Editor's
Note:
We have two superb, but short articles this week.
Charley
Reese is a conservative writer who claims to be a
Goldwater
Republican. He is immensely critical of our foreign
policy.
The second offering comes from a soldier presently in
Iraq.
Al Lorentz is on-the-ground and we hope you find his
assessment illuminating.
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A Comedy Routine - By Charley Reese
President George Bush's denial of the reality of Iraq is
beginning to sound like a stand-up comedy routine.
"Mr. President, the insurgency has spread to the whole
country."
"We're making great progress."
"But Mr. President, the attacks against coalition forces
have escalated dramatically."
"We're making great progress."
"But Mr. President, all but 2 percent of the Iraqi
people
want us to leave."
"We're making great progress."
"And the interim government has no support and in fact
can't
step outside the Green Zone without being surrounded by
American security."
"We're making great progress."
And so forth. Whether the president is actually in
denial or
is misleading the public for partisan purposes, I will
leave
to your judgment. It would be less dangerous if he were
engaged in deliberate deception. That, at least, is a
sign
of sanity.
Some are now speculating that the president's solution
to
the morass in Iraq will be to launch an attack against
Iran ? after the election, of course.
There can be no other reason to sell Israel
bunker-buster
bombs. The only possible target would be Iran's nuclear
reactors. The Iranians would retaliate, and, of course,
the
United States would join the war in defense of Israel.
Widening the war to a country with 60 million people
might
sound stupid, but with this administration's record of
stupid decisions, it's not to be ruled out.
Nothing would destroy the democratic movement in Iran
quicker
than an attack by Israel and the United States. The same
stupid people who thought we would be greeted as
liberators
in Iraq, however, might actually think Iranians would
welcome an attack. People who spend their lives in
academic
surroundings can be forgiven for not knowing much about
human nature. The most basic response of all humans is
to
rally around their country's government when it is
attacked
by a foreign power. The Iranians would certainly do
that,
as they demonstrated in the 1980s when Saddam Hussein
attacked
them.
As all democratic nations do, we have uneven luck in
choosing
our leaders, but this is the first administration that
actually
scares me. There is nothing so stupid and wrongheaded
that I
can't visualize them doing.
Bush has no real compassion. That's why he forbids
ceremonies
for returning dead. According to Ollie North, President
Reagan
was at the airport every time a dead American
serviceman's body
came home. The British also formally greet their
returning dead
with honor and respect. Only in the United States does
the
government even forbid news organizations from greeting
the
dead.
Bush and his corporate cronies care for Bush and his
corporate
cronies. If Reagan was the Teflon president, Bush is the
irresponsible and unaccountable president. Not only has
he
created a bloody mess in Iraq, his economic policies
have
forced many American working men to endanger their lives
by
going there to work. Naturally, wages in Iraq, for
everybody
but the troops and the Iraqi people, are exorbitant,
since
the taxpayers are footing the bills.
I've noticed that Bush has stayed out of Iraq, except
for his
short dead-of-the-night sneak into and out of the
Baghdad
airport for a photo op.
If we are making such great progress, as he keeps
insisting
that we are, surely he could visit the country in the
daytime.
Other national leaders have done so.
But the Bush policy in regard to Iraq has been a fraud
from
the beginning, and it remains a fraud with the
appointment
of an old CIA leech as prime minister to oversee the
rape
of Iraq by the favored corporate pirates. The Iraqi
people
know the score. The question is, Do the American people?
Why We Cannot Win - by Al Lorentz
Before I begin, let me state that I am a soldier
currently
deployed in Iraq, I am not an armchair quarterback. Nor
am
I some politically idealistic and naïve young soldier, I
am
an old and seasoned Non-Commissioned Officer with nearly
20
years under my belt. Additionally, I am not just a
soldier
with a mud’s-eye view of the war, I am in Civil Affairs
and
as such, it is my job to be aware of all the events
occurring
in this country and specifically in my region.
I have come to the conclusion that we cannot win here
for a
number of reasons. Ideology and idealism will never
trump
history and reality.
When we were preparing to deploy, I told my young
soldiers
to beware of the "political solution." Just when you
think
you have the situation on the ground in hand, someone
will
come along with a political directive that throws you
off
the tracks.
I believe that we could have won this un-Constitutional
invasion of Iraq and possibly pulled off the even more
un-
Constitutional occupation and subjugation of this
sovereign
nation. It might have even been possible to foist
democracy
on these people who seem to have no desire,
understanding or
respect for such an institution. True the possibility of
pulling all this off was a long shot and would have
required
several hundred billion dollars and even more casualties
than
we've seen to date but again it would have been
possible, not
realistic or necessary but possible.
Here are the specific reasons why we cannot win in Iraq.
First, we refuse to deal in reality. We are in a
guerilla war,
but because of politics, we are not allowed to declare
it a
guerilla war and must label the increasingly effective
guerilla
forces arrayed against us as "terrorists, criminals and
dead-
enders."
