Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles

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Rob Unmanned Vehicles will not save lives 4/20/2002 6:48:35 PM

Another thing refuting the claim that unmanned vehicles will save lives, IT WON'T!!! Do you honestly think that our enemies are dumb enough to duke it out with robots? Heck no! They'll strike at our weakest link. If remote control vehicles do replace humans, it will actually make humans more of the target. When trying to explain why the US concentrated most of its strategic bombing around Bagdhad during the Gulf War instead of the Iraqi troops in Kuwait, the pentagon offical said, "Well its like fighting an old western gun fight, you can shoot your opponent in the hand that's holding the gun or you can shoot him in the head. If you shoot him in the hand that's holding the gun, you haven't completely solved your problem. If you shoot him in the head, you've solved all your problems, you no longer have to worry about the gun." Same is true with the concept of remote control vehicles. If you kill the human controlling it, you don't have to worry about the robot, its practically useless. And since the human is no longer really trained to fight effectively in the old fashion way, well now he's easier to kill. All the enemy has to do is train some assassins with bombs or even with small insect robots(hehehe) to infiltrate the control centers where humans are controlling the unmanned vehicles and explode, killing all the humans. Think its impossible? Remember 9/11 with a civilian aircraft crashing into the Pentagon. There have even been some small terrorist attacks at the CIA headquarters. They don't even have to be successful, all they have to do is create fear and anxiety(the real purpose of terrorism) so that the human operators will have to look over their own shoulders, thus inhibiting their own abilities to control the vehicles. Classic example of good old fashion physcological warfare. And since there's no appearent danger in letting a robot get destroyed(as opposed to preventing yourself from being killed), they'll neglect their duties in controlling their robots, thus reducing the effectiveness of the robots on the battlefield. That'll mean the greater possibility of robot armaments being captured by the enemy, and having the more intelligent terrorist study them and figure out ways to defeat it. Because effectiveness of robots will start to decline, the terrorists(or whoever) will be able to start diverting more resources towards destroying human control centers thus creating more fear and anxiety among the human operators. In order to better be able to secure themselves, the human operators will probally start to re-train in the old fashion methods of fighting so that they'll be able to counter such a threat(as so many are doing now because of 9/11). Because when that terrorist threat approaches the control centers, whose going to defend it? The robots that are hundreds of miles away? No, the human operators themselves. Even with this old fashion security back, the human controllers will still probally pay more attention to saving their own butts as opposed to worrying about some robot hundred miles away. After a while, people will begin to see of how useless trying to fight wars completely with unmanned vehicles has becomed, because all it really does is give the human controllers a false sense of security which makes them more vulerable to attack. This type of mentalty is what made 9/11 possible. So again, we'd be playing right into our enemies hands. So many in the Middle Ages thought gunpowder had made armor obsolete, after so many years, it was reintroduced. Even today we have a neo-medieval obssession of designing armor that can deflect bullets, just like how the knights wanted armor that could deflect arrows. In fact when helmets where first re-introduced in WW1, many of them were modelled after Medieval helmets. Just like with armor re-appearing on the battlefield; eventually, we will re-introduce human infantry back onto the battlefield. Thus the $300trillion experiment fails, and the wheel of history has once again come full circled!

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bsl RE:Unmanned Vehicles will not save lives 4/20/2002 9:45:00 PM

