Today's recommended war reading: First, read this post from Tacitus, commenting on yesterday's Washington Post article on why the war could "last months" and "will require considerably more combat power than is now on hand there and in Kuwait." Then read the Post article itself. The final graph is just about the only part that offers some reason for optimism:

One senior general at the Pentagon, listening to both sides of the argument, said he thinks that in short term the pessimists will look right, but will be proved wrong by mid-April. "There are some tough days ahead," he said. "I think this whole thing is at the culminating point. Within the next week to 10 days, we will find out about the mettle of the Republican Guard." But he concluded, "Once we smash the Medina and Baghdad divisions, it's game over, and I think Baghdad will fall."