Press, political pressure helped 'lose' Fallujah, report says

[sabra]

Source: UPI

A secret intelligence assessment of the first battle of Fallujah shows that the U.S. military thinks that it lost control over information about what was happening in the town, leading to "political pressure" that ended its April 2004 offensive with control being handed to Sunni insurgents.

"The outcome of a purely military contest in Fallujah was always a foregone conclusion — coalition victory," read the assessment, prepared by analysts at the U.S. Army's National Ground Intelligence Center, or NGIC.

"But Fallujah was not simply a military action, it was a political and informational battle. ... The effects of media coverage, enemy information operations and the fragility of the political environment conspired to force a halt to U.S. military operations," concluded the assessment.

It added that the decision to order an immediate assault on Fallujah, in response to the televised killing of four contractors from the private military firm Blackwater, effectively prevented the Marine Expeditionary Force charged with retaking the town from carrying out "shaping operations," such as clearing civilians from the area, which would have improved their chances of success.

Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080102/FOREIGN/780456096/1003

[underpants]

1. Yeah the Pentagon sure has had trouble with that pesky press

Just ask Pat Tillman or Jessica Lynch

[hobbit709]

2. The "press' helped lose Nam too.

If the powers that be didn't have the press to blame when one of their misadventures turns into a total FUBAR, they'd have to find another scapegoat. And the next one may not be so complaisant.

[MisterP]

11. Melani McAlister's "Epic Encounters" finds that Americans' hyper-investment in

Israel really started after the evacuation of Saigon: the 1977 Kampala commando raid by Netanyahu's brother "showed 'em," and the American right felt that take-no-prisoners butchery was the way to go--regardless of the "traitorous media" and its "pro-Muslim-Untermensch fabrications."

[madrchsod]

3. could it be that they blew the fuck out of the city

because blackwater sent their under armed mercenaries into a very pissed off city?

i guess by their reasoning My Lai was a success

[ConcernedCanuk]

4. 4 MERCENARIES - hired killers, got hanged by the RESIDENTS of Iraq

.
.
.

And USA military went in and killed hundreds, if not thousands of innocents to "even the score" so to speak

And remember,

most of the USA munitions are poisoned with Depleted Uranium,

so now the whole city of Fallujah is toxic

- killing Iraqis for generations to follow

"Mission Accomplished"

[Rambis]

10. bingo!

the generals on the ground even said on night line "blackwater cost us fallujah"

[saigon68]

13. Good Riddance to the rubbish

That attended the first Fallujah Bar-Be-Que

[EFerrari]

17. And those murders were in response to a year of people sitting

outside of Abu Ghraib - 20 km away.

[boricua79]

5. in other words,

"if it weren't for you meddling kids, I would have gotten away with it"....Scooby Doo military policy.

Seriously, it's the old "we lost Vietnam because the press showed body bags" argument. The military wants carte blanche to be a brutal machine in an attempt to shock and awe the population into fearful submission. They want to recreate the Israeli situation in Palestinian territories...where the population is swiftly controlled...if only for a few moments.

They should know better. They should know that the roots of terrorism and resistance are to be found in the ruins of "total war" policies. Even with press coverage, the military made of Fallujah what the Russians did with Grozny, Chechnya. They used phosphorus bombs...they used depleted uranium...they went all out and destroyed the village "to save it". And even then, they complain that the press was the source of their loss.

What has this nation become!?

[saigon68]

12. What has this nation become!?

A Nation Led by Thuggish War Criminals like Gangster Cheney !!! That's what.

And millions of lobotomized, right wing, religious sheep that Bray and Clap at every killing of islamic sub-humanoid types.

[boricua79]

6. in other words,

"if it weren't for you meddling kids, I would have gotten away with it"....Scooby Doo military policy.

Seriously, it's the old "we lost Vietnam because the press showed body bags" argument. The military wants carte blanche to be a brutal machine in an attempt to shock and awe the population into fearful submission. They want to recreate the Israeli situation in Palestinian territories...where the population is swiftly controlled...if only for a few moments.

They should know better. They should know that the roots of terrorism and resistance are to be found in the ruins of "total war" policies. Even with press coverage, the military made of Fallujah what the Russians did with Grozny, Chechnya. They used phosphorus bombs...they used depleted uranium...they went all out and destroyed the village "to save it". And even then, they complain that the press was the source of their loss.

What has this nation become!?

*DUPE...PLEASE DELETE!*

[karynnj]

7. That is utter nonsense

1) Bush had control of both Houses of Congress and even many Democrats were completely on his side in April 2004. There was no effort that I saw to push Bush to hold back at all.

2) Given that, if Bush changed his plans because he was afraid of bad press, away from a plan that he thought was good, what does that say about him. The press, to my knowledge, has no control over what the military does. The problem was also the lack of any reasonable political situation in IRAQ.

The Democrats and the media have not gotten Bush to change ONE thing on Iraq. He got EVERYTHING he wanted each time, this is his mess.

[Javaman]

8. So how does an army "lose" a battle via the media and political pressure when all the

press was sanitized and only the real truth came out AFTER the battle?

I mean, it's not like there were people milling around TV sets at the corner store in fallujah complaining while the city was being carpet bombed. What is this fucking mayberry?

what a load of shit. the army is fucked up. it's micro managed by rightwing neo-con arm chair, no leadership skill set, religious nutjobs, that believe in some sort of zealots manifest destiny that "gods will" will prevail and deliver the US a victory in the great crusade against the muslim evil doers.

christ on a pogo stick!!! the inmates run the asylum.

[gratuitous]

9. The epitaph of a donkey

"It wasn't our fault! Someone who wasn't even there stopped us!" Pathetic. And it would be laughable if the inevitable results of these fuck-ups weren't so lethal to so many people who had nothing whatsoever to do with this complete fuck up. But that's not a story the Washington Times is interested in.

[donkeyotay]

14. The "political pressure" was George W. Bush's "re-election" nt

[ohio2007]

15. It's been months a US soldier or marine was killed in Fallujah

The marines had a full lock down on the few remaining city blocks of Fallujah. Nobody was getting in or out but they were not allowed to secure and finish the city.......

It was the politicians that were listening to the "Stalingrad" comparisons being frantacillay reported by the MSM and so,

they removed the noose.

To bad the marines obeyed those orders.

[EFerrari]

16. Yeah, you lost control of your WAR CRIMES.

[DavidDvorkin]

18. You might say they were stabbed in back

The right wing has been using the same rhetoric regarding Viet Nam for decades.

It was also used decades before Viet Nam, by a national leader preparing his countrymen for a world war and trying to convince them that they hadn't lost the previous one on the battlefields.

[LynnTheDem]

19. Gee, and all this time I thought it was coz of all the dead kids.

The children killed in George W. bUsh's illegal invasion war crime assault on Fallujah.