This is a vast overreaction. There are issues with unmanned platforms, but you don't seem to have identified any of them. 1) " Do you honestly think that our enemies are dumb enough to duke it out with robots? " War is where the weapons are. If one side sends combat systems into a theater and the other side doesn't fight, it's either retreating or giving up. The only alternative is "being destroyed". One can imagine an enemy refusing conventional engagements and trying to melt into a countryside or urban area, to switch to a guerilla war. But, this is NOTHING new, at all. Been dealing with that for more than half a century. And, if the OPForce was set up as a conventional military, to begin with, they'll lose most of it, and more of their capacity by trying to change the basis of their operations on the fly. 2)Re: Rear echelon attacks. You think there is ANYTHING remotely new about this? Please. Where do you want to start looking in the history of warfare? Modern - meaning 20th century - military science had whole careers built around codifying how to get to the enemy rear, precisely to avoid engaging his spearheads. That's what the Blitzkrieg was about. That's what Basil Liddel Hart established his reputation describing. That's why Headquarters Companies have combat elements. That's why Division or Corps Headquarters have guard units. Good lord, have you never read Tom Clancy's RED STORM RISING? Soviet doctrine loved the notion of suprise attacks on Soviet HQs with special forces units. NATO knew that, too. You ALWAYS want to get between the FEBA and the rear echelon if you can manage it, to disrupt communications, supplies, and upset the whole mojo of your enemy's field forces. Now, it IS true that some aspects of unmanned military operations present some new opportunities for an enemy to exploit. Principally, where we're speaking of "remotely controlled" (versus "autonomous") units, there is, potentially, an opportunity to cut the (presumably) radio link between the operators and the craft. Or, to simply intercept it, and derive useful intelligence from it. Or, to hack into the data stream to spoof the operations, or to actually capture them. But, this is really not very different from existing points of attack on conventional systems. You try to trash an enemy airfield, if you can. If the warcraft happen to be on missions when you do so, they may have no place to come home to. You try to destroy communications if you can. You try to intercept those communications, if you can. You try to plant spurious information in the enemy intelligence apparat, if you can. Every level from the highest (Spy versus Spy stuff) down to the battlefield level, if possible. Countless stories in the history of warfare of this. Building false campfires at night while your forces try to slip away, unnoticed, for instance, is an old classic. The Soviets excelled at maskirovka, deception. Indeed, even the US wasn't bad at it, as in the instance of Eisenhowers phony army group, in England, commanded by Patton, which captured Hitler's attention and helped convince him that the real invasion would come at the Pas de Calais, rather than Normandy. Your reference to the reintroduction of armor goes nowhere. Armor disappeared from the battlefield when it lost it's utility, and reappeared when it regained it. The reasons are perfectly rational and realistic. You think tanks would work better without armor? Want to strip the titanium bathtub out of the A-10s?

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/20/2002 10:04:46 PM

There IS something to the notion that when one side considers it's cause worth dying for and the other side doesn't that the first side has a huge advantage. Problem is, that consideration has limited application to this war. It breaks down into two aspects: What we think and what they think. Now, as far as what WE think, we've gotten over most, though not all, of the real hesitation to accept friendly casualties which influenced the last generation and a half of American policy. Partly, there was less such hesitation than some claimed. Americans have ALWAYS been less willing to accept casualties for what they perceive as peripheral interests than they were willing to accept for what they see as basic self interest. One thing OBL accomplished with 9-11 was to convince the VAST majority of Americans that we are in a real war, for our own self defense. Under this regime, we'll bleed and go on. As for what THEY think, I might agree, to some extent, that our enemies are trying to cultivate a self image in which they are brave, holy warriors, prepared to die, facing cowardly infidels who are the hated of Allah. This can help motivate their forces. To some degree. Problems crop up when it turns out that Americans will take casualties and go on. More problems crop up when the mujahadeen start dropping like flies. It's somewhat more difficult to believe that Allah favors you when you're dying, retreating, and losing. Remember the Iraqi Army, in Kuwait? Or, how fast Afghanistan fell, once the Taliban started losing battles? And, once your holy leader's private line to Allah is called into question, morale, generally, tends to start to collapse. Now, it IS true that this line of propaganda can be more effective when you're speaking of a *purely* unconventional campaign. But, this isn't turning out to BE a purely unconventional campaign, now, is it

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Rob RE:Unmanned Vehicles will not save lives 4/24/2002 6:04:43 PM

