March 25, 2003
SIEGE AND CONQUER:
No 'Baghdad Bloodbath' (Ralph Peters, New York Post, 3/25/2003)
Once our forces are ringing Baghdad ... the world is going to witness the first post-modern siege....Once the last die-hard Saddamites are corralled in Baghdad (and, perhaps, in Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, a city that just brings out the nuclear side of my character), we're going to work 'em like history's biggest cat batting around a blind, three-legged mouse.
Allied special operations forces - already in Baghdad - will be prowling the hallways and alleys, taking direct action against the regime's remaining supporters, collecting information for precision strikes and working with the growing Iraqi resistance.
As David Warren noted, the Iraqi resistance will have saved many allied lives.
MORE: Uprising in Basra(BBC Reporters' Weblog, 3/25/2003)
There is a popular uprising in the city of Basra.People are rising up against the ruling Ba'ath regime, we are being told by military intelligence officers there that they have had enough.
Iraqi soldiers in the city are actually firing mortar rounds on their own people.
God bless the Iraqi people.
MORE: Don Rumsfeld says that the main fighting is between Saddam's Fedayeen secret police, wearing civilian clothes, trying to kill Iraqi soldiers who want to surrender. Posted by Paul Jaminet at March 25, 2003 1:07 PM
Who can blame them for being reluctant, in the early moments, to engage in active resistance solely on the words of a U.S. President named Bush. It didn't work out so well last time. Thank goodness they are beginning to see our commitment, and to take matters into their own hands (as much as they can). As you say, God bless those poor Iraqis.
Posted by: Kevin Whited at March 25, 2003 1:51 PMSaddam's fedayeen kill Iraqi soldiers who want to defect and the Fisks and Herrolds write in glee of mounting Iraqi casualties.
Ditto when the Iraqi conscripts kill the fedayeen in self-defense.
I can just see those reporters drooling at the prospect of such large casualty figures.