How Operation Iraqi Freedom could have been better

Duty Honor Country

Duty Honor Country

Active member
The forum has spent all kinds of time debating whether Operation Iraqi Freedom was the right thing to do, but we have never really looked back at the operation itself. I am going to throw this question out...

What things could have been done better in Iraq?


I will delete any off topic posts. Things like "the war was wrong" or "where are the WMD's?" are not to be discussed in this topic.
 
It needed international approval from the start to make it better, i believe in afghanistan having a multi-national force has made it better as the afganistan people dont believe the invasion was just a US invasion it was a UN backed world invasion.
http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=24406&archive=true

We needed to stop the insurgents entering the country (how i dont know)

A more softly-softly approach was needed, the american approach was a lot harsher then the british, and won no friends.

Those are just some of my views.
 
Haliburton makes it look to corporate. Conflict of interest with Cheney. Let Elf{french oil} have the contracts. The French are key diplomats here it`s not too late. Bush needs to talk more often and from his heart. We need wartime sacrifice in the homeland, energy habits maybe.
 
I think that USA underestimated the enemy and the Iraq people alot. It seems that they thought that the people would give USA standing ovasions (?) when they came in to Iraq. The basic problem in Iraq now is that some (most ?) of the people doesn't want to have them in Iraq.

If they should have had a more humble approach, like the british, it might been different now. USA should have learned more about the people and taught the soldiers more about how to behave towards the civilians. They must get the civilians over on their side, make them trust the Americans.

Of course it would have been better if the war was sanctioned by the UN and more countries took part in the war.

To fix the situation they got now I think they need more troops, more countries must take part in the war.

Thats all I come up with now. I'll be back :)
 
They all could have put more thought into the possibility of insurgents coming in and trying to take over. They were more thinking down the lines of a massive humanitarian crisis with poverty and starvation running rampant than a military crisis.
 
consumerbydesign said:
Haliburton makes it look to corporate. Conflict of interest with Cheney. Let Elf{french oil} have the contracts. The French are key diplomats here it`s not too late. Bush needs to talk more often and from his heart. We need wartime sacrifice in the homeland, energy habits maybe.
Click to expand...

I totally agree with you there. You can also expand your idea to include Iraqi companies. While I was in Iraq, I thought about how to win the hearts of the people. My thought turned to injecting money directly into the Iraqi economy. Instead of awarding US companies with contracts, award the reconstruction contracts to local companies. I mean, Iraq is not this uncivilized country. I saw signs of unfinished construction all over the place while I was there. These contracts would put Iraqis to work which puts all kinds of money into the economy. That is much better than giving out aid on the form of handouts to the people.

We definitely need to change our energy habits. Or policies in the middle east would be much different if we were not dependent on the black gold.

FlyingFrog said:
Be better by sending Arab troops into Iraq.
Something like 500,000 Arab troops.
Click to expand...

It's a good idea, but the Arab League of Nations won't approve that. The ALN said that they would not recognize the Interim Iraqi Government because none of the Iraq leaders are elected into their positions. Someone in the media pointed out that none of the country leaders in the ALN are elected to their positions. That point alone shows the world the ALN's view on Iraq. The ALN can hardly agree on anything except an extreme hatred of the US and Israel.
 
the_13th_redneck said:
More troops to police the streets once the authorities of Iraq under Saddam fell.
Click to expand...

If we hadn't decided to disband the Iraqi Army, we would have had thousands of trained Iraqis to restore the peace. Here is a piece that says it better than I can.

"The decision—decreed by the U.S.-led occupation authority's "Order No. 2," titled "The Dissolution of Entities"—is now widely seen as a turning point in the post-battlefield phase of the war. Removing a potential force for order from an inherently chaotic landscape, the decision allowed looters to flourish and worsened matters by unleashing thousands of ticked-off Iraqi ex-soldiers who no longer had paychecks but still had their guns. The ensuing riots stretched the already-sparse "coalition" forces still thinner. Finally, the elimination of the army destroyed all shreds of the Iraqi people's hopes that their sovereignty might be preserved. Gordon quotes one U.S. colonel as saying of the disbanding, "We changed from being a liberator to an occupier with that single decision."
SOURCE

I believe it was Paul Bremer who was the father of that stupid idea but approval came from higher. :?
 
I remember the problem with that was a political one.
Iraqis, being held by the same Iraqi army, was politically unacceptable, and could have been a huge stumbling block in winning hearts and minds.

What they *should* have done was sack all volunteer units or "special" units but keep the conscripts. I don't think it would have been hard to tell the public the conscripts were good guys who were now free from Saddam as well and now served to protect the Iraqis.
 
Yeah, the special units like the Republican Guard would have had to go. I believe the Iraqi Army was around 300,000 or so at the time it was disbanded. Even 50,000 Iraqi troops would have helped immensely in the days after major military operations were over in Iraq. Those troops would have gone a long way as to the prevention of the looting that went on. Not to mention putting an Iraqi face on the security in Iraq.
 
The borders were not cut off as well as they should have been, nothing more, nothing less. Zarqawi's aid comes through damascus, Sadr's through Tehran.
 
I think the governing authority should have banned civilians from owning weapons long ago. Here is a piece from the USMC's Small Wars Manual that explains why.

"If it has not been done previously by the intervening forces,
the disarming of the people should be initiated upon the formal
declaration of military government, and must be regarded as the
most vital step in the restoration of tranquility. The disarming of
the native population of a country in which military occupation has
taken place is an imperative necessity."

"Peaceful inhabitants, voluntarily surrendering their arms,
should be guaranteed protection by those forces charged with the
restoration and maintenance of peace and order. where it possible to
disarm completely the -whole population, the military features of
small wars would resolve themselves into simple police duties of a
routine nature. Obviously, considering the size of the population,
the extent of territory, and the limited number of available troops,
any measures adopted will not he 100 percent effective. However,
if properly executed, the native military organizations and a large
proportim~, of the populace may be disarmed voluntarily; many
others will be disarmed by military or police measures designed to
locate and confiscate arms held clandestinely, These measures will
limit the outstanclin~ arms to those held by a few individuals who
will seek to hide them. In many instances, these hidden arms will
be exposed to the elements or to deterioration which in time will
accomplish the same end as surrender or confiscation. Although
complete disarmament may not be attained, yet the enforcement
of any ordinance restricting the possession of arms will result in the
illegal possession of such arms oldy by opposing native forces, outlaws or
bandits, and a few inh:lbitants who will evade this ordinance as they
would attempt to do with ally unpopular legislation. Comparatively
few of this latter class will use their weapons except in selfdefense.
Thus the inhabitants are partially segregated at the outset
of the negotiations. The chswning order will probably not influence
the professional guerrilla fighters to give up their weapons but,
such source of supp]y and replenishment of weapons and anmunition
within the country will be practically eliminated."
 
I agree with most of the points made here.

Well Doody, I think Donald Rumfeld has to go. Everytime his head appears on the telly and he opens that mouth my blood starts to boil. I bet a lot of Iraqis' feel the same.

He is a public relations nightmare. One of Bush's buddies!!!!!!

The bad security will continue unfortunately. If you can't make the Green Zone safe what can be made safe? Disbanding the Iraqi army conscripts is now seen as a stupid decision.

Using Chalabi as a potential leader????????? What a sad joke on the Iraqi people.

How come Garner only lasted for 5 minutes??????

The US doing deals with the Kurds, is going to come back and haunt the US when someone tries to work out the power sharing arrangements in the future government. Particularly with the Shiite majority.

The election in January and beyond are going to be interesting times!!!
 
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