This is a vast overreaction. There are issues with unmanned platforms, but you don't seem to have identified any of them. Rob: Actually no, these were not overreactions, and what you say next is simply what I said. 1) " Do you honestly think that our enemies are dumb enough to duke it out with robots? " War is where the weapons are. If one side sends combat systems into a theater and the other side doesn't fight, it's either retreating or giving up. The only alternative is "being destroyed". Rob: This is exactly what I said! Our enemies aren't going to try to fight robots when they know they'll be killed. So like I said, they'll strike at our weakest point, and that would be the human controllers who lack traditional training in combat arts. Bst: One can imagine an enemy refusing conventional engagements and trying to melt into a countryside or urban area, to switch to a guerilla war. But, this is NOTHING new, at all. Been dealing with that for more than half a century. And, if the OPForce was set up as a conventional military, to begin with, they'll lose most of it, and more of their capacity by trying to change the basis of their operations on the fly. Rob: I know military history here, I don't need a basic lesson. I know that guerrilla(a term coming from the Napoleonic Wars when Spainish insurgents fought the French invadors) warfare is not new, in fact its possibly older than conventional war itself. Some of the earliest accounts of guerrilla warfare being is used are of small Persian units harrassing Alexander the Great's army during his invasion of the Near East. BST: 2)Re: Rear echelon attacks. You think there is ANYTHING remotely new about this? Please. Where do you want to start looking in the history of warfare? Modern - meaning 20th century - military science had whole careers built around codifying how to get to the enemy rear, precisely to avoid engaging his spearheads. That's what the Blitzkrieg was about. That's what Basil Liddel Hart established his reputation describing. Rob: You seem to think that I don't know jack about rear echelon attacks? Please! I know that flanking your enemy and attacking at the rear is the best way to destroy the enemy. Our enemies would simply do this when faced with remote control robots, they'll strike us at the rear i.e. the human controllers. Bst: That's why Headquarters Companies have combat elements. That's why Division or Corps Headquarters have guard units. Good lord, have you never read Tom Clancy's RED STORM RISING? Rob: No I don't read fiction, i read non-fiction. Bst: Soviet doctrine loved the notion of suprise attacks on Soviet HQs with special forces units. NATO knew that, too. Rob: Yes I know about Soviet Special forces(Spetsnaz, naval spetsnaz, Alfa, OMON, VDV). Please mister, you're acting like I don't know any of this? Bst: You ALWAYS want to get between the FEBA and the rear echelon if you can manage it, to disrupt communications, supplies, and upset the whole mojo of your enemy's field forces. Rob: and you honestly think I didn't already know this? Why the heck did I even make my argument in the first place? Bst: Now, it IS true that some aspects of unmanned military operations present some new opportunities for an enemy to exploit. Principally, where we're speaking of "remotely controlled" (versus "autonomous") units, there is, potentially, an opportunity to cut the (presumably) radio link between the operators and the craft. Or, to simply intercept it, and derive useful intelligence from it. Or, to hack into the data stream to spoof the operations, or to actually capture them. But, this is really not very different from existing points of attack on conventional systems. You try to trash an enemy airfield, if you can. If the warcraft happen to be on missions when you do so, they may have no place to come home to. You try to destroy communications if you can. You try to intercept those communications, if you can. You try to plant spurious information in the enemy intelligence apparat, if you can. Every level from the highest (Spy versus Spy stuff) down to the battlefield level, if possible. Countless stories in the history of warfare of this. Building false campfires at night while your forces try to slip away, unnoticed, for instance, is an old classic. The Soviets excelled at maskirovka, deception. Indeed, even the US wasn't bad at it, as in the instance of Eisenhowers phony army group, in England, commanded by Patton, which captured Hitler's attention and helped convince him that the real invasion would come at the Pas de Calais, rather than Normandy. Rob: I knew all this long before you even told me. Heck I knew this since 8th grade. Bst: Your reference to the reintroduction of armor goes nowhere. Armor disappeared from the battlefield when it lost it's utility, and reappeared when it regained it. The reasons are perfec

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Rob RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/24/2002 6:36:52 PM

