That Burnin', Yearnin' Urgin' To Be Surgin'

... is not being widely felt.  James Joyner rounds up reaction and closes with this:

Not exactly the needed home run, it would appear.  If you’ve lost Hinderaker ...

Mickey has an interesting point on Bush's promise to "Get Sadr":

n this video from AEI, Frederick Kagan and Gen. Jack Keane, originators of the "surge" strategy, make it as clear as can be that they do not intend for surging U.S. or Iraqi troops to go after on Moqtada al-Sadr's Shiite Mahdi Army or to attempt to enter and clear out the vast Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City.**  Yet in his speech tonight, President Bush said (without mentioning Sadr's name) that Iraqi prime minister al-Maliki had given U.S. forces the "green light" to do just that. ... Either Bush's surge is some other kind of surge from the Kagan/Keane surge, or there's some Kabuki goin' on (e.g., al-Maliki doesn't really mean it, and perhaps the Bush administration knows al-Maliki doesn't really mean it, but wants a)Iraqi Sunnis, b) Americans, c) Sadr or d) himself to think he means it). ...

Mickey also notes that 20,000 troops is "Surge Lite".

Gregory Djerejian's reaction is somewhere between stunned and horrified.  He has an increasing number of quick takes, but Bush VII is representative:

Folks, this is really either (more likely) a bunch of hot air (additional carrier strike group, destroying "networks", etc), masquerading as resolve (as Teheran and Damascus will likely smell out), or the beginning of a collosal blunder of epic proportions well beyond the very significant fiasco and disaster we've already witnessed in Iraq. With this team one can't really ever know, of course, a fearful reality indeed as we run out the clock until January '09.

Given political realities, however, not to mention capacity constraints (putting it mildly) I'm still putting my chips on hot air rather than 'go wide.'

Interesting that Greg is only counting the months to the next President - I would have guessed that by now he was counting the days, or hours.  (For benchmarking purposes, I am still saying "just two more years", but my flexibility is evolving.  And I know many folks look to the day when they can see Bush on television and say "Just One Minute.  In fact, I welcome sponsorship proposals.)

MORE:  No, no, "sponsorship" means YOU pay ME!

Comments

[allen]

Greg Djerejian or David Patreus? This guy is always "stunned and horrified." Hey Greggy poo, what are the Taliban, Saddam Hussein, Moammar Qhaddafi and A.Q. Khan doing these days(compared to what they were doing during BJ Clinton's days)? The ICU is getting smoked in Somali(By the G.W.B. admin. trained Ethiopians), Abu Sayef is getting pounded in the Phillipines(More G.W.B. admin. training), the FARC geurillas in Colombia are losing ground, Kashmir has been relatively quiet(Compared to the Clinton days when they were close to going to war)and other North African countries(Tunisia, Morrocco and Algeria to name a few) have been aggressively taking on Al Qaeda as well. I heard that going into Iraq was going to create MORE terrorists and MORE terror strikes around the world. Hey Greg, in the last 2 years, where are all of these vaunted terrorists and their successes? Seems like the world has been awfully quiet in that regard lately. 9/11(3,000 dead), Beslan(350), Bali(200), Spain(193), London(60) and on and on. What have these big bad terroists that G.W.B. is suppossedly breeding by going into Iraq been doing lately? Anyone? Greg? And don't get me started on American military and Iraqi civilians deaths statistics. Go see Jim Hoft at Gateway Pundit for a little reality check.

[Appalled Moderate]

The Prez urge to surge makes me want to purge.

Seems, from events, though, that the real change is a wilingness to do stuff like storm Iranian embassies rather than the 21K surge. Bush risks a bigger war, or having his bluff called. I think, if I were Iran, I might consider calling the bluff.

[boris]

W is hoping you do, Iran

[Terrye]

Losing Hinderacker is no trick.

I remember after Bush gave a speech on immigration that 79% of the population had a favorable reaction to powerline was complaining that by not taking their advice Bush had blown it.

