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Seems as though this campaign has not been thought through properly, some observations in the last 48 hours: 1) No decision to halt the advance and secure towns properly. 2) This leading to pockets of resistance and urban warfare, Iraq troops retreating then coming back. 3) It seems the armour barrages a town, goes around it continues north, then waits for troops to mop up behind, not working. 4) As we can see from Um Qasr this morning, the Americans have given up, and having to get the Paras and Royal Marines to do the real work in successfully clearing out towns of resistance. 5) The war planners having a naive view of the population not fighting back. 6) See potential problems taking Baghdad, especially its size, seeing as they have decided to fight a politically correct war, where the use of air stikes and heavy bombardment of towns and enemy held villages is not happening. This allows troops to entrench their positions in civilian buildings, or to flee to the safety of civilian areas (in some ways similar to Vietnam). What they should have done is advanced methodically and professionally, not get carried away and advance on and on, but seeing as America is running the show, this is the way that will continue. Lastly, the contrasting media footage of American and British troops - Americans jumping about going yahoo, woohoo when they blow an enemy installation up. British - professional, subued approach. Seeign as I'm British, I may be a bit biased?

Maybe we should have a poll on how quickly the Americans and British reach the capital?

Yes, I can't stand CNN!!!

Yep, their government is sending troops, approved by parliament. 'In the same vote, Parliament approved a government plan to send two Turkish army brigades to Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq to protect Turkey's interests there. In doing so, lawmakers ignored warnings by the Bush administration that such an incursion could lead to clashes between Turkish and Kurdish forces. Parliament's action did little to heal a rift with Washington. U.S. State Department spokesman Richard Boucher welcomed the vote granting airspace rights, but said the United States remained "opposed to unilateral action by Turkey or by any party in northern Iraq."' I think only last week or so the Turks banned the main Kurdish parties from operatin in Turkey. SO tempers could be frayed...

Turkey to invade northern Iraq, bbc news http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2874635.stm This news story also says Iran is going in: overthrow http://www.overthrow.com/ Maybe this could get intersting? I'm sure the Kurds aren't going to be too happy to see their enemies the Turks turn up?

Turkey to invade Northern Iraq, US not happy: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2874635.stm Hmm, wonder what will happen when the Kurds meet the Turks, could turn a bit bloody?

Come on guys the Iraqi army was never gonna be a tough cookie, look at the military hardware they have. Its like taking a hammer to a nut! The real test of Iraqi morale will come closer to Baghdad, close quarter battles and the such.

Apologies, didn't pay close enough attention.

'just a question do you think we will ever see combat Photography like in WWII with actually action against iraqi resistence?' Over here in the UK the coverage has been very samey, replaying the same images over and over again. If they showed proper combat on TV at 6pm, where people were getting maimed by shrapnel, having their legs blown off, body bags, and so forth, like in Vietnam, I would say war support could drop. What about the air corridor to the North, I reckon it'll take probably 4 weeks to complete this action in Iraq.

Couln't agree more peanuckle.

'BTW: The photo of the ship dates back to the Afghanistan invasion, which is clearly a result of some of the events listed.' So is the Taliban somehow related to blowing up the American soldiers in Lebanon? Is the Taliban related to PAN AM downing? I'd like to see the evidence. As for the Libya connection and PAN AM, that's on dodgy ground. See here for an example lockerbie http://www.serendipity.li/more/lockerb.htm

As to that american ship list picture: PAN AM bombing was not carried out by Iraq, so that is wrong, in fact it probably wasn't carried out by those convicted of the crime. After the 'greatly competent' american Navy shot down an Iranian passenger plane in the 1980's I have though that the Iranians hired Palestinians to blow the plane up. Why put that on the side of your ship? What's Lebannon got to do with this illegal attack on a soverign state? So is the US Navy against the Palestinian's and their struggle? As for this remark: 'As I recall, the Aussies were not on board until their tourist attraction in Bali was blown to smithereens by terrorists. This is fact. They were wishy-washy until that happened. When you are attacked, it changes one's perspective. ' We in Britain have suffered years of bombing from the IRA, and Europe knows fully well about Terrorism. SO don't lecture us you ignorant individual. Maybe you won't be laughing when your country gets attacked again by a lone terrorist organisation bred by its hatred of American aggressive foreign policies. You reap what you sow unfortunately, just like the English have reaped because of their intervention in Ireland some 400 years ago. Memories stay long in peoples minds and are passed down through generations, dpn't forget that.

