I have heard that some wars, or at least some battles within wars, have been fought with some semblance of chivalry. That seems strange to me but possibly true. I don’t believe, however, that that has ever, or could ever, be the case with a gorilla war. I believe that the present war in Iraq, at least the part of it that is between the U.S. and whoever the hell we are fighting there, and who ever is a fighting us [I’m not sure they are always the same] is a gorilla war. Debate the reasons for invading the sovereign state of Iraq somewhere else and recognize that here I am talking about the nature of the conflict between the actual combatants, the people pulling triggers, how the combatants come to respond to each other, and how that forms a feedback loop that kills the possibility, or at least the reasonable likelihood, that the U.S. military can determine, through force, a good outcome in Iraq.

  First this. When I see a blog challenged the challenge often comes in the form of; where’s your proof, where’s your link, where’s your documentation? I offer none, this is just my own speculation and interpretation for what ever it is worth. Take it or leave it, my feelings can’t be hurt on this subject.

I imagine here what I think is a fair picture of a generic infantryman who has spent some time in the trigger pulling position in a gorilla war. I don’t see this as necessarily describing only an American soldier but instead more the the universal soldier. He could be the young man of any nation, a young man who is sometimes brave, often scared, sometimes terrified, has developed an attitude, sometimes feels rage, and has seen the closest friends he has yet known die senselessly or be hideously injured at the hand of some unidentified person who looks like everyone else in the strange land he has been sent to. This young man has an M-16 in his hand, artillery and more available through the radio he carries. He has a license to kill, and the will to win and live. When a tense situation comes up, this young soldier, whatever his training, is not prepared, or in the right frame of mind, to be an ambassador of good will. He is more likely to start shooting. Someone is very likely to die. 

Maybe you can imagine the psychology of this soldier. Now, try to empathize with the people of the city he occupies and relate to their feelings. When he first entered the city, let’s say Baghdad, the strategy was to crush the traditional military defenses in a campaign so powerful and brutal that it would shock and awe the population and convince them that resistance was pointless. For a while it looked like it worked, at least to our short sighted non-planners. Bush was so thrilled and confident that he high-fived his way all the way to a carrier full of non-combat support troops excited to be coming home and ready to cheer in the spirit of the hero welcome they were already getting. There Bush famously said “Mission accomplished”. He, unfortunately, just didn’t understand the folks in Iraq. These people are as human as you and I. They have foreign soldiers occupying their homeland which is deeply offensive and humiliating to people of any land. They have had their homes destroyed and seen their parents, spouses, children and friends killed in the conflict started by these foreigners. They know that many of their friends and family who have had the courage to act on the completely natural and understandable human instinct to fight back have been killed or captured . They know that many of those captured have been tortured. They hate the people who have done this. They would hate them regardless of where they came from or how they felt about them before the war began. They will hate them until they die and their children will grow up hating them. Some of them will act on this hate.

Now, reader,  try to mentally place yourself in  Baghdad. You are the soldier described above. The city contains many people who both want to, and are willing, to try to kill you. Most of the other people are at least sympathetic to them and will help them if they can. Some just wish someone, anyone, would win and take over so things would calm down and life could go on. A very few actually support the invaders but are afraid to say so or to overtly help them. Every single one of these people looks just like every other one to you. Every single one of them can spot you from a mile away.

OK, soldier, the stage is set. Your job today is to go out and do something constructive. Maybe you should drive around and look for signs that say something like “insurgent inside” or “terrorist headquarters“. Maybe you will get a less than friendly look from someone that will tip you off. Maybe you should just kick in doors until you find something suspicious. Maybe you decide not to be so pushy and just drive around until the opportunity presents itself to someone and they shoot you. That is really all you can do, isn’t it, just be a target and then respond because you are in a gorilla war in a city and you are the guy wearing a uniform/target. When you hit the ground bleeding your buddies will suddenly want to kill something, anything. They might open fire on the house that they think the fire might have come from, they can call in artillery on that block while reinforcements are coming, then they can round up anybody they can catch and haven’t shot in an adrenalin rush of rage and send them to the local interrogators where they will be questioned, maybe with the “gloves off“, until that person comes up with some damn name that the interpreter likely can’t understand anyway, and your surviving buddies can go looking for him the next day. They might come to call their daily patrol a cakewalk. If their daily patrol consists of twenty men, maybe they can think of how it would be more effective with forty men. Of course the reality is they will only have nineteen until your replacement arrives, and maybe now your limbs only number three. Maybe those nineteen can do something tomorrow that will improve life in the city though, and maybe things will get better, but I can’t imagine what, can you? I can only imagine making more enemies.

Now reader, you may think I imagine Iraqi cities wrongly, and maybe I do. After all I’ve never been to one. Here’s something else to think about though. Here is how I imagine the use of an IED. The kind I am thinking of is a command detonated explosive like is used to attack American troops, usually in vehicles. They are usually set up next to the road or even buried in the middle of the road Think of the pictures you’ve seen. These things are used in crowded urban areas. Do you think no one notices when they are being placed? They are along normal transit routes that they can expect their target to use. The person who detonates the mine must stay in a place with the road in view and the detonator in his hand until the target comes along so that he can push the trigger at exactly the right time. Again, do you think none of the locals notice. One reason for these attacks to take place in congested areas is so the attacker can run and melt into the local population. Have you ever heard of one of them being caught? Do you think, though, that the American soldiers don’t respond? I think they do, but I don’t think it is always appropriately. Hell, there is rarely an appropriate response possible. What would it be? If they respond, as you would, or your kid would, or your neighbor would, and that response is not appropriate, then we can assume that they often respond inappropriately. What I am getting at is that traumatic injuries are ugly, traumatic death is ugly, killing is ugly, and when these things happen there is normally someone left around who is real pissed off. Pissed off people with guns in their hands look for something to shoot. For them it is war, not an abstraction. Not something to blog about and refer to in Latin phrases. It becomes about killing. The circle is joined. The killing continues.

Back home, you hear someone say bring it on and you throw the remote at the tv, but you miss. Your not so good yet with your left hand.