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Politics : DON'T START THE WAR -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Just_Observing who wrote (11535)	2/21/2003 4:35:48 PM
From: jlallen	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25898

The US will not have to enter Baghdad....surrender will occur long before that is necessary....

To: Just_Observing who wrote (11535)	2/21/2003 4:36:44 PM
From: Just_Observing	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25898

Inspectors Call U.S. Tips 'Garbage' Feb. 20, 2003 CBS) While diplomatic maneuvering continues over Turkish bases and a new United Nations resolution, inside Iraq, U.N. arms inspectors are privately complaining about the quality of U.S. intelligence and accusing the United States of sending them on wild-goose chases. CBS News Correspondent Mark Phillips reports the U.N. has been taking a precise inventory of Iraq's al-Samoud 2 missile arsenal, determining how many there are and where they are. Discovering that the al-Samoud 2 has been flying too far in tests has been one of the inspectors' major successes. But the missile has only been exceeding its 93-mile limit by about 15 miles and that, the Iraqis say, is because it isn't yet loaded down with its guidance system. The al-Samoud 2 is not the 800-mile-plus range missile that Secretary of State Colin Powell insists Iraq is developing. In fact, the U.S. claim that Iraq is developing missiles that could hit its neighbors – or U.S. troops in the region, or even Israel – is just one of the claims coming from Washington that inspectors here are finding increasingly unbelievable. The inspectors have become so frustrated trying to chase down unspecific or ambiguous U.S. leads that they've begun to express that anger privately in no uncertain terms. U.N. sources have told CBS News that American tips have lead to one dead end after another. Example: satellite photographs purporting to show new research buildings at Iraqi nuclear sites. When the U.N. went into the new buildings they found "nothing." Example: Saddam's presidential palaces, where the inspectors went with specific coordinates supplied by the U.S. on where to look for incriminating evidence. Again, they found "nothing." Example: Interviews with scientists about the aluminum tubes the U.S. says Iraq has imported for enriching uranium, but which the Iraqis say are for making rockets. Given the size and specification of the tubes, the U.N. calls the "Iraqi alibi air tight." The inspectors do acknowledge, however, that they would not be here at all if not for the threat of U.S. military action. So frustrated have the inspectors become that one source has referred to the U.S. intelligence they've been getting as "garbage after garbage after garbage." In fact, Phillips says the source used another cruder word. The inspectors find themselves caught between the Iraqis, who are masters at the weapons-hiding shell game, and the United States, whose intelligence they've found to be circumstantial, outdated or just plain wrong. more at cbsnews.com

To: Just_Observing who wrote (11535)	2/22/2003 11:01:13 PM
From: PartyTime	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 25898

Think Stalingrad, as you consider the below. That's where two million died, where the Soviets lost more soldiers in that one battle than did America in its entire World War II campaign. And Stalingrad was a much smaller city than is Baghdad which has a population of 5.5 million, many citizens of whom have been armed. The city will likely be fortified and protected by hundreds of thousands of Iraqi solders, conventionally equipped and as able as anyone who'd defend their homeland capital city. Who in their right mind would send a military force into an enviornment like this without the support of the world? The sitauation nearly begs that WMD become used, by either side, in order to achive a victory in such a hotbed. I hate to say it, but Bush and his advisory team are complete fools deeply lacking in compassion! >>>In the same vein, an analysis by George Friedman, co-author of The Future of War, cautions: "The elite of the Republican Guard are competent and motivated. They have benefited from Hussein's regime, and his defeat would cost them personally. They have reason to fight and some sense that it is not hopeless. "They may not have satellites in space but they are well armed with the basic weapons of urban warfare: rifles, machine-guns, hand grenades, anti-tank weapons and, most important, familiarity with the battlefield. "In a war of attrition, Saddam's troops merely have to put up a competent fight and, in a worst-case scenario, there could be thousands of American casualties." So the challenge for the US - to minimise the street-to-street or house-to-house contest - becomes a double-edged sword. Can it break the Iraqi will to fight without a first-up, brutal strike? And if it does not opt for the brutal strike, how does it take Baghdad? Historically, the US is used to destroying or going around cities. Now they need to isolate all or significant parts of Baghdad in a manner that will break the grip of Saddam's regime before Iraqi nationalism and anger at the extent of war damage stoke the fires of popular defiance. At all times, Washington will have to juggle the hopes and wishes of its different constituencies - the US voters and families back home, the Middle East and the world at large. Clearly, Saddam's best option is a slow and deadly war. Vice-Admiral Lowell Jacoby, director of the Defence Intelligence Agency, warned Congress this week that to achieve this, Saddam was likely to adopt a "scorched earth" strategy - destroying food, transport, energy and other infrastructure in the hope of creating a humanitarian disaster that he would blame on the Americans even as it slowed their advance. Leaflets will rain down with the US bombs, telling civilians that the US and its allies are their friends and pleading with Iraqi soldiers to surrender. The risks are huge - General Anthony Zinni, a former head of the US Central Command, says: "I wouldn't get sucked into the cities. There would be a lot of casualties on our side, we'd kill a lot of civilians and destroy a lot of infrastructure, and the images on Al Jazeera [television] wouldn't help us at all."<<< smh.com.au