This implies that there is a zero sum game at work, i.e.
we
can simply kill X number of the enemy and then the fight
is
over, mission accomplished, everybody wins.
Unfortunately, this
is not the case. We have few tools at our disposal and
those
are proving to be wholly ineffective at fighting the
guerillas.
The idea behind fighting a guerilla army is not to
destroy its
every man (an impossibility since he hides himself by
day amongst
the populace). Rather the idea in guerilla warfare is to
erode or
destroy his base of support.
So long as there is support for the guerilla, for every
one you
kill two more rise up to take his place. More
importantly, when
your tools for killing him are precision guided
munitions,
raids and other acts that create casualties among the
innocent
populace, you raise the support for the guerillas and
undermine
the support for yourself. (A 500-pound precision bomb
has a
casualty-producing radius of 400 meters minimum; do the
math.)
Second, our assessment of what motivates the average
Iraqi was
skewed, again by politically motivated "experts." We
came here
with some fantasy idea that the natives were all
ignorant, mud-
hut dwelling camel riders who would line the streets and
pelt
us with rose petals, lay palm fronds in the street and
be
eternally grateful. While at one time there may have
actually
been support and respect from the locals, months of
occupation
by our regular military forces have turned the formerly
friendly
into the recently hostile.
Attempts to correct the thinking in this regard are in
vain; it
is not politically correct to point out the fact that
the locals
are not only disliking us more and more, they are
growing
increasingly upset and often overtly hostile. Instead of
addressing the reasons why the locals are becoming angry
and
discontented, we allow politicians in Washington DC to
give us
pat and convenient reasons that are devoid of any
semblance of
reality.
We are told that the locals are not upset because we
have a
hostile, aggressive and angry Army occupying their
nation. We
are told that they are not upset at the police state we
have
created, or at the manner of picking their
representatives for
them. Rather we are told, they are upset because of a
handful
of terrorists, criminals and dead enders in their midst
have
made them upset, that and of course the ever convenient
straw
man of "left wing media bias."
Third, the guerillas are filling their losses faster
than we
can create them. This is almost always the case in
guerilla
warfare, especially when your tactics for battling the
guerillas
are aimed at killing guerillas instead of eroding their
support. For every guerilla we kill with a "smart bomb"
we
kill many more innocent civilians and create rage and
anger
in the Iraqi community. This rage and anger translates
into
more recruits for the terrorists and less support for
us.
We have fallen victim to the body count mentality all
over
again. We have shown a willingness to inflict civilian
casualties as a necessity of war without realizing that
these same casualties create waves of hatred against us.
These angry Iraqi citizens translate not only into more
recruits for the guerilla army but also into more
support of
the guerilla army.
Fourth, their lines of supply and communication are much
shorter than ours and much less vulnerable. We must
import
everything we need into this place; this costs money and
is
dangerous. Whether we fly the supplies in or bring them
by
truck, they are vulnerable to attack, most especially
those
brought by truck. This not only increases the likelihood
of
the supplies being interrupted. Every bean, every bullet
and
every bandage becomes infinitely more expensive.
Conversely, the guerillas live on top of their supplies
and
are showing every indication of developing a very
sophisticated
network for obtaining them. Further, they have the
advantage
of the close support of family and friends and
traditional
religious networks.
Fifth, we consistently underestimate the enemy and his
capabilities. Many military commanders have prepared to
fight
exactly the wrong war here.
Our tactics have not adjusted to the battlefield and we
are
falling behind.
Meanwhile the enemy updates his tactics and has shown a
remarkable resiliency and adaptability.
Because the current administration is more concerned
with
its image than it is with reality, it prefers symbolism
to
substance: soldiers are dying here and being maimed and
crippled for life. It is tragic, indeed criminal that
our
elected public servants would so willingly sacrifice our
nation's prestige and honor as well as the blood and
treasure
to pursue an agenda that is ahistoric and
un-Constitutional.
It is all the more ironic that this un-Constitutional
mission
is being performed by citizen soldiers such as myself
who
swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution of
the
United States, the same oath that the commander in chief
himself has sworn.
***********************************************************
Al Lorentz is former state chairman of the Constitution
Party of Texas and is a reservist currently serving with
the US Army in Iraq.
***********************************************************
More selected readings
Israeli Moles Penetrate The Pentagon – Jane’s Quarterly
http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/fr/fr040929_1_n.sh
tml
Truths Worth Telling - Daniel Ellsberg
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/28/opinion/28ellsberg.html?ex=1097348803&ei=1&en=410198a09db57ba2
Feeling A Draft
http://www.antiwar.com/roberts/?articleid=2319
US Prepares For Military Action Against Syria
http://216.26.163.62/2004/ss_syria_09_28.html
Not Enough Troops To Subdue Iraq - Navy Times
http://www.navytimes.com/story.php?f=1-NAVYPAPER-370919.php
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