Doc in the Box

Culminating Point of Victory:

You'll recall "Clausewitz & The Triangle," in which I argued that the traditional mode of victory -- what von Clauzewitz called "the culminating point of victory" -- was not available to the Iraqi insurgents.

Doc in the Box, mourning a vicious slaughter of friends he had while in the sandbox, makes the point in personal terms:

The insurgences, whom I believe are foreign nationals mostly, aren't doing anyone over there any good. They're installing fear in everybody, they're not only attacking us, they're attacking the very people that are trying to raise the country out of post war barbarism that seems to be running rampant. These people don't have the good of the Iraqi people at heart, they don't worship Allah, they worship Chaos.

This is the true terrorism, when you're trying to change a country by taking out anybody that can make a difference. Relief workers, people that help the poor? Doctors, Teachers, potential Leaders?

After such attacks, who is ever going to take these people seriously?

That is why they cannot win. That is why we will, and it is why we must. Only we ourselves can lose, by talking ourselves out of fighting it through to the end. The good folk of Iraq are counting on us.