We can't beat them man-to-man, it's now obvious

[keithyboy]

We have to pound them with air strikes huge bombs and massive fire power. Fallujah is proving that people fighting for their homeland, their lives, their religion, their culture, are tough to defeat.

It is shameful that the US calls this incursion into Fallujah a "defensive" response and not an attack as it really is. We are in THEIR country, bombing THEIR people, mosques, infrastructure, murdering THEIR children and women throwing everything we have at them from the air, sea, and land, using armored tanks, heavy equipment, and the best trained military on earth and we call this a DEFENSIVE strike.

Give me a f**cking break!!!

We are invaders, and we would be getting our asses kicked royally were it not for the technical advantage we have and our much superior weapontry not to mention soldiers inside heavy tanks and helicopter spraying the area with exploding ammo and bombs!!

The world is watching and looks like we are the monsters they believe us to be. Now we are crying about Al-Jazeera being responsible for the uprising...we still don't get it. These are people fighting for their lives and their country and their identity. Literally fighting to defend against organized genocide against them.

[stopthegop]

1. I think you're mistaken..

given the same weapons and terrain the US would crush the 'fighters' in Fallujah...the US training is far superior..

we use the technology to prevent US casualties...a concern the other side does not share

[Bandit]

2. Right and Bush* is a war hero

:shrug:

[Skittles]

23. LOL

dear GOD some people are totally SNOWED, are they not???

[ieoeja]

6. I agree and I disagree.

I agree that eliminating our technological advantage and eliminating their numerical advantage, our guys would still win handily. And I agree with your assertion that we go ahead and use our technological advantage to reduce US casualties.

However, I disagree that the Iraqis would not use technology to prevent their casualties if they had the technological advantage.

[GreenPartyVoter]

8. Don't forget Saddam's 300,000+ army is still out there

So while the Iraqis may not be as well trained as our folks, they do have a number of trained fighters of their own.

[Comadreja]

14. Like in Vietnam, right?

The Resistance was similarly ill-equipped to fight the US invaders, but defeated them in the end.

[Cat Atomic]

16. Ever read T.E. Lawrence's book?

I finally got the chance to start reading The Seven Pillars of Wisdom last month (yeah, I'm a slow reader).

He makes some very interesting observations on the traditional military vs. guerillas or insurgents.

Basically, he says that the traditional military has the aim of lowering every man's abilities down to the lowest common denominator. They want the individual to instead be a "unit". They want his performance to be easily predictable to allow for large scale coordination.

Insurgents, on the other hand, are unpredictable. They can be extremely effective, or they can completely fuck up. But Lawrence was saying that, man for man, a traditional military is far less effective than a coordinated band of guerilla fighters.

Anyway, I thought it was interesting.

[eridani]

28. Depends on what you mean by 'win'

Of course we could 'win' by obliterating large chunks of the population. The Nazis defeated the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, obviously. What kind of 'victory' is that?

Our pet governing council folks are against this, which is a lot like Petain griping about Oradour.

[Devils Advocate NZ]

18. Dream on...

The Iraqi have somethingthe US troops DON'T have - experience.

IF you took away all the high tech equipment and body armour and so on, the US army would not even BE in Iraq right now.

[markses]

19. Pure racism

"...a concern the other side does not share"

The old lie. Unless of course, you mean the other side doesn't care about preventing US casualties, in which case it is a trivial tautology. If you are claiming that the other side doesn't care to reduce it's own casualties, then you are dealing in pure racism.

[maggrwaggr]

24. The US is attacking as distraction about Bush's testimony tomorrow

they don't want people to realize that Bush is testifying and it's NOT UNDER OATH.

Oh yeah and Cheney's hand is UP HIS ASS making his little dummy say what he wants.

This is a HUGE embarassment to the administration, so they're starting another battle/war to distract us from it.

[ugarte]

3. I agree

I'm always amused when right-wingers like Rumsfeld accuse the 'terrorists' of fighting cowardly. I wish someday someone would ask him, "What kind of coward fights tanks, helicopters and gunships with an AK-47?"

[keithyboy]

4. Touche!

And what kind of a hero drops bombs on peoples' head and launches missiles from ships hundreds of miles away?

[Az]

5. Its talk like that

that cost Bill Mahrer his job.

[Howardx]

7. its the election

bush cant afford the kind of casualties house to house fighting would entail.

[bryant69]

9. I agree in part

But I disagree in part. Organized Genocide? Do you really believe that?

I don't; i've seen no evidence of it, except, of course, from our friends at al-jazeera, who don't have the best record in my mind.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[keithyboy]

20. Their record is a lot better than FOX news.

What has Al-Jazeera been proven guilty of? The last media outlets i know about that were charged and proved to be quilty of lying in the meida was the NYT, USA Today, WSJ, WP.

[pezcore64]

10. hah

I tend to wonder if we can beat them man for man too.

I was watching a special about the invasion on the Discovery Channel, I believe, and time after time i noticed PISS POOR MILITARY PLANNING when going into combat situations. Vehicals stuck in the mud, units changing plans without knowing whats going on with the other units, so much talk on radio/communication people couldnt hear each other, confusion in alot of cases, and what seemed to be organised disorganisation? if that makes sense?
lol

my brother, who usually votes republican but wont this election year, was even appauled at the lack of understanding of the battle field that the 'leaders' of the units had.

I dunno, God bless 'em for signing up to the armed forces,but, I tend to think our military lacks a certain... i dunno... intelligence?

