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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Nadine Carroll who wrote (27392)	4/27/2002 3:29:15 AM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi all; So Rowan Scarborough thinks that Desert Storm II can be done with only 40% as much ground troops? Desert Storm I was fought in the desert while Desert Storm II will be fought in cities (Baghdad), which require far more troops to perform house to house fighting. I think the author is nuts. Imagine Jenin, but replace a shantytown of a few thousand with a full city of four million. Imagine Jenin, but replace a riffraff defensive force armed with home made explosives with a real army. Yeah, Iraq has no air force but that simply won't help us in Baghdad. If we used air power to fight our way through the city we will never be forgiven for it. If we don't use air power we take far worse casualties than the Israelis picked up, but going on for miles instead of meters. It's hardly random chance that made the Russians choose Stalingrad (a city) to hold back the Germans. Cities make excellent defensive terrain. Satellites are useless. Air power is almost useless. If we decide to fish Saddam out of Baghdad it will require massive forces on the ground. I doubt that there are enough "indigenous rebel forces" to pull that stunt off. Remember that with Kabul, the population was anti Taliban before we arrived. The Taliban fled the city in fear of their lives. The Taliban was largely Arab foreigners who were despised and hated throughout the country. Saddam's Army, by contrast, is based out of Baghdad and made up of the local population. So what are we going to do, lay siege to Baghdad and starve them out like Constantinople in 1532? I don't think so. What's going on here is that the military is doing what they're told, making a plan to topple Saddam, but making sure that it doesn't happen because it is diplomatically impossible. -- Carl