Silly man, you would think he was President or something the way he makes decisions without the input of bloggers who by and large are no more typical of average America than their lefty counterpart.

You know it seems to me that Bush's job is difficult enough without everyone with a keyboard acting as if they have all the answers.

How about we see what happens?

And you know what? Whoever the next president is the same people will giving him crap too. It is more about them than the president. It is just what they do. Am I supposed to believe that if we get someone new in the White House that all of a sudden our military will be able to fight wars in such a way that these guys won't second guess them? Or that the ME will suddenly be a nice peaceful place? Or that AlQaida will simmer down? Or that pundits will admit they don't know everything.

It might take longer, there might be a honeymoon but sooner or later the back seat drivers will be giving directions again.

[clarice]

Dan Riehl is reporting US troops took over an Iranian consulate in Iraq, seized documents and arrested several people.
I think if this is true, and if you carefully read the President's statements on Iran and Syria, "surge" is simply the cover for dummies. This is a great deal more than putting more feet on the ground. It is a scrapping of the old ROE.

[lonetown]

I think the surge would actually be unnecessary if we are really willing to take out the militias permenantly. (its easy to hold empty space)

The surge should make it faster, then, not just possible.

[PeterUK]

Clarice,
The US troops were reported to have taken computers and documents,leaving the consulate in the hands of the Kurds,who as we know are completely beyond American control.
Looks very much like evidence of a smoking gun of Iranian involvement is being searched for.

[Terrye]

lonetown:

AlQaida is the biggest troublemaker. If they were not blowing up Shia on a regular basis the militias would lose most of their support.

[clarice]

PUK we got the smoking gun about a week ago when we picked up 4 Irani intel operatives on the ground along with very detailed documentation of their operations.
And we've had it forever when we picked up recent war supplies made in Iran and Syria on enemy forces.
What's different now is the crackdown.

I wouldn't put money on the the Mullahs staying in office longer than Bush.

[Soylent Red]

Clarice:

I wouldn't put money on the the Mullahs staying in office longer than Bush.

I'll differ with you on that one. I believe the mullahs are pragmatic when it comes to what they fund. It's Ahmadingleberry who is perpetrating foreign adventures.

The mullahs will stay, but Ahmadingleberry will meet with an "accident". That seems to be the way political change happens in Iran.

[clarice]

Khamanei is dead or dying; reports today (I think from the BBC) are that the nuke program has hit a snag; the economy is in shambles; they're are almost out of oil; the population is young and unemployed; there is considerable ethnic strife and more can be easily ginned up by Sheikh Yerbouti and his pals..Ahmamadnutter will go first, but the others are on thin ice.

[PeterUK]

Clarice,
Look at the jury,they will need more than proof.
I would agree with Soylent that the Mullahs have too much of an economic stake in Iran to let a religious fanatic stand in the way of the moohlah,Ahmadigestivebiscuit is going to meet with a tragic goat bonding accident.
That leaves all the revolutionary groups,it might be best that those of a sensitive nature avert their eyes from events in Iran.

[reliapundit]

yo fellas: we demolished al sadr's gang in najaf - by the cemetery there, but let al sadr off the hook.

so we donlt need many more troops to demolidh them in sadr city. just a green light and resolve.

our troops are up to the job, and their commanders know how may they need to do the job.

this time: we mustn't use sistani to cut a deal.

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0KWG/is_3_33/ai_n13807508

[clarice]

Right you are, relia--And I suspect that he knows it. I haven't seen his fat puss around for quite some time. Last I heard of him he was getting some advice from Sistani.

[Soylent Red]

Oh goodie...

The Moonbat element is planning to weigh in
sometime around Jan 27th.

[ed]

Hmmmm.

I don't know if the assumptions being made here are really valid.