Perhaps we should find ways to get people with higher education and people skills involved with the military. Tho most those people prolly oppose the war, so heck i dunno.

perhaps that show will come back on the Discovery Channel. I highly advise people watch it.. I knew our military had its problems, but I didnt know how bad it was until i watched it.
The discovery channel doesnt treat it as such, and tried to be positive and supportive, but the armed forces mistakes still shown thru.

[the Kelly Gang]

11. I don't think you can ever defeat someone fighting in their own land

..they will fight till the day they die..generation after generation..and the invaders heart will never be in it.


Even the US soldiers who believe the lies they were told must eventually lose heart in the task when they finally realise it's not as they were told.

[Zero Gravitas]

12. Sending troops in to fight door to door

would not be good in an election year, even though Bush* never cares about polls and only does what he believes to be right :eyes:

[BabsSong]

13. Two points

Heard one of those military analysts this a.m. talk about how these guys are fighting for a much bigger cause (or that's what they instill in the people); i.e, kill the Infidel. Therefore door to door is going to be an American bloodbath, among other things. But secondly, I would like to point out (did you hear the e-mails on CNN?) that the American people now look at the Iraqis (and most did from the beginning) as stinkin' Arabs who need killing. They don't care about bringing democracy to them any more than Bush does. Because they have killed more troops recently, we want to see the place burned to the ground, people killed...blow them to hell, you name it. So, indeed, Bush will blow them to hell. It ends the situation there (and others can be ended the same way) and the Amurekan people will cheer and yell "four more years, four more years"!!! It's a win-win situation for el Presidente.

[tom_paine]

15. Not organized genocide, per se, just some Soviet-style oppression

(using a different basic economic philosophy but the Bushevik Torturers and Saddam's Torturers will be identical in tactics and may well be the same people )

C'mon! What's a little Soviet-style Opression in the name of the Free Market between friedns?

</sarcasm off>

:puke:

[troublemaker]

17. We could beat them man to man easily

Training in team fighting is key. Our boys are terrific pack-hunters and would enjoy a vast advantage man-to-man with knives, rocks, bare fists, etc..

But we would take losses in the process--losses we consider unacceptable. Man-to-man is very different from aerial bombardment.

[shanti]

21. i'm positive that

this has been their plan all along. the freepers will get their wish :grr:

[ieoeja]

22. "Genocide"?

You seriously think we intend to kill the entire Sunni population of Iraq?

[markses]

25. Recent changes to the definition of genocide

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20040419-0539-warcrimes-genocide.html

"The ruling also will help clarify the definition of genocide by determining that the massacre was genocidal, even though it was limited to a small geographic area.

The defense had challenged that definition, arguing that the deaths of Srebrenica's males and deportation of about 25,000 women, children and elderly did not threaten the overall survival of Muslims throughout Bosnia.

But the court ruled that Srebrenica was numerically and strategically crucial for all Bosnian Muslims, and a symbol of the community's ultimate fate."

----snip----

Now, you might argue that the US occupying power doesn't intend to massacre a portion of the Sunni population in a small geographical region (i.e., Fallujah), or you might argue that Fallujah is not "numerically and strategically crucial for all Iraqi Sunni's," but the latest ruling on genocide from the UN War Crimes Tribunal in the Hague clearly states that the conditions you have set up (that is "the entire Sunni population of Iraq") is not a necessary component for the charge of genocide.

[haele]

26. I've heard some so-called compassionate conservative Repuke types

- Bush supporters all - say that very thing since the occupation began. Recently, at work. To them, "those people" cannot and will not embrace western style capitalism and "democracy" - so it's best just to get rid of them to protect the "proper way of life". These are also the same people who say "there's too many people in the world" and that criminals should be executed without remorse for an increasing number of crimes despite the possibility that they may have been convicted over a lie or through improper legal representation - and in the very next minute, decry keeping choice for abortion legal as being immoral and sneer at social programs as being a waste of tax dollars.
Yeah, perhaps only four or five out of our work force of around fourty, but very few people will argue against them when they're bringing up casual commentary to apparently bait liberals (like me) during breaks.
I have no doubt that most true believers of the Bush doctrine couldn't care less one way or another if the entire Sunni population was wiped out, even if they might mouth platitudes about being compassionate, good people themselves. These are usually the same people who believe that accusation of committing a crime means one is guilty, and have no remorse in supporting the severest penalty against the accused party without even bothering to try him or her first.

Just get rid of the problem - those pesky varmits - and go on with your own life - to people with that mindset, any other way of handling situations is a waste of their personal "precious" resources.

Extremely selfish and egoistic, but then an increasing amount of Americans can't conceive that anything might matter that's outside of their own interests, beliefs, or lifestyles for any number of reasons.

Haele

[taughtmepatience]

27. I would have to disagree

While I agree that we should never have gone to war with Iraq, as long as we are there, we might as well use our technology to preserve the lives of our troops. Sun Tzu advocated striking the enemy where they are weak hundreds of years ago...It is an age old tactic that has proven effective over and over again. From a strategic standpoint, if the Iraqi's cannot defend against air strikes, then that's how we should attack. If we have the technology to send drones into battle to prevent unnecessary death, then we should.

The nature of war is changing... Increasingly, troops are becoming "scouts" of the enemy's positions and attack drones do the dirty work of killing them. Just because its changing doesn't mean our troops are getting "softer" or "weaker"... American troop resolve has been tested over and over again and we've proven to be one of the toughest armies in the world.

[keithyboy]

29. Tough only if we can shoot from the sky and the water.

Tough is we can drop 2,000 lb bombs. Tough if we can carpet bomb.
That's tough!!!