All wogs look the same

Turning back to international affairs, it is clear that Operation Matador is the next step in shattering the terrorist insurgency in Iraq.

Captain Ed links to analysis by the Washington Times that examines the larger issues at stake.

Further information can be found at the Strategy Page and the indispensable Belmont Club.

Mainstream accounts have attempted to portray this as yet another pointless bloodbath with Marines chasing aimlessly around the desert.

The reliably defeatist BBC offers a helpful chart that combines the deaths of Iraqi civilians, police, military members and terrorists and compares them to the Coalition losses.

We must pause over that last little nugget of information and ponder why the BBC should be so eager to lump killers in with their victims.

We find it odd that the fanatical suicide bomber can be statistically lumped in with the school children he has just blown up, or that a when an Iraqi National Guard patrol wipes out a terrorist cell, this too is added to the "body count."

No doubt to the BBC, all deaths are America's fault anyway.

One question remains: What of the foreign jihadis?

Are they lumped in with the random assortment of miscellaneous Iraqis?  Do all wogs look the same?

Apparently so.

Of course, the BBC was good enough to mention that one of its sources is the notoriously unreliable Iraq Body Count, whose methodology seems to be questionable at best. 

As an amusing aside, we note that even their obviously inflated totals are only a quarter of what the hilariously innacurate Lancet study claimed.   

In any event, the Posse views the offensive as another key element in breaking the back of the insurgency.

The sudden surge in suicide attacks is obviously a sign of Coalition defeat by the anti-war movement, but for them, everything is a sign of Coalition defeat.

A lop-sided battle like Fallujah is merely evidence of Coalition atrocities.

But to a more discerning observer, the sudden surge in terror bombings is proof of a spoiling attack, a desperate attempt to derail current operations.

The bombings target only the "softest" of targets - indicating that the military correlation of forces is even more unbalanced against the terrorists than before.  In addition, Strategy Page indicates that many of the suicide bombers are mentally ill or duped into participating in an attack.  For example a man might be offered a sum of money to transport explosives, only to have his car detonated from a distance.

In short, nothing indicates a growing strength on the part of the terrorists.  In fact, their indescriminate use of bombs among civilians can only be seen as a sign of despair.

Comments

[Collin Baber]

Operation Matador will kill many people and inspire legions of disaffected Mideast youth to join the jihadists in their struggle to keep America from dominating the region.

In addition, the Bushian Warfare Cult is unwittingly breeding future McVeigh clones in that conflict through it's gratuitous abuse of the soldiers sent there.

[Dwilkers]

Every time I read one of Colin's posts I wish I had taken the blue pill.

On topic: The front appears to be moving where it has needed to move all along from what I could tell, to the border with Syria.

I'm ex-military but no military strategist. I am also infected with the same disease so many of us have, an outrageous impatience created by our on-demand culture. So I've been banging my head for quite a while now over the apparent lack of attention to the border with Syria where the jihadi's are pouring in.

Slow, steady progress is what I see. Elections held. Iraqi security forces forming up. The US moving the front away from the interior.

Patience. I want our guys out of there but we have to have patience.

[DWMF]

Re Captain Ed's blog about the Flypaper Strategy (Having troubles registering on his site, I'll write it here.) :-

This has historical precedent. This is what the Romans/Byzantines used to do. They marched to the battlefield and banged on their shields. The hairy barbarians couldn't resist a great big glorious pitched battle, and the Romans could beat them at that every time.

For a fictionalised version of this, read "Count Belisarious" by Robert Graves, the chapter where the Roman/Byzantine General Nessus consults with Belisarius as to how to engage the enemy. Nessus later related that the battle had really been won in Belisarius's back garden.

[mike ryko]

not very bright are you?

[DWMF]

Are you talking to me, Ryko?
Got anything intelligent to say?
Thought not....