Tuesday, March 25, 2003

 
Complications in a Modern Invasion

Sun Tzu, in "The Art of War", poses seven questions, the answers to which will create a clear vision of the war's outcome:

1) Which of the two sovereigns is imbued with the Moral law?
2) Which of the two generals has most ability?
3) With whom lies the advantages derived from Heaven and Earth?
4) On which side is discipline most rigorously enforced?
5) Which army is stronger?
6) On which side are officers and men more highly trained?
7) In which army is there the greater constancy both in reward and punishment?

By means of these seven considerations I can forecast victory or defeat."

However, that was 2400 years ago. Sun Tzu never had to contend with public opinion. Blair and Bush on the other hand have their heads on a block. They know that excessive civilian casualties will destroy their fragile and selective support.

In fact Blair recently bemoaned the difficulties associated with trying to keep open long and lengthy supply lines to feed the country that they're fighting. These lines, arguably our most vulnerable targets in Iraq, are stretched thin, open to guerrilla warfare and critical to the success and survival of front-line troops.

Because Bush and Blair have decided to proceed with a "decapitation" strategy to upend the Iraqi military, the push into Baghdad leave room for opposition forces to gain a foothold to the rear of front-line forces. The strategy is based on the idea that they remove Saddam immediately from the picture. After that, Iraqi troops would be demoralized, without a leader and asking themselves what they are fighting for. Indeed, most will see that as the beginning of the end and surrender. Right?

Wrong! First of all, I'm sure that Iraqi troops equate the value of the Administration's propaganda with that of camel dung. In addition, the Iraqi leadership will never let the troops know if Saddam is dead. Quite the contrary, they will say he is alive as long as they possibly can.

Think about it. If we were being invaded by a force many multiples the strength of our military and believed that they wanted to pillage and plunder, do you think it would matter if we hated our leadership? Absolutely not. We would fight to preserve our families and friends, our sense of self and our remaining dignity. If another sovereignty decided to invade us in order to liberate us, do you think anyone would believe them? No way. Not here and not in Iraq. As crappy as we might perceive Iraq to be, It's all that Iraqi citizens have, and they're not about to believe that the America that they supposedly hate is invading to make their lives better.

In essence, there is a secondary war that must be won, one of "propaganda and perception" targeted toward winning the hearts and minds of the Iraqi civilians as well as the global public. This goes well outside the realm of traditional warfare and will thus create non-traditional problems.

As a resultThere will be a trade-off between allied coalition lives and Iraqi civilian casualties. This trade-off will likely dominate the battle for Baghdad. Indeed, US/UK forces are publicizing their efforts to spare civilian lives even as Iraqi soldiers use civilians as shields. This will inevitably result in more vulnerable US troops.

In addition, as the supply line is spread ever thinner throughout southern Iraq and into Baghdad, troops become more vulnerable to guerrilla attacks from roving bands of Iraqi military. Such attacks have already taken place from military personnel who were supposedly surrendering at the time. Other episodes have included soldiers dressed as civilians. So the question arises, how do you separate enemy forces from civilians. The answer is…ultimately, you don't

Now add the following difficulties:

First, there has already been greater Iraqi resistance than the "quick war" scenario many had initially predicted

Second, there have been few signs of Iraqi's populace welcoming coalition forces and more importantly there are no signals of Iraqi's willing to rise up against Saddam and do the US's fighting for it, in contrast to the Afghanistan model.

Third, there are plenty of signs that Saddam is trying to adopt a guerrilla fighting stance, which is certainly not a surprise, but serves to undermine the coalition's technology advantage; Lastly, the US/UK coalition has yet to take any major urban center where the battle involves a clear-cut choice between the lives of US soldiers and civilians.

To complicate things further, the "psyche ops" have been admittedly overwhelming through all phases of the Iraq invasion to date. The Republican Guard is surrendering. No it's not. They launched scuds. No they didn't. Saddam is dead! Uh, not quite. Maybe injured. Umm Qasr is taken! Wait. Not yet The Iraqi 51st Division surrendered! No it hasn't. Only the Republican guard will stay to fight. Not even close. Resistance has existed at every level. Basra is taken! Nope, wrong again. We found a chemical weapons factory! Well, actually it was discovered 12 years ago…and it probably doesn't produce weapons.

So the truth is you simply can't believe anything that is released by the "coalition" governments.

