The Battle of Baghdad

[Tom Odom]

20 October Washington Post - General Says Mission In Baghdad Falls Short by John Ward Anderson.....

"We're constantly going back in and doing clearing operations."

At the risk of over simplifiying (admiitedly this hypocritical of me to do this as I often point out simplistic analysis is a lodestone around our collective necks), this sentence to me goes back to the roots of our problems, troop numbers and the long term effects we have seen.

Best
Tom

[Jedburgh]

At the risk of over simplifiying (admiitedly this hypocritical of me to do this as I often point out simplistic analysis is a lodestone around our collective necks), this sentence to me goes back to the roots of our problems, troop numbers and the long term effects we have seen.

Best
Tom

It seems pretty clear that the troop numbers issue is not going to be fixed - we've just got to do better with what we have.

As regards Baghdad, I'd like to refer to the my previous post on displacement. Virtually all of those elements are present in the reaction of the bad guys to our efforts in Baghdad. I may be beating a dead horse, but we need better intelligence and better integration of intelligence with operations. Of course, to be truly effective, all of that needs to be tied in tight with close cooperation with Iraqi security elements - which is tough, because many of them are tied in with (or are part and parcel of) the elements we're attempting to disrupt and destroy.

With intel in the context of "displacement", I'm talking about true predictive intelligence, based upon in-depth knowledge of the city, its population, and the multitude of factions and their shifting alliances along with deep analysis of historical operational trends projected in sync with current and planned ops. We need analysts with significant experience not just in Iraq, but working the Baghdad AO to be tied in with trusted counterparts from among the indig. As long as this ain't happening we're not succeeding.

[Merv Benson]

Gen. Abizaid seems determined to keep troop numbers down in order to force the Iraqis to do more. This strategy had some positive results when we were primarily fighting al Qaeda as intelligence seem to improve dramatically.

As others have pointed out, the situation in Baghdad now has Iraqis of questionable allegiance dealing with militias that they may support. This is not a situation that is going to yeild much new intelligence on those operating the Shia half of the death squads. You also have the situation this week where one of the leaders of the militia is arrested and the Iraqi governemtn orders his release. That suggest that the governemtn is being influenced too heavily by these militias are that it is not serious in doing anything to stop their activities. If the government wants our continued assistance it is going to have to do better than this.

The General's resistance to fixing the force to space ratio issue also suggest that this situation is not going to be fixed soon.

[Jedburgh]

...As others have pointed out, the situation in Baghdad now has Iraqis of questionable allegiance dealing with militias that they may support. This is not a situation that is going to yeild much new intelligence on those operating the Shia half of the death squads. You also have the situation this week where one of the leaders of the militia is arrested and the Iraqi government orders his release...

The "situation this week" is only one of many similar incidents that have been occuring as we struggle with the militias. Most don't make it to the media.

The Economist, 5 Oct 06: Your Man or His? Keeping an Eye on the Security Forces

...Iraq's political parties work on the theory that if you don't fill the post with your partisans, the enemy will fill it with theirs. As a result, say American officers, they can judge the importance of a captured Sunni insurgent or Shia militiaman by the number of high-ranking Iraqi commanders calling up to demand his release...