So, Nasser ordered the UN forces out of Sinai: and what?
Is that 'evidence' for his aggressive intention?
The IDF has captured all the Egyptian military documentation for the June 1967 War. Every single paper, every single order, every single plan: mostly even 3-4 times.
....and yet: it never found trace for any kind of a serious plan for an attack/aggression/invasion of Israel. Even the story about the supposed drive into the Negev Desert remains 'not really substantiated'.
So, if Egypt had no plan to attack Israel, what do you want to complain about?
I'm a liar because I didn't go to extension to discuss irrelevancies?
Yeah yeah , the Usual if you do not agree with me then yoou are a Nazi, are you a Putinist? Also typical Arabs are sub-human and deserve extermination , you are not discussing military history , just forcing your political view on other people by calling them names without realising that you acually hurt your own cause , no one likes a bully
With all the examples like these, you'd think they'd learn their lesson by now. Then again, there seems to be a theme of never learning from past mistakes; an interesting read as always.
Question; Have you ever covered conflicts and wars in Asia or the kinds of military structures they have?
Asia.... me: not. It took me so much time and effort to find out all the 'bits and pieces' of different wars in the Middle East and Africa, that I never found the time to 'care' about Asia.
But, I know people who did and thus I've asked them to write us a few books for the Asia@War series published by Helion.
If I'm to ask, the best example would be Ravi Rikhye. His insights into the Indo-Pakistani wars are startling. Excellent example: Indo-Pakistani War, Volume 1:
Volume 2 is about to be published, in a few weeks.
Another example: Dr Sanjay Badri-Maharaj. The man who co-wrote the official Strategy for Deployment of Nuclear Weapons for the Indian Government (and thus the armed forces). Recommended read: Nuclear India and Terror and Response.
I've read a lots of books by Indian and Pakistani authors (was 'even' instrumental in having at least two Pakistani authors writing books for us, too); 'but', I simply never found anybody as capable as cleanly dissecting and as clearly describing these conflicts as Ravi and Sanjay.
And then there are calibres like
- Albert Grandolini (the 'living/walking encyclopedia of all the wars in South-East Asia': we've published two mini-series of his, one about the Easter Offensive and then the - simply unbeatable - 'Target Saigon'): the way Albert understands a 'conflict', the way he's studying it....me thinks: unbeatable.
- Darren Poole (Hunting the Viet Cong mini-series),
- Ken Conboy (the Erawan War mini-series and the book on the CIA ops in Tibet) or
- Adrien Fontanellaz (see his two-volume work on Soviet-Japanese Wars of the 1930s: Red Star vs Rising Sun, or his series on the Sri Lankan War: Paradise Afire).
....with other words: if I would ever dare writing any kind of books about wars in Asia, I would do so in style of these fine gentlemen.
Oh, dear! What a Master class on Middle East modern warfare (and politics).
Sorry for you, Tom, but I hope some other “genius” ask irritating questions to you, if it may generate more post like this. I’m just re reading your “Iran-Iraq War” (this time in the big compendium), so I’m in the mood for it.
you're not dealing with some 17-years-young fan-boy posting fantasies around the internet because's he's got a smartphone and internet connection, but with somebody who's researched the affairs in question to the depth widely considered 'impossible' by all the colleagues I know have tried.
Thus, nope, I'm not 'mixing' Iran and Iraq, and I know very well who bought what - as can be seen from, between others, books like these:
All are researched on basis of interviews with participants, and official documentation - not on 'could be/would be/should be' or some 3rd hand sources of reference based - as so often - on some famed 'Israeli intelligence'...
Thus, when I tell you that Saddam was, yes perhaps the 'biggest fan' of the F-14 - ever - then I know what am I talking about and why. So much so, that he sought to buy at least a similar fighter jet from somewhere else. Never found any, and the British would never sell him F-4 Phantoms (which were US-designed, but the British purchased their own variant) and so opted for Dassault Mirage F.1.
....and later, on, during the war with Iran, Saddam went to great extension to hamper Iranian F-14-operations at every opportunity. Which is why Baghdad spent US$ 2 billion for paying the French to develop electronic countermeasures against the F-14 (see the book 'Iraqi Mirages' for details), and why the Iraqi General Directorate of Military Intelligence run a multi-year operation to convince one of Iranian F-14-pilots to defect with his jet to Iraq (for details, including the outcome, see 'MiG-23 in the Middle East').
I am very thankful you found time to present such informative and interesting passage as an answer to my comment. But I must apologize for somewhat obscure expression of my arguments. I only wanted to point to the great cultural differences between the citizens of the former Soviet Republics nowadays and Eastern people 30-50 years ago. The wars of 1960-ies between Israel and Arabic states were the place to earn "big money" for the Soviet military functionaries who were sent as "advisers" to Egypt. In the USSR in general military capacities of Egypt were considered as "poor" and Soviet weapons were considered to be "used improperly". Every war in the Middle East was thought to be the stage where USA and the Soviet Union fought using their proxies. Dictatorships are ineffective but the democracies are not always sufficiently effective in their wars with the dictatorships.
