IS crisis in Iraq and Syria

[K. A. Pital]

True. However, please remember that the whole 'Arab Spring' thing and the Syrian Civil War have been going on for three years. The fact that in 2014 ISIL and other fundamentalist groups are totally dominating over the secular groups does not mean that the US must have been somehow totally insane or secretly pro-ISIL to think the secular groups had a chance in 2011 or 2012.

In 2011 already most of the Syrian 'rebel' (i.e. not controlled by government) territory was controlled by Islamic Front (moderate islamists) or the radicals that later had sworn allegiance to ISIL. Sad as it is, the fight was lopsided from the start.

Sometimes in a proxy war, the side you back loses to the side that has more popular support. Or you were fooling yourself about the strength and competence of your proxies. It happens.

It does happen indeed; with vietnamization, for example. Or training and support of Georgian proxies that failed miserably when acting on their own. But... none of this has the hallmark of stupidity such as supporting a steady flow of military equipment and money into Middle Eastern territories not controlled by any government. It is well-known that 'The government is the only European here' saying applies to the Middle East much more than to any other territory on Earth. This is also well-known to the CIA and US intelligence circles.

Note that I'm not saying that there's some sort of conspiracy like Brock. Maybe there's none, but it is horribly misguided on a level that exceeds the miscalculations that happened before. Vietnamization by that standard seems to be a genius decision of transferring power to a well-trained military force of your unquestionably loyal satellite...

[Metahive]

Simon, I laud your effort to reason with Agent Mulder here, but from past experience the absolute best result you can hope for is to be labelled part of the conspiracy.

[Simon_Jester]

Eh. He actually once sent me a PM going "you know what, I was right, I've been stuuuuupid."

[xerex]

Its unbelievable indigenous jihadist fighters could be this successful on their own, right down to running a Hollywood B movie script of atrocities to outrage America into another Iraq war. .

General Brocks entire conspiracy is predicated on THIS. The notion that the Arabs are incapable of running a successful war. How on earth did the first Caliphs defeat the Byzantine and Persian Empires ? They must have had help from the West.
Comparisons have been drawn between the IS fighting style and the Mongols. Another comparison IMHO is with the early Caliphate under Abu Bkar and Omar. They've simply unlearned whatever it was that was hamstringing the Arabs in the 20th Century.

[Channel72]

They were "hamstringed" because of WWI, for the most part, and they still haven't really recovered. They're well behind the Western powers in terms of military capability and economic development. In fact, ISIS' progress is pretty impressive, all things considered.

However, General Brock is simply a conspiracy nut who isn't factoring in all the circumstances here. Again, in hindsight, the conditions for something like ISIS were pretty perfect: a weak, infant state with a corrupt military, and widespread Sunni resentment over the Shi'a government. It's not that crazy, really. Remember, ISIS has been in the works for decades - their movement goes back to Al-Qaeda in Iraq and earlier. They've been organizing and planning for decades now.

[Grumman]

Its unbelievable indigenous jihadist fighters could be this successful on their own, right down to running a Hollywood B movie script of atrocities to outrage America into another Iraq war. .

General Brocks entire conspiracy is predicated on THIS. The notion that the Arabs are incapable of running a successful war. How on earth did the first Caliphs defeat the Byzantine and Persian Empires ? They must have had help from the West.
Comparisons have been drawn between the IS fighting style and the Mongols. Another comparison IMHO is with the early Caliphate under Abu Bkar and Omar. They've simply unlearned whatever it was that was hamstringing the Arabs in the 20th Century.

They were "hamstringed" because of WWI, for the most part, and they still haven't really recovered. They're well behind the Western powers in terms of military capability and economic development. In fact, ISIS' progress is pretty impressive, all things considered.

Have you read the old article, Why Arabs Lose Wars? Do you think it is accurate?

[xerex]

Have you read the old article, Why Arabs Lose Wars? Do you think it is accurate?

I agree with elements of what is written in that article. I think alot of it can simly be summed up that Arab armies tend to be organized like WW1 era armies while their enemies act like WW2 armies

They are Heavily dependent on the general staff for leadership and on mass and firepower for advance. When they go up against an enemy that uses a decentralized leadership capable of taking initiative on the battlefield , an emphasis on speed , shock and imaginative thinking and a fondness for flanking attacks and deception tactics---well they simply get overwhelmed.

Its like the French Army in 1940 getting steamrolled by the Germans, or the Third Coalition getting clobbered by the Grande Armee.