Before I begin, I like to appologize for calling you bst in my last post. I misread the name. Bsl: There IS something to the notion that when one side considers it's cause worth dying for and the other side doesn't that the first side has a huge advantage. Problem is, that consideration has limited application to this war. It breaks down into two aspects: What we think and what they think. Rob: Again, bsl you are simply repeating what I already said. bsl: Now, as far as what WE think, we've gotten over most, though not all, of the real hesitation to accept friendly casualties which influenced the last generation and a half of American policy. Partly, there was less such hesitation than some claimed. Americans have ALWAYS been less willing to accept casualties for what they perceive as peripheral interests than they were willing to accept for what they see as basic self interest. One thing OBL accomplished with 9-11 was to convince the VAST majority of Americans that we are in a real war, for our own self defense. Under this regime, we'll bleed and go on. Rob: Yes I've noticed those who shout most about "killing them all" are usually those who don't know much about terrorism, war, politics, or anything of that sort. In fact they have no intention of joining the military, police, firefighters, anything of that sort. Plus the media isn't a good message of what this war is about. I've never once seen on tv in all this time from 9/11 once anybody even give a single definition of what terrorism is. Only on CNN did I hear somebody give the blunt definition of "its the use of violence or the threat of violence", but that is too geneal. The USA threatening Afghanistan to hand over Bin Laden or we'll bomb them could be considered a terrorist act under this definition. I've haven't even heard the Dept. of Justice's definition of it anywhere, despite the fact the FBI's counter-terrorism team admits that having a clear definition of terrorism and having it well known is the key to any fight against terrorism. Kinda hard to fight something when you don't even know or understand it. "Know thyself and thy enemy, and you don't have to fear a hundred battles," Sun Tzu "Art of War" Well the American public doesn't know anything about their enemy, except that they're "bad, bad people and they all must die"! I do notice a big difference between how the American media presents the war and how others(like Canadian and British) news report it. For one thing, they spend then just 30 seconds on the stories and is less biased. Bush, or anyother high government official, has never given a defitntion either. In fact I question Bush's "black and white" doctrine on terrorism. Yet anything in terrorism is not "black and white", its largely gray! "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter", we heard that alot before 9/11, now we never hear it. What a concidence! Don't believe me, look at Israel. It was founded by terrorist groups like the Haganah, Irgun, and Stern Gang. Ariel Sharon was a memeber of the Haganah, yet nowhere is this mentioned in the media. The American public is prepared for war? Yeah it will take more to defeat terrorism than "going to work" or "marrying my boyfriend" or other crock on those Live Brave Coalition ads. How many Israelis go to work each day or get married? That has done nothing to stop the sucide bombings! So frankly the American public is being misled and trying to fight a war almost practically blind! Bsl: As for what THEY think, I might agree, to some extent, that our enemies are trying to cultivate a self image in which they are brave, holy warriors, prepared to die, facing cowardly infidels who are the hated of Allah. This can help motivate their forces. To some degree. Problems crop up when it turns out that Americans will take casualties and go on. More problems crop up when the mujahadeen start dropping like flies. It's somewhat more difficult to believe that Allah favors you when you're dying, retreating, and losing. Rob: That happened with the Boxers in 1900 yet they still came coming. The same was true of the Japanese in WW2. Even after the atomic bombs, the Japanese military still wanted to continue fighting. Hitler Youth sill kept on fighting even during the final battle. Like a wild animal, an enemy is most dangerous when he's cornered, because he'll fight with every muscle to pull through or die trying. Bsl: Remember the Iraqi Army, in Kuwait? Or, how fast Afghanistan fell, once the Taliban started losing battles? And, once your holy leader's private line to Allah is called into question, morale, generally, tends to start to collapse. Rob: HAHAHA! You've been mislead by the media and how it presents the war. The Iraqis were not religious fanatics, theirs is a secular Ba'thist regime. In fact Saddam has had to crush many Shiite militant uprisings in Iraq, which makes me doubt he supports

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bsl RE:Unmanned Vehicles will not save lives 4/24/2002 9:41:33 PM

Rob, Wonderful. You know it all. So what's your thesis? You went on about how the sky is falling because we're moving towards extensive use of unmanned combat systems. You either support the thesis or get off of it. I gave a number of reasons why the matters you raised are NOT going to present insupperable obstacles. All you have to say, in reply, is that you already knew it. So, then, you know why your arguments lack logical force. It's up to YOU to explain why what turn out to be little more than OLD military problems will be serious issues. I won't waste my time talking to thin air, but I will reemphasize the very first point, again: Despite your little tap dance away from addressing the issue, if one side introduces military force into an area and the other side withdraws, then the attacker CONTROLS that area. If that happens in a large enough area, the attacker controls the whole country. All you have to offer is vague muttering about guerilla warfare? Let me help you with this little bit of military history and practice; you don't CHOOSE to wage a guerilla campaign out of strength. You do so out of weakness; because you CAN'T wage a conventional campaign or don't believe you can win one.

