"No war plan survives first contact with the enemy. But look at our awesome war plan!"

by shamanic

Eric Martin (who does some duty here at the Newshog) has a must-read over at Total Information Awareness. There's a lot more excellent than what I'm quoting, but I thought this was a really important idea to mainstream:

The way that those that favor military confrontation with Iran attempt to reconcile the current predicament involving our armed forces with the increased strain that would result from the opening of a third front is to promise, again, a quick and easy war. This time, the best case scenario is supposed to play out something like this: We unleash a massive campaign of airstrikes against Iranian targets and Iran (despite its significant retaliatory capacity) does not respond in any way that would require an escalation and use of ground forces on our part.
...
In recent years, Iraq war supporters have taken to lecturing those that have criticized the disconnect between rosy war plans and actual execution by frequently turning to the military truism that no battle plan survives first contact with the enemy. Yet many of those same Iraq war defenders would have us plunge headlong into another potentially devastating conflict under the assumption that our war plan will survive in near pristine condition after the fighting starts - and throughout.

Read the whole thing, but definitely internalize the contradiction he points out in these passages. It's as if those agitating for war with Iran are saying, "Of course Iraq didn't go as planned! Wars never go as planned. But we have a great plan for taking out Iran!"

Thanks Eric.