But that health bar and other console elements really lets it down. Seems a bit Hidden and Dangerous in places to me.

I was jesting, actually the game doesn't look bad, but the presentation of it does look a teeny bit Hollywood-like. Well have to wait and see, though it doesn't seem to be a proper military sim, some kind of futuristic hybrid. At least its more imaginative than CS and Unreal 2. Time will tell...

Be assured Soldner will not reckon up to OFP. I'm interested in the mission aspects, objectives, dynamic waypoints and taks, that flashpoint has. Will Soldner have, this? Blowwing shit up is fun, but when the gameplay is not there, the game will become another bargain bin addition. Anyway, when OFP2 comes out, Soldner will be dumped... I'm off to Soldner forum to taunt some kiddies...

Hi Ho, Hi Ho, its off to WAR we go, dum, dum, dum, dum I bet CNN can't wait to get going with their gratiutous, over-exposed, insanely subjective media circus. I haven't got SKY anymore, but when I did CNN was media satire come to life, but they didn't know it. Journalists waiting for smart bomb footage are probably already queing up outside the pentagon as we speak.

Canadians contributed a fair amount, I must agree. Aslo, peopel forget the amount of men lost in the Gurkha's and the effort they contributed. Saying who played the greatest part in WW1 is useless. What about the Russians in Korea, who were secretly supplying the Koreans with Migs?

From Private Eye (British political satirical mag) 'Before a Shot has been fired, the race is on for contracts to rebuild Iraq. Time magazine report that the US Agency for International Development has held talks for securoty-cleared bidders and sent out confidential requests for construction proposals. Initial estimates suggest $900m of work will be available repairing infrastructure destroyed in the war. Curiously, many of the firms lekly to rebuild Iraq will be among those who willbe among those who have helped demolish it. President Bush has appointed retired Lieytenant General Jay Garner as head of the Pentagon's 'Office of reconstuction and Humanitarian Assistance.' which will be central to rebuilding Iraq. Garner was until last month the president of arms firm SY Coleman, which makes targeting systams for missiles and tanks. Dick Cheney's olf firm Halliburton are stongly tipped for Iraqi reconstruction. International engineers with both construction and oilfield experience, Halliburton also have many contracts to feed and house American troops. They also have experience in working for Saddam. Halliburton subsidiaries Dresser Rand and Dresser Pump sold $73m of oilfield equipment to Saddam from 1997 and 2000, when Cheney was in charge. All I can say is the Militray-industrial combine is really reaping the rewards of spilt blood!!

There was program on BBC2 a few weeks ago about WW1 and it was pointing to an unfortunate combination of circumstances, such as inventions and the way people fought wars up until WW1. Invention of barbed wire, machine guns, massive artillery, mixed with battle tactics still used in the Boer war, or even the American Civil War. Bully beef, food that could be stored all year, also had an impact. This allowed troops to stay in field all year round, not having to make camp for winter like previously. Studying WW1 is just studying a catalogue of death over and over again, with little successes of a major nature. Tyhe whole Gallipoli adventure is a prime example of these unfortunate circumstances coming together.

Cannon Fodder is SUCH a HARSH word, don't you think? I have just finished reading a book compiled by the Imperial War museum of WW1 accounts from all sorts of soldiers, allies and Germans. F**k, it really brings home to you teh sheer cruelty, barbarity and waste of modern warfare! The men that lived at that time most of been made of different suff, than the people who only seem to care about mobile phones and celebs nowadays.

