From: sdr57@cas.org ()
Subject: Re: **** ANOTHER COVER-UP - Please read this... ****
Organization: Chemical Abstracts Service, Columbus, Ohio
Date: Sat, 26 Sep 1992 20:13:47 GMT

In article <1992Sep25.200750.23511@porthos.cc.bellcore.com> bobh@troy.uucp (22131-hettmansperger) writes:
>In article <Bv57CD.DzK@mail.boi.hp.com> rdetweil@boi.hp.com (Richard Detweiler) writes:
>>anouther's agression.  In this vain, I throw my lot with the previous
>>posters - war is indeed hell and if you must fight it can't be halfway.
>>Any agressor or agressor's apologist who denounces the cruelty or
>>unfairness of an enemy's tactics doesn't get any sympathy here - "Welcome
>>to the working week!".  If some Iraqis were buried alive in the heat
>>of combat, they can thank Mr. Hussein for that.  The allies were only
>>doing what anyone at war is attempting to do.  Win.  And hopefully with
>>the fewest number of casualties to your own troops.  The enemy cannot be
>>a concern.
>>
>
>I understand what you are saying, but let's be honest: if we bulldozed
>Iraqi solders off the front lines when it was just as easy to capture them
>as prisoners of war, then are we really deserving of the moral high ground
>in the war?  Is it the kind of behavior that merits praise and ticker tape
>parades?

You are making a false assumption here. It is pretty clear that
the Iraqis who were bulldozed were not surrendering, but rather
were taking advantage of their prepared positions to fight from
them. It was not a case of saying "heads we take them prisoner,
tails we bulldoze them." It was a case of "these guys are fighting,
lets take them out in a way which minimizes casualties to our troops."
Trying to get as few of your own side killed as possible is moral,
in my opinion.

It is easy to get caught up in the image presented on TV here
in the west which suggests that the Iraqi Army was a pushover all of
whose soldiers simply through down their weapons at the earliest
opportunity. This was simply not the case. There were units
whose morale was so low that they did not fight, but there were
also units which put up a good fight. Our low casualties
were not due solely to Iraqi surrenders, but rather to a plan
which allowed us to achieve tactical surprise against an enemy
unused to fighting an opponent in a mobile battle, and, also, to
equipment with superior protective capabilities (at least one M1
was reportedly struck twice by shells from a resisting Iraqi T-72
without being penetrated).
>
>If the only goal was simply to "win" regardless of the human cost, then
>perhaps we should have taken all of our nuclear warheads, aimed them at
>every city in Iraq and tried to kill every last citizen in the entire country.
>We probably could have done it, but somehow most people would find that to
>be pretty offensive.  War is strange that way.
>
If you look at the way in which the war was conducted, it seems to
have been prosecuted in a manner intended to minimize casualties
on *both* sides. It seems that you are objecting to the fact that,
when presented with the choice between coalition casualties and Iraqi
casualties, the coalition commanders chose a course which produced
Iraqi casualties. It might have seemed like more of a "fair fight"
if we had conducted "human wave" frontal assaults against every
defended Iraqi position. Then the casualty figures would have
been much higher for the coalition. If you were the commander who
had ordered such a course, what would you say to the mothers and
wives of the men who would have died in such assaults when those mothers
and wives asked you why you didn't use the armor to reduce the positions
instead of reverting to tactics which were proven useless in World War I?
For that matter, what would you say at your courts martial for being
so stupid? (And, if your concern is for the Iraqis who want to surrender,
you might wish to consider that surrendering is dangerous in the heat
of battle, and also that, for some reason, units which have taken
heavy casualties seem to end up taking fewer prisoners than units
which have taken light or no casualties).

War is never a good thing. You don't make it better by trying to
get your own people killed so as not to hurt the enemies feelings
by not embarrassing them.
******************************************************************************
Renegade academician. They're a dangerous breed when they go feral,
academics are...a chemist, too.
		    -(James P. Blaylock in "Lord Kelvin's Machine")

My organization hasn't agreed with any of my opinions so far, and
I doubt they'll start now.

Stanley "Ya nee speon" Roberts

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