Look at the northern parts of Iraq, that is a model that has worked quite well, why wasn’t anybody interested in doing that in the south. Just like the US/UK UN created a protected area there why couldn’t the model be tried in the south. It would have cut off the regimes arms and legs. And once the people see what they have been deprived off they will not be willing to go back, just ask any Iraqi from the Kurdish areas. Instead the world watched while after the war the Shias were crushed by Saddam’s army in a manner that really didn’t happen before the Gulf War.I am not an expert on military tactics and don't know if there is a way to do this that doesn't just add up to invasion and regime change, but read the whole thing. Joe? Sgt. Stryker? Any thoughts?
Meanwhile, it's 10 PM - do you know where your troops are? (link via Unlearned hand, via the always interesting and chock-full of juicy URLS Winds of Change)
UPDATE: Diane rightly chastises the Sarge for his harsh words to Salam. I have to agree with Diane here. If you haven't lived in a totalitarian regime with informers on every block, where thousands get disappeared every week, it's easy to give advice to those who do. Sarge's words remind me of those peaceniks who say we have no business liberating Iraq because if the Iraqis didn't want Saddam they would depose him themselves. You've got to jump over a whole lot of history (Soviet Russia, North Korea, Cambodia, Nazi Germany, to name a few) to be that dismissive of the difficulties of deposing a dictator with an aggressive secret police. And I can't imagine anyone being sanguine about huge bombs being dropped on their city, even if those bombs might eventually lead to a favorable outcome.
UPDATE: There may not be much bombing anyway.
UPDATE: Why, Robert Fisk seems to be quite put out that Baghdad is so calm.
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