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/24/2002 9:46:20 PM

First, care to point out where I have ever written about "killing them all"? Once again, rather than actually address any specifics, all you have is a spew against me and people who think in ways you don't approve of. And, btw, for all your claims of historical knowledge, you seem to know darned little about the history of the Middle East. Virtually nothing if you can claim the Hagganah was a "terrorist" group. Unless, of course, you have some new, personal definition of "terrorism" you care to share? I never claimed the Iraqis were religious fanatics. I wrote of level of motivation, not nature of ideology. You do understand there's a difference, don't you?

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Dr. Know RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/25/2002 12:12:13 AM

Hi Guys!, I slipped in from the China board onto this very interesting debate. A lot of good points have been raised by both Rob and BSL. I'll just add my 2 cents here. [Don't worry, I won't write as much on this board as I did on the China one. I was fishing for a new employer there.] Not to sound too partisan, but Rob presents a much more convincing argument than does bsl. I won't go over all the sundry details, but Rob seems to have a much better grasp of both history and politics. Specifically, Rob's cut to the heart of the matter when he explains how the low tolerance of Western, and particularly American, society for casualties has generated a delusional mind-set. This mind-set not only creates an over reliance on technology, but it has also spawned a political environment where a few more massive strikes on the scale of 9/11 - or a protracted terrorist campaign like the one raging in Palestinian territories - would probably convince the American public to accept a compromise peace with radical Islam. [Mind you, I'm talking here about a protracted campaign that drags on and on for the next 5 years or so. Even pres. Bush said that the American public would surely tire of this conflict before the 2 year mark was up. He's got a year and a half to go. This idea that the American public will tire of this conflict, if it drags on and on, is a judgement on my part (and Bush's). But it's an informed and considered professional judgement.] But getting back on point: Bsl said that "war is where the forces are ... if you refuse to fight" then you admit defeat - or some words to that effect. I'm sorry, but that's crazy talk. An enemy is defeated IFF 1 of the following 2 conditions is met: 1) You've killed every last man, woman, and child of the enemy. or much more commonly in the last 300 years ... 2) THE ENEMY HIMSELF THINKS HE IS DEFEATED. It isn't until the enemy himself admits that continued hostilies are not worth pursuing that he is actually beat. As Lt. Col. R Leonhard wrote so lucidly in his book "Manuever Warfare", DEFEAT IS A PURELY PSYCHOLOGICAL PHENOMENON. Therefore, all the gadgetry in the world won't help you if your enemy is determined to fight and you're not. I'll give an example of what I'm talking about. Supposing the US, w/ all of its technologial might, decided to wage war on a crappy, tin-pot, little country. Let's just say, ... uhhh .... I don't know ... Iraq? If the Iraqi enemy decides to "go guerilla" (as Liddell Hart puts it), then can anybody on this board actually imagine the American public supporting the use of American infantry in fighting a protracted street to street, house to house, urban warfare battle in Iraq lasting for more than few days? Of course not! Actually, can anybody imagine the American public supporting any kind of protracted anti-guerrilla or urban fight campaign, and for any reason other than for defending American soil? What's going to happen, if Saddam is smart and plays guerrilla, is that after a few days of watching a giant urban-brawl unfold on CNN; all those suburban 'Soccer moms' and nervous gen. Xers (who work in cushy office-jobs and who have become accustomed to a pampered upper-middle class lifestyle - I have to admit I'm one of them... I'm a gen. Xer, not a Soccer mom) will start quaking their Birkenstocks about Saddam's secret agents putting ground-up nuclear waste into their drinking water ... or worse. American public opinion will then call for a halt to hostilities. In effect, America will then have defeated itself. Period. End of story. [Even in Afghanistan, because of the American fear of casualties, the overwhelming majority of the infantry fighting was done by our mercenary allies (oops, I mean 'friends') the Northern Alliance. The few times we did send in large numbers of light infantry, the resulting fiasco meant that the missions were basically abandoned - for example, operation Anaconda and that first airborne assault. That's why "Allied forces" haven't won much of a victory in Afghanistan: the bulk of the Taliban escaped because we refused to send in enough ground troops to hunt them down and all that was accomplished in Afghanistan was that a shaky Taliban overlordship of various tribes and warlords was replaced by an even shakier 'foreign' imposed regime led by Karzai - who only controls Kabul with the help of tens of thousands of foreign occupation troops. But getting back to the point about robots replacing infantry...] And furthermore, please don't tell me that if we replaced our infantry with robots, then America could go after guerillas and fight urban battles again. The American public would be equally horrified by pictures of little American toy tanks and robot helicopters shooting-up unarmed enemy civilians caught in cross-fires, as it would be by images of American grunts getting

