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We should be grateful that this phase of the US invasion is so quick and easy...
But in this thread I'm trying to understand how it's so easy. How can one division facing another not actually have a battle with casualties on both sides? The Iraqi divisions just seem to disintegrate.
1. Morale:
a. they're fighting to defend Saddam Hussein, who has probably intimidated, tortured, or killed a relative of most people in Iraq. Naturally Saddam is not exactly Ho Chi Min to the Iraqi people.
b. they've been fighting the US AF for 10 years, with a total lack of success, and they know it. They can't get pilots or hope to build up an airforce to match some 600 attack and air superiority aircraft in the area. They can't **** with out it being tracked and analyzed by multiple satellites, drones, etc. let alone put up radar.
They've had a remarkable lack of success in developing better radar or targeting technologies to avoid HAARM missiles, and particular they have been unable to import or make SAM that would worry US planes.
2. Technological isolation: The Iraqi generals know that when Saddam is on TV talking about how carriers are not a problem that he's entered fantasyland.
tanks
On the ground, Iraqi tanks are outdated still, they fire a round which will not even penetrate the US side armour, let alone the frontal plate. They must stop to fire, while the US fires and moves. They are outranged. They have no laser guided targeting computers or divisional available night vision. In actual war, they also don't have much resupply or reinforcement hope, all they can do is dig in and wait to die or surrender.
infantry
this is the 'big advantage' the Iraqis have in that close infantry combat still depends a lot on courage and viciousness, not computers. The Iraqis have AKs, RPGs, 12.7 mm machine guns, all old Soviet crap whose main virtue is that is cheap, easy to fix, and tough.
The have a 'levy en masse' (all citizens called to fight, the grannies and kids), but history has shown that the kids and grannies tend not to do very good in combat, (Franco-Prussian War, end of WWII) in fact they tend to surrender once they realize the bullets are in fact real.
The Americans on the other hand have a couple of tricks their sleeves for the big bad 'Stalingrad' (which Baghdad won't be; there is no relief force coming and the people are not on Saddams side). They have excellent snipers with good equipment. They have a bunch of fancy new guns that can lay down a lot of fire. They have new body armour that, although i would want to walk very far in it, would be a big help in creeping house to house. They have sensors for body heat and vibration which will make it more difficult for enemies to hide out and attack an exposes flank later. They even have a couple goddamned robots that can go up stairs and launch grenades. They've also had a few special groups of soldiers training (fairly) hard in a 'simulated urban environment' for a few years now, with doodads the Iraqis never seen.
In other words, as long as I'm right about the people not supporting Saddam, this should be the easy part, even in Baghdad.
The hard part will be the US occupation, how they handle it, will it be like Afghanistan with tiny US backed puppet government in control of the capital and the oil pipeline, and the rest warlords paying lip service to it? Will the Kurds get a home? What will be the relationship between Iran and the Shiite majority? What the heck will Syria/Hezbollah do with a US occupation force between them and Iran? The next few years will curse us with interesting times.
BTW, off-topic, on Dave's ESL cafe there is a job posting for Jenin, Palestine to teach English......pretty good danger pay if you don't mind the occasional shelling....
But in this thread I'm trying to understand how it's so easy. How can one division facing another not actually have a battle with casualties on both sides? The Iraqi divisions just seem to disintegrate.
1. Morale:
a. they're fighting to defend Saddam Hussein, who has probably intimidated, tortured, or killed a relative of most people in Iraq. Naturally Saddam is not exactly Ho Chi Min to the Iraqi people.
b. they've been fighting the US AF for 10 years, with a total lack of success, and they know it. They can't get pilots or hope to build up an airforce to match some 600 attack and air superiority aircraft in the area. They can't **** with out it being tracked and analyzed by multiple satellites, drones, etc. let alone put up radar.
They've had a remarkable lack of success in developing better radar or targeting technologies to avoid HAARM missiles, and particular they have been unable to import or make SAM that would worry US planes.
2. Technological isolation: The Iraqi generals know that when Saddam is on TV talking about how carriers are not a problem that he's entered fantasyland.
tanks
On the ground, Iraqi tanks are outdated still, they fire a round which will not even penetrate the US side armour, let alone the frontal plate. They must stop to fire, while the US fires and moves. They are outranged. They have no laser guided targeting computers or divisional available night vision. In actual war, they also don't have much resupply or reinforcement hope, all they can do is dig in and wait to die or surrender.
infantry
this is the 'big advantage' the Iraqis have in that close infantry combat still depends a lot on courage and viciousness, not computers. The Iraqis have AKs, RPGs, 12.7 mm machine guns, all old Soviet crap whose main virtue is that is cheap, easy to fix, and tough.
The have a 'levy en masse' (all citizens called to fight, the grannies and kids), but history has shown that the kids and grannies tend not to do very good in combat, (Franco-Prussian War, end of WWII) in fact they tend to surrender once they realize the bullets are in fact real.
The Americans on the other hand have a couple of tricks their sleeves for the big bad 'Stalingrad' (which Baghdad won't be; there is no relief force coming and the people are not on Saddams side). They have excellent snipers with good equipment. They have a bunch of fancy new guns that can lay down a lot of fire. They have new body armour that, although i would want to walk very far in it, would be a big help in creeping house to house. They have sensors for body heat and vibration which will make it more difficult for enemies to hide out and attack an exposes flank later. They even have a couple goddamned robots that can go up stairs and launch grenades. They've also had a few special groups of soldiers training (fairly) hard in a 'simulated urban environment' for a few years now, with doodads the Iraqis never seen.
In other words, as long as I'm right about the people not supporting Saddam, this should be the easy part, even in Baghdad.
The hard part will be the US occupation, how they handle it, will it be like Afghanistan with tiny US backed puppet government in control of the capital and the oil pipeline, and the rest warlords paying lip service to it? Will the Kurds get a home? What will be the relationship between Iran and the Shiite majority? What the heck will Syria/Hezbollah do with a US occupation force between them and Iran? The next few years will curse us with interesting times.
BTW, off-topic, on Dave's ESL cafe there is a job posting for Jenin, Palestine to teach English......pretty good danger pay if you don't mind the occasional shelling....
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