Zašto Arapi gube ratove (članak)

Why Arabs Lose Wars

http://www.meforum.org/441/why-arabs-lose-wars

Norvell De Atkine, a U.S. Army retired colonel with eight years residence in Lebanon, Jordan, and Egypt, and a graduate degree in Arab studies from the American University of Beirut, is currently instructing U.S. Army personnel assigned to Middle Eastern areas. The opinions expressed here are strictly his own.

Arabic-speaking armies have been generally ineffective in the modern era. Egyptian regular forces did poorly against Yemeni irregulars in the 1960s.1 Syrians could only impose their will in Lebanon during the mid-1970s by the use of overwhelming weaponry and numbers.2 Iraqis showed ineptness against an Iranian military ripped apart by revolutionary turmoil in the 1980s and could not win a three-decades-long war against the Kurds.3 The Arab military performance on both sides of the 1990 Kuwait war was mediocre.4 And the Arabs have done poorly in nearly all the military confrontations with Israel. Why this unimpressive record? There are many factors—economic, ideological, technical—but perhaps the most important has to do with culture and certain societal attributes which inhibit Arabs from producing an effective military force.

It is a truism of military life that an army fights as it trains, and so I draw on my many years of firsthand observation of Arabs in training to draw conclusions about the ways in which they go into combat. The following impressions derive from personal experience with Arab military establishments in the capacity of U.S. military attaché and security assistance officer, observer officer with the British-officer Trucial Oman Scouts (the security force in the emirates prior to the establishment of the United Arab Emirates), as well as some thirty year's study of the Middle East.

Norvell De Atkine, američke vojske pukovnik u mirovini s osam godina boravka u Libanonu, Jordanu i Egiptu, te diplomu u Arapskih studija iz Američko sveučilište u Beirutu a, trenutno je naložio osoblju američke vojske dodijeljene bliskoistočnih područja. Mišljenja izražena ovdje su strogo svoje.

Arapski govornog vojske su uglavnom neučinkoviti u moderno doba. Egipatski redovite snage nisu loše protiv jemenskih paravojne u 1960s.1 Sirijaca moglo samo nametnuti svoju volju u Libanonu tijekom sredine 1970-ih uporabom neodoljiv naoružanja i numbers.2 Iračana pokazalo nevještost protiv iranske vojske rastrgana revolucionarnih previranja u 1980 i nije mogao osvojiti tri desetljeća dugu rat protiv Kurds.3 Arapska vojne izvedbe na obje strane 1990. Kuvajt rata bio mediocre.4 I Arapi su učinili loše u gotovo svim vojnim sukobima s Izraelom. Zašto ovaj neuzbudljiv rekord? Postoje mnogi faktori-ekonomske, ideološke, tehničke-ali možda najvažnije ima veze s kulturom i određenih društvenih atributa koji inhibiraju Arapi od proizvodnje učinkovitu vojnu silu.

To je istina vojnog života da vojska bori kako trenira, i tako sam se osloniti na mnogo mojih godina iz prve ruke promatranja Arapa u treningu izvući zaključke o načinima na koje idu u borbu. Sljedeći dojmovi proizlaze iz osobnog iskustva s arapskim vojnim objektima u svojstvu američkih vojnih atašea i za sigurnost pomoć, promatrač časnik britanske-oficir Trucial Oman Izviđači (sigurnost sila u Emiratima prije osnivanja Ujedinjenih Arapskih Emirata) kao i tridesetak Ovogodišnja studija na Bliskom istoku.

False Starts

Including culture in strategic assessments has a poor legacy, for it has often been spun from an ugly brew of ignorance, wishful thinking, and mythology. Thus, the U.S. army in the 1930s evaluated the Japanese national character as lacking originality and drew the unwarranted conclusion that the country would be permanently disadvantaged in technology.5 Hitler dismissed the United States as a mongrel society6 and consequently underestimated the impact of America's entry into the war. As these examples suggest, when culture is considered in calculating the relative strengths and weaknesses of opposing forces, it tends to lead to wild distortions, especially when it is a matter of understanding why states unprepared for war enter into combat flushed with confidence. The temptation is to impute cultural attributes to the enemy state that negate its superior numbers or weaponry. Or the opposite: to view the potential enemy through the prism of one's own cultural norms. American strategists assumed that the pain threshold of the North Vietnamese approximated their own and that the air bombardment of the North would bring it to its knees.7 Three days of aerial attacks were thought to be all the Serbs could withstand; in fact, seventy-eight days were needed.

It is particularly dangerous to make facile assumptions about abilities in warfare based on past performance, for societies evolve and so does the military subculture with it. The dismal French performance in the 1870 Franco-Prussian war led the German high command to an overly optimistic assessment prior to World War I.8The tenacity and courage of French soldiers in World War I led everyone from Winston Churchill to the German high command vastly to overestimate the French army's fighting abilities. Israeli generals underestimated the Egyptian army of 1973 based on Egypt's hapless performance in the 1967 war.

