The Monte Cassino Test

The strike on a mosque compound in Fallujah is not exactly a new thing in the history of warfare. Can we get some Gurkhas in the mix?

Comments

[Todd Fletcher]

The fact that they used the mosque as a fort in the first place shows that we've been too restrained.

[nds]

Great Post! Jeff A. Taylor

I wish someone on TV would counter an Islamist sputtering about the improprietry of attacking a mosque (I just saw a former Arab league secretary complaining about the counter-attack in Fallujah) by pointing out that we left a monastery full of dead Nazis in 1943. A dead fascists in monastery, a dead fascist in a mosque, either way it's a dead fascist.

[anon]

"a dead fascist in a mosque"

Your claim might make some sense if you were not claiming that you are liberating those 'fascists'.

[jon]

Hiding in a mosque is okay. Attacking from a mosque is not okay.

The bombing was a-okay.

[Mo]

If you hide in a mosque with a small militia, armed to the teeth with an assortment of automatic weapons, it's only fair to be considered a military target. You desecrated the ground first.

[Mo]

On the plus side, at least the Sunni and Shiites are finally cooperating. (ducks)

[anon]

kwais:

I see more Iraqies in Iraqi cities protesting the 'occupation' and dnouncing the 'occupiers', than Iraqies holding the welcome signs. So, unless you are liberating them against their wishes, you ain't liberating them.

Another point the US military claimed that the Iraqies were shooting from the mosque, the Iraqies deny that. The US government lied before, so whatever they say isn't a given any more.

[M. Simon]

The Iraqis are voting....

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,1185792,00.html

Secular.

Proof positive that separation of chuch and state is impossible in Iraq and that bombing mosques will make us more enemies than friends.

OK?

[kwais]

I would just like to point out that there are ghurkas in Iraq. More of them would be cool though.

If we could get mostly ghurkas and south Koreans there, that would be cool. They have a reputation for not pussyfooting around. They wouldn't worry how holy the place is that the bad guys are shooting us from.

[kwais]

anon,
we are supposedly liberating the people from those fascists, we are not liberating the individual terrorists, except in that we are liberating their souls to go hang out with the 72 virgins or 72 raisins or whatever.

[Quasimodo]

Sanctuary! Sanctuary!

[joe]

Like Sharon, you people are so eager to demonstrate that the religiously-offensive strike was morally acceptable (a point I grant you), that the question of whether it was smart, as in useful in our attempts to succeed at our ultimate strategy, falls by the wayside.

This war isn't being fought to make hawks feel moral (I hope). It's being fought for the purpose of establishing a friendly, liberal government in Iraq. Are 40 more dead insurgents really so important it outweighs the harm this move does to our efforts to rally support from ordinary Iraqis?

[A joker, a smoker, a midnite t]

It's ok with me if Al-qaida blows up a few churches in return. Seems perfectly reasonable.

[Stephen Fetchet]

Hey, you march your Army into a mosque, we're gonna take it out of there.

Seems to me, people around here should be in favor of separation of Church & State.
Besides, the Constitution forbids the government from doing anything "respecting religion." If this isn't following that directive, I don't know what is.

[Critic]

I favor the separation of church and earth.

[Jean Bart]

If your point is that the U.S. will elect to slaughter its own men by incomptent generalship - that is you are going to raise up another General Mark Clarke - well, I can say nothing else. Anyway, your analogy is a rather two-edged sword.

[peachy]

are the poles fighting around fallujah? because that would help the analogy, you know (also some free french, but i guess this would be the wrong war for that, eh?) oh - and monte cassino being full of italians too, rather than foreign 'occupiers' (italy having been, you know, on the allied side for months)... hmm, maybe not all knocked-to-pieces places of worship are equal, after all. malash...

[Jean Bart]

peachy,

Some New Zealanders too (though they are of course absent from Iraq as well).