--- Alberto Monteiro <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >\> What is the evidence of this? Iraqi army was thought > invincible in 1991, > but what we saw was that an amry whose training is > beating civilians > prefers to flee than to fight when confronting an > armed opponent. > > Alberto Monteiro
Definitely not true. Elite Iraqi formations fought with some degree of bravery - they were just fighting an opponent that was completely out of their league. _Crusade_ by Rick Atkinson, for example, describes several major tank battles fought between American and Iraqi forces. The best study on the topic (published in International Security last year) counted 11. In all of them the Iraqis fought, and actually fought hard and with some degree of skill. That just wasn't enough against American or British soldiers. The North Korean Army almost certainly is better, actually. It performed at a fairly high level during the Korean War (a level that no Arab army has ever attained, in my opinion) and has been training ever since. It is also _enormous_, and positioned on the border. Most evaluations of the North Korean army describe its equipment as obsolete, but its level of training as decent, and training is much, much more important than equipment. While I don't think a North Korean invasion of South Korea would have any possibility of success, the military situation is clearly completely different between North Korea and Iraq. Iraq's army has been crippled by 10 years of sanctions. North Korea's is still formidable. Iraq does not have nuclear weapons. North Korea _already does_. Iraq has no significant allies. North Korea is protected by China. Iraq lacks the capacity to inflict significant harm on any major US ally if we do attack. North Korea can kill tens of thousands in Seoul, and potentially hundreds of thousands in South Korea and Japan. _Of course_ we treat Iraq and North Korea differently. That isn't a sign of hypocrisy, it's a sign of rationality. Gautam __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
