Thoughts

My favorite professor in college told me that terrorist cell organizations cannot be fully defeated due to their decentralized organization. He used the metaphor of trying to grasp a stream of water in your palm, you can try all you want but some of the water is always going to leak out.

I notice a lot of financially motivated "terrorism", not the ideological terrorism that I feel most of the western world imagines. Yea, there are the occasional religious fundamentalists who strap on the SVEST but my experience has shown me mostly frustrated young men who found a way they can "be somebody" and make their own money.

My last post describes and IED strike that happened a little while ago. I didn't have much to say about it, but I can say that soldiers and officers alike really do fall back on that annoying and repetitive training that we all go through a million times before we deploy.

There is no doubt that Coalition Forces and ISF have the upper hand in Diyala, however, it is ultimately the ISF that must hold the security gains and work with CF in pursuing what water is still dripping on the floor. I would truly enjoy mopping up what my professor seemed to be an impossible task.