Ralph Peters of The New York Post has an article entitled "Arabian Nightmares". The article discusses the recent kidnapping of 50 university students in broad daylight and addresses the solution to winning in Iraq and the GWOT (or Long War) in general. Mr. Peters writes,
What really matters is what our forces are ordered - and permitted - to do. With political correctness permeating our government and even the upper echelons of the military, we never tried the one technique that has a solid track record of defeating insurgents if applied consistently: the rigorous imposition of public order.
That means killing the bad guys. Not winning their hearts and minds, placating them or bringing them into the government. Killing them.
If you're not willing to lay down a rule that any Iraqi or foreign terrorist masquerading as a security official or military member will be shot, you can't win. And that's just one example of the type of sternness this sort of fight requires.
With the situation in Iraq deteriorating daily, sending more troops would simply offer our enemies more targets - unless we decided to use our soldiers and Marines for the primary purpose for which they exist: To fight.
I whole heartedly agree with Mr. Peters. In a Post on August 18, 2006 I wrote,
The solution? Assuming that the Western world wants to maintain its way of life and standards of living and absence an alternative to oil, one of two things has to occur for the Western World and the Muslim world to peacefully coexist. First, the will of the Islamic Fascist to fight has to be destroyed. This can only be done by brute force. The Western world has to have the stomach to draw the battle lines and undertake offensive military campaigns similar to those used against Germany and Japan during World War II. The enemies' ability and will to fight has to be utterly destroyed and the populace has to be so tired of dying and suffering that it capitulates to the Western world. The national policy has to be "You are either with us or against us."
The second alternative is a Reformation of the Muslim world. If the Muslim world actually has a silent majority that wants the right to pursue life, liberty and happiness then it will have to stand up and force an attitude of tolerance upon the Muslim religion. This means true tolerance and an acceptance of equality even if the other person is of a different religion. By the way, Dhimmitude is not tolerance - it is subjugation.
Until there is an acceptance by the Muslim religion, whether due to acquiescence brought about by absolute defeat by force or by an internal reformation, that each person has a right to his own views and that the holding of such views does not disqualify the person from life, there will be no peaceful coexistence with the Western World. There may be eras of stalemates and nonaggression but there will be no peace. If the Western World does not have the stomach for the first and the Muslim world does not have the desire for the second, we may have no choice but to button up our jackets, shut our doors, and let the future generations deal with an inevitable problem.
I think that the problems we experienced with the results of the Korean and Vietnam wars were due to the fact that we were not committed to total war. Thus our perceived goal of an unconditional win was unattainable. If the goal was complete capitulation of the enemy, then total war was the only answer. Both Germany and Japan surrendered because they simply had no fight left in them. The military age men left in those countries had been bombed and shot at so much that they realized the only option was surrender or annihilation. The reality of these two options caused them to reevaluate the propaganda that they had been eagerly devouring and they chose to surrender.
George Bush was right when he said, "Either you're with us or you're against us." I believe that such an attitude is the only way to win a total war. Like General Patton said, "Lead me, Follow me or get out of my way." If the goal is complete capitulation of the enemy then the tactics have to match. Absence a change in heart by the enemy or the enemies supporters and enablers then the only way to win is by all out war.
However, if the goal is to fight until a satisfactory accord can be reached then all out war may not be the answer. In such instances the idea of what I think of as coercive military force may be the correct strategy. That is flex your muscles and crack a few heads as a warning. Make the enemy reevaluate whether his ideas are that important to him. Use the carrot and the stick approach.
In trying to rebuild Iraq we have flexed our muscles and have acted short of all out war. Given our intention to rebuild a sovereign Iraq, full capitulation is not our goal.
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