The case- of "cognitive bias"- Amr Mohammed Al-Faisal, Arab News Opinion, 21 September 2003
<<Amr Mohammed Al-Faisal of Jazeera fame with his friend…
''Last week I had lunch with a French journalist friend of mine in Paris. The food, as you may want to know, was excellent. We discussed many things including the situation in the Arab world.
During the conversation my friend said he was appalled at the Iraqi resistance’s attacks on their own country’s infrastructure including electricity stations, water pipelines and oil installations. At one point he burst out: “They are nihilists”. I pointed out to him that the Iraqi resistance was anything but nihilists. They were merely applying a military tactic as old as war itself, which is the tactic of scorched earth.
The tactic has been used many times in history and by many different people — an example is the scorched earth tactic used by the Russians when Napoleon invaded their country in 1812. The Russians burned everything in the French Army’s path up to and including setting Moscow itself on fire. The Russians did this to deny the French any sustenance or succor while they were on the sacred (to them) soil of their motherland. Napoleon was forced to retreat and his power was broken forever.
This is precisely what the Iraqi resistance is doing, in the hope of achieving a similar result. ''
<<In nearly 5 months of combat and peacekeeping in a nation of 20mn people less than 80 American soldiers have died. The continuous stream of media reports make the figure seem much higher. I guess it has to do with "cognitive bias", whereby memory of a particular incident overestimates the likelihood of reoccurring. This act of terrorism is worrying but not unduly alarming. Factional loyalties and terrorist inclinations were inevitable in a nation like Iraq ruled by a despot for few decades.
This is a classic example of 'cognitive delusion' of the author, the facts of the Russian war are that Bonaparte decided to bring the Czarist Russians back into line and gathered a Grande Armee of more than 500,000 men - including contingents from all France's allies - to frighten them.The implied threat did not work and the tsar ordered two Russian armies to protect the Motherland.
Exaggeration of events is way of life..
The five Saddam Armies to defend motherland never really waged a single organised battle of resistance to coalition invading forces, their was no defence of motherland, Sahaff made a mockery out of Arab pride by deriding facts and making the entire country a laughing stock in front of the global media. Baghdad had fallen in no time and the Saddam loyalists had all but escaped, in case of Russia this is what happened;;>>
Led by General Barclay de Tolly and General Bagration, the Russians retreated as Bonaparte's troops swarmed across the frontier on the River Niemen on 24 June.
Combining at Smolensk, the Russian armies fought at Smolensk and Valutino, but the overall strategy was to trade space for time and continue to avoid a major battle with the French. Finally the retreat stopped some 110 kilometres west of Moscow.
Now under the command of General Mikhail Kutusov, the Russians set up strong defensive positions for his 120,000 troops at Borodino and waited for Bonaparte's men to come on.
They did so, 133,000 strong, and the fighting was brutal, even in Napoleonic terms, with little quarter being given.
Although advised by Marshal Davout to manouevre around the defences and attack from another direction, Bonaparte threw his men into a series of bloody attacks on the Russian positions.
At the end of the day - and at the cost of 44,000 Russian casualties and 30,000 French losses - the battle was indecisive, as Bonaparte withheld his Imperial Guard in a move that probably saved Kutusov's army from destruction. But, so far from friendly territory, Bonaparte said he could not take the risk.
Kutusov retreated again and the French occupied a burning Moscow - set on fire by the Russians themselves.
Hoping for a Russian surrender that never came, Bonaparte waited in Moscow for five weeks - far too long - and then began what would become one of the greatest disasters in military history.
Again ignoring good advice from Davout to take a different, better-supplied route to that they had advanced on, Bonaparte sent his men back to Smolensk through already-plundered territory.
<<I wish someone passes this on to Amr Mohammed Al-Faisal; this cognitive self delusion is the basic cause of denial within the Arab world, comparison of the heroics of the Russians like Kutusov with in competent Iraqi Baathists like Tai is an insult to most important part of human history that of resistance to a tyrant by forces of motherland in the name of motherland, Amr Mohammed Al-Faisal should know that and those who quote him as authority should understand that a man with such a poor grasp of history cannot be expected to lead anyone on to a sensible discussion, beating neo cons is one thing but condemnation of a policy based on cognitive biased arguments is quite another >> |
