Saturday, September 16, 2006
Iraq Strategy Goes Back to Crusades
Haven’t we seen this movie before? The siege mentality has taken over: fences along our borders, and a moat around Baghdad. Obviously, we need to start building castles and practicing with our crossbows. I bet the Pope would be happy to bless our crusa...uh, mission...defense of traditional values. That’s it: traditional values. American values…
A fucking moat? Why not a line like the Maginot Line? Or the Great Wall of China. Just because they didn’t work the first time doesn’t mean we, Americans, can’t make it work this time!
It’s lunacy is what it is. Both sides, the Muslims and the Crusa—Christi—Coalition members are out of their heads. Blowing yourself up in the name of God is as whacked as blowing up others in the name of God—or “Democracy.” It’s like that old line about “civilizing them with a Krag,” only now we use M-16s. And cluster munitions. It's an axiom that generals are always ready to fight the last war, but now they seem to have jumped back countless war to the Middle Ages. Trenches and moats and fences. Do they keep others out or us in?
Security Ring for Baghdad Underway
Massive Effort Aims To Block Insurgents
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/15/AR2006091501232_pf.html
By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, September 16, 2006; A01
BAGHDAD, Sept. 15 -- U.S. military and Iraqi security forces have begun a massive effort to seal off Baghdad with a ring of reinforced checkpoints, berms, trenches, barriers and fences in an attempt to clamp down on insurgents, officials said Friday.
A few dozen checkpoints will be placed along key arteries in and out of Baghdad to ensure that people move through "predictable paths" that can be controlled, Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a U.S. military spokesman, said late Friday night. Iraqi forces will man the checkpoints and patrol the terrain, with support from U.S. troops.
"We know there's a flow in and out of the city of those who are responsible for the violence," Johnson said. "The intent is to control Baghdad city."
The plans were announced on a day when officials said 52 bound and tortured corpses were found across Baghdad over a 24-hour period. Baghdad's body count has surged in recent days, despite a month-old push by thousands of U.S. and Iraqi forces to tame some of the capital's roughest neighborhoods.
The construction of a ring around Baghdad would be the most ambitious security endeavor yet for the U.S. military and its Iraqi allies as they try to block militias, death squads and insurgents from funneling in weapons, explosives, funding and recruits from outside the capital.
A fucking moat? Why not a line like the Maginot Line? Or the Great Wall of China. Just because they didn’t work the first time doesn’t mean we, Americans, can’t make it work this time!
It’s lunacy is what it is. Both sides, the Muslims and the Crusa—Christi—Coalition members are out of their heads. Blowing yourself up in the name of God is as whacked as blowing up others in the name of God—or “Democracy.” It’s like that old line about “civilizing them with a Krag,” only now we use M-16s. And cluster munitions. It's an axiom that generals are always ready to fight the last war, but now they seem to have jumped back countless war to the Middle Ages. Trenches and moats and fences. Do they keep others out or us in?
Security Ring for Baghdad Underway
Massive Effort Aims To Block Insurgents
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/15/AR2006091501232_pf.html
By Sudarsan Raghavan
Washington Post Foreign Service
Saturday, September 16, 2006; A01
BAGHDAD, Sept. 15 -- U.S. military and Iraqi security forces have begun a massive effort to seal off Baghdad with a ring of reinforced checkpoints, berms, trenches, barriers and fences in an attempt to clamp down on insurgents, officials said Friday.
A few dozen checkpoints will be placed along key arteries in and out of Baghdad to ensure that people move through "predictable paths" that can be controlled, Lt. Col. Barry Johnson, a U.S. military spokesman, said late Friday night. Iraqi forces will man the checkpoints and patrol the terrain, with support from U.S. troops.
"We know there's a flow in and out of the city of those who are responsible for the violence," Johnson said. "The intent is to control Baghdad city."
The plans were announced on a day when officials said 52 bound and tortured corpses were found across Baghdad over a 24-hour period. Baghdad's body count has surged in recent days, despite a month-old push by thousands of U.S. and Iraqi forces to tame some of the capital's roughest neighborhoods.
The construction of a ring around Baghdad would be the most ambitious security endeavor yet for the U.S. military and its Iraqi allies as they try to block militias, death squads and insurgents from funneling in weapons, explosives, funding and recruits from outside the capital.
