October 13, 2002
The New York Times
Foreseeing a Bloody Siege in Baghdad
By BARRY R. POSEN
B RUSSELS Advocates of regime change in Iraq have presented an
optimistic view of the coming war. Most assert that the Iraqi military
will not fight. A dazzling attack by smart weapons and computer
viruses will shut down Iraq's military nervous system. Western forces
will dash for key military and political centers, cutting the Iraqi
military up into isolated fragments. Most troops will surrender; a few
diehards will huddle with Saddam Hussein and patiently await their
destruction by a second wave of smart bombs.
The war could indeed go this way, but it may not.
While the Iraqi military is less than half as capable as it was in
1991, when it suffered a devastating defeat, this will be a different
kind of war with different military objectives. These objectives will
give Iraq the opportunity to impose significant costs on the United
States.
In 1991 American forces fought Iraq's army in open desert, using the
tactics and technology they had developed to defeat Soviet tank armies
on the plains of Europe. Today, the United States plans to conquer a
country full of towns and cities and civilians.
Urban combat is Iraq's best option, as many have observed. Combat
within cities minimizes American military advantages and offers the
greatest possibility for the United States to make mistakes to harm
civilians and create the kind of collateral damage that can cause
consternation in the Arab world and here at home.
Iraq's military strategy would not be to defeat American forces but to
inflict pain and buy time for frustration to mount, enabling Mr.
Hussein to make one last bid to save his regime through compromise.
This is the strategy of the weak.
To understand the difficulties of urban combat, one should imagine the
brutal trench fighting of World War I conducted in an endless
multistoried maze. The urban landscape provides the defenders with
layer upon layer of defensive positions, places where they can
retreat, regroup and prepare to fight again. The urban environment
neutralizes the key technical advantage of United States soldiers in
ground warfare the ability to locate and kill the enemy at ranges much
greater than those from which the enemy can locate and kill them.
Past experience suggests that small forces can impose high costs on
even a qualitatively and quantitatively superior attacker in street
fighting.
The last time American forces tried to take a heavily defended city
was in the Vietnam War. Two North Vietnamese divisions took the city
of Hue; a combined South Vietnamese and United States Marine and Army
force of similar size with superior firepower took four weeks and
suffered more than 600 dead and 3,800 wounded to get it back. They
destroyed much of the city in the process.
Recent war games and simulations suggest that large-scale urban
warfare hasn't gotten much easier particularly since America's main
military advantage, technology, isn't as much of an advantage in
cities. The Iraqi military has had considerable experience fighting in
cities, both during the Iran war and in putting down the domestic
uprisings that took place after the Persian Gulf war. Similarly,
Iraq's military engineers know how to reinforce buildings where troops
will lie in wait and to construct other defenses in urban
environments.
Most discussions of urban fighting in Iraq imagine a single
concentrated battle, but given that greater Baghdad stretches for
almost 150 square miles and has a population of more than five
million, American forces will probably face a series of hard fights.
Baghdad would likely be defended with a network of interlocking urban
fortresses, most within greater Baghdad, but some as many as 25 miles
from the center along key avenues of approach. Each Iraqi defensive
bastion would likely possess dozens of artillery pieces.
American forces will not be able to bypass the outer ring of positions
without risking their own lines of supply. Elimination of the outer
ring of defenses may be costly and time consuming, because they would
receive artillery and rocket support from more heavily armed forces
arrayed near Baghdad's center. What's more, these batteries, hidden in
the city, would not be easy for the United States military to knock
out.
Iraqi forces could be in it for the long haul. According to
intelligence reports, Iraq is stockpiling ammunition, fuel and food in
key spots. The Iraqis can mix their six Republican Guard divisions and
four special Republican Guard brigades with their 17 poorly equipped
regular army divisions, thereby coercing troops of doubtful loyalty to
remain in the fight, as the Soviets and the Nazis did in World War II.
Allied air power may not be able to provide as much assistance as we
have come to expect. Iraq's air defense organization has large numbers
of antiaircraft guns and shoulder-fired missiles that, if concentrated
in Baghdad, would make it dangerous for allied aircraft or helicopters
to fly at low altitudes to support ground troops. Reconnaissance
drones, used to great effect in Afghanistan, would have a hard time
surviving.
Iraq is believed to retain some chemical weapons and the means to
deliver them. The Iraqi Air Force can be discounted, but Iraqi
artillery is plentiful and has considerable experience firing chemical
warheads some of which have a range of 18 miles. Iraq would likely
save most of its chemical shells for key moments in the battle. But
small-scale chemical attacks are to be expected in order to force
American troops to take complex and uncomfortable steps to protect
themselves. The very existence of these systems will likely encourage
United States forces to stay beyond artillery range as they try to
surround and isolate Baghdad, making it difficult to maintain a tight
cordon.
Finally, the Iraqi regime will spare no effort to ensure full coverage
of any American mistakes that harm Iraqi civilians. Al Jazeera, the
satellite television network that has given a worldwide voice to so
much Arab resentment of the United States, will be ready to broadcast
from Baghdad. We can expect that the images it shows will not win
America much support.
Iraq cannot prevent an American military victory. But it might be able
to extend the war over weeks or months, imposing significant costs and
putting on a bloody show for the rest of the world. American political
and military leaders ought not to embark on this war of choice, unless
they are ready to pay the price.
Barry R. Posen, a professor of political science at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, is a German Marshall Fund fellow.
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