We could be in Syria well before 2007

[M Hofbauer]

Steve:

But I think most Americans are idiots, so my opinion is not political as much as it is social

general widespread social stupidity unfortunately is neither an american invention nor monopoly. it's globally universal, with locally different pronounciations.

I generally agree very much with Steve's assessment, or, rather, description (note I do not refer to the quote above, but the complete post).

the setting for the CMSF scenario requires both a politico-social and a military-factual condition to be met.

on the military side, the US would need sufficient forces.

unless the US would increase its military (which would require not only respective financial means but also a respective amount of time to take effect), these forces would become available if the current commitments could be reduced significantly.

the "unsolved problems" Afghanistan and Iraq could either be

-solved,

-abandoned or

-taken over by other countries.

in the case of iraq, I don't see any other country willing to contribute major forces, even if the situation improves, since iraq is now a public brandmark where other countries' politicians cannot afford to send troops because of public opinion, even if the situation improved considerably and these forces would in reality truly only be stabilization forces in a pacified environment.

It also seems unlikely that the situation in Iraq will be completely solved within the next one, two years so that US/international troops would be completely unneccessary.

It seems most likely to me that the US could choose the "abandonment" route, especially if the situation indeed improved over the course of the next two or so years.

A "Vietnamization" of Iraq.

Even if this would acknowledge sort of defeat, it is the most plausible thing to happen. It would address the US public's demand to bring the troops home.

The longer the quagmire in iraq continues, and with even the slightest improvement or hint at any ability of the iraqi government to look after itself (this might even be spindoctor-fabricated or claimed), the more likely the US will take the "abandonment" option in some way or form.

Afghanistan will not be solved either, and personally I predict the "settling" of the dust in Afghanistan to take even longer than in Iraq.

Unlike Iraq, however, there is a real possibility to have other countries take over this effort and free up the US forces there: Afghanistan is much more popular in international public opinion and would be easier to sell to the populaces of committing countries; the Afghanistan campaign does not carry the negative "iraq" brandmark-stigma, neither with regard to the legitimization nor regarding current activities.

In the western media it has been largely (falsely!) portrayed as a rebuilding effort, sort of aid to an unfortunate nation that has been plagued by war and lack of human rights for many decades. The international forces are there to help the new democracy, they aid in construction efforts and, as a side isse, hunt down some remnant isolated terrorists in the far mountains at the fringe of afghanistan

(the truth, however, is that governmental control is largely restricted to Kabul itself, immediate surroundings and some other large cities; some (smaller) areas are actively contested between taliban and international forces; the (huge) rest is in control of local warlords of sorts, and both the government and the international forces depend on their good will;

opium production has reached record highs under the eyes of the international forces (esp. germans) who are outspokenly unwilling to mess with the drug issue (since this would upset the local warlords whose very benevolence they depend upon for being allowed to even be there in the first place; the fights against the taliban&terrorists are still rather violent and ongoing);

the stabilization forces have largely had the effect of stabilizing the environment for opium production)

However, even if other countries would take over the Afghanistan problem, this would not free up sufficient US troops for our fictional syrian operation, as there aren't that many regular troops in Afghanistan in the first place.

At best it would contribute to Syria some of those US special forces units currently engaged in Afghanistan.

The political issue is a different one.

Public opinion in the US is, uh, of unique character. One would think that after being mislead by GWB into the iraq war they would regret their mistake and take respective consequences.

However, they reelected GWB even after the iraq war had taken place and it had become obvious even to the most gullible that the war had been waged under, to phrase it carefully, wrong pretense.

Still, there is this tendency to "rally behind the flag", a card played so efficiently time and again by US poiliticians/presidents: unwavering support as a patriot duty even in the face of most appaling facts to the contrary.

Note I am not saying this applies to all citizens (luckily by far not, as this board alone shows), but to take effect this only has to apply to a large populace, not the whole populace.

Steve said that "even idiots can finally get a clue". Even if that was the case, it does not rule out that the same "idiots" would fall for a similar trick yet again (Tonkin Gulf anyone?).

