U.S. Draws on Israeli Methods for Iraq (Israeli advisor pessimistic)

[Barrett808]

U.S. Draws on Israeli Methods for Iraq
By RAMIT PLUSHNICK-MASTI, Associated Press Writer

JERUSALEM - In fighting insurgents in Iraq (news - web sites), the United States is drawing on some of Israel's methods and experiences in the West Bank and Gaza Strip (news - web sites), including running checkpoints and tracking militants with drone aircraft, Israeli officials say.

Israeli and U.S. security experts have met repeatedly in recent months to discuss urban warfare and Israel's lessons from its grueling three-year fight against Palestinian militants.

In public comments, Israeli and U.S. officials acknowledge "strategic cooperation" and confirm high-level meetings, the most recent one last week in Tel Aviv. However, they play down the contacts as routine, apparently for fear the Arab world will be outraged.

...

Martin Van Creveld, an Israeli military expert, warned that just as Israel has been unsuccessful in eliminating militant groups and suicide bombers, the United States cannot expect to be victorious in Iraq.

...

"I don't see how on earth they (the U.S.) can win. I think this is going to end the same way Vietnam did," Van Creveld said. "They are going to flee the country hanging on the strings of helicopters," he added, referring to the 1973 U.S. departure from Saigon.

(much more)

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=ap/israel_iraq

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. Creveld is a top

Military Historian who has taught, among other places, at the War
College, Sanhurst Military Academy and guested at Princeton and Harvard. He knows what he is talking about, and yes those of us
paying attention, see it coming

[The Stranger]

2. The "Arab world outraged"?

How about the whole fucking civilized war outraged.

[nadinbrzezinski]

3. no not the whole world

Just those wiht a concience, and cleeland knowns these tactics
only work in the very short term... they have not worked in Gaza either...

[reknewcomer]

7. Outraged about what?

Stopping suicide bombers before they reach their target or the fact that Israel and the US are working together?

[bobbyboucher]

9. Duh.

Try looking a little deeper into a subject.

[reknewcomer]

10. The deepest and most dangerous depth of the subject

Is the inability to stop or prevent suicide bombers targeting innocent people.

[demconfive]

11. The main point is....

...that thse tactics have been a failure. Suicide bombing still occurs in Israel as do settlement killings. The article gives a big clue; that Israel has been in a three year battle with Palestinian militants. The Mid-East's most technically advanced military is still battling a rag-tag group of lightly armed insurgents. Israel has a right to defend itself. The problem is the leaders inability to understand that there are ways beside violence to gain security.

[reknewcomer]

13. One short read of recent news in Israel will show few suicide bombings

I doubt that it's due to a lack of trying on the part of hamas and others. I'd say something is working better than it was a short while ago.

[AtTheEndOfTheDay]

12. "The deepest and most dangerous depth of the subject"

How does one stop bombing aircraft and bulldozers plowing into their house? Might consider doing some killing myself if subjected to that crap!

[reknewcomer]

14. I'm guessing you would not have that problem

One would first need to aid and assist those determined to kill as many Jews as possible just for the shock (and maybe pleasure) value before you would have air and land assualts against your house.

I doubt you are one of the few that would seek to kill Jews for any reason.

[DrBB]

4. Thanks, nadinbrzezinski--useful info

Always hard to gauge when you don't know anything about the "expert." Not but what a lot of us have been saying this for months, even before the damn idiot invasion went ahead.

Any relation to Zbigniew?

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. No

That name is like Smith in Poland. It is that common.

And you welcome. I'm a frelance writer in the RPG industry and I get
to read a lot of material in all kinds of fields for ideas and material. He writes pretty good articles and books. His analysis of modern war even made it to some gaming material as the rules of warfare.

What was funny is they used only 12 of his eighteen principles... I guess they were afraid that an egg head would sue them for copyright... long story.

One of the best pieces of advise he gives is that intelligence is like eggs, the fresher the better... guess what our Intel is more than just stale... and this is why (leave the morality of the war to the side) we are not doing well.

Shin Beit has far better and fresher intel in the Gaza strip and the West Bank and they are having all kinds of problems... ours is like crap and really stale... that is why he gives us really low odds. Just that this will not dawn on the boys in charge who need to be voted out.

The Generals in the meantime have gone into mission mode... and tactically they may be wining (really if you believe DoD they really are... really), but strategically, just like Nam, they are loosing... and they are also loosing the battle for hearts and minds. This is the other reason why Cleeland gives us so low odds... assuming there are any odds here given to us.

(And yes quite on purpose I have left the morality of this out, and just discusing this from a tactical POV)

[bemildred]

5. Creveld is a smart fellow with interesting ideas.

If anything the US position in Iraq is worse than VietNam,
and much worse than the Israelis situation WRT the Palestinians.

I would speculate that all of this is just about buying a bit
of time and trying to save some face before we leave. It's sort
of dumbfounding that we will spend hundreds of billions for that,
but cannot afford to fix our schools or pay decent wages.

[sungkathak]

8. Slaughter to conquer

Quote, "US, Israel prepare mass killings in Iraq
By Bill Vann
10 December 2003
Back to screen version | Send this link by email | Email the author

The Bush administration is about to launch a campaign of wholesale killings in Iraq with the assistance of the Israeli military, according to both US and Israeli sources quoted in several recent news reports.

Frustrated over the growing popular resistance to the US military occupation and determined to reduce US casualties in Iraq before next November's election, the administration has authorized a policy that could well resemble the infamous "Operation Phoenix" assassination program run by the CIA during the Vietnam War. That operation claimed the lives of as many as 41,000 Vietnamese over a four-year period beginning in 1968.

In preparation for the new counterinsurgency campaign, the US military has brought urban warfare specialists from the Israeli Defenses Force (IDF) to Fort Bragg, North Carolina, the headquarters of the US Special Forces. They are training assassination teams in methods that the IDF has used to suppress Palestinian resistance to the Israel occupation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

http://www.nowarforisrael.com

http://www.nogw.com/warforisrael.html