The IS is the first modern Arab force we've seen that places an emphasis on speed , shock and surprise.

A simple example is that arab armies tend to misuse their tanks as mobile artillery instead of as cavalry. They will lay down a a massive barrage and only then advance at foot speed. Thus losing all surprise

IS on the other hand does surprise attacks using truck bombs just ahead on their mechanized infantry charge. They also tend to attack at night and from multiple directions overwhelming their enemies ability to react.

[Channel72]

I'll try to read that later tonight, but I mean, right off the bat - Arab armies are usually using purchased military equipment which is decades behind the West. Saddam's army was pretty beefed up after the Iran/Iraq war, but it still got easily steamrolled in 1991 and 2003 by Western forces. They just don't have anything like the military R&D we have. There is no Arab equivalent of something like Lockheed Martin and Boeing, because their military budgets are insignificant compared to the West.

[Channel72]

I skimmed through the article - regarding the idea that Arabs are culturally more "indifferent to safety", "paranoid" in terms of operations and intelligence (even over mundane things like promotions, etc), and less likely to promote individual initiative: these claims seem true to me, for anecdotal reasons. However, I hesitate to endorse these conclusions because it's merely an anecdotal sentiment. Also, at the risk of generalizing, couldn't the same be said about China, which has an extremely advanced military?

The obvious, prima-facie reason that "Arabs lose wars" is because their military equipment is decades behind, and they don't have anything like the industrial base and military R&D capability of the US, UK, China, Russia, etc.

I would conjecture that a lot of this has to do with the fact that oil wealth has stymied their development in intellectual and engineering endeavors (at least in KSA, and the Gulf) - a lot of the best and brightest Arab minds end up emigrating to the UK or US.

[Darmalus]

Has "sending a message" this way ever worked? Or is this more for internal consumption to keep faith in the cause? It strikes me that they missed some sort of opportunity with trading a prisoner for, well, anything other than more airstrikes.

[Simon_Jester]

I'll try to read that later tonight, but I mean, right off the bat - Arab armies are usually using purchased military equipment which is decades behind the West. Saddam's army was pretty beefed up after the Iran/Iraq war, but it still got easily steamrolled in 1991 and 2003 by Western forces. They just don't have anything like the military R&D we have. There is no Arab equivalent of something like Lockheed Martin and Boeing, because their military budgets are insignificant compared to the West.

Yes, but the point of the article is that the Arab armies about which the article was written have trouble even getting good mileage out of the equipment they do purchase.

Israel doesn't have a particularly big military R&D program either, for instance, and relied very heavily on foreign-purchased military hardware during the Arab-Israeli Wars... yet somehow they kept winning over and over despite being surrounded and outnumbered.

Likewise, Saddam Hussein had large numbers of tanks and military aircraft, and while yes they were aging hardware in 1991, they weren't so hopeless and useless as all that. Similar equipment in the hands of a Warsaw Pact force should have inflicted a lot more casualties on the attacking coalition troops, for instance.

The argument, then, is that authoritarianism, clannishness, and disrespect for the common rank and file of your army are bad for your army's ability to fight wars effectively.

So it's not just a question of "The Arab nation-states are poor, their weapons are inferior." They're also losing wars to other people whose weapons are basically equivalent to theirs, and showing persistent signs of failing to really 'get' how to use their weapons as effectively as possible, so that even when they do spend billions on modern weapons (e.g. Saudi Arabia), they still can't use them as well as they might.

I skimmed through the article - regarding the idea that Arabs are culturally more "indifferent to safety", "paranoid" in terms of operations and intelligence (even over mundane things like promotions, etc), and less likely to promote individual initiative: these claims seem true to me, for anecdotal reasons. However, I hesitate to endorse these conclusions because it's merely an anecdotal sentiment. Also, at the risk of generalizing, couldn't the same be said about China, which has an extremely advanced military?

Well, China doesn't have a very great record of fighting and winning wars in recent history either, although they haven't fought many wars in the recent past.

Moreover, I see no reason to assume, even from anecdotes, that the Chinese military is indifferent to equipment safety, restrictive in keeping operational knowledge or technical skills from spreading around their military, or any of a number of other factors that are mentioned in the article.

But if they were, well... I'd expect them to lose wars against someone who is not so hamstrung by a culture of inflexibility, authoritarianism, political infighting, and/or clannishness.

