October 10, 2003 - Before the race for Baghdad began on March 20th the Secretary of Defense was told that the occupation of Iraq would require a force of 300,000; would cost at least $100 Billion a year; and the duration of the mission would be not less than 5 years. Rumsfeld advised the President that those estimates were wildly pessimistic. On April 9th the Army rolled into Baghdad with surprisingly light casualties; toppled the statues of Saddam for the imbedded television cameras; while Baghdad Bob denied the chaos closing around him. To all appearances the Battle of Baghdad had been won and the stage was set for the President’s triumphal flight to the deck of the Abraham Lincoln to declare the Second Iraqi War was over.

Except that it was not over. Six months later Saddam is still at large and apparently directing the continuation of the war that America launched in a new guerilla phase. While Donald Kay scoured the countryside searching for weapons of mass destruction turning up only a reference vial of botulism toxin and what he called evidence of an intention to re-acquire unconventional weapons for his pains, it is the Iraqi arsenal of conventional that has been killing Americans, cooperating Iraqis and our allies.

As guerilla wars go it is an high intensity one. Lt. Gen, Ricardo Sanchez, our commander on the ground in Iraq tells us that the guerillas are growing in sophistication and show evidence of coordination of their attacks. They are mounting an average of 50 attacks on coalition forces each week resulting in casualties Incoming flights at Baghdad International Airport fly through a gauntlet of small arms fire and shoulder launched SA-2 missiles.

The resistance fighters are apparently supplying themselves from the hundreds of weapons dumps that the Saddam regime had established around the country. Major Ronald Zimmerman of the 299th Engineer Battalion, part of the 4th Infantry division was quoted this week in the San Francisco Chronicle. “I haven’t seen a place that has more ammunition lying around. The SA-2s we find every day.” 39 SA-2s lay scattered about on the abandoned military airstrip east of Tikrit. Like most of the known arms depots, this one was unguarded.

General Sanchez explained, “There is so much ammunition in this country that you cannot guard it all. There are more than 650,000 tons of ammunition in this country.” In the same press briefing he told the reporters that he did not need additional troops from the United States. The conjunction of these two contradictory statements paints a surreal picture worthy of Salvador Dali.

Condoleezza Rice has her work cut out for her if she is going to rescue the situation in Iraq from the Rumsfeld PNAC bred doctrine of preemptive war on the cheap. Ten thousand Turks won’t begin to tip the balance. It is going to take 100s of thousands more American troops and 100s of Billions of dollars before Iraq is stabilized – and we are still only hip deep.