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

To: Bill Ulrich who wrote (79629)	3/5/2003 11:13:21 PM
From: Bilow	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Hi Bill Ulrich; Re: "The Malay and Northern Ireland examples of 20:1000 force ratio were extraordinarily determined antagonistic insurgencies. Are Baghdad's citizens that fond of the current regime?" The Iraqis won't be shooting at us to bring back Saddam Hussein. They'll be shooting at us for being foreigners who've invaded their land. Similarly, the Palestinians who shoot at Israelis aren't doing it to save Arafat's regime. They're doing it because the Israelis invaded their land. Re: "The occupation force in Japan at the very end of WWII was around 450,000 but dropped sharply to 200,000 within six months." The Japanese situation is not similar to the Iraq one because by the end of WW2 the Japanese had been so severely defeated, with so many military and civilian deaths, that they were not in the mood to continue fighting. The same was true of the Germans at the end of that war. Iraq is a different kettle of fish. A war with Iraq would be very short and very few Iraqis would be killed. That situation tends to leave the defeated population uncowed, and willing to continue the fight. This fact is a universal tendency of humankind, but if you believe that the Arabs are "special", you can look to the history that Israel has had with them to verify the fact that defeating them militarily will not subdue them. History shows that the resistance to Israeli forces has increased with time, rather than decline as the Japanese example would suggest. -- Carl P.S. A good example of the tendency of nations who have suffered a bloodless defeat (i.e. defeated by strategy rather than worn down by attrition) to continue fighting is the French in 1870 and 1940. In both cases the Germans defeated them militarily, but with quick battles with relatively light casualties. In both wars the Germans ended up having their troops sniped at by French partisans. And again in both times, the Germans were able to maintain order only by using reprisals far more bloody than anything the Israelis (or we) can get away with. The Israelis can't repeat the German excesses because modern world opinion would be too much against it. We are similarly restricted in how we can respond to partisan activity, and for the same reason it is not possible for us to garrison even a mildly unruly population with less than the 20:1000 ratio. What's worse, Iraqis are one of the most gun happy populations on the planet. Invading and occupying the place would be like the Russians trying to invade and occupy Texas or Idaho. Except that unlike the Commies, in Iraq we would have to follow the Geneva Convention. Among a population that doesn't like us, that is a recipe for a disaster.