The Message that Helped Win Anbar Province: We'll Stay As Long as it Takes
Friday, February 29, 2008 at 10:17PM Some call the defeat of al-Qaeda in Ramadi, Anbar Province the “Gettysburg of Iraq”. This is the story of how 1st Brigade of the 1st Armored Division helped usher in the Anbar Awakening:
Anbar Awakens: The Tipping Point
by MAJ Niel Smith and COL Sean MacFarland
“We also took a different IO (Information Operations) tack with the sheiks. Instead of telling them that we would leave soon and they must assume responsibility for their own security, we told them that we would stay as long as necessary to defeat the terrorists. That was the message they had been waiting to hear. As long as they perceived us as mere interlopers, they dared not throw in their lot with ours. When they began to think of us as reliable partners, their attitudes began to change. Still, we had to prove that we meant what we were saying.”
So the next time you hear John Murtha, Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama taking credit for the success of the surge because their threats to pull troops out if “Iraqis don’t step up to the plate” scared them into progress, DON’T BELIEVE THEM.
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Reader Comments (19)
My son, serving with the 101st, is on his way home for treatment for his foot. He has said that he wants to go see Murtha. I will do what I can to stop that until he "feels better". Thanks for this post.
If there is a field manual for how nation build in the face of vrutal forces, this is it. Pre-surge american strategy and the worldview of the left and many Democrats is and was based on a mistake, mainly that the presence of the United States inflames hatred. In reality the presence of US troops has the exact opposite effect as Americans are generaly decent people and easy to get along with. (Of course these is always the rotten ones, but that is life.) The most troubling aspect was that in 2005 the tribes were rallying against al qaeda, but we did not provide enough support. The most heartening part of this article, to me :
"On 21 August, the insurgents attacked a newly established station in a tribal stronghold with an immense suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (SVBIED). IPs, however, refused to be scared away. Despite offers of safe haven at a nearby coalition base, the survivors remained at their posts, ran their tattered flag back up the flagpole, and even began to conduct patrols again that same day."
Senator Obama and the democrats need to explain how abandoning people like that in the heart of the middle east strengthens american security.
Rissha who is mentioned in the article was later assasinated by Al Qaeda, when the event happened it was latched on by some journalists as evidence of our defeat. Here are some links, but you may wince when you see how eager some americans are to find america hurt.
A Crippling Blow in Anbar-Time Magazine-Sep. 13, 2007 By MARK KUKIS
http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1661648,00.html
Worst line:
"In the months ahead, violence in Anbar Province will likely rise again as Sattar's successor faces further death threats while commanding less of a following. And the biggest U.S. success to date in Iraq will likely unravel slowly."
Sunset In Anbar?
By Kevin Drum
Sep 13, 2007
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/09/13/politics/animal/main3257659.shtml
worst line:
"His murder graphically demonstrates that the other groups threatened by the American Anbar strategy were never going to just sit back passively and allow it to succeed — an obvious strategic point which has always seemed to elude surge advocates"
Really? I am sure the soldiers on the ground were going to put their weapons away since they didn't count on opposition.
I could go on, but a person could see our media in action on this one.
100 years, or a thousand years...
Please never get married or have children, mudd. If you can't understand committment and friendship it'd just be wrong.
So onward 100 years! (you might want to find out what McCain actually said before making such ignorant comments!)
War and marriage/childbearing are not compatible ideals or ideologies.
Besides, what do care about my personal life?
And you, Amy, might want to find out what McCain actually said.
COMMITTMENT is a compatible ideal, mud. It's about COMMITTMENT.
You continue to misquote McCain. I'm not sure what soundbyte you're relying on but if you use the quote, its' up to you to prove it and back it up. Then it can be discussed from there. There's no point dialouging about someone's interpretation of a quote.
Commitment wasn't what the military and the American public were sold on. We were sold on a cakewalk that would be proved worthy by the discovery of WMD's. We were lied to. But now that we broke it, we have to fix it.
Amy, I'm not buying your innocent routine anymore.
You are a rightwing propagandist.
Committment is required to take down a dictator, mudd. Please produce a quote or speech from Bush that says the invasion into Iraq would be a cake walk. I'm looking forward to this new information.
In his speech before the war, Bush said the opposite. I'll find it later and post a link to it.
Mud,
You are wrong, we toppeled the tyrant who appeared to hold Iraq together by dropping nerve gas on his own people. By the time we invaded a third of the country had allready left Saddam's grip, and the Southern part filled with fear and hatred for the central government in Bagdad.
This story is incredible. I really wish Hollywood would do the inconceivable and make a pro-American movie about the Anbar Awakening. These guys are everything that is right about America. 585 casualties in a 3600 man Brigade Combat Team. In the end it was our ability to sustain committment as Amy noted that created the tipping point of the war. God bless these wonderful heroes from the 1st Armored Division.
Ignore the muddster as the pitiful troll that it is. The anti-Americanists FEAR this "Patriotic" thing.
Right you are, Snooper.
Ok - RV, there are aprox 30 totalitarian dictators in this world...who next?
1000 years in Iraq? They don't want us there for 1000 years.
I don't think you people own the patent, or have a monopoly on patriotism. It's UNAMERICAN to smear other Americans with the brush of anti-patriotism, just because they don't agree with you politically. I repeat, that's the very black heart of UnAmericanism.
Mud,
65 ears ago dictators held sway over much of the planet, 20 years ago it was much less, now? Slowly but surely dictatorships are ending up in the dustbin of history.
Yeah, petty dictators are slowly being replaced by the classical definition of multi-international fascism, Bush Family/Saudi Royal style.
Let me ask you this, RV, do you even know the difference between Nazism, fascism, authoritarianism, and totalitarianism?
But thank you for making my point. 65 years ago, Hitler, et. al, had the most efficient army in the world marching across Europe, and dropping bombs on London. Yet we defeated him in less time then it's taking to defeat AQ in Iraq (and AQ is only 2% of the insurgency, no less.)
Mud,
Al Qaeda does not have a capital.
Al-qaeda also doesn't wear a uniform. It's completely different warfare. Unfortunately, some people don't know what lessons to draw from history so it's impossible for them to learn from them.6