Deep Into The Bench!

Bill Roggio talks about Ramadi and the fight for it.

While our side does not fully control the town it can not be said the terrorists (ie the other side for the morally muddied) control it either.

But it is clear the city not fully secured. Local groups of insurgents are operating in the city, intimidating neighborhoods at times, employing IEDs, setting up ambushes and sniping at Marine and Iraqi police forces. This does not constitute control of the city. Al Qaeda does not have a secure foothold in Ramadi; this is the city where al Qaeda was attacked by the predominantly Sunni Dulaimi tribe when they threatened to murder Shiites who did not leave the city. The organization is stalked by Coalition forces, as the recent arrests of four key members of the Nu'man Brigade, including the leader, demonstrates. Al Qaeda and the insurgency certainly are not in control of Ramadi.

Source: The Fourth Rail - Controlling Ramadi

However, what is most interesting about Bill's blog is the picture of recently captured terror cell members. See this picture of captured terrorists, one of them the leader of the cell. All with one exception look to be very young, so young I can easily picture teaching these guys in one of my classes. Al-Qaeda and the terrorists in Iraq are deep into their bench.

While we must be careful not to think simple body count tallies indicate progress, we must understand a dead terrorist can not teach new terrorists, and the school of hard knocks for terrorists is very hard indeed.

Patience, fortitude, and determination fellow Westerners.