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The Rediff Special/Colonel (retd) Anil Athale

March 26, 2003

In a high-intensity conflict like the present, a week is long enough for the fog of war to dissipate and contours of future to emerge.

Despite pre-war hopes, there has been no collapse of morale on the Iraq side. While the coalition's air power has ensured there is very little coordinated resistance -- in terms of a combined fight by infantry, artillery and armour -- units of battalion and company ranging from 800 to 120 soldiers have been offering stiff resistance.

This is at worst an irritant and cannot by itself affect the outcome of the war but for the clever use of TV and propaganda by the Iraqis. Across the world and even in the US, anti-war sentiment is vocal, and this can affect the outcome. The Americans seem clearly worried on that score.

In a way, this resistance is linked to the failure of American diplomacy and political leadership to get the world opinion on their side. This is quite unlike the first Gulf War. A weaker side like Iraq is drawing sustenance from worldwide opposition.

With the Iraqi army broken up in small pockets, the war has begun to look more like a guerrilla fight rather than a conventional conflict. Indians who have a long experience of this kind of fighting (the North-East, Punjab, Sri Lanka, Kashmir) know the importance of this factor.

Every time we had gained an upper hand in Kashmir, a statement of support by the US or Pakistan would sustain the morale of insurgents. Something similar is happening in Iraq and even an outburst by a Hollywood personality during the Oscar presentation ceremony, or demonstrations in New York or San Francisco are a factor to raise Iraqi morale in this age of global TV coverage.

Since the American strategic aim is to install a friendly regime in Iraq, not alienating the civil population is a major factor. This constrains the use of air power that can cause collateral damage. Respect for human rights is thus part of the American plan and not an afterthought.

Saddam Hussein's strategy obviously is to cause enough fatalities in the American forces and advertise his own civilian casualties. His target is the American public opinion that he hopes will force President George Bush to halt the attack.

Speed in operations is thus essential for the Americans, while if Saddam Hussein could prolong the fight sufficiently he could hope to avoid defeat.

THE real American difficulties are at the 'tactical' or ground level. Their technological superiority is less of factor in ground fighting unlike in air or at sea. Many so-called top of the rung weapon systems, like the Appache attack helicopter for instance, with radars and self-guiding missile against tanks, has no answer to one or two infantry soldiers hiding behind a bush and using the easy-to-use but deadly RPG-7, a Russian-made rocket-propelled grenade.

It also seems many of the American weapon systems were devised in 'fictional' or computer-simulated environment. Battlefield has that uncanny habit of throwing up the unforeseen. The lack of fighting experience of American and British army is being exposed in these initial engagements.

The US certainly has the ability to quickly learn from this and innovate new systems, like it did during the World War II or even the Korean War. But does it have that kind of time to complete the learning curve?

The army is often compared with a complex machine. Like all machines, it needs ‘running in' to sort out the rough edges.

The American army has been a peacetime force for the last 27 years. The last major war it fought, Vietnam, ended in 1976. The tactical and strategic level leadership of the American army is thus a peacetime product. And it is God's own truth about all armies that in peacetime it is ‘no risk' conventional and mediocre leadership that rises to the top. At the crack of first bullet these peacetime organisations experience a ‘shake-out'. It seems the Americans are going through that process. But for the World War II, a military genius like George S Patton would have gone home as a lieutenant colonel.

THE teething troubles the Americans face do not mean Saddam Hussein has a chance of an easy victory.

The American military briefings on TV are more important for what they do not say. While all attention is focused on the attacks by the British and American Marines in the south, there is very little mention of the most potent American force, the famous 3rd US Army of Patton. During the WW II Americans even used the reputation of Patton and his army to fool the German's about the Normandy landing.

It seems advancing American tanks (most likely of the 3rd Army) are even now moving through the desert to 'fix' the Iraqi Republican Guard and bottle it up in a triangle formed by the River Tigris Euphrates and the city of Baghdad.

The American aim will be to surround this force and then destroy it with airpower. With the hope that once the Republican Guard is destroyed, it would remove the power base of Saddam Hussein, and the rest of Iraqi army would disintegrate or surrender.

The impunity with which the Americans have 'permitted' Saddam Hussein's boastful speech to be televised worldwide indicate a quiet confidence it is he and not the Americans who are walking into a trap.

The coming week should see the decisive battle where the ground forces merely hold the ring and air power does the job.

Photographs by Scott Nelson and Joe Raedle/Getty Images

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