The obvious, prima-facie reason that "Arabs lose wars" is because their military equipment is decades behind, and they don't have anything like the industrial base and military R&D capability of the US, UK, China, Russia, etc.

Again, this wouldn't explain why they also lose wars when fighting against an enemy whose equipment isn't better than theirs. Or why they tend to underperform relative to what their own equipment is capable of (i.e. Saudi Arabian Air Force fighters being ineffective at actually killing Iraqi Air Force fighters, although that's based on another anecdote I heard.

[cosmicalstorm]

Israel was started by a group of smart Europeans with meritocracy and democracy firmly anchored in their culture. Arab culture is to speak in broader terms almost the opposite. At the height of the Syrian invasion of Israel during Yom Kippur one Syrian commander had almost all his important commanders dragged halfway back to Damascus for a meeting instead of leaving them to make good decisions at the front.
In that case it was probably for the better since I suspect Israel would have dropped atom bombs on any breakthrough Syrian tanks.
Although the notion is unacceptable to many posters here I believe Arab/Islamic culture in general is really poorly suited for modern warfare.
Hiz'bollah are kind of exceptions trying to break away from this rule. They nailed Israel pretty good the last time even if their countries infrastructure was flattened in return.

[ray245]

Israel was started by a group of smart Europeans with meritocracy and democracy firmly anchored in their culture. Arab culture is to speak in broader terms almost the opposite. At the height of the Syrian invasion of Israel during Yom Kippur one Syrian commander had almost all his important commanders dragged halfway back to Damascus for a meeting instead of leaving them to make good decisions at the front.
In that case it was probably for the better since I suspect Israel would have dropped atom bombs on any breakthrough Syrian tanks.
Although the notion is unacceptable to many posters here I believe Arab/Islamic culture in general is really poorly suited for modern warfare.
Hiz'bollah are kind of exceptions trying to break away from this rule. They nailed Israel pretty good the last time even if their countries infrastructure was flattened in return.

It's a pretty big claim to make by assuming that an entire culture is somehow incapable to fight a modern war. Bearing in mind that the many western countries were also not prepared to fight a modern war during the second world war. It took a while before those western countries learnt to fight a modern war. It would think that the Israeli army, with their experience of fighting a modern war in Europe would be much better prepared to wage a modern mechanised war than the Arabs, who did not fully experience this kind of warfare.

I don't think it is a cultural issue as much as it is an institutional history issue. You don't need meritocracy and democracy as much as needing a cadre of lower level officers who are capable of making decisions on their own with proper support.

[Channel72]

Again, this wouldn't explain why they also lose wars when fighting against an enemy whose equipment isn't better than theirs. Or why they tend to underperform relative to what their own equipment is capable of (i.e. Saudi Arabian Air Force fighters being ineffective at actually killing Iraqi Air Force fighters, although that's based on another anecdote I heard.

I understand your point, and I'm sure the factors mentioned in the article above play some role here. However, the Arab-Israeli wars are really the only example here. The Iraq/Iran war is somewhat of a counter-example, BTW, where the Arabs stalemated the Persians - and all the other wars were mostly internal civil wars/revolutions.

So, we're really only talking about the Arab-Israeli wars here, like the 6-day war, etc. I'm not sure this one series of conflicts is significant enough to generalize broadly based on cultural factors. A cursory glance at the military hardware used by both sides (Israel vs. Egypt/Jordan/Syria) seems to indicate somewhat of an edge for Israel. They had modern Western equipment, whereas the Arabs had a combination of Soviet-supplied aircraft and pre-WW2 vehicles. Perhaps someone on this board with a better comparative understanding of this equipment (Sea Skimmer?) can weigh in and explain how much of an advantage the Israelis really had here.

The point is, I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, I just question how much we can generalize here from cultural factors based on this one example. There may have been many other factors at play, including what ray245 brought up regarding the relative inexperience in fighting modern wars of the post-Ottoman Arab states.

[K. A. Pital]

Soviet equipment can be extremely deadly when used properly. Former Soviet servicemen were highly prized in post-collapse years since they knew how to use it. Also the Soviet Army inflicted huge losses on the enemy even by dumping obsolete equipment into the Third World where it was efficiently used against colonial powers.

The Arab military problems are not technogenic; in fact, wars aren't even won by super-advanced wonder weapons bu rather through proper use of mainline weaponry and vehicles.

