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Born at the Crest of the Empire

Sunday, February 04, 2007

How very Vietnam.....

McClatchy has an article.
Almost every foot soldier interviewed during a week of patrols on the streets and alleys of east Baghdad said that Bush's plan would halt the bloodshed only temporarily. The soldiers cited a variety of reasons, including incompetence or corruption among Iraqi troops, the complexities of Iraq's sectarian violence and the lack of Iraqi public support, a cornerstone of counterinsurgency warfare.

"They can keep sending more and more troops over here, but until the people here start working with us, it's not going to change," said Sgt. Chance Oswalt, 22, of Tulsa, Okla.....

Their officers were more optimistic.

If there's enough progress during the next four to six months, "we can look at doing provincial Iraqi control, and we can move U.S. forces to the edge of the city," said Lt. Col. Dean Dunham, the deputy commander of the 2nd Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade, which oversees most of east Baghdad.

Maj. Christopher Wendland, a senior staff officer for Dunham's brigade, said he thinks there's a good chance that by late 2007 American troops will have handed over most of Baghdad to Iraqi troops.

"I'm actually really positive," said Wendland, 35, of Chicago. "We have an Iraqi army that's actually capable of maintaining once we leave."


The farther up the chain, the farther from the fight, the more positive the response. From the guys doing it every day who don't have any desire to climb the ladder, the truth.

3 Comments:

  • Yeah, the window has closed. I think that in those first days, certainly maybe. A huge presence coupled with nearly immediate elections. The real problem I see is that the early effort to shape the politics away from Iran delayed elections which allowed the violent groups time to consolidate.

    At this point even if you were/are able to stifle the current violence across the entire country, the hatred and revenge will still be there festering, and at the first opportunities, there would be revenge killings which would serve to reignite the sectarian violence.

    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 9:37 AM  

  • The farther up the chain, the farther from the fight, the more positive the response.

    This is what I came away with as well.

    By Blogger -epm, at 9:47 AM  

  • And again, that's so Vietnam. The ground forces gave up on the cause long before the officers.

    This disconnect is the real beginning of a slide in morale.

    Mike

    By Blogger mikevotes, at 10:10 AM  

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