The "shock and awe" rhetoric was intended to motivate the Iraqi military leadership to prepare contigency plans for early surrender. The media played into the administration's hands by repeating this often enough for the Iraqis to hear it. It was Psy Ops from the very beginning.

Unfortunately, the Iraqis are somewhat fatalistic failed to appreciate just what "shock and awe" means. I think its fair to say that the administration's hopes in this regard failed to materialize.

Another unexpected circumstance was the surprising resistance of the Iraqi fedayeen. They have slowed the pace of the advance and made our supply lifelines more vulnerable.

But, I seriously doubt that the casualty figures would differ if we held off hostilities until a larger force was assembled. Keep in mind that at least half of the casualties comes from friendly fire.

Of course, where I think the administration has screwed up is in going to war without the U.N. The longer the war lasts and the higher the number of civilian casualties the more obvious this error in judgement will become, even though a coalition victory is inevitable.

But I still its much too early to assess the judgement of coalition strategy and tactics on the basis of current events