Probable war battles.

 

On the books, as the former commander said in his book, Iraq was the strongest army in the middle east, It was the only force Israel had any kind of fear from it and The US brought 650 000 men other than 200 000 allies to defeat 350 000 Iraqi troops. Yet what happened? Nearly all of those troops were from the Iraqi army and all of them were recruits not career soldiers. The Helicopter gunships, the main tanks and anti aircraft missiles were all under the republican guards which fired not a single shot (especially the gunships which decimated the Iranians in the 88 offensive and brought victory). All were withdrawn, except for 1 division to the comfort of Baghdad and were not targeted becasue of the strong anti aircraft missile (Iraq shot down 75 jets during the war). When the war strated, tens of thousands of Iraqis (as one veteran said entire brigades were taken as POWs by  just platoons) threw their weapons and offered to fight Saddam. Many were let go and given weapons to participate in the il-fated March uprising where the real Iraqi army showed how strong it is when it retook entire Iraq within one week. It did more damage than the Americans done during the gulf war. In 2003, the picture cmpletely changed, Iraq had only three active division and non were mechanised, it had no notion of decent artillary except mortor rounds, there were very few tanks, no gunships, no airforce, no radar installation, no navy and facing 200 000 US and coalition troops. Now tell me how on earth could it have even put a resistance at all?

 

Iran however has gotten much stronger, It had 20 years since the last war to train and stock weapons. It has three armies, two navies, two air forces as well as 120 Iraqi fighters. It aquired the most advanced radar and SAM missile defense systems and has produced several systems of its own. It has an entire division inside Iraq named Badr forces (Iraqis loyal to Iran who volunteered to fight their own country during the 80-88 war and a big part of this force is integrated with the new Iraqi army) as well as an unknown number of intelligence operative and terror networks which killed some 1000 former Iraqi commando officers, pilots, scientists and generals who were involved in the war against them. Iran covered all the bases and to say they will collapse in 2 weeks is a gross underestimation.

 

Al-Jassas

 

Most Iraqi equipment were Soviet and French.  The US military underestimated its own capabilities.  Before the war, 10,000 body bags were procured because every body believed that that would be the casualty rate for US forces.  When I say every body I mean every body (China, Russia, US, Europe, etc).

 

 

 

Russia's historical model for fighting large wars has been to use the army as a sledgehammer.  The most likely (indeed the only real) adversary for Russia along the eastern border is China.  China has 10X the population of Russia, and does have interior lines along which to operate.

 

The loss of communication with the East, and/or the loss of control over natural resources or hydro-electric resources would be very damaging to Russia, so how might she contest such a war?