Hi. Webdiarists Clem Colman and Ross Nelson have done their own analysis of what’s going on in this war Iraq for Webdiary. They have backgrounds in IT Security, scour the net for information, and have an interest in the history of conflict.

They’ve based their analysis on news reports, other information sources, and some background knowledge of warfare. What is stated, whilst based on facts where available, is their opinion.

Thanks guys. I hope you’ll become our resident “‘analysts” on how the war is going. Another Webdiarist has volunteered to track the debate on the legality of the war and will report soon. Is anyone interested in tracking and analysing the propaganda war, the media coverage, or some other aspect of this incredible “tipping point” in world affairs?

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Overall Tactical

Iraqi forces are making use of bad weather to launch counterattacks against Coalition forces in a number of locations [breaking news – no real analysis except that Iraq may have overextended herself. If the forces are still in the open when weather clears Coalition Air Power will probably inflict significant damage]

Basra: The Coalition continue to talk up the prospect of revolt in Basra. The basis for this information still seems to be the claim that mortars were fired from one part of the city against the other. However, Al Jazeer, who have access to Basra, have denied the claims. In addition British Commanders near Basra were surprised by the news when questioned by media.

We can probably expect to see one more roll of the Psychological War dice for Basra. The prospect of revolt did result in Rumsfeld changing his rhetoric from weeks back to days, so perhaps this is a significant development.

Around Basra the Coalition claim to have destroyed a division, but they still only have an unconfirmed 3,500 prisoners in the entire theatre. A division typically runs 8,000-12,000, so even at a 30% casualty rate (a heavy number) there are still a minimum of 3,000-4,000 unaccounted for troops from this division. There are either a lot of bodies around Basra, or there are significant elements of the division still in place. The media should probably be challenging the claim of a destroyed division based on this analysis.

For Basra we can probably expect the UK units, with considerably more experience in close quarters infantry combat, to bear the brunt of any assault with support from US marines. However, the Coalition may just decide to lay siege instead.

Baghdad and Surrounds: Iraq probably made use of the unexpected lull to reposition forces to face the threat now that they knows US axis of advance more precisely.

Republican Guard positions around Baghdad have almost certainly come under conventional bombardment by Coalition air. It is not clear at this stage whether B52s are being flown in county to perform these bombardments, as their previous attacks were, we believe, stand off cruise missile attacks from near the Turkish Border. At this stage there may be concerns about the capabilities of Iraqi air defences which prevent the B52s being deployed for conventional bombardment near Baghdad.

Umm Qasar: Umm Qasar continues to prove to be a great propaganda win for Iraq. Although the Coalition has declared the area secure reports continue of sporadic fighting, and the Coalition will probably have to deploy more forces here than anticipated to protect against attack by irregular forces.

Claims in the Iraqwar.ru reports that these positions have been reinforced by Iraqi Armour, seem to be a bit far fetched based on all other information available.

Najaf: The heavy fighting around Najaf has lead to the first admitted destruction of US M1A1 Abrams Main Battle Tanks. Reports say that Iraqi forces are firing Tow missiles from the back of pickup trucks and other civilian vehicles. Importantly, this indicates that Iraqi forces can attrition US Tanks at range without risking significant assets.

Also today there are reports of a column of 1000 vehicles of Iraqi Republican Guard leaving Baghdad headed to Najaf. This deployment was at least started under the cover of the recent sandstorm. This seems a significant deployment, and is discussed in more detail in the strategic section below.

Strategic

Reports of discussions of troop rotation in Australia suggest that it is now anticipated that this war will drag on longer than expected.

The Psychological War campaign, which the Coalition had invested so much in, in that it could be claimed that they under resourced their conventional forces due to their belief in its success, seems at this stage to have been an abject failure. In terms of why the Iraqi people would still support Saddam Hussein, they may wish to consider this analogy: Stalin killed lots of his own and other peoples between 1925 and 1941. He led a disastrous war in Finland (and learnt from it). His own people would have gladly shot him in the head if they could. But they still hated the Germans more…..

The failure of the Psy War has left the Coalition dangerously under resourced, particularly with respect to armour (at the start of the campaign 500 Main Battle Tanks against the Iraqi’s 2,600, even though the Coalition tanks are individually superior to Iraq tanks). In addition to that, the strategy of bypassing pockets of resistance to reach Baghdad has left the Coalition’s supply lines dangerously exposed. It may well be some time before the lead units within 80km of Baghdad are properly resupplied whilst the Coalition organises appropriately protected convoys (which will pull armour assets back from frontline units for escort duties).

The deployment of 1000 mobile Republican Guard units to Najaf under the cover of a sandstorm leaves little doubt that Iraqi C&C and Communications are still in place, at least to some extent. Furthermore, the Iraqi’s are so buoyed by successes, as well as identifying the Coalition strategy, that they feel confident redeploying assets away from Baghdad. However, this may have been over confident. In a static defence the Iraqis had little resupply concerns. This may change that.

The Units in place near Baghdad have insufficient superiority, and are probably in no condition to begin an assault for some days. However, there may be skirmishes as they attempt to probe the Iraqi defences.

At this stage it seems likely that the Coalition will await the arrival of the 1st and the 4th divisions before attempting any true assault on Baghdad. In short, they have significantly underestimated the enemy, and are unlikely to make the same mistake again.

Coalition forces continue to battle to secure bridges across the Euphrates, which have been reported secure more than once. It seems that they are meeting stiff resistance, and that Iraqi forces are mounting planned and successful counter-attacks against the Coalition.

Finally on a more personal note, it seems from the nature and character of language from Rumsfeld, particularly with chopping and changing between using weeks, then days, etc, that he may well be micro managing Franks.

In the meantime, Saddam Hussein has probably taken great confidence in making comparisons between the Coalition’s advance across Iraq, and Hitler’s advance across the Soviet Union. Seeing himself as Stalin, he may well see many parallels.