Watch the Russian tank biathlon from the time before the war and the biases Rusdian participants have to those of other nations. That is quite revealing how they see the rest of the world - inferior to themselves.
'full revelation': I'm sick and tired of racism and racism-based prejudice. Find it nothing but despicable: I'll not get mad about a mass of things about which other people are going to get mad, but I'll always get mad about racists.
My first-hand-experience – and that from working with Arabs from Egypt, with Arabs from Palestine, with Arabs from Syria, with Arabs from Iraq, or from Tunisia, from working with Turks, from working with Indians, with Pakistanis, with Philippinos, with Latinos from Mexico, from El Salvador, Guatemala, with Argentinians, with Chileans, with West- and East Europeans, with US Americans, with Canadians, with Nigerians, with Algerians, with Angolans, with Tunisians, any other 'corner' of Africa…. you name them, and highly educated, poorly educated, doesn't matter - is that there is NO difference.
Everybody - repeat for emphasis: EVERYBODY - can learn anything, and everybody can do everything.
If only given a decent chance and fair chance, and properly trained (or 'taught to do their job').
Sure, one has to approach different people in different fashion. One needs empathy for every man/woman’s unique position, so that one can understand their ‘starting point’. One needs patience. And, sure: there is a handful of people who can’t be taught anything at all. Like there are people who, no matter what one does while working with them, no matter how sincerely one tries to help them – are going to 'stab one in the back'.
But, that’s not 'Arabs' (or at least 'not reserved exclusively for Arabs').
….another experience is: if one is patronising people, and (in military disciplines) if one is teaching then defeatism, if one is all the time explaining them they can’t – then they really can’t.
What both the West and the East were doing in the Middle East during the Cold War, and the West is still doing until this very day (just like the Russians are doing it in Syria until today), is an institutional teaching of the Arabs that they can’t. Indeed: professional explaining that they can’t, always in interest of all the possible foreign interests - usually those serving the ‘industry’.
....and then there's the 'same quality of rapport' back home, so that all the possible racists are delighted: ‘We’re superior, and you, Middle Easterners, were born to be an Untermensch, period’.
Please, be so kind, and do not apply that way of thinking when communicating with me. We can discuss Western racism, Eastern racism, even Middle Eastern racism (there's not much of it there, but there still is). All no problem. But, universally declaring people from any certain part of the world for 'all incompetent', and then doing that on basis of hear-say from decades ago.... sorry: that's racist for me, and is always going to remain that way.
I did not and do not declare that the people of the Middle East incompetent or inferior, I only think that they are different. After reading Desmond Stuart/s "The men of Friday" I became very sympathetic to Arabs. Arabian way of living is different from the European. Maybe concerning the military service and military performance there are absolutely no differences and everything depends on the leaders. Then you have to assume that there was no difference between Wehrmacht soldiers and the soldiers of the Soviet Army except in command. I am not the witness of the WW II but we have quite a lot of evidence of such difference (discipline, competence etc.). As to the desire to depict Arabs as inferiors we have a lot of such Israelite narratives even in Ukraine. So one must assume that the collective West is eager to rule and to dominate everything irrespective of the declarations in public.
You are talking to the person who wrote that the lives of people of Asiatic origin have no value, that people of Asiatic origins don't value their lives, that writing such things is not racism because it's true, blah blah
....don't worry: one of first reactions to this post was an e-mail containing - essentially - an outcry of disgust: '...blasphemy! You're contradicting Pollack and his bibles like Arabs at War and Armies of Sand'....
Hi Tom. Is it a big issue to have civilian Minister of Defense, or it's an issue with loyalty vs competence? Here in Ukraine, we also have civilian Minister, and this by law starting back from 2019, and as I know this practice is quite common in the world
For the 'representatives of the VSRF-officers' I'm in touch with: yes, is a major issue. They simply can't understand how can any civilian serve as a minister of defence. So much so, is something like '10-15th most often mentioned reason' for invasion of Ukraine.
I have to admit I don't quite understand - for me, Minister of Defense is a political position. He/she should *know* what army can do, based on reports from military, to serve this knowledge during discussions with Prime Minister/President, and then set strategic goals for the military. Am I wrong here? The war itself should be conducted under orders by GenStab.
In my work, I do not try to influence how is the contact/source thinking, but I'm collecting/recording what the source says - and forwarding that, with as little 'editing' (for grammar and syntax) as possible.
Why that?
Because that's the only way to get an authentic point of view.
If I start 'correcting' the source, I'm screwing up.
Thus, I have never seriously tried to discuss this with any of contacts in question. I simply record what they say. That's it. Sole exception was one that asked me for my opinion. In that case, I've explained that I do not understand their inability to understand that a minister = 'administrator'. Indeed, the more technocrat a minister is, the more versed in administration, logistics, organisation, etc. - the better. And that, therefore, any 'CEO' can (or at least should) be qualified to act as a minister of defence, too.
