Wampum

Dumb Reading

I' m reading something profoundly stupid. Tony Cordesman's 12.22.04 draft on Iraq. Tony's got a paying job at the CSIS, so its paid work, a K Street sitrep on the opfors.

He starts off with As has been explained earlier, however, the decision needs to be put in perspective. He then goes on to prove, in the space of less than 100 words, that because some facilities had been damaged or looted, and because the decision was really just a recognition of a fait acomplie, not really a decision that decided anything, and some of the people weren't very good at their jobs anyway, criticism of the decision is invalid. Tony identifies as valid criticism that the decision wasn't made with the broader consultation, and the full plan wasn't communicated to the Iraqi people or the people who might have been good at their former jobs.

He's writing about the Iraqi Armed Forces. In his tiny brain there is no causal connection in Decmeber 2004 between 1k US personnel occupied transit tubes and 20k US personnel rotated through beds in Landstuhl, and a lot more than that of friendlies and neutrals pushed onto the mortality and morbidity pages of the public health record, and the Bush/Bremer brain fart to disband the Iraqi Armed Forces and make Ahmed Chalabi Tsar, until the next good idea came along.

The next 20 pages are a rehash of what anyone reading Cole plus Stars and Stripes could know, with some terms of art sprinkled in. He goes on and on about "insurgents" operating in cells of 2 to 3. What stands out is that preserving lives and operational readiness is so subordinate to the politicial mission that it simply isn't in the picture. He's just going to muddle on to Victory, using OPM and OPL. Somehow.

So what did I write, in July 2003?

Reconstitute and Retreat (revisited)

My suggestion to the Candidate -- everyone else in the race is gambling that Bush's strategy will work, and some kind of peacefull settlement with a new regime in place will just happen, that Vietnamization will work and that there will be Peace With Honor.

No one is making the re-establishment of Iraqi forces as Iraqi civil defense an unconditional priority, to allow US troops to safely extricate. Sadam had no part in 9/11, nor did the Iraqi civil and military leadership, for all their other faults. Decapitation of the Iraqi civil and military leadership leaves no one but US troops to prevent anyone, repeat, anyone, from engaging US forces, at the sub-squad force level. No candidate has gone public with an alternative to an Iraq version of Dien Bien Phu.

Do so. Call for the re-appointment of the Iraqi career officer corps, payment and re-arming the regular army and the transfer of control of the Iraqi metropolitian zones to the Iraqi Army, Green Lines of Control, etc., and a transitional plan that gets the last GI out of harm's way.

Our troops need the Iraqi GHQ back in operation, and at least battalion-level local command and control capability, today. Sorting out the politics can wait.

This was before "the Candidate" ment John Kerry. When it was still possible that one of the seven or so dwarves could say "Halt, reconstitute the Iraqi Army and Police, Di Di back several klicks, and start treating them like WARSAW PACT forces that temporarily misplaced their political leadership."

Back to the present moment, the koolaid is still pretty much the beverage of choice, so there really isn't anything thing that can be done to reduce casualties. Tony's job is secure too.

Posted by EBW at January 8, 2005 11:12 AM | TrackBack