With the right spin-doctoring, I would not rule out that the US government could pull it off to at least convince a large portion of the US public into a conflict with Syria, and gain not widespread but (barely) sufficient support for.

It seems highly unlikely to me, but then again, I was *convinced* they would never do Iraq either.

I am not willing to put money on any prediction. Not with democratically elected governments in charge.

[edited for layout optimization]

[ October 24, 2005, 07:15 AM: Message edited by: M Hofbauer ]

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by mazex:

I will now rest my case as this is getting too much off topic...

/Mazex

Fine by me, but if you'd like to explain further what you meant please feel free to vist The Annex Forum and start a new thread.

[Battlefront.com]

Hi Jim,

None of this politico nonsensense with WW2

You've obviously missed the "insightful" posts from neo-Nazis we occasionally see on this Forum

Steve

[Sergei]

At least this subject is less likely to heat things up than some recent, real conflicts... ahem, T-72: Balkans On Fire...

[Battlefront.com]

Hof,

general widespread social stupidity unfortunately is neither an american invention nor monopoly. it's globally universal, with locally different pronounciations.

I wanted someone else to make that point and wondered how long it would take Yes, the masses are generally sheep, even though I feel that is an insult to some of the sheep I've met since sheep aren't mean!

Generally agree with your other statements. You overlooked something in your calculations about US abilities. The other way that the US can move into Syria, while still dealing with Iraq and Afghanistan, is to rely upon other NATO (type) forces to help with a Syrian operation. As you said, Afghanistan is largely seen as a necessary and even positive thing to be involved with, while Iraq is exactly the opposite.

If Syria were to do something similar to Afghanistan, in terms of creating a pretext for war, then it is logical to assume that large forces could be made available for operations in Syria quickly and in excess of what is needed.

For example, and I'm just using this as an example, say terrorists linked to Syrian based groups detonated a dirty bomb at EU HQ in Brussels for some reason (and the way things are going with Lebanon you can use your imaginations). In such a case the EU would be asking the US to come and take part in an invasion instead of the other way around. Because something like that would mean the Euros would go to war (in some form) with or without US support, much like the US went to war with Iraq without hardly any international support. But like Afghanistan, support would be found very easily.

Now, the position of Syria compared to Afghanistan and Iraq is rather interesting. Turkey and the Aegean border Syria (this presumes certain things with Lebanon). Jordan is not all that friendly with Syria and Iraq is obviously a base of operations for US and British (primarily) military power already. So the stage is nearby and surrounded before the first shot is fired. This means that the US logistics requirements to move European troops around is not nearly as important as it would be for another location. German troops, for example, can move to forward positions by train and domestic airlift capacity instead.

How many ground troops would be needed to take out Syria's military? Not many. I'd wager that 75,000-100,000 of the right mix could do it. It's less than half the size of Iraq and has about 2/3rds of the population. The US could contribute 20,000 without much short term pain, the balance could easily be made up by EU countries. A paltry 10,000 each from France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Turkey gets the total up to 70,000 heavy troops. Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden, Cyprus (Greek part), Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia would only have to contribute a miniscule 1,500 troops each to make up the difference. Not to mention that the 5 larger nations I mentioned could easily field much larger forces. In fact, US forces don't need to be invloved at all from a paractical standpoint. Same for other countries such as Australia and New Zealand, even though I can't imagine these three sitting on the sidelines. All I am saying is that in theory the EU could handle a Syrian campaign all on its own.

The point of the above is to state that under certain circumstances the overstretched US forces, and political baggage it has loaded itself down with, aren't relevant. In fact, it could be argued that the US needn't even be involved at all (though it most certainly would be).

Just more food for thought

Steve

[ October 24, 2005, 08:59 AM: Message edited by: Battlefront.com ]

[M Hofbauer]

Steve,

indeed I had not thought of the CMSF-Syria-scenario as a "european" war.

your reasoning regarding troop strengths and abilities is sound.

however, it truly would have to be a major thing happening, like "your" dirty bomb in brussels.

to take this examples, as a european I dont see this scenario happening.

just "involvement" in terrorist activities won't do and will not throw anybody off the chair, since it's been an open secret that Syria is a breeding ground for and behind terriorist activities for decades.