To him, that was neither 'important', nor 'understandable'. Quite on the contrary: it was shocking to think that way...
Ah ok, so the reason is that military "thinks" it would be better off led by "a warrior". Rather simplistic view of the world, but then again this kind of education is hard to come by anywhere in the world.
That was a simply brilliant post, and your points were very well made ! But I feel that military competence tends to be the exception - whatever political system is in play. Certainly the last few decades of the Wars on Terror have not been good arguments in favor of democratic military governance... On the Middle East wars, have you ever read "The game of Nations" by Miles Copeland ? Quite convincing in the way it explains the failure of Nasser's grand strategy...
This is a brave and honest reporting. We just keep filter "Sergej's" or bully comments under spam..
Like your view: Mother Courage wins, not constitution, .nor confession.. any culture carries bravery.. how we ignite, mobilize fighting a war, are relevant questions..
Keep on going, like to see more of your military and historical views.
You might be good in counting tanks and explaining war strategy, but, ... oh boy - you are missing huge chunk in history. Get back to history class or don't make such comments. "Israel grabbing all of the Palestine in 1947-1949" - eh? Did you ever hear about Balfour Declaration? British mandate? Don't take me wrong, I'm enjoying your military comments and respect your opinion on war issues, but please do yourself a favor and stay away from historicopolitical comments. Thanks.
Actually, I'm very bad at 'counting tanks'. Indeed, not even interested in that.
People like you simply do not like to accept the reality, but are dogmatically gauging everything by their double standards.
Correspondingly:
Balfour declaration = 'oh, immensely important; fundamental for Israeli statehood'....but people like you do not even pay attention the same declaration conditioned support for Israeli statehood on the rights of the native population.... and that Israel is systematically not doing that? ....that it has ethnically cleansed the majority of the native population and then imposed over 60 Apartheid-style laws?
(BTW, I didn't come to the idea to declare such laws for 'Apartheid': that's what those few Israelis who are decent enough to do so, have named them.)
....just like you do not pay attention about the fact that around the same time - in the very 1916 - the British were making promises of sovereign statehood wherever they only could. Indeed, they've promised the same territory (Palestine) to the Hashemites. And independence to the Kurds. Why is 'Israel important' and 'must be', but nothing else is? And why are you ignoring the work of the King-Crane Commission of 1919? Don't like the results or never heard of it....?
- British Mandate? For what is that important? For the British screwing up another situation, and creating a decades-long conflict, just like in so many other places....? None of the locals ever wanted the British Mandate (see King-Crane Commission): this was imposed upon them. And it ended on 15 May 1948. By the time, about 80% of the native population of Palestine was already ethnically cleansed - and that by Israeli records. And by US records, Zionist leaders were making plans for grabbing all of Palestine, plus much of neighbourhod and then establishing miltiary hegemony in all of the Middle East already in March 1948, All of this is news to you or you prefer to ignore it...?
- BTW, why didn't you mention the Arab Kingdom of Syria? A functional constitutional monarchy established by the Hashemites and supporting Arab nationalists in the Middle East between al-Bab in the north and Aqaba in the south, and including Palestine, as of 1918-1920? Authoritative enough for the Zionist authorities to enter several contracts with it - before being destroyed, in blood, by the French and the British?
....why not talking about that?
So, how and what do you want to 'advise' me? To apply the same double standards like you do? To ignore Israeli wrongdoings 'because critique of Israel is anti-Semitism' and similar idiotic dogmas....?
Please, do us both a favour: as long as you're insistent on double standards, do your best to ignore me. Make a huge detour as soon as you hear my name. Or see links to my posts. Just like so many others do.
for Saddam making party's officials officers: from what I understand, that one is on Soviet's influence. Soviets were providing both arms amd doctrine and political control via party's officials embedded to all levels of leadership was just their way (admittedly, in Stalin's time - all communist party officials had also military rank and in case of mobilization were to be included into staffs - there were political committees which were overseeing all military effort).
That said, I've no illusion that Saddam loved that system because it gave him direct control over military and protected him from coup - which, in his mind, was probably much bigger threat to him than military defeat from Iran. After all, his clan wasn't biggest nor strongest (probably reason why Soviets supported him - they *love* dictators without strong powerbase who must rely on their support to stay in power).
Nope. There was no 'Soviet influence' in Iraq under Saddam. Saddam didn't tolerate any kind of foreign influence: indeed, Saddam was a nick, meaning 'Hammer'. Came from the fact that he rose to prominence through crushing in blood - between others, though first and foremost - the Communist Party of Iraq. Was a relatively small, but well-organised and thus one of most powerful political parties in (generally: conservative) Iraq of the early 1960s. And Saddam established himself as the 'chief' of the Ba'ath Party's own 'security'....
