Tet offensive reverberates 37 years later in Iraq

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http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N16231430.htm

WASHINGTON, Jan 16 (Reuters) - Iraq's Jan. 30 elections fall on the 37th anniversary of the Tet offensive, the Vietnam War turning point that could hold lessons for Iraqi insurgents and U.S. policy makers anticipating more violence that could test American resolve.

Iraq's insurgents lack the coordination, manpower and resources to execute the equivalent of the jolting attacks launched by communist forces in nearly every major city in U.S.-backed South Vietnam on the nights of Jan. 30 and Jan. 31, 1968, experts said.

But they said the experience of the Tet offensive may show Iraqi rebels how to prevail against a vastly stronger U.S. force, by using audacious attacks to score psychological and political triumphs.

"The fundamental lesson of the Tet offensive is not the immediacy of the event, but it is about the political will of the United States, and how you grind at that and you never let up on that, never lose focus on it," said Marine Col. Thomas Hammes, a leading military expert on insurgencies.

Iraq's insurgents, experts said, may try to stage high-profile attacks to disrupt the parliamentary elections -- touted by the Bush administration as a key milepost of progress -- with the same goal as communist forces in Vietnam: making the Americans go home.

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