Calling for more troops is one thing, asking your fellow soldiers to commit suicide is something quite different.

"Platoon-sized patrol bases" in hostile territory seems like a recipe for higher U.S. casualties.

How does this article, the truthfulness of which I do not doubt, add up with this empirical data? (link)

Most Iraqis - 71 percent - said American soldiers should be withdrawn within a year, but only 37 percent favored an American withdrawal in the next six months. Only Sunnis wanted American forces out within six months, and only Kurds favored a longer United States presence, as much as two years or more.

The poll also found growing support for attacks on American forces, with 61 percent of the respondents saying they approved, compared with 47 percent in January. Support for the attacks was strongest among Sunnis, at 92 percent. But support among Shiites rose to 62 percent in September from 41 percent in January. Only 16 percent of Kurds favored attacks on American troops.

First Lt. Pete Hegseth: "The future of Samarra, and Iraq as a whole, ultimately lies in the hands of her people--their sympathies are the ultimate prize in this war."

Are they coy maidens, smiling nervously from behind fluttering fans and waiting impatiently to be protected by us and won over by our bold love?

Or mature people with free will who have their own culture and values that are not what we would wish them to be?

First Lt. Pete Hegseth: "No matter how many insurgents we kill, city leaders we meet or policemen we enlist, it is all for naught if we cannot provide security and stability. Tribal sheikhs told us that even within Samarra--deep in the Sunni triangle--a vast majority of people just want peace and order and will side with whoever can provide it. Right now Samarrans rightfully question who that will be."

But what if tribal sheikhs lie?

First Lt. Pete Hegseth: "The end goal in Samarra is for Iraqis to do everything for themselves. But their government and security forces are not ready."

Given that it's late 2006, it seems they are as ready as they want to be and they have learned everything they allowed the Americans teach them. (The unwillingness or Iraqi forces to learn more from the Americans than suits the Iraqis was raised before on Winds of Change by an American soldier.) They have adequate equipment and overwhelming numbers. Iraqi forces are as "ready" as they are willing.

First Lt. Pete Hegseth: "Our four-vehicle civil-affairs patrol was often the only American presence deep inside the city and we were frequently greeted by locals with the question, "Where have you been?" Americans can't of course be omnipresent; but we should at least be there when it matters."

Is it reasonable to expect foreign forces to be there to do for the locals what they will not do for themselves whenever it matters?

Since that is what the Iraqis seem to expect - omnipotent and omnipresent Americans always doing stuff for locals who want to get rid of them and who favor attacks on them - why is this not an indication that living up to Iraqi expectations is a hopeless task and it's time for Iraqis to take care of themselves?

First Lt. Pete Hegseth: "In due time, the Iraqi Security Forces will take over Samarra, but they are not ready yet. If the Americans left today, the Iraqis would be co-opted by the insurgents--who are utterly ruthless, willing to kill family members of policemen or decapitate Iraqi soldiers to preserve disorder. It will take time. Both the Iraqi Army and Samarra Police need to get bloodied a bit and bounce back, proving their strength to the people. They will eventually be ready, but until then, security belongs to us."

Crops come in season, you can't rush them. That's fair enough.

Does the will to take on a ruthless foe grow up automatically too in due season, or is it reasonable to wonder: if corn wouldn't grow in this land either last year or the year before, how do we know it will next year or the year after?

It's late 2006. I thought it was very reasonable in years gone by to say "it will take time," and I was in favor of extending patience for a time, but time has gone by, and now I think it is time.

The argument seems to be that the Iraqi forces can't be expected to fight and win because the jihadis are willing to kill.

While opinions differ reasonably, I think that the willingness to confront a terrible foe is not something that arrives reliably but only after years of patient cultivation. (Great skill is another matter.) I think it can come as quickly as it did for the heroic passengers of United 93 on 11 September, 2001, or even faster than that. There is a primal heroic response.

If years go by and people show in practice that while they may see a need, if so they think it is somebody else's problem to take care of it - I don't think time by itself cures that.

