Operation Matador

A WaPo article about Operation Matador focuses on the American Marines’ frustrations about not finding enough Iraqi ass to kick. It quotes a major saying that if there were foreign jihadis in one village, “we’ll make it rubble.” Instead they wandered around, tore up people’s houses, stole their pillows, beat up a few of them, yelled at them in pidgin Arabic, and then went away, wondering what the hell they’d been doing there. Mission accomplished.

  WIIIAI post

And check this out:

Also, an intriguing sentence in the WaPo report: “Americans had come through their communities a few days ahead of the Marines, scaring foreign fighters into flight.”

  WIIIAI post

This is very similar to the approach to Falluja. There, the U.S. military spent the days preceding the leveling of that city by warning them that the devastation would begin in a week or so.

[W]hile the military claims to have “neutralized this sanctuary,” they’re not actually planning to occupy the area, and are now in the process of leaving; the insurgents will be back in days. The Marines are claiming victory, but the jihadis are probably claiming the same thing, with at least as much justification.

You don't want to run out of enemy before you're ready to leave, I guess.