1. Aheminadinnajacket (sorry I can't ever remember how his name is spelled) did replace most of the mid-level and executive level ministers in the Iranian government with his partisans. The mullahs do seem to have overall control, so far, but I wonder how tight a grip they have on the actual mechanisms of the Iranian government. And all it would take for him to retain power is for a coalition of like-minded mullahs on the Revolutionary Council to support him to give him the necessary political cover to ignore or remove the mullahs that want him out.

So I suppose assassination could happen, especially since there have been a few attempts already by separatist groups in Iran. But I don't know if it's anything to plan around.

2. I think people also need to consider some of the things commented here in a different light. One of the reasons why Saddam invaded Iran was to takeover the Iranian oil fields in southwest Iran. That war consumed, almost literally, millions of young men, old men and young boys. The war got so bad for the Iranians that they were sending out one armed man with two unarmed men who would pick up the fallen rifle when the armed man died. It got so bad that the Iranians formed massive suicide brigades whose sole purpose was to run at the Iraqis and *soak up the bullets with their bodies*.

(I believe there's a fountain of "blood" in Tehran that celebrates their bravery.)

In terms of technology the Iranians are very far behind. Their air force is pretty much laughable as most of it came from the Iraqi Air Force when it fled to Iran in 1991. The Iranian tanks aren't much better in general though they have been spending some money upgrading them. Most artillery is towed rather than self-propelled so American counter-battery fire would be almost certainly guaranteed to eliminate any or all Iranian artillery. Iran has invested quite a bit of money into Russian made mobile and fixed SAM systems. But the USAF could probably take those out easily.

But the real potential danger is the Iranian infantry.

As others have mentioned:

A. Iran has lots of unemployed young men.

B. Iran is running out of accessible oil.

C. Iranian backed Shia'a militias are operating openly in Southern Iraq.

And:

D. Southern Iraq is Shia'a dominated and has extensive oil fields.

E. Southern Iraq has many Shia'a dedicated sites of worship.

...

Things might not be all that easy if the Iranians do decide to push hard. There are a lot of pilgrims that come from Iran to Southern Iraq regularly to visit the shrines. I don't think it would be that difficult to intersperse trained infantry amongst them and hidden as pilgrims. Then have them travel to specific grouping points where they would assemble into light infantry units and get their weapons from armories operated by the Shia'a militias.

While we do have 150,000 soldiers in Iraq, many of them are support troops and not dedicated infantry. Additionally that 150,000 is spread all over Iraq with the biggest concentrations in the Sunni areas and not necessarily the Shia'a areas. So American soldier's are kinda thin on the ground.

Additionally the southern portion of Iraq is being run by the British who have drawn down their forces to an extremely vulnerable point. The British have an extreme deficit in armored vehicles as most British soldiers patrol in completely unarmored vehicles. Also the British have shown repeatedly that they are not actually in control in Southern Iraq. Then there's the issue of helicopters. The British forces in Iraq generally don't have many. From what I've been reading the British forces have a serious problem in not having enough helicopters, particularly helicopter gunships, in their patrol areas.

(see EUReferendum.com for details)

So Southern Iraq, up to and including Baghdad, would be extremely vulnerable to a large-scale Iranian light infantry push.

In addition to the Iranian Army there are also numerous paramilitary organizations in Iran that are normally used to enforce the will of the Iranian government. It wouldn't be that far of a stretch for the Iranian government to assemble a light infantry force of perhaps 1,000,000 soldiers and paramilitary forces. Infiltrate them amongst the Shia'a pilgrims into Southern Iraq as there are millions of pilgrims to do this every single year.

(As I understand it the economy of Najaf is based largely on income from pilgrims)

And since all of the fighting would be in the cities, it would be the most brutally dangerous fighting imaginable. Most of the burden would fall on the British, but they've got around 8,500 soldiers in Southern Iraq. And with the material deficiencies it might be possible for a huge Iranian light infantry force to overwhelm and destroy them in detail as they're spread over a rather large area.