[Simon_Jester]

Israel was started by a group of smart Europeans with meritocracy and democracy firmly anchored in their culture. Arab culture is to speak in broader terms almost the opposite. At the height of the Syrian invasion of Israel during Yom Kippur one Syrian commander had almost all his important commanders dragged halfway back to Damascus for a meeting instead of leaving them to make good decisions at the front.
In that case it was probably for the better since I suspect Israel would have dropped atom bombs on any breakthrough Syrian tanks.
Although the notion is unacceptable to many posters here I believe Arab/Islamic culture in general is really poorly suited for modern warfare.
Hiz'bollah are kind of exceptions trying to break away from this rule. They nailed Israel pretty good the last time even if their countries infrastructure was flattened in return.

It's a pretty big claim to make by assuming that an entire culture is somehow incapable to fight a modern war.

SIDETRACK ANALOGY FOLLOWS: NO POINT IN RESPONDING DIRECTLY TO THE ANALOGY, IT'S JUST AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE CONCEPT, NOT AN ATTEMPT AT DERAILING.

It's a bit like arguing that the US is incapable of having a functional welfare state on the European model, even if it would arguably be to our advantage to do so.

One can claim, not without reason, that there is an undertone of condescension and disapproval toward the underclass in the US. A hatred and otherization of 'losers.' A reluctance to use the government as a central clearinghouse for the resources of society due to a traditional reverence for 'rugged individualism.' And that all these things become very counterproductive when we try to organize a welfare state, because even when all the bureaucrats involved are sincerely trying to do their jobs, half of them have this memetic unwillingness to do what any European social democrat could tell them will work. Or they try to do it, and do it wrong, putting too much value on that thing (preventing fraud), and not enough value on this thing (the human dignity of the underclass).

As a parallel argument, one can argue that in the Arab nations, there are various things in play that make it hard to organize an army. Not impossible, but hard- and to counter that you'd have to step in and deliberately disrupt and shake up the culture and the traditions of the officer corps. Most Western nations have had to do that as an ongoing process ever since, oh, the invention of gunpowder...

But the thesis is that the Arab nations specifically have not been doing a good job of adapting to 20th century advances in military organization, attitudes toward training, and management practices.

Bearing in mind that the many western countries were also not prepared to fight a modern war during the second world war. It took a while before those western countries learnt to fight a modern war. It would think that the Israeli army, with their experience of fighting a modern war in Europe would be much better prepared to wage a modern mechanised war than the Arabs, who did not fully experience this kind of warfare.

Except that relatively few of the Israeli soldiers had prior military experience fighting in large armies. A noticeable number did- but it wasn't like they were full to the brim with experienced staff officers and people who knew how to train and organize modern armies. If nothing else, there weren't that many such officers available to them, because of anti-Semitism in pre-WWII militaries.

I don't think it is a cultural issue as much as it is an institutional history issue. You don't need meritocracy and democracy as much as needing a cadre of lower level officers who are capable of making decisions on their own with proper support.

Well, I think you do need meritocracy, but not democracy. However, authoritarianism can undermine the quality and performance of the army under some circumstances. This is especially true if the rulers rely on the army as a major prop for their ability to rule their own state. Because the requirements for having a very politically reliable army, and having an army that is good at fighting wars, are kind of mutually exclusive. This is part of why the Stalinist purges did such damage to the Soviet army, for instance. They represented a very abrupt attempt to go from a warfighting army optimized for tactical and strategic effectiveness, to a political army optimized for loyalty to the state. Many of the existing officers 'had' to go for that to happen.

As a result, the Soviet military of 1939 had great paper strength, but struggled to overpower even a small nation like Finland.

I understand your point, and I'm sure the factors mentioned in the article above play some role here. However, the Arab-Israeli wars are really the only example here. The Iraq/Iran war is somewhat of a counter-example, BTW, where the Arabs stalemated the Persians - and all the other wars were mostly internal civil wars/revolutions.

Well, the real question is, "when an Arab nation's army takes the field, what happens?" It's kind of irrelevant under what circumstances they take the field, as long as they're out fighting. The Gulf War is relevant- we can look at the Iraqi performance against the Coalition, but also the Saudi performance against the Iraqis.

The Iran-Iraq War is interesting because of the question of to what extent the same factors claimed to be a problem for Arabs (the Iraqis) were also a problem for the Iranians (who aren't Arabs).

