Fallujah's empty promise, the "decisive" battle of Fallujah has proved somewhat disappointing for the U.S. military, and for good reason. The Pentagon was hoping that many thousands of Iraqi insurgents had dug in to defend their vital base in Fallujah, but like smart guerrillas in Latin America and Vietnam, the Iraqi insurgents decided against turning the town into some sort of " Alamo" just to please the Americans. News that only light resistance greeted the U.S. and Iraqi government forces is perplexing to the American military leaders, but not to the guerillas, who have repeated the tactis of the Vietcong in catching the US in a giant trap. Fallujah is more than a city, it is now symbolic of a network: it's Baghdad, Ramadi, Samarra, Latifiyah, Kirkuk, Mosul. Streets on fire, bombs going off, Americans pinned down everywhere: Infinite numbers of Fallujahs bleeding the occupier with a thousand cuts.
Massive US military might is useless against a mosque network in full operation. The message is being relayed all over the Sunni triangle through a network of mosques. The mujahideen tactics are, classic tactics applied to urban warfare but in the context of the desert: snipers on rooftops, snipers escaping on bicycles, mortar fire from behind abandoned houses, rocket-propelled-grenade attacks on tanks, Bradleys being ambushed, barrages of as many as 200 rockets, instant dispersal, "invisible" regrouping. The strategy is clear: the resistance is united across Iraq. Insurgents say they are fighting not just for Fallujah, but for all Iraq. One American officer put it this way: "In military terms, Fallujah is not going to be much of a plus at all," says Bernard Trainor, a retired three-star Marine Corps general. "The downside is that we've knocked the hell out of this city, and the only insurgents we really got were the collateral damage, the civilians, and the nut-cases, the guys who really want to die for Allah. But the smart ones left." Meanwhile, Fallujah is a demonstration of American "shock and awe" backfiring and losing the US popular support even further. Civilians have told families and friends in Baghdad that the US bombing has been worse than Baghdad suffered in March 2003. The Pentagon is pulling out all stops to "liberate" the people of Fallujah. According to residents, the city is now littered with thousands of cluster bombs. The Washington Post has confirmed that US troops are firing white-phosphorus rounds that create a screen of fire impervious to water. Dr Muhammad Ismail, a member of the governing board of Fallujah's general hospital "captured" by the Americans at the outset of Operation Phantom Fury, has called all Iraqi doctors for urgent help. Ismail told Iraqi and Arab press that the number of wounded civilians is growing exponentially - and medical supplies are almost non-existent. He confirmed that US troops had arrested many members of the hospital's medical staff and had sealed the storage housing medical supplies. The wounded in Fallujah are in essence left to die. There is not a single surgeon in town. And practically no doctors as well, as the Pentagon decided to bomb both the al-Hadar Hospital and the Zayid Mobile Hospital. So far, the International Committee of the Red Cross has reacted with apathy. For the first time since the interim Iraqi government of Ayad Allawi took power, the interim Iraqi leader showed that he was willing to deal with the insurgents on their own terms: with raw power and violence For Allawi, the die has been cast. His own fate is now inexorably tied to the decision to attack in Fallujah, as demonstrated with tragic clarity by the kidnapping and threat to behead several members of his family this week. His government's feelers over the past few weeks toward an accommodation with the insurgents were rebuffed by their representatives and in any case would have been vetoed by the United States. Allawi's strategy is the iron fist, and now he has to use it or lose it. Only hope is defusing the disenfranchisement bomb For the American plans to succeed, hope now lies more than ever in the ability of the coming elections to empower leaders who can somehow cut the kind of deal that peels off Iraqi nationalists from the insurgent camp. But the Sunni Iraqi resistance is now regrouping and uniting itself into a full revolution. According to sources in Baghdad, the leaders of the resistance believe there's no other way for them to expel the Americans and for the Sunnis to be restored to power - especially because if elections are held in January, the Shi'ites are certain to win. Sunni Iraqis are more than ever aware they are excluded from the Bush administration's "democratic" plans for Iraq. The only Sunni political party in interim premier Iyad Allawi's "government" is now out. And the powerful Association of Muslim Scholars (AMS) - the foremost Sunni religious body - is now officially boycotting the January elections. There are unconfirmed reports that Sheikh Abdullah al-Janabi, the head of the mujahideen shura (council) in Fallujah and a very prominent AMS member, died when his mosque, Saad ibn Abi Wakkas, was bombed. While it may be crucial for the United States do everything possible to ensure that voting takes place in as many parts of the Sunni Triangle as possible, the steady drumbeat of bombings killing Iraqi's who sign up or `collaborate' with the American sponsored police forces or public ministries is evidence that the elections touted by George Bush will be undermined or severely compromised. If the vote brings to the polls only the Kurds and Iraq's largest ethnic group, the Shiites, it could leave Sunnis completely disenfranchised. Therefore, the Iraqi resistance does not care if thousands of mujahideen are smashed to pieces and it will do all in its power to make sure that full and fair elections cannot happen. In fact it is actually gearing up for a major strategic victory. Therefore, it is not in its interests to cooperate with the American sponsored elections.And if all do not participate fully and fairly, the elections will not be seen as valid in the eyes of many Iraqi's. Thus, the big question is the elections � they are the key," says David Phillips, who served through most of the first term of this Bush administration as a senior adviser on Iraq matters before stepping down in September. "Can you make elections go forward in Fallujah and elsewhere by rolling over the city? I don't think so. You can't bring people to the polls at gunpoint." This calls into question the hope that the American plan to hold the elections and isolate or expose anti-American zealots, and "foreign fighters" separating them from the insurgency is going to become reality anytime soon. They may be decimated little by little, but the fact is, the continued attacks and the unpopularity of the Americans negates the likelihood that full and fair elections can take place involving the Sunnis as well as the Kurds and the Shiites, all participating with complete cooperation. Thus, any vote, that is not seen as legitimate, held by an intermim government that is seen as an American puppet government, is a prescription for many more years of American troops in harm's way. They have everything to gain and nothing to lose by waiting the Americans out. They know that popular opinion and the cost of the war back in the States will continue to mount up pressure on Bush to get out of Iraq. And when you have an occupier in your land, while you've got nothing, what do you have to lose? ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Make a clean sweep of pop-up ads. Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Now with Pop-Up Blocker. Get it for free! http://us.click.yahoo.com/L5YrjA/eSIIAA/yQLSAA/XgSolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> ----- / o o \ ===OO=====OO============================================= (4)Portals (2)News Wikis (2)Conferences - No BuSHIT! 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