Dangers on the Ground in Iraq Lead to Increased Use of Airlifts

[bemildred]

Too late for LBN.

AL UDEID AIR BASE, Qatar, Dec. 11 -- In an effort to reduce the amount of military cargo hauled in vulnerable ground convoys across Iraq, the U.S. Air Force has begun airlifting much larger quantities of materiel to bases around the country.

The stepped-up effort started several weeks ago at the urging of Gen. John Jumper, the Air Force chief of staff, and involves cargo planes carrying vehicles, tank tracks, tires, generators and other goods that normally move over land routes. Such transport is more expensive and less efficient, but senior Air Force officers say the unusual undertaking has become necessary to protect the lives of U.S. troops and civilians who otherwise would attempt to ferry the items by dangerous ground convoys.

"What General Jumper did was basically give me clearance to, in his words, throw away the rule book," said Lt. Gen. Walter E. Buchanan III, the senior commander of U.S. aircraft in the Persian Gulf region. "He is not worried about efficiencies, and so I'm not either."

Convoy security became a hot issue last week when soldiers in Kuwait complained to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld that they were being sent to war without sufficient armored equipment to protect them. Pentagon officials have since issued statements saying that the concerns of the soldiers are being addressed and that armored transportation will be provided to troops headed into Iraq.

WaPo

[Tandalayo_Scheisskopf]

1. Ahhh...

Shades of firebases in The Nam. Bases isolated, surrounded by the enemy, only supplied by airlift.

Here we go again.

[wtmusic]

2. We could see that coming

As the military realizes that winning hearts and minds will be impossible, they will revert back to their MO which is drop everything from the air (bombs, food, medicine, napalm) etc. Avoids any kind of messy interaction.

[mhr]

3. So, Didn't Bush Say We Took The Iraq - Is He Now Giving It Back?

eom

[Ganja Ninja]

4. So when are we going to have the ...

Mission Un-Accomplished ceremony?

[hatrack]

5. Going on two years now . . ..

And you can't even drive from the airport to downtown Baghdad. Yep, freedom's on the march, no doubt about it! :eyes:

[bemildred]

6. You need to look at the larger picture.

Who is calling the shots in this war, setting the tempo,
deciding where things will happen next? What you are seeing now
are the consequences of the desperate (some might say clueless)
gamble in Fallujah, they are still fighting in Fallujah. Fallujah
was an attempt to retake the initiative, to make a new "reality", and
it has failed, and is in the process of failing catastrophically.
The question in Falluajah is who can keep it up the longest? We are
now in an urban war of attrition there, an amazing blunder.

Ponder it.

[blindpig]

7. sounds like Stalingrad

no doubt our lift capacity is magnitudes greater than Fat Herman's, nonetheless not being able to provide adequate supplies by ground speaks volumes about our control of the "rear". Can people not see the writing on the wall?

[Porcupine]

8. Build another black wall in Washington....

We have the biggest tanks, armored personell carriers, massive trucks, and humvees by the score. We have absolute total air superiority.

The U.S. is losing.

America's idea of the "Army of one," the techically superior soldier is total crap. We can't deliver fuel, food and supplies on the ground. You cannot govern a country or repair an oil pumping station from inside a tank.

If U.S. soldiers can't walk the ground they cannot possibly win.

[pfitz59]

9. Dien Bin Pheiu?

Final debacle of the French-Indochina War? Are we seeing the Iraqi version?

[teryang]

10. Inability to secure ground lines of communication

...increases the costs of war immeasureably. The is the negative leverage of an asymmetric conflict. We were being thrown to the mat with wrist locks, now finger locks are immobilizing us.

Seven thousand miles from home, everything that reaches the point of application must be delivered by air. They have bombs buried on the road with detonators in their living rooms. Eisenhower would tell you that this kind of throughput is insufficient to win a land conflict and portends a military defeat.

[maddezmom]

11. link from AFP

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/20041214/pl_afp/usiraqmilitaryair&cid=1521&ncid=1480

[bemildred]

12. I was rather pleased you got that up in LBN.

The one I found was too late.
:thumbsup: