Lileks decontructs the media’s sudden concern over the ‘sudden resistance’ in Iraq.

The BBC (about which I will say more later) is reporting that the mood at CentCom is morose and dispirited; I get the impression that Tommy Frank has retired to his bunk in tears, and most of the officers are are 24-hour suicide watch. Ten Marines dead. No one expected that. The plans called for zero casualties, after all. This changes everything. Rip up the war plan.
At Normandy ten men died every second. Up and down the coast. All the damn day long.

Lileks is certainly more devoted to the end results that become possible in this war than I am, but even I with my wishy-washy ideals have to say this: we signed off on this, if not with ink than with supportive silence from far more than the required majority, and there’s a sense that we’re offended that this time isn’t like the last time (where we bombed and bombed and bombed and sent in ground troops only to clean up the confetti and used condoms when it was over) — this is a ground war because that’s what the situation calls for.

To be surprised by the fact that there’s a body count, to use the word quagmire four days into the offensive is to rob the troops of the sort of moral support they deserve. I still don’t know that I support the war, but I certainly know I support the troops; their decision to join the armed forces to begin with, their resolution to support their commander in chief, and their right to risk their lives in hostile territory if commanded to occupy it — I’m not going to belittle their effort with worried comments that we haven’t won yet. It hasn’t been a damn week.

People are comparing this to Viet Nam already. Do they to up their viewer numbers as badly as that? Good grief.

I'm right there with ya. I don't like the war but I support the troops.
Don't even get me started on how they treated our guys coming back from Nam. I tend to take it a little personally.

What strikes me is, the US is moving as fast or faster than any other army has during a mechanized attack and even with the worst casualty estimates we've lost under 200 soldiers.

Even Poland took 27 days to take, and that was with 60 German divisions, or about 400,000 thousand troops.

No plot survives the players. No war without casualties.
Did they think it would be bloodless?
Yee ghads, are they ever severed from reality.