So, we're really only talking about the Arab-Israeli wars here, like the 6-day war, etc. I'm not sure this one series of conflicts is significant enough to generalize broadly based on cultural factors. A cursory glance at the military hardware used by both sides (Israel vs. Egypt/Jordan/Syria) seems to indicate somewhat of an edge for Israel. They had modern Western equipment, whereas the Arabs had a combination of Soviet-supplied aircraft and pre-WW2 vehicles. Perhaps someone on this board with a better comparative understanding of this equipment (Sea Skimmer?) can weigh in and explain how much of an advantage the Israelis really had here.

I'd go into this in some depth but I don't have time because I'm about to go to work. DARN.

The point is, I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, I just question how much we can generalize here from cultural factors based on this one example. There may have been many other factors at play, including what ray245 brought up regarding the relative inexperience in fighting modern wars of the post-Ottoman Arab states.

Lack of experience is almost certainly a factor- but again, part of the question is trying to figure out how well they use what they DO have, which includes quite a lot of foreign training and advisors pouring into the region trying to teach them how to benefit from other people's experience.

Soviet equipment can be extremely deadly when used properly. Former Soviet servicemen were highly prized in post-collapse years since they knew how to use it. Also the Soviet Army inflicted huge losses on the enemy even by dumping obsolete equipment into the Third World where it was efficiently used against colonial powers.

This is quite true... although usually what they dumped was small arms and infantry weapons.

Almost any military can make effective use of infantry weapons if they are well organized, and communist anticolonial forces of the 1950s were usually fairly well organized, motivated and unified in a way that made them effective. Or at least effective enough to accomplish what they needed to.

Making effective use of tanks, artillery, air support, and all the other heavy weapons of modern war, while coordinating tens or hundreds of thousands of soldiers against an enemy that has equal portions of all those things... it's a whole different level of difficulty. The Soviets worked extensively to be good at doing that with Soviet equipment, but a lot of the nations they sold military hardware to... didn't.



The Arab military problems are not technogenic; in fact, wars aren't even won by super-advanced wonder weapons bu rather through proper use of mainline weaponry and vehicles.[/quote]

[xerex]

Although the notion is unacceptable to many posters here I believe Arab/Islamic culture in general is really poorly suited for modern warfare.
Hiz'bollah are kind of exceptions trying to break away from this rule. They nailed Israel pretty good the last time even if their countries infrastructure was flattened in return.

Actually early Islamic culture ie the Rashidun Caliphs is perfect for modern warfare. I' remember reading about on early general who split his force into 10 groups and sent them each of different routes where they would be out of contact with him trusting them to carry out their orders. That couldnt happen today.

Its the overly authoritarian,hierarchical and CORRUPT nature of the current societies that make them deficient when facing an army not burdened by the the need to always ask for orders or by corrupt structures.

[cosmicalstorm]

I'm not arguing they suffer an eternal inability to wage war as we know from history. But currently (1800-2014) it seems like they did not do very much that is impressive. Maybe they will have their own WW1 now and get shaken up to speed.

[Channel72]

Soviet equipment can be extremely deadly when used properly. Former Soviet servicemen were highly prized in post-collapse years since they knew how to use it. Also the Soviet Army inflicted huge losses on the enemy even by dumping obsolete equipment into the Third World where it was efficiently used against colonial powers.

I'm not saying the Soviet equipment is useless, just that overall it seems Israel was better equipped. The Syrian army was using German WW2-era shit.

The Arab military problems are not technogenic; in fact, wars aren't even won by super-advanced wonder weapons bu rather through proper use of mainline weaponry and vehicles.

Sometimes they are. The Desert-Storm coalition forces steam-rolled the Iraqi army in 1991 easily because of major technological advantages such as greater firing range, GPS systems, etc. Plus, most US/Western attacks begin with massive aerial bombardments which cripple existing defenses, and there's little a country like Iraq can do to defend itself because their anti-aircraft tech is obsolete. That's why the casualty counts are so lop-sided. When both sides have relative parity in terms of weapons technology, you get much more even (and generally much higher) casualty counts. (Again, see the Iraq/Iran war, one of the bloodiest (if not THE bloodiest) and drawn-out wars of the post-WW2 era)

[xerex]

The Arab military problems are not technogenic; in fact, wars aren't even won by super-advanced wonder weapons bu rather through proper use of mainline weaponry and vehicles.