Saddam did tolerate communist members of the government while still a 'vice' to Bakr, once he rose to power, in 1969-1970, and yes, he had his hand in the friendship pact with the USSR of 1972. But, these were 'just tools': the British embargo on (nationalised) Iraqi oil forced him to make sure Iraq can continue earning through exporting its oil elsewhere. At the time, that was anything else than certain....
But, already 1-2 years later, he launched a systematic campaign of prosecuting Iraqi Communists. Combined with his decision to stop buying Soviet arms and tools of economic development (see: contracts for major development projects) of 1974, this brought him on a direct collision course with Moscow. By 1979, the situation was such that he openly and bitterly - and much to Brezhnev's disgust - criticised the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan...
Iraqis and Soviets were never friends: not even 'allies'. 'Arms exporters' and 'customers for arms' at best. There was no 'Soviet influence' in the Iraqi armed forces past the point at which there was a clique of officers in the Iraqi Air Force that preferred Sukhoi jets to French-made Mirages. It was even known as the 'Sukhoi Clique'. Quickly lost its influence once it became known just how superior were French-made Mirage F.1s to Su-22s...
Rather than that, Saddam converted the Ba'ath Party into his personal tool: a tool of keeping everything and everybody in Iraq under control. This foremost included the armed forces and intelligence services. For that, he 'had to' appoint his favourites and relatives into important positions. And, since the 'military' was always refusing to subject itself to the political control, the easiest solution was to dress his henchmen into military uniforms.
I don't think you're not taking it that far, but we should be careful not to run to the extreme of defining top national and military leadership - the "system" - as a dominant and determining factor of specific military performance over other institutional, cultural, and technical characteristics, or situational factors like stakeholder buy-in. After all, despite the Hitlerian system in Nazi Germany, from top to bottom and from beginning to end the Wehrmacht proved frighteningly effective, arguably one of the few most effective military organizations in history. The American and Soviet military institutions were very aware of this relative effectiveness, and struggled to analyze and find explanations for German combat power even well after the war. Of course, the Deutsches Heer punched above its weight under the Prussian system as well, despite many bad examples of top leadership and management.
But that's my point - the actual military in the field was routinely more effective than any of its opponents - *despite* the problems with leadership and policy that you may enumerate. If the uppermost leadership alone were simply determinative, Germany shouldn't even have had the opportunity to attempt invading the USSR.
I wonder when you will do such analyze on UA army. I really have the bad feeling West consultants were are pushing ZSU to push when they are not prepared. Zalushni missing for more then a mouth is very suspicious from that point of view, since he was against some of the decisions.
I think that hardly anybody is going to like hearing what do I think about the 'Western influence' upon the ZSU. I do understand that Ukrainians are grateful and I understand why. And I understand how incapable of accepting any kind of critique - especially for its own incompetence, corruption, and greed - the 'collective West' generally is.
In this place, I think it's sufficient to say: how 'good' are Western advisors/instructors was visible in the first few assaults of the 47th Mech in the Orikhiv area, back on 5-10 June this year...
Besides, my 'focus' was, is, and is going to remain on the 'Russian way of war'.
Thus, I'm usually holding back: at most, you might find a few of my related observations in 'suitable places' around books like War in Ukraine, Volume 2.
I understand, but i think such analyze just help RF to find and fix their own problems as far as they could. UA and west could use some constructive critic, because the last mouth was disgusting and it`s clear UA forces have a lot of internal problems.
So, Nasser ordered the UN forces out of Sinai: and what?
Is that 'evidence' for his aggressive intention?
The IDF has captured all the Egyptian military documentation for the June 1967 War. Every single paper, every single order, every single plan: mostly even 3-4 times.
....and yet: it never found trace for any kind of a serious plan for an attack/aggression/invasion of Israel. Even the story about the supposed drive into the Negev Desert remains 'not really substantiated'.
So, if Egypt had no plan to attack Israel, what do you want to complain about?
I'm a liar because I didn't go to extension to discuss irrelevancies?
Let me help you make it simple, Nikolaj.
I'm a liar.
Why should you trouble yourself with such works by Prof Benny Morris like, say,
- The Brith of the Palestinian Refugee Problem
- Righteous Victims: a History of the Zionist-ARab Conflict, or
- 1948: A history of the First Arab-Israeli War?`
Correspondingly, I'm not even going to try recommending you some 'even more blasphemic' literature, like, say,
- Ron David's Arabs & Israel for Beginners,
- Stephen Green's 'Taking Sides: America's secret Relations with a militant Israel', or....oh no, really no:
- diverse works by Ilan Pappe (The 1948 Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine), or
- Shlomo Sand's The Invention of the Jewish People....
Heresy and blasphemy, all of this. And I'm a liar.
Farenheit 451, mate, and you're going to feel better...
'Israel-hater'?
OK, that's it: report for harassment & hate-speech + hard ban.