And frankly if the 8,500 (or so) British soldiers are slaughtered in Southern Iraq, the British will withdraw completely from Iraq and perhaps even from alliance with America. Right now the bulk of the British Army is in Southern Iraq while many other regiments at home have been either eliminated or consolidated due to budget cuts. A catastrophe on this sort of order would cause the existing British government to fall and fall hard. Current sentiments in Britain aren't all that positive to America so any replacement government would have to take a very hard line again the US in order to convince the UK voters that a similar catastrophe won't happen again.

And it's doubtful that American forces could shift fast enough or in enough numbers to really offset the problems the British could face.

Summary: "Tet in the Desert" really. But with the possibility of a lot more enemy infantry involved than in the original Tet.

*shrug* YMMV. But while most of Iran's military is somewhat laughable. I think if Iran really wanted to hurt the Coalition in Iraq, it could reasonably be done. And done with light infantry. Particularly against the British who have neither the material excess so available to American troops nor the depth of forces that the US maintains.

[ed]

Hmmm.

The more I think about it the more plausible it is. Not to say that it *will* happen. Not at all. But it could happen if the Iranians figure to push back hard.

The only limiting factors are:

1. Denial of intelligence.

Iranians would have to maintain secrecy amongst thousands of troops. Which doesn't seem practical to me, but who knows.

2. Access to weapons at the assembly points.

But the Shia'a militias are in many ways being funded and supplied by elements in the Iraqi government. Even if the Iranians assembled a force of 50,000 light infantry with the specific task of killing off the entire British force, it would make waves across the world. Much more than that and I think everybody would be hit hard.

3. The infiltration would probably be the simplest as I assume many soldiers, being Shia'a, would go on pilgrimage anyways and so could blend in. Perhaps someone would notice that quite a few more military-age young men are pilgrims than normal, but that's not something I'd want to rely on.

*shrug* it's all speculation and conjecture though. Let's hope it remains that way.

[clarice]

Anotha' playuh:
"The Jerusalem Post reports on a possible diplomatic advance against the Tehran regime: Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert met with his Chinese counterpart, Wen Jiabao, and said Jiabao told him something "surprisingly positive and unexpected."

"Sources in Jerusalem" say the Chinese are more willing than before to support sanctions aimed at retarding Tehran's nuclear program--in part because of the efforts of the Saudis:

While China is heavily dependent on Iran for oil, importing roughly 300,000 barrels of Iranian crude a day, that dependence is not as great today as it was a year ago.

In January 2006, Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, who diplomatic officials in Jerusalem have said is as concerned about a nuclear Iran as Israel, went to China and reportedly told the Chinese leadership that Saudi Arabia would make up for any oil shortfall that might arise were the Iranians to cut back oil to China as punishment for sanctions.

It's easy, albeit boring, to wring one's hands about how terrible things are in Iraq, but what if America had abjured military force back in 2003? One possible outcome is that the Saudis, instead of acting constructively to counter Iran's nuclear ambitions, would be relying on Saddam's Baathist bomb as a counterweight."

http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110009511

[Pofarmer]

That's a whole lot of folks to supply ed. The logistics would be huge. Keeping arms for 1,000,000 infantry secret? That would be a good trick. How long would they hold out against U.S. airpower once it was massed?

[ed]

Hmmmm.

@ Pofarmer

That's a whole lot of folks to supply ed. The logistics would be huge. Keeping arms for 1,000,000 infantry secret? That would be a good trick. How long would they hold out against U.S. airpower once it was massed?

Good points.

1. There's already a system of supply in existence to supply the pilgrims in many holy shrine areas. Additionally substantial food, water and medical supplies can be accumulated by the Shia'a militias in preparation. *shrug* frankly I assume the Shia'a militias are already stockpiling weapons and supplies a la Taliban for a possible coup against the Iraqi government.

Plus we're not talking about motorized or mechanized troops here. Light infantry relies on small arms, machine guns, RPGs and mortars. All (relatively) light and man-portable. Any other weapons available, such as man-portable SAMs, would be valuable against helicopters but not technically necessary.