Sometimes they are. The Desert-Storm coalition forces steam-rolled the Iraqi army in 1991 easily because of major technological advantages such as greater firing range, GPS systems, etc. Plus, most US/Western attacks begin with massive aerial bombardments which cripple existing defenses, and there's little a country like Iraq can do to defend itself because their anti-aircraft tech is obsolete. That's why the casualty counts are so lop-sided. When both sides have relative parity in terms of weapons technology, you get much more even (and generally much higher) casualty counts. (Again, see the Iraq/Iran war, one of the bloodiest (if not THE bloodiest) and drawn-out wars of the post-WW2 era)

But there is also the basic strategic problem that in 1990 the Iraqis never considered that the Americans would come charging through the Western Desert. Regular Iraqi units didnt even bother to prepare defensive positions for an attack from the West.

Divisional unit commanders were also forbidden from talking with each other because Saddam feared a coup. of course this also prevented them from coordinating any sort of response once the attack was underway.

And finaly the Iraqi officer corp simply abandoned thier troops when the invasion occurred.

[xerex]

I'm not arguing they suffer an eternal inability to wage war as we know from history. But currently (1800-2014) it seems like they did not do very much that is impressive. Maybe they will have their own WW1 now and get shaken up to speed.

That's a long period of history. Note just because you lost the war doesn't mean you fought incompetently. You can find Muslim victories in the Greek War of Independence, the Russo Turkish Wars and even WW1 (Gallipoli anyone?) . In fact as the Arab Revolt and the Turkish War of Independence proved , Muslims can fight well when properly led and motivated.

[Channel72]

Again, I'm not denying that mismanagement as a result of paranoia and other cultural factors has been a contributing factor to Arab losses - I'm saying we can't ignore the glaring technology gap between Arabs and Western forces when talking about any engagement between the two. It's like trying to come up with reasons why the Aztecs lost to the Spaniards (who benefited from more advanced materials science), and guessing that cultural factors or chain-of-command problems were a major issue: well yeah, but hardly the most significant issue.

As for wars fought between the Arabs and their equals in terms of military capability, we basically have two examples: the Arab Israeli wars and the Iran/Iraq war. The Iran/Iraq war was a horrible war of attrition; a drawn-out endurance match ending in a stalemate and over 1,000,000 dead. And the Arab Israeli wars, where the Arabs definitively lost, involved Western technology on the side of the Israelis. So again, I'm not saying that cultural factors didn't hinder the Arabs, just that these things factor in less than the fact that the Arabs were using outdated, shitty weapons for the most part.

[Eternal_Freedom]

I think it's worth remembering that int he case of the Arab-Israeli wars, the Israelis had a high motivation to fight, as far as they were concerned it was fight as hard as possible or their nation is destroyed. I doubt you could say the same for the Arab soldiers.

[Simon_Jester]

Soviet equipment can be extremely deadly when used properly. Former Soviet servicemen were highly prized in post-collapse years since they knew how to use it. Also the Soviet Army inflicted huge losses on the enemy even by dumping obsolete equipment into the Third World where it was efficiently used against colonial powers.

I'm not saying the Soviet equipment is useless, just that overall it seems Israel was better equipped. The Syrian army was using German WW2-era shit.

The Israeli army, meanwhile, was using American WW2-era shit.

The M50 and M51 Sherman tanks were only mildly updated versions of the American tanks of the Second World War, which were broadly competitive with the T-34 on the battlefield in Korea. The T-54 was a slightly post-WWII tank much like the Centurion and M48 Patton.

Now, there may have been some slight qualitative difference. Say in that the Israeli tanks were more thoroughly updated and modernized than the Syrian ones. Or that the Syrians may have been using a slightly higher proportion of more modern weapons. But it's not like the average Syrian tank was from 1943 and the average Israeli tank was from 1963.

Meanwhile, the Jordanian army was outfitted with modern US equipment, and the Syrians were as I recall pretty well equipped with Soviet weapons of the post-WWII era.

The Arab military problems are not technogenic; in fact, wars aren't even won by super-advanced wonder weapons bu rather through proper use of mainline weaponry and vehicles.

Sometimes they are. The Desert-Storm coalition forces steam-rolled the Iraqi army in 1991 easily because of major technological advantages such as greater firing range, GPS systems, etc. Plus, most US/Western attacks begin with massive aerial bombardments which cripple existing defenses, and there's little a country like Iraq can do to defend itself because their anti-aircraft tech is obsolete. That's why the casualty counts are so lop-sided.