Yeah yeah , the Usual if you do not agree with me then yoou are a Nazi, are you a Putinist? Also typical Arabs are sub-human and deserve extermination , you are not discussing military history , just forcing your political view on other people by calling them names without realising that you acually hurt your own cause , no one likes a bully
That was a really interesting military history lesson (especially the historical parallels with Russia-Ukraine war)! Thanks a lot Tom!
With all the examples like these, you'd think they'd learn their lesson by now. Then again, there seems to be a theme of never learning from past mistakes; an interesting read as always.
Question; Have you ever covered conflicts and wars in Asia or the kinds of military structures they have?
Thx.
Asia.... me: not. It took me so much time and effort to find out all the 'bits and pieces' of different wars in the Middle East and Africa, that I never found the time to 'care' about Asia.
But, I know people who did and thus I've asked them to write us a few books for the Asia@War series published by Helion.
If I'm to ask, the best example would be Ravi Rikhye. His insights into the Indo-Pakistani wars are startling. Excellent example: Indo-Pakistani War, Volume 1:
https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/the-indo-pakistani-war-of-1971-volume-1-indian-military-intervention-in-east-pakistan.php?sid=275d10a31b23cc41fe8115fa254d9bc8
Volume 2 is about to be published, in a few weeks.
Another example: Dr Sanjay Badri-Maharaj. The man who co-wrote the official Strategy for Deployment of Nuclear Weapons for the Indian Government (and thus the armed forces). Recommended read: Nuclear India and Terror and Response.
https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/nuclear-india-developing-indias-nuclear-arms-from-reluctance-to-triad.php?sid=275d10a31b23cc41fe8115fa254d9bc8
https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/terror-and-response-the-india-pakistan-proxy-war-2008-2019.php?sid=275d10a31b23cc41fe8115fa254d9bc8
I've read a lots of books by Indian and Pakistani authors (was 'even' instrumental in having at least two Pakistani authors writing books for us, too); 'but', I simply never found anybody as capable as cleanly dissecting and as clearly describing these conflicts as Ravi and Sanjay.
And then there are calibres like
- Albert Grandolini (the 'living/walking encyclopedia of all the wars in South-East Asia': we've published two mini-series of his, one about the Easter Offensive and then the - simply unbeatable - 'Target Saigon'): the way Albert understands a 'conflict', the way he's studying it....me thinks: unbeatable.
- Darren Poole (Hunting the Viet Cong mini-series),
- Ken Conboy (the Erawan War mini-series and the book on the CIA ops in Tibet) or
- Adrien Fontanellaz (see his two-volume work on Soviet-Japanese Wars of the 1930s: Red Star vs Rising Sun, or his series on the Sri Lankan War: Paradise Afire).
....with other words: if I would ever dare writing any kind of books about wars in Asia, I would do so in style of these fine gentlemen.
Oh, dear! What a Master class on Middle East modern warfare (and politics).
Sorry for you, Tom, but I hope some other “genius” ask irritating questions to you, if it may generate more post like this. I’m just re reading your “Iran-Iraq War” (this time in the big compendium), so I’m in the mood for it.
F 14 Iran had Tomket, not Saddam.
Read again, he did not say Iraq had Tomcats.
Sergey....
you're not dealing with some 17-years-young fan-boy posting fantasies around the internet because's he's got a smartphone and internet connection, but with somebody who's researched the affairs in question to the depth widely considered 'impossible' by all the colleagues I know have tried.
Thus, nope, I'm not 'mixing' Iran and Iraq, and I know very well who bought what - as can be seen from, between others, books like these:
Iraqi Mirages:
https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/iraqi-mirages-dassault-mirage-family-in-service-with-iraqi-air-force-1981-1988.php?sid=5ea7c27f6748314b99366befb186ca94
In the Claws of the Tomcat:
https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/in-the-claws-of-the-tomcat-us-navy-f-14-tomcats-in-air-combat-against-iran-and-iraq-1987-2000.php?sid=5ea7c27f6748314b99366befb186ca94
or MiG-23 Flogger in the Middle East:
https://www.helion.co.uk/military-history-books/mig-23-flogger-in-the-middle-east-mikoyan-i-gurevich-mig-23-in-service-in-algeria-egypt-iraq-libya-and-syria-1973-until-today.php?sid=5ea7c27f6748314b99366befb186ca94
All are researched on basis of interviews with participants, and official documentation - not on 'could be/would be/should be' or some 3rd hand sources of reference based - as so often - on some famed 'Israeli intelligence'...
Thus, when I tell you that Saddam was, yes perhaps the 'biggest fan' of the F-14 - ever - then I know what am I talking about and why. So much so, that he sought to buy at least a similar fighter jet from somewhere else. Never found any, and the British would never sell him F-4 Phantoms (which were US-designed, but the British purchased their own variant) and so opted for Dassault Mirage F.1.
....and later, on, during the war with Iran, Saddam went to great extension to hamper Iranian F-14-operations at every opportunity. Which is why Baghdad spent US$ 2 billion for paying the French to develop electronic countermeasures against the F-14 (see the book 'Iraqi Mirages' for details), and why the Iraqi General Directorate of Military Intelligence run a multi-year operation to convince one of Iranian F-14-pilots to defect with his jet to Iraq (for details, including the outcome, see 'MiG-23 in the Middle East').
