope they realize just how much we’re putting our own troops at risk in order to keep as many of those civilians alive as possible.

The war is also going a little slower than hoped because of the aftermath of Gulf War I. Saddam was decimated in that war and we likely could have taken Iraq without too much trouble. Instead, we held back and settled for a cease-fire and an incomplete war. Hussein learned his lessons, though, and isn’t using the same ineffective strategies this time around. For example, he’s no longer massing his forces which made them easier to be destroyed. The psychological impact of the first war, though, is perhaps causing us even greater problems. Scads of Iraqi troops surrendered during the conflict 12 years ago. Saddam was determined not to let that happen again. Even if forces want to surrender, they have a tough choice. They can fight and risk being killed by the Americans or try giving up and be killed by their own Iraqi forces. We’ve already heard reports of people masquerading in coalition uniforms who gun down Iraqi troops attempting to surrender to them. And as I recall, Hussein set up two rings of defenses around Baghdad. The outer ring was the regular army and the inner ring was the hardcore Republican Guard. This means that if the regulars try surrendering, they’re sure to get some “friendly fire” artillery from the rear. Also, while I haven’t read anything saying so, I wouldn’t be terribly surprised if Saddam had scattered intelligence officials or political officers of the Stalinist variety among his army units to help ensure the soldiers’ loyalty. The potential of getting snitched out, tortured, and killed is a sure way to ensure vassal status among the troops.

Anyway, there are yet more reasons why we should have finished the job in 1991. If you leave an aggressive government in power after a war, then you have only postponed hostilities. Eventually, the time will come when you must fight the enemy again. The problem lies in the fact that the enemy learns a great deal about its adversary and itself during the first conflict and adjusts so as to make the second fight much more difficult.