It ain't easy

Nice post by Flea. Go check it out! Not everybody's a history buff so this is a valuable link if you are in that category or know someone who is (and who doesn't?). He shows how our "unique" historical situation in Iraq is not so unique, and we therefore have much to learn from how such conflicts were handled in the past. Flea also addresses the impact of new media technologies on war coverage, and how they impact people with no context in which to evaluate what they are being shown. I'll just add that the Nazis did try to create an underground terrorist network called "Operation Werewolf," which was supposed to do the kind of things we are seeing in Iraq. It never really took off. Germany was reeling from the bombing and five years of war. People just wanted normalcy to return as quickly as possible. Even terrorists have to eat. There was also no precedent in German culture to draw on for such a thing. The only thing close was the Nazis themselves and they were discredited by the war. In Iraq the jihadis have yet to be discredited. I'm not sure how that is to be done, but I am sure it needs to be done if the West is to succeed in its aims.