I am very thankful you found time to present such informative and interesting passage as an answer to my comment. But I must apologize for somewhat obscure expression of my arguments. I only wanted to point to the great cultural differences between the citizens of the former Soviet Republics nowadays and Eastern people 30-50 years ago. The wars of 1960-ies between Israel and Arabic states were the place to earn "big money" for the Soviet military functionaries who were sent as "advisers" to Egypt. In the USSR in general military capacities of Egypt were considered as "poor" and Soviet weapons were considered to be "used improperly". Every war in the Middle East was thought to be the stage where USA and the Soviet Union fought using their proxies. Dictatorships are ineffective but the democracies are not always sufficiently effective in their wars with the dictatorships.
Watch the Russian tank biathlon from the time before the war and the biases Rusdian participants have to those of other nations. That is quite revealing how they see the rest of the world - inferior to themselves.
The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Just let them have a hearty meal.
Elena,
'full revelation': I'm sick and tired of racism and racism-based prejudice. Find it nothing but despicable: I'll not get mad about a mass of things about which other people are going to get mad, but I'll always get mad about racists.
My first-hand-experience – and that from working with Arabs from Egypt, with Arabs from Palestine, with Arabs from Syria, with Arabs from Iraq, or from Tunisia, from working with Turks, from working with Indians, with Pakistanis, with Philippinos, with Latinos from Mexico, from El Salvador, Guatemala, with Argentinians, with Chileans, with West- and East Europeans, with US Americans, with Canadians, with Nigerians, with Algerians, with Angolans, with Tunisians, any other 'corner' of Africa…. you name them, and highly educated, poorly educated, doesn't matter - is that there is NO difference.
Everybody - repeat for emphasis: EVERYBODY - can learn anything, and everybody can do everything.
If only given a decent chance and fair chance, and properly trained (or 'taught to do their job').
Sure, one has to approach different people in different fashion. One needs empathy for every man/woman’s unique position, so that one can understand their ‘starting point’. One needs patience. And, sure: there is a handful of people who can’t be taught anything at all. Like there are people who, no matter what one does while working with them, no matter how sincerely one tries to help them – are going to 'stab one in the back'.
But, that’s not 'Arabs' (or at least 'not reserved exclusively for Arabs').
….another experience is: if one is patronising people, and (in military disciplines) if one is teaching then defeatism, if one is all the time explaining them they can’t – then they really can’t.
What both the West and the East were doing in the Middle East during the Cold War, and the West is still doing until this very day (just like the Russians are doing it in Syria until today), is an institutional teaching of the Arabs that they can’t. Indeed: professional explaining that they can’t, always in interest of all the possible foreign interests - usually those serving the ‘industry’.
....and then there's the 'same quality of rapport' back home, so that all the possible racists are delighted: ‘We’re superior, and you, Middle Easterners, were born to be an Untermensch, period’.
Please, be so kind, and do not apply that way of thinking when communicating with me. We can discuss Western racism, Eastern racism, even Middle Eastern racism (there's not much of it there, but there still is). All no problem. But, universally declaring people from any certain part of the world for 'all incompetent', and then doing that on basis of hear-say from decades ago.... sorry: that's racist for me, and is always going to remain that way.
I did not and do not declare that the people of the Middle East incompetent or inferior, I only think that they are different. After reading Desmond Stuart/s "The men of Friday" I became very sympathetic to Arabs. Arabian way of living is different from the European. Maybe concerning the military service and military performance there are absolutely no differences and everything depends on the leaders. Then you have to assume that there was no difference between Wehrmacht soldiers and the soldiers of the Soviet Army except in command. I am not the witness of the WW II but we have quite a lot of evidence of such difference (discipline, competence etc.). As to the desire to depict Arabs as inferiors we have a lot of such Israelite narratives even in Ukraine. So one must assume that the collective West is eager to rule and to dominate everything irrespective of the declarations in public.
You are talking to the person who wrote that the lives of people of Asiatic origin have no value, that people of Asiatic origins don't value their lives, that writing such things is not racism because it's true, blah blah
Thank you, I do hope the trolls read this and just do not go, oh your anti-Israeli or something worse.
....don't worry: one of first reactions to this post was an e-mail containing - essentially - an outcry of disgust: '...blasphemy! You're contradicting Pollack and his bibles like Arabs at War and Armies of Sand'....
Very interesting read Tom thanks
Hi Tom. Is it a big issue to have civilian Minister of Defense, or it's an issue with loyalty vs competence? Here in Ukraine, we also have civilian Minister, and this by law starting back from 2019, and as I know this practice is quite common in the world
For the 'representatives of the VSRF-officers' I'm in touch with: yes, is a major issue. They simply can't understand how can any civilian serve as a minister of defence. So much so, is something like '10-15th most often mentioned reason' for invasion of Ukraine.
