I was watching the tube yesterday and it suddenly occurred to me that there has been a considerable waste of life in Iraq from coalition forces being attacked while manning check points. In a country where C4, automatic weapons and grenade launchers are in no short supply and the area itself is a wide open desert, I asked myself just exactly what would a check point accomplish in the first place. In terrain like that, terrorists don't have to use the roads unless of course their mission is to blow up a bunch of soldiers standing out in the open like a bunch of sitting ducks. The military loves check points. In the 20 years that I spent with the DOD, I went through check points onto military bases all over this country and was only stopped once. Of course, these check points do serve a purpose because the officer standing there on guard will give you directions if you ask for them. Check points are probably serving the same purpose in Iraq. After all, who is better qualified to give directions to lost Iraqi's than coalition troops.