And where are the commendably bloody-minded and ruthless enemies we are fighting coming from? Are we fighting only long-service, veteran suicide bombers?

I want to raise a question: are those who direct the Americans in Iraq to fight with a "chin defilade" attitude, protecting themselves, keeping a minimum profile and just being available to do what Iraqis couldn't possible be expected to do for themselves in terms of raw material power wrong?

If so, given that the local population wants to be rid of the Americans, favors attacks on them, and readily damns them for not doing everything while producing armed forces that are indefinitely un-ready to fight against foes who are so ruthless they are willing to kill - why are the generals wrong? They look right to me.

Monkyboy, exactly what military background and historical knowledge do you base that comment on? Especially given that the author himself did it and is here to write about it.

There are other examples that indicate otherwise, most notably the USMC's CAP program, but you'd have to actually know something in order to discuss them.

David's comments are of a different stripe. The short answer is that there appears to be a minimum consistent security level that lets Iraqi forces get established, since they serve under threat both on and off duty, and under threat to their families. Volunteering under those conditions is indeed something of a heroic act, but one can push the risk calculus too far. Mosul (i.e. Michael Yon and Deuce Four) is a good example of the baseline security = success with Iraqi forces contention.

The author contends that by sitting in "chin defilade," US forces are depriving themselves of the chance to really find out if something better is possible. The concept of "community policing" whereby cops got out of cars and stations and started walking beats in troubled American cities, followed by drops in the crime rate, is an incomplete but possibly useful analogy.

The British, for instance, have radically revised their approach in their AOO around Basra, in some cases abandoning bases altogether and going kind of Bedouin within defined areas. In contrast with the earlier disaster of their Basra stewardship, David Axe reports that this is working better both as a security strategy and a pacification approach.

As for the larger issue of US presence, if the Iraqis decide that the USA should go, the US has said it would leave and it will leave. Iraqis have voted at non-negligible risk to themselves, and their elected representatives can hash that out.

The natural result of the Sunnis' apparent wish would of course be a losing war with the Shi'ites in reprisal for their continued attacks on Shi'ite mosques et. al. But if they wish that to be their problem, and continue to act in ways that guarantee it will be, that's their call.

My sense is that sentiments in a poll don't reflect that sort of calculus, however, which is likely to look very different when you're a Sunni leader making the call for real. I also don't see such a call coming because of the role US forces play in protecting Iraq from foreign incursions by conventional armies - an area where Iraq's forces are not yet evolved enough to cope given their near-entire lack of an air force (by deliberate US policy, and a foolish one I think) and reduced heavy armor (just one division right now, though a good one). The Kurds feel that issue most keenly, of course, but they are not alone. Self-contained US bases away from the cities with fighter jets and a minimum of about 40,000 troops would be my minimum expectation for at least the next 5 years, therefore, and a Germany or Korea-like situation is very possible.

If you want a real headscratcher, wander over to Iraq the Model and read Mohammed's take on the issue, from a different perspective. (Replace the * with o)

http://iraqthemodel.bl*gsp*t.com/2006/10/americas-sinhesitation.html

Probably not what you'd expect. Certainly took me aback. I would love to hear a conversation between the ITM brothers and LT Hegseth! Hmmmm....

Strength in numbers, Joe.

The terrorists/insurgents seem to lack the ability or the desire to assault our larges bases in Iraq.

They are, however, very effective at mining the roads they know our troops are likely to use.

When our troops leave their bases and go into the cities, they are protected by the element of surprise, i.e., they don't annouce what neighborhood they are going to patrol in advance.

So the bad guys can't set up mines or ambushes in advance of our troop's arrival.

If, however, our troops were stationed in the neighborhoods, the bad guys would know exactly where they were starting out from each day and place their i.e.d.s accordingly.

Plus there seems to be several groups of bad guys that are perfectly capable of taking out our troops when they are guarding fixed points in small numbers (the ones who kidnapped two of our soldiers from a checkpoint in Yusufiya and killed them, for example).

If we started setting up "police stations" all over Iraq, I bet we'd start losing one a week.

