Bobert,

Thanks for the continued stream of pure waffle and vague generalisation - no concrete ideas, no suggested means to any realistic solutions.

By the way don't worry about creating lots more Osama's - there are already enough of them and none of them require any justification for their actions. They are against you because you live the life you do - with new and improved methods of communication and free access to uncensored information, the way of life they hold so dear and by which they control the people they regard as their power base, is threatened, so they vilify what they see as the source of that threat and direct their "warriors" against it - they have no goals, they have no aims.

The model by the way Bobert only held good in so much that you had a group of people out-numbered by 17 to 1, in a confined area. The bulk of the number do not want to be there and have no particular affinity with armed men holding them (remember your assessment was that the RG, SRG & FS personnel would treat the population of Baghdad as "shields" or hostages). Your prediction was of countless thousands of US "boys" coming home in C-5's in body bags - how many casualties did the Russian Security Forces suffer Bobert.

Now the variances to the model. The hostages are not inside one building but a number of buildings, the population out-number the RG, SRG & FS personnel, not by 17:1 but by 30:1. To fight they will have to keep one eye on their hostages and the other on the troops coming in. That reduces their effectiveness to fifty percent without a shot being fired. They also have to sleep and eat. I don't think all that many will want to die, either hostages or Saddam's lads - they didn't last time, the same was true in Kabul and Khandahar, and these were Osama's proteges. Oh yeah, "We wish for death, as you wish for life" - they've yet to prove it in any way shape or form as an armed force confronted with an armed force - its a great deal easier against soft targets.

Now NicoleC's good question Bobert - not so good really:

"I'm curious how many of you who are advocating the slaughter of Iraqi civilians to achieve political ends were upset when American civilians were slaughtered to achieve political ends on April 19, 1995 or September 11, 2001?"

Point 1
No-one is advocating the slaughter of Iraqi civilians. The Iraqi's are being offered every opportunity to ensure that that does not happen - all they have to do is comply with what they signed up to do back in 1991.

Point 2
The attainment of what political ends were being sought on 19th April 1995 and on 11th September 2001?