This is slightly off-topic, and maybe there's a more appropriate thread but I've not been reading them all....

Channel 4 news in the UK tonight ran a lengthy item from a reporter following US troops operating in the Sunni triangle. The item was not, in my view, anti-US, and the point was clearly made that the lives of US troops were obviously at risk. But the behaviour, body-language, and actual language of those troops was recklessly brutal and confrontational even in communities they might have hoped to win over. C4's Baghdad correspondent Lindsey Hilsum made the point that US soldiers were applying Israeli tactics, notwithstanding that Israeli tactics make no provision for winning hearts and minds - they've given up on that,long since - whereas that is still an objective for the US.

A retired Brit officer, Maj Gen Cordingley, who was involved in the earlier Gulf war, noted that American troops had been in action for more than nine months, whereas the Brits had learned (from operations in Belfast and Derry in particular) to rotate troops regularly.

The overall impression was of an operation hopelessly mismatched to its objectives. Two or three times people said the military were at last learning the balue of a more intelligent approach, but it seemed to me that it was way too late. The best resourced and equipped army on earth has dug itself into a hole, and is still digging.

Those in this thread who think Saddam has been the inspiration for continuing insurrection perhaps should think again. My guess is that his capture will affect things not one iota, because the US military is making new enemies every day, out of sheer stupidity.