Maybe they can’t take the city, CJ, but I wouldn’t want to be trying to utilise those supply lines right about now. Probably not a great idea to play attrition games with people who have nowhere else to go.

Posted by: Monolycus | Nov 1 2006 8:50 utc | 3

The Sunnis can’t hope to actually take the city. Best guess is they’re expecting a Shia uprising in Baghdad, which would throw away both the Kerensk, err… Maliki government and the occupation forces.
And there’s no Godwinism to liken current situation to poor military planning in history as far as I can see.
Though I could come closer:
“new teams of people will “develop messages” for the 24-hour news cycle and “correct the record.””
This can only work if US people are totally clueless about Iraq. Billmon himself mentioned the German that said “even in 1944 with just Nazi propaganda, I could see we were losing. The glorious victories kept being closer to town”.

Posted by: CluelessJoe | Nov 1 2006 9:30 utc | 5

The Sunni are now collaborating with the U.S. forces, after the Coalition has realized that letting the Shi’a get their way will hand Iraq to Iran. The containment of Baghdad by the Sunni, with roadblocks and checkpoints, would be impossible unless the U.S. allowed it – U.S. airpower and artillery assets could knock out every single such checkpoint in a few minutes, if it was deemed necessary.
You can be quite certain that the “discussions” between the Sunni (and their Saudi masters) and the U.S. have taken developments in Iraq in quite interesting directions now.
When the Shi’a understand that Bush II is about to do a remake of Bush I’s “Rise and we’ll support you – NOT” then we have the recipe for a splatter movie beyond anything Feith, Perle, Wolfowitz, Hansen and Cheney ever imagined. A cliffhanger with all of us wondering “who gets the oil at the end?”

Posted by: SteinL | Nov 1 2006 13:07 utc | 7

SteinL
The Sunnis are cooperating so closely with US forces that it would appear there have been at least 90 deaths in October due to inaccurate sniper fire, lousy pray and spray tactics and premature IED detonations. With cooperation like this, there is precious little need for hostility.
Judging by the relentlessly negative dynamics on the ground, it would appear that the ongoing STORIES of negotiations between the US and the “Sunnis” ( these stories have appeared on a regular basis since early 2004 ) have failed to bear any fruit. There’s a simple reason for this: a good portion of the STORIES are just STORIES; they don’t actually have any objective referent in this world ( ie a reduction in violence directed at the US military in the Sunni dominated areas of Iraq ) that they can be tied to which would transform them from STORIES into something concrete.
The US military, contrary to mythical assumption, does not have the capacity or the resources to erect a super-panopticon of instantaneous death over Iraq; if it did, there wouldn’t be at least 80 IED’s being planted everyday, let alone the sheer level of extra chaos that prevails on the ground.
A more accurate observation: the maintenance of coalition military supply lines from Kuwait would be impossible if the Iraqi Shia didn’t permit them to function. Any objective analysis of the political strategy that the Iraqi Shia have practised since the invasion would lead one to the conclusion that any attempt at a repeat of the great betrayal of 1991 will result in the wholesale disappearance of large sections of the US military currently deployed in Iraq.

Posted by: dan | Nov 1 2006 15:55 utc | 9

The Cockburn Guardian article cited above clearly portrays that Iraq has disintegrated into a Mad Max World.
I’m so damn old I remember Ike saying “I will go to Korea” and I got to visit Vietnam first hand. In both cases, US troops battled to a bloody draw. Troops dying for nothing turned Americans against Truman and Johnson/Nixon. In Iraq there aren’t enough troops for even a tie.
As soon as the Shiites realize that the Americans are pulling out leaving them to the tender mercies of the Sunnis, the US Army’s supply line and route of retreat South to Kuwait shuts down.

Posted by: Jim S | Nov 1 2006 17:23 utc | 11

I recall several months ago there was talk of negotiations with the insurgents who offered some deal premised on a timetable for withdrawal with the added condition that it must pass a US senate vote.
And faced with an unrelenting insurgency that no doubt recognizes increasing weariness on the part of its adversary, the USA is not likely to get a better deal. On the other hand, the Shia will not agree to any deal without the go-ahead from Teheran.
Every time it has looked like it cannot possibly get any worse, it does.

Posted by: jony_b_cool | Nov 1 2006 18:56 utc | 13

“Fire at Fort Mead,” literally spooks in the attic

Posted by: christofay | Nov 2 2006 0:03 utc | 15

Are the wheels coming off yet…
Even more Contingency Planning?
Cut and Run Capitalism. Looks like it, as Bechtel leaves Iraq after “heartbreaking” failures.
Who’s next?

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Nov 2 2006 14:16 utc | 17

Uncle it won’t be the loss of the mercenaries that’s troubling them as they are ‘sub-contractors’ not employees. A big mob of Pacific Islander ‘sub-contractors’ have been lost this year and I doubt Kroll are losing any sleep over that. The compensation payouts to the deceased families are pitiful as is any rehab or other assistance for the maimed subbies. They will be getting skittish about the deaths of fellow ‘corporate cavaliers’ the colleagues offa the corporate softball team. Any corporation operating in Iraq will be hard pressed to do it without a few salarymen. No doubt after nigh on 4 years the insurgents are learning which targets matter and which don’t.
This will be a push for more money along with a decrease in the level of supervision, record keeping and any other due diligence that the Feds still insist be completed in Iraq.

Posted by: Debs is dead | Nov 2 2006 20:57 utc | 19