We had to destroy it to save it.

Neutralizing the threat from the green-domed mosque looked almost effortless. Marines in the dusty warrens of Falluja had been taking fire from one of its twin minarets. They called in air support. A 500-pound bomb slammed into a blue-tiled tower, obliterating a signature part of the Khulafa Al Rashid mosque, the city's most celebrated religious building.

Magpie at Pacific Views asks, How would you feel if this were your place of worship?

Edward Wong has another of his "reality based" reports on Iraq in the New York Times today, Breaking a City in Order to Fix It. There is no doubt that the US with it's superior military force can break things but there is nothing to indicate they can put them back together again. The storming of Falluja was supposed to make it possible for the Sunni region in Iraq to participate in the January elections. The reality is because of the attack on Falluja many if not most Sunnis are threatening to boycott the elections.

The commanders say their goals now in Falluja are to install a viable Iraqi government and security force, rebuild the city to win back the confidence of the residents and persuade the Sunni Arabs, who were Saddam Hussein's base of support and were ousted from power with him, to lay down their arms and take part in a legitimate political process.

Difficult as all of that seems, it is the last aim - persuading the Sunnis to act as a loyal minority in a democracy - that may be the most improbable goal of the retaking of Falluja by storm.

But given the track record of the Americans and their allies, military analysts say, the immediate goals in Falluja seem naïve, if not utterly inconsequential given the surging resistance across the Sunni-dominated regions of Iraq, almost certainly organized by the very leaders who fled Falluja before the offensive.

It would appear that the US has failed to learn the most important lesson of the post WWII conflicts, you can't win the war without winning the hearts and minds of the people and you don't do that by destroying their cities and towns and killing their women and children. It is said the American troops have killed or captured over 1000 "insurgents". I guess only time will tell how many new ones they created.