Mentioned in Dispatches

Underbelly’s Wichita bureau, doubling on the military beat, weighs in with a couple of points I hadn’t focused on yet:

If the Shiites manage to get full control of Basra, I think that controls the sea exit. Then it’s time for Xenophon. CNN has a big piece on equipment shipped back to the States for repair and refurbishment. Lots of wounded Bradleys, tanks and zillions of Humvees. Even with out new arrivals, they estimated that it would take three years to get all the equipment salvaged and repaired. Bet there are going to be a lot of surplus HMVs in a couple of years.

But the major point is that the army is running out of equipment.

And again (I guess he is repeating himself, but perhaps worth it):

I’m still waiting for the press to figure out that if Basra is totally in Shiite control, we have no easy exit route. Even if the Navy had enough sea lift to pull out the men and equipment. If it turns into a bug out, Bush will go to the top of the ‘worst presidents’ list.

Several bloggers and one author in the Naval Institute Proceedings protest the growing shortage of equipment. Mostly they are talking about tanks, trucks etc but even something as simple as a machine gun has to have a replacement barrel after a few thousand rounds. Most of the heavy machine guns are configured so that one guy can replace the barrel quickly. But even the M-16 will not fire forever. They’ve got to be wearing out everything over there.

Afterthoughts: well, if all those Humvees are charred wreckage in the desert, they won’t do much to distort the secondary market. By “Xenophon,” I assume he is referring to the Anabasis, where the Greek mercenary army found itself cut off and stranded in central Mesopotamia, and had to claw its way out. Yes, but they made it home, even if they did have to leave their Humvees behind. The more chilling reference is still Herodotus: he who crosses the river Halys will destroy a great nation. Turned out to be true. Or that bit from British history, where the government sent five regiments out from Kabul, and only one survivor made it to Jellalabad.