HIstorical Analogies If The US Attacks Iran Directly & Begins Actual War?

[KittyWampus]

Someone mentioned Stalingrad, as in, it would be the Bush's edition of STalingrad.

Are there any better or more to the point analogies? My knowledge of historical warfare is neglible.

[HeeBGBz]

1. Frying pan to fire n/t

[Jacobin]

2. Waterloo

1815
Napoleon returns for 100 days but is again beaten in the battle of Waterloo by the combined armies of England and Prussia. Napoleon surrenders to the English and is exiled to St. Helena.

http://www.hyperhistory.com/online_n2/civil_n2/histscript6_n2/napol_wars.html

[acmavm]

3. Shit hits fan. We can't take on another country. AND I DON'T WANT TO.

.

[Astrad]

4. Stalingrad

marked the end of Nazi expansion. They hit the Red Army wall. Waterloo also works. :)

[Warpy]

5. Stalingrad is a good analogy

because Iran won't be the same kind of pushover that Iraq was. However, the siege killed millions, not a great aim for anyone.

If Stupid attacks another country "preemptively" and unilaterally, I doubt the world will sit idly by. It's had a nasty habit of uniting to take tinpot dictators with imperial ambitions out before and certainly has the capacity to do so again.

We won't win this one, not in any sense of the word.

[Whoa_Nelly]

6. Pre-emptive strike and WW I

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/war/wwone/middle_east_01.shtml

Interesting reading

<snip>

The Ottoman/Turkish army (some 600,000 troops divided into 38 divisions) was of an unknown quality. But with Germany as an ally, the Ottoman Empire represented a serious threat to the British Empire, so in a pre-emptive strike, London immediately landed an Anglo-Indian force at Basra, near the estuary of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers. This was done to protect the Anglo-Persian oil pipeline, which was vital to the British navy, and to show the Union Jack in this strategically important area in the Persian Gulf.

Within weeks the Central Powers struck back with a surprise attack against Britain's 'jugular vein', the Suez Canal. This attempt, in early February 1915, to breach British defences on the Suez Canal and raise an Islamic revolt in Egypt, failed however, and resulted in heavy losses for the attackers.

<snip>
The muddled thinking that led to this campaign continued during the savage fighting, and the predominantly British force suffered heavy losses (205,000 British soldiers, and 47,000 French - with the sick included in the figures) and had to be withdrawn. The Ottoman/Turkish Fifth Army, well armed and fighting from strong defensive positions, had proved more than a match for the Allies.

[KittyWampus]

7. Thanks for the very interesting read. I didn't know where to start, really

:hug:

[tocqueville]

13. but but... Lawrence of Arabia... and 4 years later....

Allenby returned to the offensive at the Battle of Megiddo, on 19 September 1918. With a decided advantage in manpower, artillery, air power and morale, and assisted by Arab allies on his flank, he quickly destroyed the Ottoman/Turkish armies facing him.

Once the enemy front was broken, the EEF's cavalry dominated the campaign. Damascus fell on 1 October, Aleppo, the last city to fall in the campaign, on 26 October. Five days later an armistice with the Ottoman Empire came into effect. Since 19 September Allenby's forces had advanced hundreds of miles and netted over 75,000 prisoners.

The war ended with the British occupying the territory that was to become Iraq, Palestine, Trans-Jordan, Syria and Lebanon. With the Ottoman Empire destroyed, Russia paralysed by foreign intervention and civil war, and French influence limited somewhat by their minor military role in the Middle East, Britain's military success made her the dominant power in the region. The resulting settlement, which fostered an instability that continues to be a source of conflict today, generated much controversy at the time and has continued to do so ever since.

'They believed that the western powers, especially the British, had acted with arrogance.'
Employing bags of gold, the diplomacy of Lawrence of Arabia, and promises of Arab independence, the British had encouraged an Arab uprising in 1916 against the Turks. Although the Hashemite Arabs were rewarded with considerable territory, they and other Arab nationalists believed that they had been 'robbed' when the British did not fully deliver on their pledges of independence. They believed that the western powers, especially the British, had acted with arrogance, drawing borders and creating nations with little or no regard for the wishes of the local inhabitants.

The fate of Palestine, occupied by the British, especially provoked Arab frustration and anger. (In 1917 the British Foreign Secretary, Arthur Balfour, had supported a Jewish home in Palestine.)

morale : the war was won so it's not a good comparison

[htuttle]

8. War of 1812

It's similar in that we thought it would be a quick takeover of South Eastern Canada, and we ended up getting our ass kicked when they counter-attacked.

I doubt the US plans on sending a lot of ground troops into Iran aka Hitler's invasion of Russia, so I don't know if the Stalingrad analogy would hold up as well.

