Instead of fighting it out the yankee and their donkey (brits) are still hoping the easy way out. Still counting on defections or uprising. As both sides will finsh with much less than with they have started, anyone with a minimum of intelligence can conclude that there is no winner in this war.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?artid=41895697
War may not end with Saddam
MANOJ JOSHI
TIMES NEWS NETWORK SUNDAY, MARCH 30, 2003 10:41:50 PM ]
NEW DELHI: Eleven days into the war, US commanders are coming to terms with the new realities of the conflict and weighing the increasingly dismal options before them.
Even as the war continues, US planners may have to begin working out the conditions of what is termed as ‘‘war termination’’.
Continuing resistance in Iraqi towns and cities has compelled the US to sharply boost its manpower levels by an additional 1,20,000 men. Whether or not more will be required will depend on whether or not the Americans will stay on long after displacing Saddam.
As of now, the US is committed to staying on and reconstructing Iraq. But with the process of regime change turning out to be bloodier than expected, it is unlikely that the Iraqis will look benignly at the Americans even after Saddam has gone.
** ‘‘War termination’’ still remains premised on the elimination of Saddam Hussein and his family. But there are indications now that the Iraqis may not end the war even after Saddam has gone. The scripted scenario had called for the Iraqis to have welcomed the Americans as liberators, but Saturday’s suicide car bombing at a US military checkpost near Najaf shows that the Iraqis are writing their own script.
US planners had hoped that the sudden appearance of a small mobile force at the gates of Baghdad would cause Saddam’s regime to collapse. But that force, now in some instances just 60 km from Baghdad, has been compelled to pause for reinforcement and rest. It is being harried by organised Iraqi resistance foraying out of the towns and cities the Americans had bypassed. A ‘‘mother of all battles’’, to use Saddam’s phrase, looms ahead in Baghdad. It’s clear that the Iraqis will contest the US entry into the city strongly.
They will not fight the main battle outside Baghdad where US airpower would pulverise Iraqi defences. Saddam is likely to pull his forces inside the city of 5 million people and will force the US forces into undertaking urban warfare. Through history, sieges have been won by guile and treachery and the Americans may still hope a major defection in Saddam’s ranks will deliver them Baghdad for a smaller cost.
The US have already expended a vast amount of political capital in trying to convince the world of their cause, now they must be ready to expend military capital as well. The Americans do not have too much experience of fighting in built-up areas and are likely to use the kind of tactics Israelis use in the built-up areas of the West Bank and Gaza strip. They will depend on high-tech equipment in conjunction with heavy firepower. As the Israeli experience shows, this cannot entirely avoid a heavy toll of civilian lives.