From: HADCRJAM@admin.uh.edu (MILLER, JIMMY A.)
Subject: Re: **** ANOTHER COVER-UP - Please read this... ****
Organization: University of Houston Administrative Computing
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 12:49:57 GMT
X-News-Reader: VMS NEWS 1.20

In <1992Sep29.224443.14036@oracle.us.oracle.com> rchilder@us.oracle.com writes:

  I'm not Mr. McCullough, but I hope you don't mind my interjecting a comment
or two.

> mccullou@cae.wisc.edu (Mark McCullough) writes:
> >a very major fundamental difference: Iraq was the aggressor.  They invaded
> >Kuwait.  The US intervened to stop this invasion.  For a better comparison,
> 
> Save me the party line. Think for yourself.

  Actually, we intervened because we were concerned about the Kuwaiti and
Saudi oil, and what SH might do with the revenues from that oil.  We did not
intervene "just" to reverse the invasion for it's own sake.  I see nothing
wrong with this.  The US does not have the resources to go out and play world
policeman all the time.  It must pick and choose those areas where it feels its
vital interests are threatened. 

> >soldiers.  Okay, you can go to the hundreds of families and explain to
> >them why a certain soldier won't be coming home, because you were more
> >worried about using conventional strategies than minimizing casualties.
> >Why in some military groups, that idea could lose you your command, if
> >not all.  A commander with that attitude _should_ be relieved of command.
> 
> I refer you to a military classic widely regarded throughout the world.
> It's called _The Art Of War_, attributed to an individual named Sun Tzu,
> whose existence cannot be authenticated but whose writings were revered by
> American generals and Mao Tse Tung, alike.
> 
> He has some harsh things to say about your kind of attitude.

  I have read Sun Tzu, and I think not.  Sun Tzu was very much against the 
needless expenditure of life in areas where battle would gain you nothing.  He
favored the indirect approach, so as to maximize your resources at unexpected
points of an enemy's defenses (also expounded by Liddell-Hart).  I believe that
Sun Tzu would very much approve of the *conduct* of the war in general, in that
the Allies utilized the indirect approach, and took advantage of all their
areas of superiority to minimize their own casualties.  Minimizing Iraqi cas-
ualties was not thier job.

  I believe Tzu would have been far more critical of Iraqi leadership than the
allied.  The Iraqi's (read: Saddam) wasted soldiers on a hopeless position.

  The only way the Allies had to minimize their casualties while also minimizing
Iraqi losses was not to attack at all.  But whether the *political* objectives
could have been attained by that action (or inaction, if you prefer) is open to
question.


semper fi,

Jammer Jim Miller 
Texas A&M University '89 and '91
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