Lots more now at Glenn Reynolds', including input from commenters with actual - you know - arguments.

Hehe, Tim,

Is this what you consider an "actual argument:"

"Thus, this war will not see an end unless America revives the preemptive war strategy and start chasing the enemies and striking their bases in the region, especially in Syria and Iran."

A real Catch-22 you have there:

America won't be able to attack Iran unless we turn Iraq a success, but we can't turn Iraq into a success unless we attack Iran.

That's some catch!

#7 from Tim Oren on October 6, 2006 8:43 PM
Lots more now at Glenn Reynolds', including input from commenters with actual - you know - arguments.

Mt opinions are close to those expressed in the email by Glenn Reynolds' reader who prefers anonymity.

We're not losing momentum in Iraq. The Pentagon strategy is a very deliberate form of tough love that is forcing the Iraqis to defend their own country.

I avoided the phrase "tough love" though. Coming from me, the "love" would not be all that sincere.

If we had sent 500,000 troops to Iraq and fought a Soviet-style counterinsurgency, the end result would have been an Iraq with no incentive to do the very hard work of creating viable fighting forces from scratch.

This I agree with unreservedly.

I also agree with the anonymous reader that to attack Syria and Iran would be a terrible idea, on all sorts of grounds.

Our strategy in Iraq is sound. It's keeping our own casualties down, and it's forcing the Iraqis to defend themselves.

Don't despair. We're winning.

Just so.

Monkyboy is not smart enough to grasp that this argument is coming from an Iraqi in Iraq, or to wonder what might be triggering that opinion. But yes, it is a valid argument that presupposes a particular strategic situation. And the "Catch-22" ceases to become one if either of its premises are invalidated. So there's an argument or three to be had there - you just have to be over 12 years old to grasp that fact and begin making some (apologies to any smart 11 year olds out there).

Monkyboy's extensive non-knowledge of matters military fails to account for so many things, foremost of which is the author's survival of a mission he believes to be "suicide." Concepts like basing on location cuts down transit time and hence potential danger zones, makes it easier to monitor for potential IED land mine emplacements in the area, allows the unit to take different routes around the city, builds zones of secrity and also local intelligence networks, etc... don't enter his head. Nor does the thought that similar efforts have worked elsewhere - most intelligent people might have googled for "CAP" or some variant thereof when gven the hint, and learned something.

But monkyboy is way too busy being a typical ignorant liberal. The question is, can he ever be anything else?

#4 from Joe Katzman: "The natural result of the Sunnis' apparent wish would of course be a losing war with the Shi'ites in reprisal for their continued attacks on Shi'ite mosques et. al. But if they wish that to be their problem, and continue to act in ways that guarantee it will be, that's their call."

I think the key word there is "continue". That is, their actions are consistent with having made their choice. There is a slow-boiling civil war already, and they must lose it. America's most useful contribution to that necessary outcome is to stay out of the way of the winners.

#4 from Joe Katzman: "My sense is that sentiments in a poll don't reflect that sort of calculus, however, which is likely to look very different when you're a Sunni leader making the call for real."

I am not a worshipper at the shrine of Clausewitz, but at this point I'll call on his remarkable trinity of policy, calculation of chances, and sentiments. I agree the sentiments expressed in a poll don't represent a calculus. This isn't about the calculation of chances, but raw sentiments of animosity, prejudice, chagrin and hatred.

Joe,

America's power in Asia is rapidly waning.

We can forestall that trend for a while by dumping massive amounts of borrowed money into our campaigns there...

But in the end, Asia (outside the Indian subcontinent) belongs to China and their pals Russia and Iran.

Any special interest group that wants to influence future events in Asia should stop wasting their time on American politics and focus all their efforts on China...

And anyone who wants to attack Iran should buy a gun and hop on a plane for the Middle East.

CAP used to mean combat air patrol back when air power mattered...does it mean something different now?

I think some people are trying to paint a rosey scenario over something that is clearly last ditch rationalization over actions we really dont have much choice over any more. At least the military dont anyway- theyve been given their instructions and their allotted resources and told to get 'er done so to speak.