And remember this is a Tet-like offensive I'm speculating about. We're not talking about having 1,000,000 in one single place. Frankly even that 1,000,000 number is an extreme one as I seriously doubt that would be necessary. Instead they would operate in battalion strength units of about 400 as operational units and combine into larger maneuver units when necessary. But I think the basic operational unit would be a battalion as Iran, and Iraq, doesn't really have that much commo gear to spread around.

Probably one major weakness would be communications as cellphones would be the method of choice, which could be disrupted pretty easily by knocking down the cell towers. But muslim forces in such situations usually end up relying on young boys as messengers since Western forces generally refrain from shooting them. So they could have a very slow/low tech means of basic communication but unit evolutions wouldn't be anything I'd call quick.

2. Keeping arms for 1,000,000 a secret.

Well that is a kicker isn't it? :)

Except that it doesn't mean having a single large armory with arms sufficient for that number of infantry. If a single house had weapons for a squad of 10, not a stretch IMHO, and a group of 10 pilgrims used available transportation, such as taxis, to the house. Then the infantry could get the weapons, assemble as an armed infantry squad and then assemble the battalion in force at the local mosque. 400 infantry spread 10 per house is only 40 houses necessary to provide the basic assembly structure for the battalion.

(And remember. These are Iranians, not Arabs. The "spray and pray" we've seen Arabs do in videos and stories by US soldiers may not apply at all here as the Iranians have a much more substantial warrior culture.)

Assemble one battalion per mosque, with hundreds if not thousands of mosques all over Southern Iraq. *shrug* remember the Vietnamese accomplished something similar, though in much smaller numbers than my speculation, for real. Considering that there is already a pipeline of Iranian fighters and weapons funneled to the Shia'a militias and the support of subversive elements in the Iraqi government.

I really don't think it's impossible.

3. As for American air power.

*shrug* so what? We only have a very limited supply of smart weapons available at any one time in Iraq. To supply more would require flying them in on C-5 and C-17 aircraft. And flying in bombs halfway across the planet isn't exactly a winning strategy.

Additionally the equipment manifest for the National Guard units is bare bones dry. Due to the harsh conditions in Iraq and the need for replacement heavy equipment, many National Guard units have been completely stripped of their heavy equipment. And a great deal of the damaged and worn out vehicles and equipment is now undergoing Reset where they are rebuilt and upgraded. But that means that there isn't an available pool of replacements to throw into Iraq now.

So every single Abrams tank or Bradly AFV or Stryker destroyed is a vehicle that cannot be easily replaced on the battlefield. And even then, they'd be stuck here in the USA because the priority would be on flying smart bombs to Iraq to maintain an operational tempo against the Iranian push.

And in addition to the above what exactly are you going to bomb? The battlefield won't be a Fallujah that's been largely cleared of civilians. It'll be a battlefield completely *filled* with civilians. Every house the USAF bombs will be one that can, and very well might, contain numerous civilians trying to keep safe and out of the way. Every civilian dead is another "atrocity" that'll be used against the US after the battles are over.

So indiscriminate bombing would be an extremely tough decision to make. A smart weapon is an accurate weapon. But using a smart weapon doesn't guarantee that the house you destroy is empty or filled only with the enemy.

Take for example the Russian Army invasion of Grozny, in Chechnya. Nobody really knows just how many civilians died in Grozny, but the wild ass guess is around 70,000. In that battle, unlike Fallujah, the civilians weren't given the time to evacuate. The Russian Air Force bombed the crap out of the city. And Russian infantry generally used grenades first when entering a house.

Just imagine what kind of crazy shit would happen if 70,000 civilians were killed by American forces in a single week's fighting, on camera and live.

Also, going back to a previous point, about the supply issue. The intent could easily be to provide sufficient supplies to fight for 1-2 weeks. High intensity light infantry action. At the end of it all, if victory is not at hand, the remaining infantry discards their weapons and disperses amongst the inevitable crowds of refugees.

