Are we fighting factions that will continue to fight even if the inevitable happens… that some day we will not be in Iraq?
Why haven’t the Iraqi civilians provided us with more “on the ground” intelligence?
These are questions I am thoughtfully pondering. I don’t necessarily have the answer…many thoughts, some answers. The warring Sunni and Shi’a factions of Islam are largely not peace-thinking people; they kill each other and they will kill anyone who threatens their ideology. They join together to fight the “west”, but similarly fight each other with the same vigor and brutality. {Begs the question, what is the ideology of each of these factions?}.
Followers of either sect might not be willing to blow themselves up or pick up an M-16, but they sure as hell aren’t ratting out the ones who do…the ones that are shooting at us; our enemy. Why aren’t these people; Iraqi civilians who say they want to live in peace providing us with the “on the ground” intelligence we need to kill the insurgents and win this war?
Certainly policing the area as we are currently executing this “war” is not working. The CSI-Baghdad method is an egregious war on our troops as we place them in the cross hairs of warring factions who wish to destroy each other; and us. Searching for perpetrators after the fact of an “insurgent” attack is an abomination of military and criminal justice; and belies the trust of the very people we are HOPING trust us. If we have the might and the will to fight, then for crying out loud we have the responsibility to use it – let’s get this done.
Any aggression toward our troops must be met with an overwhelming response up to and including leveling any town where we know the enemy is firing from or hiding. The rules of engagement for our side are paralyzing. It is absolutely imperative that the rules of engagement change and allow our troops to respond appropriately to the enemy on the ground... “If you feel threatened, shoot to kill”. With this approach, I believe we would soon begin to get solid intelligence from Iraqis who want to live (in peace?).
Scenario 1: An Iraqi mom with five children (or any “peaceful Iraqi) is living in a village and worshipping at the same mosque as a group of radical Islamic insurgents preparing to launch an attack on a passing US & Iraqi military group in two days. The Iraqi mom also knows that a similar attack occurred in an adjoining village two weeks prior. The response of our military was to send in troops to look for the perpetrators, collect crime scene evidence and file a report. What would this Iraqi mother do with the knowledge of an impending attack?
Scenario 2: Same scenario only the response of our military to the attack two weeks prior was an immediate bombing of the village until there was no life left. Given this scenario, what do you think the Iraqi mother would do with the information she had regarding the impending attack? It may not be that she would come forward, but she and several others would flee that village…fleeing civilians would be noticed; thus providing us with useful intelligence information.
The key to winning the war against Radical Islam is not necessarily always total military action, but intelligence followed by surgical strikes. We must insist by military force that moderate and peaceful Muslims (Shi’a or Sunni) come forward and take as much responsibility for their fate as our troops have; friendly persuasion has not worked.
The argument that innocent lives will be lost if we ramp up our military operations is simply not reasonable. To be sure there has been and will be some civilian life loss from our military operations. However, the longer we drag this on, the more innocents will be sacrificed. It isn’t our side that blows up restaurants, markets, cars, etc. It’s their own kind; the religious zealots who kill them.
In order for that to stop, the Iraqi civilians must take the responsibility and have a duty to provide us and subsequently the Iraqi troups and police with the Intel we need to win; or we all lose.
Followers of either sect might not be willing to blow themselves up or pick up an M-16, but they sure as hell aren’t ratting out the ones who do…the ones that are shooting at us; our enemy. Why aren’t these people; Iraqi civilians who say they want to live in peace providing us with the “on the ground” intelligence we need to kill the insurgents and win this war?
Certainly policing the area as we are currently executing this “war” is not working. The CSI-Baghdad method is an egregious war on our troops as we place them in the cross hairs of warring factions who wish to destroy each other; and us. Searching for perpetrators after the fact of an “insurgent” attack is an abomination of military and criminal justice; and belies the trust of the very people we are HOPING trust us. If we have the might and the will to fight, then for crying out loud we have the responsibility to use it – let’s get this done.
Any aggression toward our troops must be met with an overwhelming response up to and including leveling any town where we know the enemy is firing from or hiding. The rules of engagement for our side are paralyzing. It is absolutely imperative that the rules of engagement change and allow our troops to respond appropriately to the enemy on the ground... “If you feel threatened, shoot to kill”. With this approach, I believe we would soon begin to get solid intelligence from Iraqis who want to live (in peace?).
Scenario 1: An Iraqi mom with five children (or any “peaceful Iraqi) is living in a village and worshipping at the same mosque as a group of radical Islamic insurgents preparing to launch an attack on a passing US & Iraqi military group in two days. The Iraqi mom also knows that a similar attack occurred in an adjoining village two weeks prior. The response of our military was to send in troops to look for the perpetrators, collect crime scene evidence and file a report. What would this Iraqi mother do with the knowledge of an impending attack?
Scenario 2: Same scenario only the response of our military to the attack two weeks prior was an immediate bombing of the village until there was no life left. Given this scenario, what do you think the Iraqi mother would do with the information she had regarding the impending attack? It may not be that she would come forward, but she and several others would flee that village…fleeing civilians would be noticed; thus providing us with useful intelligence information.
The key to winning the war against Radical Islam is not necessarily always total military action, but intelligence followed by surgical strikes. We must insist by military force that moderate and peaceful Muslims (Shi’a or Sunni) come forward and take as much responsibility for their fate as our troops have; friendly persuasion has not worked.
The argument that innocent lives will be lost if we ramp up our military operations is simply not reasonable. To be sure there has been and will be some civilian life loss from our military operations. However, the longer we drag this on, the more innocents will be sacrificed. It isn’t our side that blows up restaurants, markets, cars, etc. It’s their own kind; the religious zealots who kill them.
In order for that to stop, the Iraqi civilians must take the responsibility and have a duty to provide us and subsequently the Iraqi troups and police with the Intel we need to win; or we all lose.
2 comments:
Julie,
Couldn't agree more. Unleash our hounds of hell and let's get the job done. Stabilize Iraq and show the rest of the "Arab Street" we mean business. Put them on notice.
This political diplo-diddling is getting nervewracking, and costing us valuable time, blood, and treasure. Ultimately, the price might be unimaginable.
I like your thinking.
Andrea
Radio Patriot
{Begs the question, what is the ideology of each of these factions?}
My answer; two different and opposed forms of islam. Both shia and sunni ARE moslims.
The sunnis hate (and seek to kill) what THEY consider infidels.
The shia hate (and seek to kill) what THEY consider infidels.
The ONLY thing sunnis and shi'ites agree on is those who are non-moslims are enemies.
The shia see ''those infiedel Americans'' as ''just getting in the way'' and the sunnis will see us the same way.
And BOTH sides WILL USE ''our troops'' as human shields.
Brillant. Just brillant.
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