I have to admit I don't quite understand - for me, Minister of Defense is a political position. He/she should *know* what army can do, based on reports from military, to serve this knowledge during discussions with Prime Minister/President, and then set strategic goals for the military. Am I wrong here? The war itself should be conducted under orders by GenStab.
What am I missing here?
'Heh & sigh'... how shall I explain this....?
In my work, I do not try to influence how is the contact/source thinking, but I'm collecting/recording what the source says - and forwarding that, with as little 'editing' (for grammar and syntax) as possible.
Why that?
Because that's the only way to get an authentic point of view.
If I start 'correcting' the source, I'm screwing up.
Thus, I have never seriously tried to discuss this with any of contacts in question. I simply record what they say. That's it. Sole exception was one that asked me for my opinion. In that case, I've explained that I do not understand their inability to understand that a minister = 'administrator'. Indeed, the more technocrat a minister is, the more versed in administration, logistics, organisation, etc. - the better. And that, therefore, any 'CEO' can (or at least should) be qualified to act as a minister of defence, too.
To him, that was neither 'important', nor 'understandable'. Quite on the contrary: it was shocking to think that way...
Ah ok, so the reason is that military "thinks" it would be better off led by "a warrior". Rather simplistic view of the world, but then again this kind of education is hard to come by anywhere in the world.
'Simplistic'?
Not really. Rather something like 'from 1914-1945-period'.
Fair enough.
That was a simply brilliant post, and your points were very well made ! But I feel that military competence tends to be the exception - whatever political system is in play. Certainly the last few decades of the Wars on Terror have not been good arguments in favor of democratic military governance... On the Middle East wars, have you ever read "The game of Nations" by Miles Copeland ? Quite convincing in the way it explains the failure of Nasser's grand strategy...
Of course: there is no 'military competence by birth'. That's racist BS.
Military competence is exactly like pluralism (or 'democracy'): either exercised with constant vigilance, or paid in blood.
(And nope: never read Copeland. I have a different, 'indirect' approach to such topics.)
Tom. Respect.
This is a brave and honest reporting. We just keep filter "Sergej's" or bully comments under spam..
Like your view: Mother Courage wins, not constitution, .nor confession.. any culture carries bravery.. how we ignite, mobilize fighting a war, are relevant questions..
Keep on going, like to see more of your military and historical views.
You might be good in counting tanks and explaining war strategy, but, ... oh boy - you are missing huge chunk in history. Get back to history class or don't make such comments. "Israel grabbing all of the Palestine in 1947-1949" - eh? Did you ever hear about Balfour Declaration? British mandate? Don't take me wrong, I'm enjoying your military comments and respect your opinion on war issues, but please do yourself a favor and stay away from historicopolitical comments. Thanks.
Actually, I'm very bad at 'counting tanks'. Indeed, not even interested in that.
People like you simply do not like to accept the reality, but are dogmatically gauging everything by their double standards.
Correspondingly:
Balfour declaration = 'oh, immensely important; fundamental for Israeli statehood'....but people like you do not even pay attention the same declaration conditioned support for Israeli statehood on the rights of the native population.... and that Israel is systematically not doing that? ....that it has ethnically cleansed the majority of the native population and then imposed over 60 Apartheid-style laws?
(BTW, I didn't come to the idea to declare such laws for 'Apartheid': that's what those few Israelis who are decent enough to do so, have named them.)
....just like you do not pay attention about the fact that around the same time - in the very 1916 - the British were making promises of sovereign statehood wherever they only could. Indeed, they've promised the same territory (Palestine) to the Hashemites. And independence to the Kurds. Why is 'Israel important' and 'must be', but nothing else is? And why are you ignoring the work of the King-Crane Commission of 1919? Don't like the results or never heard of it....?
- British Mandate? For what is that important? For the British screwing up another situation, and creating a decades-long conflict, just like in so many other places....? None of the locals ever wanted the British Mandate (see King-Crane Commission): this was imposed upon them. And it ended on 15 May 1948. By the time, about 80% of the native population of Palestine was already ethnically cleansed - and that by Israeli records. And by US records, Zionist leaders were making plans for grabbing all of Palestine, plus much of neighbourhod and then establishing miltiary hegemony in all of the Middle East already in March 1948, All of this is news to you or you prefer to ignore it...?
- BTW, why didn't you mention the Arab Kingdom of Syria? A functional constitutional monarchy established by the Hashemites and supporting Arab nationalists in the Middle East between al-Bab in the north and Aqaba in the south, and including Palestine, as of 1918-1920? Authoritative enough for the Zionist authorities to enter several contracts with it - before being destroyed, in blood, by the French and the British?
....why not talking about that?
So, how and what do you want to 'advise' me? To apply the same double standards like you do? To ignore Israeli wrongdoings 'because critique of Israel is anti-Semitism' and similar idiotic dogmas....?
