From the beginning of the war-planning process, Baghdad posed the greatest challenge. The United States does not want to fight an urban battle, but the conquest of Iraq cannot be complete without the fall of Baghdad. The initial U.S. action — trying to kill Saddam Hussein — was designed to trigger a political capitulation that would make a battle for Baghdad unnecessary; it didn’t. Iraqi resistance may collapse simply out from attacks and internal weakness. But if this doesn’t happen, three war-fighting models will be available. One is the fall of Paris in 1944 — the favored U.S. strategy. The second is the siege of Budapest in 1944-45 — six weeks of encirclement and bombardment, with civilian casualties. The third is the fall of Berlin in 1945, with the attackers losing almost 80,000 men in three days. Berlin is out of the question. Paris is the model the United States wants, but the danger is that it will slip into a Budapest mode.