On the positive side, at least in the minds of some, the Iraqi oil fields have apparently been secured by US forces. The southern Rumailah fields that pumped 1.25m b/d has been secured, while the news on the next largest fields in Kirkuk that was pumping 800K b/d, according to government sources, has also been secured by special forces, but with less publicity given the limited ground protection the forces have.

In the near-term however, the point of focus all revolves around the battle of Baghdad. Arguably one could say it always did; except we now know the Iraqis will not just lay down their arms, but in certain ranks are willing to fight.

Perhaps Sun Tzu hits the target when he notes that:

"The practical art of war, the best thing of all is to take the enemy's country whole and intact; to shatter and destroy it is not so good."

Sieges are no way to win hearts and minds any more today than they were 2500 years ago, nor is house to house fighting, the type that most likely will dominate in Baghdad. This is a likelihood that could result in both heavy US casualties and a huge loss in the secondary war for the hearts of the Iraqi people, something Saddam is sure to recognize and use to his advantage.

In the end however, the central idea that the US coalition will prevail holds true, but thoughts of "at what cost" are now a growing concern. Increased opposition increases the prospect of a polarized Iraq post-Saddam, with pro-Saddam elements or least anti-coalition elements potentially stronger than feared.

It seems that we have now entered a cloudy, myopic zone of "what if" scenarios. In fact, the situation, for better or for worse, will become clear once forces have fully engaged the Republican Guard in Baghdad. Only then will we have a true sense of the brevity and cleanliness of this invasion.

True, the objective is certain. Unfortunately, due to the nontraditional nature of an invasion focused on public relations and politics instead of traditional military tactics, the cost, already excessive, is uncertain.

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posted by Thomas Ball 4:52 PM

 
Combat Report - March 25, 2003

1055 GMT - US and British attacks have killed 16 Iraqis and wounded 95 over the past 24 hours, Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf says. He says Iraqi forces killed "scores of invaders" in marshes near Nasiriya but he gives no precise numbers; such figures have not been confirmed by US or British sources. He also denied that Russia has given Iraq military equipment.

1010 GMT - Brigadier Jim Dutton of the British Royal Marines says the southern port of Umm Qasr is now "safe and open"; hopes the first aid ship will arrive in 48 hours.

1000 GMT - Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan criticises Arab countries which supply the United States and Britain with oil.

0845 GMT - Iraqi officials say they have delivered food and medicine supplies for six months across the country, but accuse the US and UK of preventing supplies paid for under the oil-for-food program from reaching Iraq.

0825 GMT - A convoy of US Marines crosses the Euphrates river at Nasiriya to advance north, after meeting stiff Iraqi resistance.

0740 GMT - A British soldier from the 1st Battalion The Black Watch has been killed in action in an operation near Al Zubayr in southern Iraq, UK military officials say.

0635 GMT - British military commanders say status of Basra has changed and the city is now a military objective in order to get humanitarian aid through.

0620 GMT - Substantial numbers of US forces are now passing through Nasiriya, the BBC's Andrew North reports, although the area is still not totally secure.

0525 GMT - A sandstorm blows in over US troops advancing on Baghdad, reducing visibility and hampering operations.

0455 GMT - British Royal Marines move into positions along the Iraqi border with Iran.

0332 GMT - American TV networks claim intelligence sources tell them that troops around Baghdad could be authorized to use chemical weapons if other means of defense appear to be failing, reports the BBC's Justin Webb in Washington.

0031 GMT - British support for the war in Iraq increases to 54% of the population, according to an ICM survey for The Guardian newspaper carried out in the days since hostilities started. Thirty percent of those polled were opposed to the war. (This, along with the rising polls in America are due to the "rallying around the flag" effect and have historically been temporary)

0005 GMT - Bush asks Congress for $75bn to pay for the war in Iraq, and will formally propose a supplementary budget in a speech later on today.

Combat Report - March 24, 2003 (Second half of day)

1735 GMT - US B52 bombers take off from RAF Fairford in western England.

1710 GMT - Iraqi TV shows footage of two men it says were the crew of a US Apache helicopter forced down by Iraqi ground fire. The men look unhurt and don't say anything.

1810 GMT - Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz says the Iraqi leadership is "in good shape" and Saddam Hussein is "in full control of the army and the country".

1630 GMT - The British Army confirms that the first UK soldier was killed by enemy fire early on Monday morning.

1558 GMT - Buses of volunteers are reported heading from Syria to Baghdad to join Iraqi forces.

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posted by Thomas Ball 9:26 AM