[DBoon]

9. Pearl Harbor

With the US playing the role of Imperial Japan.

The Japanese hit Pearl Harbor as a pre-emptive strike against a potential opponent (the US).

[KittyWampus]

18. Interesting Point!

[stevietheman]

10. Either Poland or Stalingrad...

Poland if the world takes action against the U.S in response...
Stalingrad if the world lets the U.S. do it (that is, it will be self-defeating)

[TahitiNut]

11. The Charge of the Light Brigade?

:shrug:

[teryang]

12. Poland

After the occupation of the Rhineland, Austria, and the Sudetenland, the invasion of Poland forced the allies to declare war on Germany.

Iran has a similar significance. Russia will not sit by while its position in Iran is liquidated by the Anglo-Americans. The clock cannot be turned back. Iranian intermedling in Iraq is completely understandable considering American actions over the last 50 years. Russian and Chinese acquiescence over the Iraq occupation was understandable given the time and the opportunity for them to consolidate their positions while the US weakened itself and further depleted its resources and international standing. These nations are in a far better position to confront us now even if it is only by indirectly supporting Iran in a war of attrition with the US. If the US is confronted by an Iran supported by Russia and/or China, our regime may become desperate and up the ante to nuclear strikes. Indeed, the possibility of pre-emptive nuclear attacks has already been anticipated in revolutionary new nuclear doctrines adopted by the Bush administration before the iraq war becausee this current situation with Iran had to be anticipated: namely, the impractibility of a wider scale conventional conflict on our flank, when our conventional forces are clearly inadequate to the task. Why are they inadequate?

Two reasons: Negative leverage, fighting a war on the Asian mainland so far away from home. The enemy fights on his doorstep.

Secondly, the corrupt defense department budget gutted manpower levels to line the pockets of war profiteer contractors, like Halliburton, Bechtel, Boeing, etc.

[northernsoul]

14. Napolean in Russia

Over extended, under-supplied, harassed by enraged local partisans, ultimately forced to make a long, bloody retreat.

[tocqueville]

15. Frankly I think that we have to look elsewhere...

This won't be a ground troop war...

it's going to be air strikes à la Kosovo, with NATO participation. Probably with attempts to destabilize the Mollahs through a RW gerilla war à la Contras...

Irani retaliation will be wreaking havoc in Iraq through the Shiites and doing as much damage as possible in the Hormuz strait + probably launching a pair of conventional missiles at Israel for propaganda purposes (as Saddam did). Increased terrorism in Lebanon and maybe EUrope is expected.

Remember that nobody likes the Iranis becauses they are Shias. Egypt and Saudi Arabia don't want to see a nuclear Iran. Besides Russia and China don't care about who wins, as long as they can buy oil.

Iran's strongest weapon is the oil price. The price will flame up at least $150 the barrel the day the first tanker is sunk. Add a couple of Katrina like hurricanes in the same region (the probability is high), then the US will start to negotiate...

if there is a Waterloo to be, it will be at the stock exchange, not round Teheran...

[KittyWampus]

19. "Russia and China don't care about who wins"= kind of what I thought

wouldn't they rather just "make a deal". Many DU'ers say Russian and China won't allow the US to proceed. But they might find a way to make hay from Vulcan's stupidity.

[Odin2005]

16. According to the late British historian Arnold Toynbee...

Western Civilization is in it's "time of troubles", so if we compare Western Civilization to Classical Civilization, and US = Rome, we would be just after the Wars with Cathage and the wars with the Greek states (WW1, WW2, Cold War). Bush is the Roman Consul (chief exectutive and C-i-C of the Roman Pepublic) Crassus, who was killed fighting the Persians because he was a god-awful commander. :rofl:

[Strelnikov_]

17. Iraq Was Analogous To Operation Barbarossa (1941 Invasion)

Thinking that it would be a pushover, and would lead to dominance of the region. Overreach and mismanagement doomed the operation.

Iran (would be) the summer offensive of 1942, leading to the siege of Stalingrad. The operation was required to obtain oil resources and take pressure off other parts of the German line, otherwise degrading Soviet capabilities. In other words, their initial invasion went to shit, but they had no choice as they now were in a Catch 22.

I still don't think they are going to do it, as the risks of action far outweigh the risk of inaction.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

20. America in the ME is like Custer at the Little Big Horn.

Surrounded, cut off, but determined that he was going to be victorious against the "savages". Equal hubris by the geniuses who expected the countries of the ME are all dying to erect statues of Boosh and name their kids Dubya before toddling off to the WalMart after shaking hands with Rev Falwell after services.