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re: Fallback plans
TB — (archived)

The military has been constructing a large network of border forts along the Iranian and Syrian borders for well over two years now.

The demilitarization of the Euphrates ratlines took place last year. There are still some centers of terrorist operations that need to be dealt with in that area. We are getting a lot more cooperation now in Anbar from the locals.

A lot of other things are going on in Iraq. And not just bad things. I don't have time to put all of them here, and they wouldn't be well-received anyway.

Discussing these issues is difficult for two reasons:

One, it's hard to get some people past Bush, who seems to occupy their minds like the white whale occupied Ahab's. As long as the focus is on "will this proposal in some way help/hurt Bush," nobody is going to be able to deal with it rationally. Since a victory in Iraq would make Bush look good, no good liberal can allow themselves to deal with any concept that leads to anything but defeat. This also narrows the discussion. Note that almost anything I say on this subject gets the response that I'm a Bush toady. This has never been about Iraq for those people.

For this same reason, the Democratic Party is now completely invested in defeat in Iraq, and will accept no other outcome. This is going to be the starting point in the debate in Washington over the coming months. It isn't going to be pretty.

Two, a lot of liberals seem to be violently allergic to any military source of information, or almost any source other than the mainstream media. Unfortunately, much of the media falls into category "One" above, so like Denethor's Palantir, they hear the truth, but only that truth that makes all look lost. This leads to a rather limited view of what's actually going on over there.

I heard about the ongoing Haifa operation on ABC news today from a reporter tucked in his hotel, declaring that something was going on because he could hear the distant noise. I'm following other sources, too. Everyone should.

Full implementation of the current operation may be held off until after Ashura, but some sweeps have already begun.

BTW, Petraeus' hearing in Congress provided mostly politicians with the opportunity to hear themselves talk. Damn few cared what he had to say, and what he had to say was important.

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