Being a history graduate, it amuses me when people use politics for their own ends, especially politicians. Over the past months politicians have used Saddam as some sort of Hitler figure and rate them as an equal threat. Well, I could rebuff that for hours, but I won't. In relation to WWI and America, what I would add is that troop numbers were not the over-riding factor that won the war. New tactics won the war as well, not just masses of Americans. O.K with the influx of cannon fodder from america, the allies had a resource that would probably ahve come into real effect if the war had continue on into 1919. But the real breakthrough's at the end of WW1 came from new battle tactics, such as tanks, combined air and artillery recon, moving barrages, and so forth. If you look at the battle of Cambrai in 1917 we see the first signs of these new battle tactics, immense gains by the allies. Unfortunatley, the Germans quickly counterattacked and the gains were lost. But the signs were there. As for revisionist history, its all good and well as long as the historical study is purely objective, not motivated by some political ideology or politically correct mantra. It seems this whole American argument of saving the poor old Europeans from defeat and enslavement is old hat and predjudiced, largely coming from recently annoyed americans because we won't play ball over Iraq (we have seen the consequences of bloodshed for the past 3000 years, unlike America who has only had 500 years of seeing it). History is a far more complex subject than the idea of Troop numbers. WW1 and WW2 have been won, why squablle over who paid the most in blood. What we should learn from history is to learn from it, and not to abuse it. Unfortunatley, the human species has this knack of repeating itself. Hitler is Saddam, yeah right, Jew hating, Racially ruthless dictator who has invaded 3 countries? I don't think so. Blair and Bush should read their History before opening their big dumb mouths.

'To keep realism at a slightly bearable level the guys at BIS thought " would an average guy on a tourist attraction island have experience with heavily weighted gunship helcopters and advanced weapon systems?" and decide that no they probably would not.' OK then why in the original campaign, James could go and fly a heli if he liked. Was he specifically trained to fly a heli? Resistance was dissapointing as you spent too much time in tanks... Felt it lacked infantry missons. Not saying it was cack, but was disappointing....

Resistance was poor in my opinion. Where are the heli missions? O.K maybe the resitance may not of had any helicopters, but maybe they could of been stolen? Plus, I find it very unbelievable that the Ruskies would be beat so easily by the resitance. Especially seeing as USSR had a massive air superity. Another thing that was lacking in resitance was the use of all the island, plus you missed out on most of the scenery as you were either stuck in tanks or trucks for a long time. I mean the island in the middle of the river was a perfect layout for some interesting missions. Red Hammer and Cold War Crisis dumped all over Resitance. Lastly, why couldn't Victor have a decent sounding voice, one that may sound remotely un-shakesperian english.

Having just played the new Unreal game (sorry guys but I was a big fan of the orginal game before seeing the error of my ways by playing Flashpoint), and turns it out its all eye Candy, point shoot, point shoot. I vented my rage over at the Unreal 2 forum, and saw many other people becrying the lack of gamplay and imagination. The fact that Unreal 2 was lacking in imagination and bugs (been in development for many years) got me thinking about the whole games industry at the moment, especially with a new flood of FPS coming out soon, Black Hawk Down, Unreal 2, Doom III and Project IGI. It seems that gameplay is still not in developers minds, apart from Flashpoint I can't think of a challenging and revolutionary type of game in terms of gameplay since Half-Life. The lack of support for these heavily beta-stage games that get released at the moment, emphasis on graphics not gameplay and the high-price for a PC games seems to me as a damning indictment of the games industry. Maybe I'm wrong, would be great if others were to share their viewpoints on this, or let me know about some very playable games out there that are getting ignored. Discuss?!

See the thread about the games indusrty Its crap, graphics over substance, sold my copy before ven completing it I was that bored and pissed off iwth it. Where's the puzzles and suspense from the first game gone? Ripped out for crappy, preachy cut scenes and unneccesary large graphic data.