A "regular" bomb attack or similar won't do, we've had those in the past with Syrian connection and nothing happened (or think Lockerbie etc., the maximum to happen is half-hearted sanctions by *some* countries).

First of all, the Europeans have long been known to be the best friends of the palestine-syrian-lebanese-jordan-egypt cause.

Just like Israel has its bonds with the US, the Europeans have their patronage for the arabs in the middle east. It would be a dumb things for the Syrians to damage that, *and* it would take a considerable act of atrocity to truly shake that.

The Syrians would be rather dumb to do that, *and* have it linked to themselves.

And that alone would be sufficient for many europeans to call it a setup, a CIA-planted effort etc. and doubt the Syrian involvement for the very fact that it is too easy to fabricate a finger pointing at Syria.

Mind you, it does not matter whether or not Syria truly did it - what matters is whether public opinion, directed by the european mass media, believes it. Any doubt would be sufficient to sit back and postulate that "violence has never been a solution" etc.

Even if the Syrians *did* do such an attack, *and* it would be traced back to them, all it would take would be a formal denial by the Syrian government that they had nothing to do with it, together with condolences for all the unfortunate victims of that terrible inhumane despiccable act of terrorists blabla, and you would have sufficient Europeans (and all it requires would be just a few out of the 25 to be unwilling) for the EU itself to be unable to wage real war.

Most of these countries, in fact all except two (the UK and France), have not been involved in wars for ... practically since WWII and there's fortunately still enough shock from the WW II experience in these societies to have a distinct dislike for war (apparently that is gradually fading away together with the respective generations).

Any recent involvement in conflicts had to be marketed to the voting public as peacebuilding missions and humanitarian operations, of very limited military scale.

Ok, say, the Syrians were dumb enough to do it, have it traced abck to them despite all efforts to the contrary, and the denial-condolences thing don't work, the Europeans have the fingerprints of Syrian embassy personal and members of the syrian secret service and want to see heads roll.

Still no go for a war, the Syrian government would merely have to sacrifice these pawns, label them as terrorist individuals who acted without the consent and knowledge of the syrian government, extradite them to Hague or even put them on trial themselves, and again your reason to go to war goes out the window.

Naw, it's just too hard to imagine the EU as such go to war (the "sufficient military forces" conditon would be met, but the "political" condition I can't see happening), much harder than seeing the US do it; mind you, I'm not saying the EU citizen (in all their inhomogenity) were even one iota smarter than the US citizen, they are just less likely as pertains the support for such a large military action (war).

[C'Rogers]

My name was mentioned by Battlefront in a post? Tis a happy and glorious day for me.

I wanted someone else to make that point and wondered how long it would take [big Grin] Yes, the masses are generally sheep, even though I feel that is an insult to some of the sheep I've met since sheep aren't mean!

The main problem with the masses = sheep argument is that pretty much everybody believes it, yet no one believes that they (and those who agree with them) are the ones who are part of the masses.

A someone related quote (on the people being stupid issue) I heard once that always stuck with me.

"Do you believe that the average person is really intelligent enough to make such important decisions?"

"Intelligent enough, absolutely. Able to become informed enough, no."

The Syrians would be rather dumb to do that, *and* have it linked to themselves.

I think the concept of the game is that the normal, somewhat sensible, government has been overthrown.

While I think your post brought up a lot of good points, I think you are making the rational actor assumption (which a lot of people who find the game to be impossible make as well, in my opinion). What I mean is you assume the Syrian government will continue to act by what we consider to be rational standards. If overthrown by an extremist group, who by almost very definition aren't acting rationally, then the scenario becomes much more possible.

[Battlefront.com]

Hof,

just "involvement" in terrorist activities won't do and will not throw anybody off the chair, since it's been an open secret that Syria is a breeding ground for and behind terriorist activities for decades.

