Why can't the Americans get their act in Iraq together?

TomF

Much has been said (and posted) about how the Americans and British are being shown as continually surprised by events in Iraq and how they have kept changing their battle plans and don't seem to know what is coming next. I found a very interesting recent essay about this kind of thing, and a quote of a beautifully done translation quoted in the essay certainly sheds light:

"everything in war is simple, but the simplest thing is difficult. The difficulties accumulate and end by producing a kind of friction that is inconceivable unless one has experienced war. Countless minor incidents — the kind you can never really foresee — combine to lower the general level of performance, so that one always falls far short of the intended goal....The military machine — the army and everything related to it — is basically very simple and therefore seems easy to manage. But we should keep in mind that none of its components is of one piece: each part is composed of individuals,...the least important of whom may chance to delay things or somehow make them go wrong....This tremendous friction, which cannot, as in mechanics, be reduced to a few points, is everywhere in contact with chance, and brings about effects that cannot be measured, just because they are largely due to chance. "

http://www.nationalreview.com/owens/owens032803.asp
"Keep Thinking 'Main Thing' "
by Mackubin Thomas Owens

Éomer of Rohan

...and said essay is a waste of time for saying 'the best laid plans...' not to mention a standard, dull, self righteous justification for why the right is failing to deliver on its promises. Again.

This less than spectacular article lacks notice of one thing; while listing the Clauswitzian principles for war, he acknowledges that the third of these is the ' "element of subordination, as an instrument of policy, which makes [war] subordinate to reason alone"(the realm of the government).' - but ignores the consequences of having a government which itself is not subject to reason.

lili

do you know what goes wrong in this war and rumsfeld's plans?
it's that rumsfeld thought that in this war it would be only one side to fight.

actually its more in the vein, that the US thought it would be a repeat of the first Gulf war. They actually thought they'd get a conventional war, whereby they'd win in a week. The Iraqi Regime, however, has learnt the lesson, that nobody can beat the US in a conventional war, so, alternative tactics must be used.

Thats why, the US are in trouble. The didn't expect to face a desert form of Vietnam.