Me hanging my ass in the wind
Aug. 13th, 2004 12:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumIraq:
An Najaf
Sadr (who bothers me, he bothered me when he was a new face on the block, and nothing I saw while I was in Iraq made him look any better, nothing I've heard of him since has done so either) has tried to give himself a win/win situation (for certain definitions of win).
If he gets killed, he's a martyr and gets some of what he wants. This presupposes a sincere religious belief in behind some of his aims. I think this much is true.
If the US/Iraqis back off, he's pulled an Hussein and lost a battle, but since he's still at large (a la the outcome of the Gulf War, where we stopped when we said we would, did what we promised and he claimed victory because we didn't break the rules and chase him out).
If we attack the Shrine of the Imam Ali, all hell breaks loose and we probably reap a whirlwind of our own sowing.
Can it be fixed?
Maybe. I think I have a solution, but I'm not there and I have a rocker, not a bird, on my shoulders, so the odds are slim I'd be listened to.
Invest it. Go back to renaissance type war.
Clear all the houses in An Najaf which are in 60mm mortar range of the Shrine, take photos of the condition, give a copy to the owners. Promise to pay them if they are damaged (we do this in Germany all the time. If Reforger chews up a guy's field, Finance pays for, cash, on the spot).
Invest the shrine.
Offer an amnesty. If they walk out, right now, we take their picture, fingerprints and parole.
If they wait, they get tried when they come out.
And then we wait. They get hungry, they get thirsty, they can come out. They get arrested, they get tried, and they end up in jail.
Sadr, he gets arrested and then he gets tried. Rebellion, treason, whatever the appropriate charge is. He gets convicted. And he gets prison, so he can't be martyred.
It would be expensive, and it won't be quick, nor all that satisfying, because they will kill Marines. They will destroy houses, and markets and schools and all sorts of things.
But if anything happens to the shrine... they will have done it, and the whirlwind will be less.
An Najaf
Sadr (who bothers me, he bothered me when he was a new face on the block, and nothing I saw while I was in Iraq made him look any better, nothing I've heard of him since has done so either) has tried to give himself a win/win situation (for certain definitions of win).
If he gets killed, he's a martyr and gets some of what he wants. This presupposes a sincere religious belief in behind some of his aims. I think this much is true.
If the US/Iraqis back off, he's pulled an Hussein and lost a battle, but since he's still at large (a la the outcome of the Gulf War, where we stopped when we said we would, did what we promised and he claimed victory because we didn't break the rules and chase him out).
If we attack the Shrine of the Imam Ali, all hell breaks loose and we probably reap a whirlwind of our own sowing.
Can it be fixed?
Maybe. I think I have a solution, but I'm not there and I have a rocker, not a bird, on my shoulders, so the odds are slim I'd be listened to.
Invest it. Go back to renaissance type war.
Clear all the houses in An Najaf which are in 60mm mortar range of the Shrine, take photos of the condition, give a copy to the owners. Promise to pay them if they are damaged (we do this in Germany all the time. If Reforger chews up a guy's field, Finance pays for, cash, on the spot).
Invest the shrine.
Offer an amnesty. If they walk out, right now, we take their picture, fingerprints and parole.
If they wait, they get tried when they come out.
And then we wait. They get hungry, they get thirsty, they can come out. They get arrested, they get tried, and they end up in jail.
Sadr, he gets arrested and then he gets tried. Rebellion, treason, whatever the appropriate charge is. He gets convicted. And he gets prison, so he can't be martyred.
It would be expensive, and it won't be quick, nor all that satisfying, because they will kill Marines. They will destroy houses, and markets and schools and all sorts of things.
But if anything happens to the shrine... they will have done it, and the whirlwind will be less.
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no subject
Date: 2004-08-14 10:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-14 04:47 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-16 08:36 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-08-16 11:46 pm (UTC)After all, it's not the non-lethality that's at issue here. We could, like the Belgians in the Congo, start lopping off arms. You'll note the Belgians aren't in the Congo any more.
If the mission is to peaceably hold Iraq, tactics that lead to a short-lived "military victory", but also lead to even more resentment locally, and even more condemnation globally are worse than ineffective, they actually put completion of the mission further off. Tell me how, aside from your own personal preferences and apparent unconcern for the opinion of other people -- people on whose opinion the success of the mission depends -- just why pursuing a counter-productive tactic would be "reasonable".
no subject
Date: 2004-08-14 05:30 pm (UTC)In the first place, Tear gas isn't a gas. It's an irritant micro-crystal. To make it airborne requires converting a solid to a smoke. This is the reason tear-gas cannisters are classified as pyrotechnics, and grenades.
Which risks damage to the shrine, as well as giving cover to anyone who damages it, or destroys it. Think of Waco. Even if the Davidians burnt the place around themselves, we'll never know.
What we got from that tear gas was Oklahoma City.
In the second. A pro-mask will last, almost, forever against tear/CS gas. It gets a little harder to breath, as the crystals clog the filter, but not much, and not for days.
The strain of living with a respirator might wear on them, but that would require hundred of cannisters and grenades; every hour, just to make it dense enough to be irritating to those inside. A whiff is an annoyance, it has to be thick as pea-soup fog to incapacitate.
But thanks for reminding me I get my annual walk through the LAPD tear gas house in a couple of months.
TK
no subject
Date: 2004-08-16 09:01 am (UTC)I'm aware of that. I used it as a generic term for non-lethal irritants, actually.
This is the reason tear-gas cannisters are classified as pyrotechnics, and grenades.
Which risks damage to the shrine, as well as giving cover to anyone who damages it, or destroys it.
Well, having a lot of firepower trained at the shrine apparently does not carry a risk of damage. Well, well, well.
In reality, there's not much risk of the fire caused by a malfunctioning non-explosive grenade in a stone building. There's more risk from their cooking fires, most likely. Besides, there are non-incendiary irritant delivery methods.
What we got from that tear gas was Oklahoma City.
I find this chain of reasoning quite strained. The guy was nuts, and any other perceived injustice could trigger him.
The same goes for "giving cover". They can just as happily burn or blow up the mosque themselves and blame that on US forces, gas or no gas. They probably will, too, in case of an outright attack.
In the second. A pro-mask will last, almost, forever against tear/CS gas. It gets a little harder to breath, as the crystals clog the filter, but not much, and not for days.
One word: dust. It is a dusty place. Clogs filters like hell. Besides, they are unlikely to have anything better than expired Soviet respirators.
And even without dust, it that heat few hours in a respirator is sufficient to render nearly anyone unconscious. I learned that in the Army, hard way.
But thanks for reminding me I get my annual walk through the LAPD tear gas house in a couple of months.
Fun, fun, fun. I had a whiff of the stuff without any protection on, and that was quite memorable; be careful :)