Yes, but those terrorists kill Israeli Jews and their own Muslim brothers within the confines of the Middle East. This has been the problem with tollerating domestic terrorist states which in turn tollerate, or even sponsor, international terrorist organizations. Taliban in Afghanistan are a prime example.

A "regular" bomb attack or similar won't do, we've had those in the past with Syrian connection and nothing happened (or think Lockerbie etc., the maximum to happen is half-hearted sanctions by *some* countries).

Things have changed since Lockerbie. Terrorist groups are no longer seen as a mild source of annoyance every so often. The US, and many other nations, are starting to wake up to the fact that this is only going to get worse. My problem is that the solution is, like almost every political solution, to attack the results of the problem instead of the problem itself. But I digress

Just like Israel has its bonds with the US, the Europeans have their patronage for the arabs in the middle east. It would be a dumb things for the Syrians to damage that, *and* it would take a considerable act of atrocity to truly shake that.

Who said the Syrians were the ones that planted the dirty bomb? I'd have to look some info, but I don't think there were any Afghanis on any of the 9/11 flight, yet Afghanistan was still targeted. And anyway, your statement shows that you haven't read the papers lately:

Ok, say, the Syrians were dumb enough to do it, have it traced abck to them despite all efforts to the contrary, and the denial-condolences thing don't work, the Europeans have the fingerprints of Syrian embassy personal and members of the syrian secret service and want to see heads roll.

They've already apparently done this with Lebanon. Assad even said he'd consider anybody that was involved in the assassination to be a traitor, yet his own brother and most of the big wigs in the security system have apparently got their fingerprints all over the whole operation.

What I'm saying is... don't give so much credit to the way isolated regimes think. Saddam thought he could get away with invading Kuwait, then he thought he could get away with playing games with UN Inspectors. The Taliban thought they could score successes against the West without having to actually do it themselves. Argentina thought open military action against the British would be a great PR move, just as Morrocco thought landing troops on disputed islands wouldn't get the Spanish government pissed off and send in the Marines. The list of mistakes and short sighted thinking with smaller petty dictatorships would probably choke this BBS with the volume of examples.

In short... just as one should not underestimate a likely threat, one also shouldn't underestimate the ability for people in power to make major mistakes.

Steve

[ October 24, 2005, 04:59 PM: Message edited by: Battlefront.com ]

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

...one also shouldn't underestimate the ability for people in power to make major mistakes.

E.g., Hitler embarking on WW II. But I suppose that's off-topic for this forum.

Michael

[Battlefront.com]

E.g., Hitler embarking on WW II. But I suppose that's off-topic for this forum.

Hehe... I originally had a couple of Hitler's biggest mistakes in my little list of stuff, but then I figured some silly person would argue that attacking the Soviet Union could have worked if they had just [insert laundry list of impossible/impractical/naive things here] and then they would have rulled for 1000 years. So I deleted it

Steve

[junk2drive]

Was it Yamamoto who said...

[stoat]

Yes it was.

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by junk2drive:

Was it Yamamoto who said...

"Ouch! Where did those damned P-38s come from?"

Michael

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />E.g., Hitler embarking on WW II. But I suppose that's off-topic for this forum.

Hehe... I originally had a couple of Hitler's biggest mistakes in my little list of stuff, but then I figured some silly person would argue that attacking the Soviet Union could have worked if they had just [insert laundry list of impossible/impractical/naive things here] and then they would have rulled for 1000 years. So I deleted it </font>

[Battlefront.com]

"If German scientists had been allowed to develop anti-gravity in time..."

Ooo!! I know the answer to this one:

"... the Maus would have been able to drive on normal surfaces without bogging and cross bridges without crushing them. And it follows that a couple of Maus would have won the war!"

When I was young I thought of all the things that could have been done for the 3rd Reich to have won. Then I realized how seriously f'd up the entire regime was and that there was no chance of victory unless the Nazi Party was completely eliminated. However, if that happened the chances are that war would have been averted, limited, or at least ended as soon as was practical. Best bet was to not have invaded the Soviets, but that would be like putting a raging alcoholic in booze cellar and finding him dead of alcohol poisioning several days later, then saying "if only he hadn't drunk all that booze he'd still be alive today".