See, you're sort of... repeating the argument here, I guess. Technological superiority does a lot to make the casualty ratio lopsided, but the essential point is that even when supplied with highly modern technology (e.g. the Saudi military), or when facing an opponent that is at most slightly better armed than themselves (e.g. Israel in the Arab-Israeli Wars), the militaries of the region still underperform compared to what we would expect from Soviet, European, or American forces operating with the same equipment.

When both sides have relative parity in terms of weapons technology, you get much more even (and generally much higher) casualty counts.

The catch is that any war fought with 20th century weapons between nations with tens of millions of people will have high casualty counts. You could fight a war with literally nothing but World War One rifles and cannons drawn by horses and kill millions- because that would be exactly what happened during World War One.

So the existence of mass casualties on both sides does not prove that the war is being prosecuted effectively by both sides. It can even prove the opposite- that despite being well armed with advanced weapons, neither side is able to organize an effective offensive using the lessons of the Second World War and the postwar era.

So the status quo reverts to the World War One trench stalemate, which is about the best that you can do with an inflexible chain of command and inadequate provisions for combined arms tactics.

(Again, see the Iraq/Iran war, one of the bloodiest (if not THE bloodiest) and drawn-out wars of the post-WW2 era)

The main reason the Iran-Iraq War was so bloody is that it was essentially a reprise of World War One-era trench warfare... but fought with vastly more advanced weapons on either side, because by that point both sides were armed entirely with Cold War-era equipment lavished upon them by the Soviets (for Iraq) and Americans (for Iran).

Neither Saddam Hussein's Iraqis nor the Ayatollah's Iranians were able to take the (large) arsenals of modern weapons at their disposal and reliably employ them in a modern fashion.

Again, I'm not denying that mismanagement as a result of paranoia and other cultural factors has been a contributing factor to Arab losses - I'm saying we can't ignore the glaring technology gap between Arabs and Western forces when talking about any engagement between the two. It's like trying to come up with reasons why the Aztecs lost to the Spaniards (who benefited from more advanced materials science), and guessing that cultural factors or chain-of-command problems were a major issue: well yeah, but hardly the most significant issue.

This is not unreasonable, but no Arab force has ever been as technologically outclassed as the Aztecs against the Spanish. The gap in hardware between 1991 Iraq and the Coalition was more like twenty years. Guided bombs were still in their infancy, stealth aircraft played a limited though significant role. Sure, the Iraqis were outgunned badly... but the practical effect of their strategy is that it's almost like they didn't even TRY to put up a fight.

They were totally outmaneuvered by a fairly basic flanking strategy, their army was so unable to coordinate that it could be rolled up piecemeal by the enemy, and so on.

We can reasonably say that they were badly outgunned, the point is that even allowing for that, a Soviet or American force of the same size, armed with the same weapons wouldn't have been as much of a pushover. They might have still lost but they'd have done a lot more damage.

As for wars fought between the Arabs and their equals in terms of military capability, we basically have two examples: the Arab Israeli wars and the Iran/Iraq war. The Iran/Iraq war was a horrible war of attrition; a drawn-out endurance match ending in a stalemate and over 1,000,000 dead.

Which I would argue is in large part because neither side was using their own technology properly. It's inexplicable in terms of "one side had better weapons," but it's very explicable in terms of "neither side had the doctrinal knowledge, flexible command structure, or versatile, well-trained troops to penetrate what was essentially a teched-up version of a World War One defensive line."

And the Arab Israeli wars, where the Arabs definitively lost, involved Western technology on the side of the Israelis.

Except that the Israeli/Western weapons in question were at most marginally superior to the Arab weapons. A MiG-19 isn't that much better or worse than a Mirage III, a T-54 isn't that much (if at all) worse than a Centurion tank, and an S-75 surface to air missile isn't much (if at all) worse than a MIM-23 missile.

[K. A. Pital]

I'm not saying the Soviet equipment is useless, just that overall it seems Israel was better equipped. The Syrian army was using German WW2-era shit

Israeli equipment was often marginally superior; or even inferior in cases when, say, the MiG-25 first arrived.

When both sides have relative parity in terms of weapons technology, you get much more even (and generally much higher) casualty counts. (Again, see the Iraq/Iran war, one of the bloodiest (if not THE bloodiest) and drawn-out wars of the post-WW2 era)

You forgot Vietnam and a dozen other conflicts which were way more bloody; and where military objectives were often achieved even with inferior weapons, albeit at greater cost in life and limb.