McQ at Blackfive ("the paratrooper of love") shows how the enemy gets a vote in how the best-laid plans go aft agley. (We're not the only ones with a learning curve, after all.)
Money quote(s):
"I noted the other day to someone that once Gadhafi’s forces figured out how to adapt to the coalition presence and tactics, they’d probably begin to swing the momentum back to their side. Why? Because they’re better trained and equipped than the “rebels”. "
The Libyan rebels are, almost by definition, a "rag tag band." In other words, they're a "pick-up" team. No hard winter at Valley Forge drilling under Von Steuben for them. To their detriment.
"Think about it - what is the hardest thing to distinguish? Whether or not a civilian vehicle is occupied by good guys or bad guys – or neither. Make your side pretty much identical from the air to the other side or just regular civilians and it makes the job the coalition has undertaken much harder. That’s precisely what the Gadhafi troops have done."
The enemy gets a vote in how your plan (assuming you have a plan developed somewhat beyond the "Underpants Gnome" stage) and will be doing whatever they can manage to foul up and interfere with its successful implementation.
That why the call them "the enemy."
"I hear a lot of talk about the US (or others) arming the rebels and how that will make the difference. Nonsense. While not having the weaponry that the other side has is indeed a disadvantage, it isn’t the rebel alliance’s biggest problem. Their biggest problem is they’re an untrained and undisciplined rabble. And an untrained and undisciplined rabble confronting even marginally trained troops with at least a modicum of discipline are going to lose if all else is equal."
In political terms, this is why the odds favor the Muslim Brotherhood coming out on top of the tweeters and Facebookers in Egypt: the Ilkwan are organized and prepared for violence, just like the Bolsheviks and Khomeini's "revolutionaries" were.
