11.17.2005

WW4

Algerians Arrested In Italy >>> And more in Norway. While this story only concerns Algerians, this is indicative of how widespread these terror cells can be, especially in places like Europe where a free-society allows such operations to be sustained with great ease.

Troops On The Border >>> While Murdoc has a point in comparing the US-Mexico border to the Iraq-Syria border, stationing troops on our border is not an effective use of military manpower. While it is certainly valuable training and, their job is not to interdict marijuana smuggling and illegal immigration. There needs to be another group to take care of that, but good luck getting full-time volunteers who want to do it.
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OIF

Ramadi >>> The Coalition and the Iraqi Government is going to try and secure this place before the December 15th elections, and it won't happen. As Roggio's post states, they are building up the ISF force level slowly, rather than by mounting a large Fallujah or Tal Afar like operation. While this strategy may certainly work--the best way to kill a frog in a pot of water is to bring it to a slow boil--it won't happen very quickly, and the elections are less than a month away. Regardless of the election, it will be interesting to see if the 'slow boil' strategy works. If it doesn't, then--as I've stated before--Ramadi will be 2006's Fallujah or Mosul, and in a few months we'll be watching another Marine-led urban assault on a medium-sized town in Iraq.

Iraqi Special Operations Forces >>> These guys are already quite good, and with several years of urban combat and counter-insurgency work ahead of them chances are that in 5 years Iraq will possess one of the most highly-trained and battle-hardened SOF in the world, with its standard military not far behind.
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DEFENSE & TECHNOLOGY

Artillery Out Of A Job >>> The distinction here is not that the bombs are guided--because there are guided artillery shells and MLRS-launched rockets--but that the bombs have a much greater impact than the shells or rockets, (known as indirect-fire weapons). A 500 or 1,000 pound bomb dropped from thousands of feet in the air has both a greater amount of kinetic energy to penetrate the target and more explosive charge to let off once it does so. The indirect-fire is easier to deploy in theater--no waiting for an F-18 to arrive from the Gulf--and the smaller payload decreases the chances of collateral damage. But when there's hard target to take down, nothing works like a JDAM.
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