The War In Iraq: Are We Winning? How Big the Win? What Went Wrong?

On-Line Resources Over the Debate

"The enemy we're fighting is a bit different than the one we war-gamed against." -- Lt. General William Wallace, commander of Army forces in Persian Gulf (NYT, March 27, 2003)

"Now, philanthropists may easily imagine there is a skillful method of disarming and overcoming an enemy without causing great bloodshed, and that this is the proper tendency of the art of War. However plausible this may appear, still it is an error which must be extirpated; for in such dangerous things as war, the errors which proceed from a spirit of benevolence are just the worst. -- Carl von Clausewitz, On War (1832).

• How to Tell if We're Winning Interesting article by Fred Kaplan, originally from Slate, March 18, 2003
• Millennium Challenge 02 Official site of a massive war-game (cost: $250 million; involving 13,500 personnel), held in July-August, 2002, which was designed to test many of the underlying theories involved in the current battle plan as championed by SecDef Donald Rumsfeld ("rapid dominance", "effects based operations"). When the side playing the "bad guys" (the Red Force) -- led by a retired 3-star Marine general -- used suicide bombing tactics or unconventional communications to confound the invading Blue Force, the judges of the war-game invalidated his moves, thus ensuring the "good guys" a victory. The Red Force general eventually quit the war-game and circulated a letter of protest. See below.
  • "War Game Rigged?" From Army Times, August 16, 2002
  • "War-Gamed: Why the Army Shouldn't be Surprised by Saddam's Moves" by Fred Kaplan, Military Analyst for Slate, March 28, 2003. A discussion of the Millennium Challenge war-game
  • "War Game was Fixed" from The Guardian, August 21, 2002
  • More on the Millennium Challenge War-Game from The Guardian, Sept. 6, 2002
• The Reality of War Major assessment by The Guardian, March 30, 2002
• "Snap Judgments" by William Safire, NYT, March 31, 2003
• "Offense and Defense" by Seymour Hersh, from The New Yorker, March 31, 2003
• "Shock and Awe Lite" The author of the concept of "Rapid Dominance" and "Shock and Awe" (Harlan Ullman) criticizes the application of his doctrine in the current battle, from The Baltimore Sun, April 1, 2003
• "Where the Elite Meet Defeat: Saddam's Hugely Overrated Republican Guard" by Fred Kaplan, in Slate, April 2, 2003
• "Pentagon Plans for Worst Nightmare" from The Guardian, April 3, 2003
• "Who do you Think you are Kidding, Mr. Hussein?" By John Keegan, Defence Editor, The Daily Telegraph, April 3, 2003
• "The Battle Plan for Baghdad" 7 scenarios, from Slate, April 3, 2003
• OOPS! Missed Again! From The Guardian, April 9, 2003