ASSESSMENTS

Reflections on Ramadi

undefined and Military Analyst/Director of Analyst Operations

Paul Floyd

Military Analyst/Director of Analyst Operations, Stratfor

May 25, 2015 | 09:15 GMT

A U.S. soldier pulls security on a berm during a search for weapon caches near Ramadi, Iraq, 2007.

(U.S. Military)

Editor's Note:

This analysis was written in 2015 by Stratfor's lead military analyst, Paul Floyd, who served in the U.S. Army's 75th Ranger Regiment, a core component of the United States Army Special Operations Command. He deployed multiple times to Iraq and Afghanistan in a combat role. Though the Iraqi battlefield has changed significantly in the two years since this reflection was first published, the core struggle between separating time, place and person endures in conflicts, past and present.

The Iraqi city of Ramadi has fallen again into the hands of the Islamic State, a group born of al Qaeda in Iraq. That this terrorist organization, whose brutality needs no description, has retaken a city once fought for by American soldiers troubles me. I served two deployments in Ramadi, fighting al Qaeda. Comrades died in that fight. I was shot in Ramadi. My initial reaction, like that of many veterans, is to ask what the hell it was all for, when nothing seems to change. The whole endeavor was a costly bloodletting and it seems the price we paid yielded no actual benefit. Yet, Memorial Day is as much a day for reflection as it is for remembrance and commemoration. And in reflecting, I have had to sit back and define exactly what we are memorializing on this day....

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