"[b]Damascus, Iraq Press, Feb. 14 - Ten senior army officers have been executed when the authorities managed to stifle yet another attempt by the armed forces to topple the regime of President Saddam Hussein.

The plotters, according to informed Iraqi sources, had established cells within the elite force of the Republican Guards and included some of the top army brass."

Folks this is NOT good!  These are the leaders of the new regime that President Bush wanted to replace Saddam.

There could have been an actual coup plot.  OR Saddam's Intelligence thought they were on to something and arrested some scapegoats to send a message.  OR this is Iraqi disinformation.

In any case, it will throw a monkey wrench into an "Afghanistan style" easy regime change because it will reinforce the world's perception that the United States cannot foment a successful coup against Hussein.

DaMan  

On the other hand, much like the Red Army purges of the late `30s it may kill off the most capable officers and make the Iraqi army less of a threat when it comes time to go after Saddam in a srious way. Let`s hope so.

I suspect that the whole "announcement of that exiled general, Who we wish to replace Saddam with," was a clever CIA mind game. I think the Idea was, all along to push Saddam into anouther purge, To weaken and forment dissent and dissatisfaction within the Republican Guard.

It's working. Nice trade craft guys. The spirit of Wild Bill Donnavan and William Casey is alive and well.

What exiled general are you talking about, Fear?  Never heard of that one.

DaMan

Now we need to convince Sadamn that thousands of his troops are actually plotting against him.

Saddam regularly executes army officers. He does it as a sort of premptive measure. Sometimes the victims are really plotters, sometimes they're just bystanders. In either case it serves as an object lesson to everyone else.

There's a chilling video floating around of Saddam shortly after he took power. He's in an auditorium with most of the Baath leadership. He announces that there are plotters, and reads off names one by one. The security guys walk up to those named and take them away.

The US doesn't necessarily need the active cooperation of the Iraqi military. They just need to not fight when the time comes, and be bystanders. I think that's fairly likely; Saddam works by fear, and if everyone recognizes that he _will_ be overthrown by the US, his leverage vanishes. They're not fighting out of belief; once their motivation is gone, they'll stop being a factor. At the end, there will probably be spontaneous efforts to seize power for themselves.

Iran and North Korea might or might not be in the same category. The worst case for the US is a Clauswitzian situation in which the army, government, and people are united. That means the US can't win by simply destroying the top leadership. If the Iranian or North Korean army and people still lend their support to their governments after being decapitated, things would get ugly.