Please, do us both a favour: as long as you're insistent on double standards, do your best to ignore me. Make a huge detour as soon as you hear my name. Or see links to my posts. Just like so many others do.
Thanks a lot - in advance.
for Saddam making party's officials officers: from what I understand, that one is on Soviet's influence. Soviets were providing both arms amd doctrine and political control via party's officials embedded to all levels of leadership was just their way (admittedly, in Stalin's time - all communist party officials had also military rank and in case of mobilization were to be included into staffs - there were political committees which were overseeing all military effort).
That said, I've no illusion that Saddam loved that system because it gave him direct control over military and protected him from coup - which, in his mind, was probably much bigger threat to him than military defeat from Iran. After all, his clan wasn't biggest nor strongest (probably reason why Soviets supported him - they *love* dictators without strong powerbase who must rely on their support to stay in power).
Nope. There was no 'Soviet influence' in Iraq under Saddam. Saddam didn't tolerate any kind of foreign influence: indeed, Saddam was a nick, meaning 'Hammer'. Came from the fact that he rose to prominence through crushing in blood - between others, though first and foremost - the Communist Party of Iraq. Was a relatively small, but well-organised and thus one of most powerful political parties in (generally: conservative) Iraq of the early 1960s. And Saddam established himself as the 'chief' of the Ba'ath Party's own 'security'....
Saddam did tolerate communist members of the government while still a 'vice' to Bakr, once he rose to power, in 1969-1970, and yes, he had his hand in the friendship pact with the USSR of 1972. But, these were 'just tools': the British embargo on (nationalised) Iraqi oil forced him to make sure Iraq can continue earning through exporting its oil elsewhere. At the time, that was anything else than certain....
But, already 1-2 years later, he launched a systematic campaign of prosecuting Iraqi Communists. Combined with his decision to stop buying Soviet arms and tools of economic development (see: contracts for major development projects) of 1974, this brought him on a direct collision course with Moscow. By 1979, the situation was such that he openly and bitterly - and much to Brezhnev's disgust - criticised the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan...
Iraqis and Soviets were never friends: not even 'allies'. 'Arms exporters' and 'customers for arms' at best. There was no 'Soviet influence' in the Iraqi armed forces past the point at which there was a clique of officers in the Iraqi Air Force that preferred Sukhoi jets to French-made Mirages. It was even known as the 'Sukhoi Clique'. Quickly lost its influence once it became known just how superior were French-made Mirage F.1s to Su-22s...
Rather than that, Saddam converted the Ba'ath Party into his personal tool: a tool of keeping everything and everybody in Iraq under control. This foremost included the armed forces and intelligence services. For that, he 'had to' appoint his favourites and relatives into important positions. And, since the 'military' was always refusing to subject itself to the political control, the easiest solution was to dress his henchmen into military uniforms.
As a general matter:
I don't think you're not taking it that far, but we should be careful not to run to the extreme of defining top national and military leadership - the "system" - as a dominant and determining factor of specific military performance over other institutional, cultural, and technical characteristics, or situational factors like stakeholder buy-in. After all, despite the Hitlerian system in Nazi Germany, from top to bottom and from beginning to end the Wehrmacht proved frighteningly effective, arguably one of the few most effective military organizations in history. The American and Soviet military institutions were very aware of this relative effectiveness, and struggled to analyze and find explanations for German combat power even well after the war. Of course, the Deutsches Heer punched above its weight under the Prussian system as well, despite many bad examples of top leadership and management.
'Hitlerian system in Nazi Germany' - was 'highly efficient'....?
It couldn't get together its stuff in regards of arms production until 1944, but people still call that 'highly efficient'....?
Sorry mate, I am allergic on such commentary.
But that's my point - the actual military in the field was routinely more effective than any of its opponents - *despite* the problems with leadership and policy that you may enumerate. If the uppermost leadership alone were simply determinative, Germany shouldn't even have had the opportunity to attempt invading the USSR.
I wonder when you will do such analyze on UA army. I really have the bad feeling West consultants were are pushing ZSU to push when they are not prepared. Zalushni missing for more then a mouth is very suspicious from that point of view, since he was against some of the decisions.
I think that hardly anybody is going to like hearing what do I think about the 'Western influence' upon the ZSU. I do understand that Ukrainians are grateful and I understand why. And I understand how incapable of accepting any kind of critique - especially for its own incompetence, corruption, and greed - the 'collective West' generally is.
In this place, I think it's sufficient to say: how 'good' are Western advisors/instructors was visible in the first few assaults of the 47th Mech in the Orikhiv area, back on 5-10 June this year...
Besides, my 'focus' was, is, and is going to remain on the 'Russian way of war'.
Thus, I'm usually holding back: at most, you might find a few of my related observations in 'suitable places' around books like War in Ukraine, Volume 2.
I understand, but i think such analyze just help RF to find and fix their own problems as far as they could. UA and west could use some constructive critic, because the last mouth was disgusting and it`s clear UA forces have a lot of internal problems.