Steve

[SSgt Viljuri]

Michael Emrys wrote:

(snips) If German scientists had been allowed to develop anti-gravity in time..."

The sad fact is that many US government institutions do support crackpots, who make claims about absolutely ridiculous findigs and discoveries (as long as those findings could potentially support a military application).

For example, Tampere University of Technology* had appointed a certain russian emigree scientist (dunno about his real credentials, but everything is possible in Tampere), who was truly a pseudo-scientist... namely, he authored a formal paper about a discovery of anti-gravity, in Civilization terms, or course .

Naturally, he doesn't work for the Finnish university anymore, the last time he was heard from, a certain US government institution had given him a grant to "pursue" his ideas. Sad, if true.

* Far second to Helsinki University of Technology, like everything else coming from Tampere. Turku is still worse though, not to mention there are some places beyond comprehension (U of Joensuu... only moose study there or somefink)

[Abbott]

My next-door neighbor who Steve probably considers to be an idiot is a retired Native American Firefighter, a Vietnam veteran, an excellent Bass fisherman and a all around nice guy. In conversation the other day he mentioned his thoughts to me on the problems in the Middle East. He said (and I quote) “We should turn the Jews loose”. I know a few dozen people, mostly veterans with similar thoughts on the subject who think that people with the attitudes of some on this Forum are the idiots.

Personally as a proud American I don’t have a problem with the US exerting its influence over a country that contains the second largest oil supply in the world. I don’t have a problem with Sadaam Hussein going on trial and I could cheerfully shoot the man in the forehead then sit down to a nice meal. I am glad his sons are dead and I applaud the men who killed them.

It wouldn’t bother me a bit if the US attacked Syria tomorrow to curtail the insurgents and it would not surprise me in the slightest if some cross-border missions (assassinations) have already been carried out. What some people seem to have difficulty understanding is that everyone in that business be it a soldier, terrorist, supporter or private contractor knows the score when they chose to walk in that realm. It is tough on those who haven’t been there but to those who have it is normal everyday life. Screw them, insurgents and terrorists are not people, they are bags of sh*t and bags of sh*t are easily disposed of.

[Sergei]

Uh-huh. It is very reassuring to know that we have such great humane thinkers as Abbott among us.

Say, you have a lot in common with 'em bags of ****...

[Abbott]

Originally posted by Sergei:

Uh-huh. It is very reassuring to know that we have such great humane thinkers as Abbott among us.

Say, you have a lot in common with 'em bags of ****...

Your wrong. I have a lot in common with those who have been there.

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Abbott:

Your wrong.

No, I'm not. You're just the type that is soft in the top and thus easy to train to kill innocents. To claim that you have things in common with veterans is an insult to the veterans everywhere.

[Abbott]

Originally posted by Sergei:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Abbott:

Your wrong.

No, I'm not. You're just the type that is soft in the top and thus easy to train to kill innocents. To claim that you have things in common with veterans is an insult to the veterans everywhere. </font>

[jim crowley]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

Hi Jim,

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />None of this politico nonsensense with WW2

You've obviously missed the "insightful" posts from neo-Nazis we occasionally see on this Forum

Steve </font>

[Kurtz]

Originally posted by Abbott:

Personally as a proud American I don’t have a problem with the US exerting its influence over a country that contains the second largest oil supply in the world.

You know, the US (and other countries) "exerting its influence" is what gave power to men like Saddam Hussein and the Shah of Iran.

They really should have named the war Operation Iraqi Liberty.

[Sergei]

Originally posted by Abbott:

All you are doing is running your mouth without any knowledge of what you are talking about.

Which differs from your modus operandi, how? You're just the perfect example of what Steve was talking about:

I think most Americans are idiots

[M Hofbauer]

Originally posted by Sergei:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Abbott:

All you are doing is running your mouth without any knowledge of what you are talking about.

Which differs from your modus operandi, how? You're just the perfect example of what Steve was talking about:

I think most Americans are idiots

</font>