Look, we didnt send 500,000 troops into Iraq because we didnt feel we needed them to win the war against Hussein (which was true). We didnt add them after the war because (and this is an absolute fact) we didnt have much of a reconstruction/occupation plan. Lets not argue about it- we didnt, its well documented particularly by military sources generally in the Bush camp.

Now thats not the end of the world because you can make plans on the fly. In fact you have to, its part of war. We had little idea what a post-war Iraq would like, nobody did. It wasnt massive parades and flowers... but it wasnt a depopulated wasteland of WMDs and burning oil wells. It was what it was.

Now you want to talk about the bootstrap strategy we've allegedly employed? What does that have to do with sealing the Syrian borders so Al Qaeda couldnt put several thousand foriegners in places like Fallujah? Or launching a massive American industrial rescue project to repair the electricity that still leaves Iraqis in the dark and heat most of the day (think about that, it makes me sick)? Nothing the Iraqis themselves can conceivably do could repair their infastructure. But the nation that built a liberty ship a day? Who knows? We sure as hell still dont know because we never even tried. Certainly not the way we could have. I defy the biggest Bush proponent on the planet to tell me what percentage of total American effort and power (industrial, military, everything) has been devoted to Iraq. If the answer isnt 100% (and anybody that gets into the double digits should have their head examined) the question because 'why not more'?

Its one thing to push a man hard. Its another to tell him to learn to swim by pushing him into the deep end. No we didnt build the pool, but at some point it really doesnt matter anymore- you either do what must be done to win or accept that you arent going to devote those kinds of resources. Sometimes you accept the latter by default because you fool yourself. I cant tell which has happened to this administration.

If we win this fight, and god I hope we do, it will have precious little to do with any strategy from above. It will be from the guys on the ground who were seldom given the missions they took on themselves that end up doing the most good.

Mark,

Even if we'd done everything "right," there was little chance the people of Iraq would have elected a corrupt, pliant secularist like Ahmed Chalabi to be our new Shah like the neocons evisioned.

I think once Bush realized all he'd done is turn over Iraq to the Islamic extremist like al Sadr, he gave up.

Our biggest enemies in Iraq right now aren't the insurgents and "terrorists," but the folks in the Green Zone we're protecting who will turn Iraq into an Iran clone once we leave.

Monkeyboy, that's radically over simplifying the matter. Between the Kurds, the Sunni, the secular Shiia, and the Sistani Shiia- that cant happen. Sadr can only grab at power with Irans blatant help, and that will rile most Iraqis (who arent far removed from that war), and he certainly cant do it while we are there.

A good reason to stay, no? Btw, if as you say the current elected Iraqi government is Sadr's puppet regime, why havent they demanded the United States leave?

What's the hurry?

Everyone (including the "terrorists") is getting their cut of the oil revenue, Iran and Saudi Arabia are funding their factions in the Potemkin Parliament and America itself is blowing $100 billion a year in Iraq, too.

Why kill the gold rush before it's played out?

Don't forget, we're the ones who made being a Sunni or a Shiite or a Kurd such a big deal in Iraq...in fact, Bush's lawyers carved the importance of factions into the Constitution they threw together.

The ethnic cleansing that's now going on is a direct result of American policies.

#13 from Mark Buehner: "Nothing the Iraqis themselves can conceivably do could repair their infastructure."

The essence of our disagreement is that you assert that and I deny it.

Iraqis can do everything that needs to be done. And only they can do it.

The Americans cannot do it for them.

Necessary tasks in Iraq must and can be accomplished only by forces that Iraqis are inclined to support. That means Iraqi forces.

Iraqis want the Americans out within a year, believe that the American military presence causes more conflict than it prevents, and favor attacks on Americans. That last point means Iraqis are not our friends but among our enemies. From our point of view, the Iraqi people should be considered as quicksand.

Fortunately this applies to Al Qaeda too, which means Al Qaeda has lost, which means we've won this second war in Iraq (consequent to Operation Iraqi Freedom).

