Having persuaded themselves that Saddam Hussein and his closest colleagues were little more than a band of murderous thugs, the British and the Americans marched off to war.
As the world knows, they were initially buoyed by their idea that once they reached Iraq a people jubilant in their liberation would welcome the invasion.
Apparently nothing could be further from the truth. The Americans and the British are coming up against stiff opposition, some of it from civilians. To make matters worse, there are reports suggesting the emergence of a type of urban guerrilla warfare against both the British and the Americans.
One particularly telling account in the New York Times notes that, “As American marines battled their way into the heart of this city today, they appeared to be stepping into just the sort of urban imbroglio they had been hoping to avoid.
“Following heavy fighting on Sunday, when at least 10 Americans were killed, the battle that unfolded today had all the hallmarks of a confused and chaotic urban shootout. Helicopter gunships rocketed the city from above, and Nasiriya’s residents said the raids had killed and injured scores of civilians. Their assertions were impossible to verify in the chaos of the fighting today.
“The marines said the Iraqis were using civilians as shields, pushing women and children into the streets. Iraqi fighters, the marines said, were leaping out of buses and taxis to shoot at them.
“The fighting continued until sunset, with the marines appearing to gain control of part of the city center after taking control of part of the city center after taking an unknown number of casualties.
“Nasiriya spans the Euphrates River in southern Iraq. The military covets the spot not for the city itself, but for a pair of bridges here that could help American forces move north to Baghdad. It was apparently to ensure the security of this of this vital strategic area that the marines moved into the city.
“American commanders had hoped for different scenes in Iraqi town, which, at least in the south, had been widely expected to welcome the allied invasion. For American military planners, winning the war means destroying the Baghdad government, but it also includes a concerted effort to avoid the kind of urban fighting that might enrage the Iraqi people”.
The point, therefore, is that a matter which once seemed ‘open and shut’ is now alive to any number of possibilities. One or two observers are suggesting that the improbable can yet become reality, namely that the United States and Britain can be baffled. After all, they note, the United States was baffled and beaten in Vietnam.
Editorial, The Bahama Journal