*shrug* how do you determine if a guy is someone you've been fighting if he doesn't have any weapons and claims he's just trying to get out alive? Would American soldiers have enough time or energy by this point to interdict the flood of refugees? Would Bush have enough remaining political clout to give the Coalition forces political cover for it?

Sure there are obstacles, it is after all speculation. But something like this could end up doing a lot of damage. And it did happen before in the Tet Offensive. Sure it was kinda stupid militarily then. But it still won the NVA the war.

[clarice]

What "won the NVA the war" are the very same folks and thinking that are tryong to win the jihadis this one.

[ed]

Hmmm.

@ clarice

Yes. Pretty much so I'm afraid.

There's been a lot of questionable reporting by the MSM from Iraq. I really wish Bush had stomped on them at the very first sign of such.

It's kinda late so I can't call now but I'll run the scenario past some of my fellow wargamer and history buffs. I've been studying history and playing wargames, which of course isn't necessarily anything to boast about, for 30 or more years now. And it appears to be a solid framework.

There could be three primary objectives of such an Iranian push:

1. Destroy the British forces completely.

2. Capture as many American and Coalition people as possible and try to transport them to Tehran or somewhere in Iran. This would be a reprise of the infamous "Iranian Hostage Crisis".

3. Use the presence of armed Iranian infantry to solidify control over Southern Iraq.

Of the three the most useful, from an Iranian perspective, would be #2. It's one thing to have a few hundred hostages. It's quite another if they number in the thousands. And a high intensity urban battle spread all over half of Iraq would provide many opportunities to capture wounded or isolated soldiers or small units.

*shrug* what could Bush do if the Iranians captured 10,000 American soldiers and held their lives as hostage? 5,000? Could Bush ignore their fate and press on? I really don't think so though I really have no idea how the public would deal with it. But it would cause a political crisis here in the US. And anything that weakens us here, would definitely weaken us in Iraq.

Additionally what I discussing are already historically established concepts. Nothing in this is new at all. It's all taken from operational guides on fighting wars of this kind or from historical examples. The operational plan would be similar to Tet with a deliberate aim towards manipulating the media and through them the political elements. The taking of American soldiers as hostages is taken from Iran's own history, something they know from first hand experience. And probably something they'd like to use again to humble America.

The individual battle plans would be similar to what's been going on in Iraq but with bigger and better trained units. The infiltration plan is probably similar to what's being used now, the pilgrims. The escape plan is also something already being done by the insurgents in order to escape.

*shrug* it's pure speculation. But it's based on existing data and logic. If anybody would like to poke holes in it, be my guest.

[Larry]

Ed, is this the same vaunted Irani army that in only 8 years fought the Iraqi juggernaut to.......a draw? Perk up your ears. Iran is on the receiving end as of about right now. They'll be a little too busy to be ginning up any offensive.

[ed]

Hmmm.

@ Larry

*shrug* they fought Iraq to a draw because the US forced a complete embargo of arms on Iran. Plus when Iran was invaded it had just recently disposed of it's Army officer corps and had almost no trained soldiers in any position of authority. Also much of the equipment in Iran's inventory were American made for which suddenly the Iranians didn't have any available supplies.

The circumstances between the Iran-Iraq War and a conflict between Iran and the US would be very different.

[richard mcenroe]

Yes, they would die faster and in larger numbers because the Europeans would cut off their logistics in a heartbeat to get the oil terminals unmined again...

[ed]

Hmmmm.

@ richard mcenroe

Yes, they would die faster and in larger numbers because the Europeans would cut off their logistics in a heartbeat to get the oil terminals unmined again...

Actually I think the bulk of the weapons in the Iranian military are Russian or Chinese in origin. And weapons that would/could be used in an Iranian push in Iraq would be small arms, so could be sourced from pretty much anywhere including third party arms dealers.