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thedrifter
03-30-04, 07:15 AM
03-29-2004

Guest Column: Avoid ‘Vietnamization’ of Iraq



By Eric R. Taylor



It’s beginning to look a lot like Vietnam.



Ever since our victory over Saddam Hussein last year, we have been plagued by terrorist attacks on our troops that have now killed more soldiers than the actual three-week military campaign that toppled the regime.



While attacks against U.S. and coalition troops have generally plateaued, attacks against Iraqi civilians (softer targets) are on the increase. Recent ruthless attacks such as the car-bombing of the Mount Lebanon hotel in Baghdad have led some observers to compare the situation with the Vietnam War. These attacks cast an ominous shadow over the U.S. plan to turn sovereignty over to the Iraqis on June 30.



We should expect the terrorism to deepen in ferocity and frequency in the months ahead. It is the only hope the jihadists have of defeating us. And there is a precedent: In Vietnam, the enemy wore us down, politically, physically, materially, economically and psychologically.



Our conduct of the Vietnam War contains some valuable “lessons not learned” that are pertinent to the situation in Iraq today.



In Vietnam, we attempted to fight a classical, set-piece war of attrition reminiscent of World War II and then-current NATO war plans. But the North Vietnamese Army (PAVN) and the Viet Cong (VC) didn’t fight such a conventional war. They avoided massed clashes as much as possible.



Instead, they capitalized on hit-and-run, melt-away tactics. We were fixed. They weren’t. We operated from firebases and other fixed installations (defense), while they operated mobile and loose (offense). We attempted to defend everything and couldn’t defend anything. At a day’s end, we retired to a firebase or a tactical bivouac within range of friendly artillery. Any ground we took during the day was repurchased in blood the next.



The enemy’s line of communications was an ill-defined jungle logistical route called the Ho Chi Minh trail that snaked from North Vietnam down along Laos and Cambodia with feeder tentacles all along and across the border into South Vietnam. They operated from sanctuaries in Laos and Cambodia that – except for “sneak and peek” observation missions by the Special Operations Groups (SOG) – were “hands off” to conventional strikes because of political decisions in Washington. The reluctance to hit enemy lines of communications until very late in the war was a major strategic blunder, significantly contributing to our losses, both in terms of casualties and the war itself.



A similar situation seems to have emerged in Iraq today. Iraq is surrounded by (clockwise from the north) Turkey, Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria with a total border of 2,266 miles. Despite diplomatic formalities, Iran, Syria and even Saudi Arabia – with nearly 2,000 of those miles of borders – should be considered unfriendly to the United States in terms of our Iraqi occupation. And it appears that they have no incentive to quell the operation of terrorists targeting Iraq who are operating within their borders.



To avoid a repeat of Vietnam, we must mercilessly strike those strongholds using our Special Operations Forces. If we refrain out of concerns of world opinion or international law, we face allowing the “Vietnamization” of Iraq and a continuing bloodbath.



Already there are disturbing parallels between the occupation and the quagmire we endured a quarter-century ago: Our current position in Iraq is that of circled wagons. We are fixed, and the terrorists are mobile. We are concentrated and the terrorists are diffused within the larger civilian population.



Our troops are saddled with the impossible task of providing urban security for nearly all areas to make the political case we are bringing change and security to Iraq. By the time our troops smell something’s afoul, it’s too late.



The terrorists operate with the aid of an inviolate supply line from currently untouchable sanctuaries. Yet, to massively thrust into neighboring countries to strike terrorist enclaves does risk widening this conflict. But if we don’t neutralize those targets, it will probably widen anyway.



If we turn a blind eye to the sources nurturing these butchers, Iraq will be fed a steady diet of terrorism. We can’t win a war patterned after McNamara’s doctrine of “proportional response.”



An adage much older than the Vietnam War is still pertinent: The best defense is a good offense. Our lightning-fast drive to Baghdad a year ago confirms the U.S. military’s expertise in offense.



A year after victory, our troops in Iraq are stretched too thin. They are exhausted from the constant and frustrating vigilance for a threat they can’t see coming. We can only end the terrorist attacks by going back on the offensive against the terrorist enclaves in countries neighboring Iraq.



Ask the PAVN’s Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap if defending expanses of land or cities is a nation-building strategy.



Guest Contributor Eric R. Taylor, served in the U.S. Army Chemical Corps before earning his PhD as a biochemist. He is the author of “Lethal Mists: An Introduction to the Natural and Military Sciences of Chemical, Biological Warfare and Terrorism”, and several papers on Weapons of Mass Destruction issues published with the Cato Institute in Washington, DC. He can be reached at ertaylor@louisiana.edu. Send Feedback responses to dwfeedback@yahoo.com.

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Ellie