Airstrip One

Killing Ground

Iraqi exile Burhan al-Chalabi writes in the Guardian "You should have known we'd fight". Through some left wing drivel it seems that the Iraqis who are fighting, are fighting a patriotic war in much the same way as the Russians did. This is dangerous for two reasons. We are not in Baghdad in "four to five days" (remember that), although plans do slip in war and we shouldn't make too much of that. However guerilla wars against occupying armies can be damn difficult to fight, hence any idea of colonial occupation reconstruction should be in the short term.

One particular sentence scared me witless:

Iraqis - in particular the Arab-Iraqi Shi'ites - fought bitter and hard and suffered thousands of casualties in order to liberate Iraq from the British occupation. They will do so again.

What have the Shi'ites got against us? Not only were they deadly in Lebanon but they are about half the population in Iraq.

UPDATE: Here's more on Chalabi the leader of the Iraqi National Congress. Reading my above piece I didn't realise that I stressed his interest in giving the above advice. Consider it stressed.