Major events and actions in the War in Iraq in relation to Counterinsurgency

[Farnan]

May have missed some but here are the ones I'm going to include in my paper so far:

Disbanding the Iraqi Army and Debaathification
The "Its not an Insurgency" Movement in Pentagon
Abu Ghraib (going to also show the event where a sniper shot a Qu'ran as a counter-example to show the right way to handle that)
Failure to manage expectations in the media by the Pentagon and White House
Publishing of the Counterinsurgency Field Manual
Creation of Integrated Transition Teams
Anbar Awakening
Reform of Iraqi Prison System
Creation of Joint Security Stations
Iraqi Lead on Military Operations
Provincial Elections

Trying not to do individual battles.

[motiv-8]

Gah, you just reminded me to read that beast... Comments momentarily. You clearly know more about it than I do, though.

[Farnan]

Gah, you just reminded me to read that beast... Comments momentarily. You clearly know more about it than I do, though.

I haven't got that far in all of them, just finishing the "Its not an insurgency" movement and going on to Abu Ghraib.

[motiv-8]

Okay, read the intro. It looks good, damn good. I hope you don't take it as too grave an insult when I say your grammar is atrocious. That doesn't really dispel the quality of the sourcing and structure of your work. I like the way you introduce the general concepts of an insurgency, especially by giving and sticking with a concrete definition to use as groundwork, and then continuing on to the finer aspects while drawing from historical examples to supplement your explanations. One thing I would recommend is better explaining what counter-insurgency is, perhaps also deleting that bit about abortion; when talking about a somewhat contentious issue you don't want to confuse and irritate your readers by abruptly introducing another contentious issue that is irrelevant to the topic.

Overall, though, I really like what you're doing here; it's concise, but authoritative. I would also be more than happy to do editing for you. It deserves the polish.

[Farnan]

Okay, read the intro. It looks good, damn good. I hope you don't take it as too grave an insult when I say your grammar is atrocious. That doesn't really dispel the quality of the sourcing and structure of your work. I like the way you introduce the general concepts of an insurgency, especially by giving and sticking with a concrete definition to use as groundwork, and then continuing on to the finer aspects while drawing from historical examples to supplement your explanations. One thing I would recommend is better explaining what counter-insurgency is, perhaps also deleting that bit about abortion; when talking about a somewhat contentious issue you don't want to confuse and irritate your readers by abruptly introducing another contentious issue that is irrelevant to the topic.

Overall, though, I really like what you're doing here; it's concise, but authoritative. I would also be more than happy to do editing for you. It deserves the polish.

I'll switch abortion to the poor quality of TV programs...

But yea my grammar sucks, hoping to get it done about 5 days early so I can work on improving it. But yea any editing will be appreciated.

[s.rwitt]

I know you said you're trying not to do individual battles but don't you consider Fallujah a pretty big milestone? I'd throw Al Sadr in there somewhere as well.

[Mikelus Trento]

When the one faction demolished the other faction's holy golden shrine might be an important milestone. The manure hit the fan after that one.