The consequence of Iraqi freedom is that Iraqis can choose their future without Saddam, and they are doing so.

Sort of: Saddam is still around. But like everything else that may look wrong with Iraq from our point of view, that is how Iraqis have chosen so far.

I think the future of Al Qaeda in Iraq is even worst than its present. Iraqis want American blood, so when Al Qaeda inflicts casualties on Americans it enjoys legitimacy. But Iraqis are not equally approving of attacks on Iraqi forces and civilians.

The more the Americans protect themselves, the more they hurt Al Qaeda's legitimacy in Iraq.

Now that a losing dynamic for Al Qaeda has been established, the smaller and harder target the Americans make themselves, the worse Al Qaeda will hurt.

Al Qaeda is also in a weak position to defend its main allies, that is those Iraqi Sunnis who have joined with Al Qaeda in fostering civil war. The best thing those guys can do is die in great numbers and in ways that invite the question, "remembering how Al Qaeda's allies in Iraq wound up, who wants to be Al Qaeda's next allies?"

Everybody seems eager and determined to play their parts.

We should let them.

Alternately, in a spirit of trust, generosity and disregard for the demonstrated character of the social engines we are dealing with, we could make ourselves more readily available as sources for jihadi prestige and satisfied blood-lust; which would help Muslims unite with each other as everyone got in for their chop against the common, popularly approved infidel target. But I think that's a bad idea.

Force protection: it's not just a euphemism for cowardice, it's a war-winning principle. Especially in our situation.

"#13 from Mark Buehner: "Nothing the Iraqis themselves can conceivably do could repair their infastructure."
The essence of our disagreement is that you assert that and I deny it.
Iraqis can do everything that needs to be done. And only they can do it.
The Americans cannot do it for them."

I've heard some excuses about rebuilding Iraqs electricity infastructure. God knows I have. But the idea that only the swelling breast of a free-willed Iraqi can build a generator is a new one, i'll say that much. Its like George Carlin said about the homeless, "these people aren't homeless, they're HOUSELESS." We have been consistantly overcomplicating these things, and with all due respect alot of it is from the self actualizing new agey bulls&^t that you are advocating- and both political sides do it.

Look, if MacArthur or somebody from the WW2 generation were looking at this problem they wouldnt be hand-wringing over all this nonsense. They'd see it in a much simpler sense for what it is- a power struggle. We want something done our way and a whole bunch of different people want it their own ways. If we werent prepared to deal with that reality and all it implies we shouldnt have started this enterprise. That means we impose our will untill such a time as those we are imposing on begin living it (or something similar to it) themselves. Thats what history shows can work.

Meanwhile, we try to 'convince' and reason and cajole while our enemy bombs and blasts and destroys. Who the hell gets their way do you think? This is Heart of Darkness, Apocalypse Now- the enemy will die and kill as many innocents as he can to have his way. What are we willing to do? Because of our great strength we dont have to do those things- but we have to do something! The least bloody way that plays to our strengths is to fix the damn place so blowing it up doesnt seem so attractive to the people living there.

Screw allowing the Iraqi people to self-actualize and find themselves. If we dont believe our way is the moral and wise and right way and have the courage of our convictions we might as well get in bed with the far left who have always said our way is no good and certainly shouldnt be forced on people- at least they are honest about it. Of course you can push 'civilization' on others. The West has made 2 millenia of it for goodness sake.

Joe:

The Brits took a hands off approach from the begining. I would suggest that is why we have so much of a problem with the Iranians. The Brits let the radicals take over their area of operations. With no coalition support the cities and towns became radicalised.

#20 from davod: "The Brits took a hands off approach from the begining."

That's how I read the news too.

Has Bush allowed the Iraqis to have municipal and provincial elections yet?

Last I heard, America put its own handpicked leaders in charge of the cities and provinces of Iraq, which at least in part, started the insurgency.

"8:59 a.m. April 16, 2006

RAMADI, Iraq ? U.S. officials are pressing for early local election in troubled Anbar province, hoping it will produce a government that can undercut support for the insurgency in the region where it is strongest"

source