Phase III Resistance in Iraq

[bemildred]

I do like the pipe.

An article in the Friday, March 29 Washington Post
pointed to the long-expected opening of Phase III of
America?s war with Iraq. Phase I was the jousting
contest, the formal "war" between America?s and
Iraq?s armies that ended with the fall of Baghdad.
Phase II was the War of National Liberation waged
by the Baath Party and fought guerilla-style. Phase
III, which is likely to prove the decisive phase, is true
Fourth Generation war, war waged by a wide variety
of non-state Iraqi and other Islamic forces for
objectives and motives that reach far beyond politics.

...

Finally, the way the war is fought will gradually
change its character. Fourth Generation forces, like
the Baath, will fight a guerilla war. But religious
motivation will gradually introduce new elements.
We have already seen one: suicide bombers. We will
start to see others: women and children taking active
roles, riots where the crowds force "coalition" forces
to fire on the people and create massacres, treachery
by Iraqis who we think are "friends" (we are already
seeing that among the Iraqi police), and finally an
Iraqi intifada, where everyone just piles on. That
could happen as early as this summer, at the rate
things seem to be going. If it does, American forces
will have little choice but to get out of Iraq as best
they can.

Nor is it just in Iraq that American troops are now
facing Fourth Generation war. They have their hands
full of it in Afghanistan, in Pakistan (by proxy), in
Haiti, and in Kosovo. So long as America continues
on the strategic offensive, intervening all over the
world, the list will grow. In each case, the root
problem will be the same: the disintegration of the
local state. And in each case, the attempt to recreate
a state by sending in American armed forces will fail.

As Clausewitz said, "But it is asking too much when
a state?s integrity must be maintained entirely by
others."

AntiWar.com