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bsl RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/25/2002 6:32:17 PM

1)I am familiar with the various definitions of "war" and what they relate to. I have a couple of notes up, right now, where I say that winning a war means getting an enemy to do what you want him to do (or not do), and I go on, in one note, to relate this to Von Clauswitz's observation that war is the continuation of politics by other means. Nevertheless, I answered Rob in the way I did because his notes have gone on, at some length, making points which don't bear scrutiny. The thrust of much of his argument seems to ignore the simple fact that when one side projects force into an area and the other side refuses engagement and withdraws, the first side is most of the way towards not just effective, but total control of that area. Rob goes on about a magic guerilla campaign which appears, as if by magic, in force, hither and yon, in friendly warfighting nexi. I spent some time trying to explain how the details he supplied all seemed to break down to various aspects of warfare which are not new, at all, but, instead, old issues which our military is ALREADY prepared to meet. I tried to address some of the stated weaknesses in the thesis. I'll move to an implicit one; that American force posture is going to be utterly and completely transformed into a small bunch of geeklike specialists sitting somewhere in theater, but well away from the fighting, ripe for assault by the valiant mujahadeen. Give me a break. Unmanned platforms are going to *supplement* existing forces; not replace them. We'll add small scale surveillance capabilities to the spearheads. We'll have larger craft at division or corps levels, plus some strategic platforms run out of Washington/Virginia. As we add *significant* fighting capability to drones - which we do NOT have and will not have for a good many years in the future; two Hellfires on a large drone run from theater HQ or America are NOT what we're talking about - they will be used as a sort of shock troop, to dull the sharpest part of the enemy spear or supplement defenses of major installations. We'll still put men with rifles into the field, in numbers, and we'll still have big guns shoved around by engines guided by real, living drivers. Your Iraq example is entirely wrong. Iraq is FAR from a minor power. "Crappy tin-pot". Sorry, but his is just, plain wrong. Iraq is a medium-sized power, in terms of manpower, economic resources, technical expertise, military prowess, etc.. This discussion isn't going anywhere if we can't separate Iraq from Libya or Congo. If you check around, you'll find a depressingly long series of notes I've posted on how things might go in an assault on Iraq. It doesn't look towards a trivial exercise or any minor things, at all. To the contrary, while I feel that conventional fighting will go very well, and the Iraqi military will perform relatively poorly against a well-considered, well prepared American campaign, I believe there's a strong possibility of an unconventional attack by Iraq on American forces in theater, Israel, or, conceivably, the continental United States, as well as a fair possibility the fighting will expand to encompass much of the region. The possibility of the campaign turning into a local, guerilla campaign, otoh, is relatively small. Hussein is far to widely hated by *Iraqis* and has far too little heartfelt support among his own armed elements for that. The moment he abandons control of very large, conventional forces (including police elements), his own life is at serious threat from his own people. And, any scenario which seriously examines HOW he'd have to wage a guerilla campaign needs to explain how he does so WITHOUT abandoning most of Iraq and, thus, allowing most Iraqis the freedom to decide if they want to die for him without having his guns aimed at their backs while they think it over. You also get some of the history wrong. Sorry, but I was around during the Gulf War, too. The only people getting noticably queasy were the media and Colin Powell. There was NO groudswell of public opinion to stop the fighting when it was stopped. That brilliant decision was made for *external*, not internal reasons. It had little to do with American politics, but a lot to do with "coalition" and UN politics. The notion that a few more days of hostilities would have damaged the Administration *in America* is sheer fantasy. You seriously misread domestic politics, too, if you believe that people would NOT tolerate a high level of American casualties IF they believe the fight to be a real American interest; the defense of AMERICA, rather than a matter of abstract geopolitics, or helping a distant and questionable ally. The past years of the real American queasiness about taking casualties is misread if it is considered purely a matter of distaste for violence. That was ONE aspect. Only one. The other w

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Dr. Know RE:Manned vs. Unmanned Vehicles 4/29/2002 6:09:54 AM

Hi Guys!, bsl's latest post is logical, literate, and generally well written. It's exactly the kind of reply that I like to see!!! ... Even if I don't agree with it. I'll give only a cursory reply now ... my vacation started last Friday and I'll be travelling for the next week or so. In Japan, it's "Golden Week" and I'm sitting in one of those smokey Korean internet cafes as we speak. 1)About that "magical guerrilla campaign" Though me and Rob were flippant in how we used some words in some of our posts, I'll stick with the gist of what I meant (and what I think Rob meant). What I meant, was that an enemy will take steps (not just to avoid American forces on the battlefield when they came, but he will) ensure that Amereican forces CANNOT come. IE, on the grand-strategic-level, a smart enemy will use diplomacy, propaganda, and economic leverage to forestall any American military action. What Saddam is doing right now, is the perfect example of this. He knows the US can't attack Iraq while the Palestinians are rising in rebellion against the Israeli occupation. (Notice here that I'm not taking anybody's side. I'm using "occupation" in its technical sense: 'there are currently Israeli military units in Palestinian-Arab inhabited areas while those same Arabs don't want them there'.) Strategically, Saddam (as you yourself say) can try and drag in other countries into any potential conflict - and thus throw a crowbar into American deployment plans. Operationally, Saddam can use or threaten to use his chemical and biological weapons. Such a move would weaken American public resolve. He can also fight a defensive urban campaign, that at least has the prospects for significant American casualities. That was what I meant to say, in my last post, when I said that it was "crazy talk" to assume that if the enemy refused to fight on your terms, then you've already won. (Come to think of it, I should have avoided the word guerilla too. I should have been more specific, and less tongue-in-cheek.) 2) My flippant remark about Iraq being a "tin-pot" little country I'm sorry but it is. Iraq IS more powerful than the Sudan or Libya. But I still think Iraq is a crappy little country because: a) Iraq is not a Super Power, b) Iraq is not a major-regional Power / Potential Super-Power like China, Europe, Japan, and Russia are, c) Iraq is not in the same league as the major Western European powers like France, Germany, Italy, Britain, or even Canada and India are, d) Iraq isn't even in the same league as Taiwan, Mexico, Brazil, Vietnam, South Africa and (of course) Israel. Ergo, following my criteria, Iraq is a "crappy little country". 4) Iraqi Barbecue not to American taste When I said that images of chared Iraqi's, is what got the administration of George I to cut short the first Gulf War, I'm just repeating discussions held in one of my graduate seminars that looked at some of the diplomatic papers and documents from the Gulf War. I'm not talking here about what CNN reported, or what "opinion on the street" said. I'm just saying, that regardless of how Americans felt at the time, the archival evidence tells us that the administration of George I was VERY worried about the effect of the Iraqi barbecue on public opinion. Similarly, the archival evidence also says that George I's cabinet was worried 'shitless' about Saddam making a partial withdrawal, or beginning serious negotiations, at the last minute before Bush's deadline past. That was called the "Nightmare scenario" by the Bush team, because it would have shaken the reslove of many alliance members to attack. If you want more either of these topics, I'll try to dig up the references if you want them - but it'll take some time because a)I'm currently on vacation b)I normally work a 55 hour week (hey, I work in Japan so I can't help it) so I'm pretty unmotivated and lethargic by the time the week rolls around c) I'll need to get to an academic library with extensive English holdings - quite a trip. 5) On American Resolve We can debate the current state of American public resolve, and morale, ad nauseam. But my point wasn't that "all" or even "most" Americans are fearful about finishing a campaign against Saddam... Far from it. My point was that a good many INFLUENTIAL people are fearful and hesitant to do so... I wasn't joking about those pampered gen X and Y types being panicky and lacking in resolve. These "men" that I'm talking about are those 20-something, professional, 'cool-guys' who drive around in flashy black sports cars, wear dark European-cut suits that are too tight for even their girl friends' bodies (and who secretly carry compact-mirrors to check their "men's make-up"; to my lasting shame I secretly considered doing this a few years ago when I saw all those adds in Men's Mags advertising for them), and wh

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