Lažne Počinje

Uključujući kulture u strateškim procjenama ima lošu nasljedstvo, jer je često bio tkani od ružnog pivo neznanja, željnog razmišljanja i mitologije. Dakle, američka vojska u 1930 ocjenjuje japanski nacionalni karakter nedostaje originalnosti i nacrtao neopravdani zaključak da će zemlja biti trajno nepovoljnom položaju u technology.5 Hitler je odbio Sjedinjene Države kao mješanac society6 i time podcijenio utjecaj američke stupanja na Rat. Kao što ovi primjeri ukazuju, kada je kultura smatra se u izračunu relativne prednosti i slabosti neprijateljskih snaga, što upućuje na divljim distorzije, posebno kada je riječ o razumijevanju zašto navodi nespremne za rat ući u borbu ispran s povjerenjem. Iskušenje je za terećenjem kulturne atribute na neprijateljske države koji negirati svoje vrhunske brojeve ili oružje. Ili suprotno: da biste vidjeli potencijalnog neprijatelja kroz prizmu vlastitih kulturnih normi. Američki stratezi Pretpostavlja se da je prag boli od Sjevernog Vijetnama aproksimirati vlastitu i da je zrak bombardiranje Sjeverne bi ga dovesti na svoje knees.7 Tri dana zračnih napada su mislili da se sve Srbe mogao izdržati; u stvari, bili potrebni sedamdeset osam dana.

Posebno je opasno da bi lak pretpostavke o sposobnosti u ratovanju temelji na minuli rad, za društva razvijaju i tako se vojni subkulturu s njom. Tužan Francuski nastup 1870. francusko-pruskog rata i vodio njemački visoki naredbu pretjerano optimističan procjene prije Drugog svjetskog rata I.8 upornost i hrabrost francuskih vojnika u Prvom svjetskom ratu vodio sve od Winstona Churchilla na njemačkom vrhovnog zapovjedništva znatno precijeniti borbe francuski vojske abilities.9 izraelski generali podcijenio egipatsku vojsku 1973. godine na temelju egipatskog bespomoćnog nastup u ratu 1967. godine.

Culture is difficult to pin down. It is not synonymous with an individual's race nor ethnic identity. The history of warfare makes a mockery of attempts to assign rigid cultural attributes to individuals—as the military histories of the Ottoman and Roman empires illustrate. In both cases it was training, discipline, esprit, and élan which made the difference, not the individual soldiers' origin.11 The highly disciplined, effective Roman legions, for example, were recruited from throughout the Roman empire, and the elite Ottoman Janissaries (slave soldiers) were Christians forcibly recruited as boys from the Balkans.
The Role of Culture

These problems notwithstanding, culture does need to be taken into account. Indeed, awareness of prior mistakes should make it possible to assess the role of cultural factors in warfare. John Keegan, the eminent historian of warfare, argues that culture is a prime determinant of the nature of warfare. In contrast to the usual manner of European warfare which he terms "face to face," Keegan depicts the early Arab armies in the Islamic era as masters of evasion, delay, and indirection.12 Examining Arab warfare in this century leads to the conclusion that Arabs remain more successful in insurgent, or political warfare13—what T. E. Lawrence termed "winning wars without battles."14 Even the much-lauded Egyptian crossing of the Suez in 1973 at its core entailed a masterful deception plan. It may well be that these seemingly permanent attributes result from a culture that engenders subtlety, indirection, and dissimulation in personal relationships.15

Along these lines, Kenneth Pollack concludes his exhaustive study of Arab military effectiveness by noting that "certain patterns of behavior fostered by the dominant Arab culture were the most important factors contributing to the limited military effectiveness of Arab armies and air forces from 1945 to 1991."16 These attributes included over-centralization, discouraging initiative, lack of flexibility, manipulation of information, and the discouragement of leadership at the junior officer level.

Kultura je teško ustanoviti. To nije sinonim za pojedinca rase, niti etničkog identiteta. Povijest ratovanja čini sprdnja od pokušaja da dodijeliti krute kulturne atribute za osobe-kao vojne povijesti Osmanskog carstva i rimskih ilustriraju. U oba slučaja to je bio trening, disciplina, esprit, i elan koji je napravio razliku, a ne pojedinih vojnici origin.11 Visoko discipliniran, učinkovite rimske legije, primjerice, regrutirani su iz cijele Rimskog carstva i elita Osmansko janjičara (vojnici rob) bili su kršćani nasilno regrutirani kao dječaci s Balkana.
Uloga kulture

Bez obzira na te probleme, kultura ne treba uzeti u obzir. Doista, svijest o prethodnim greškama treba omogućiti procijeniti ulogu kulturnih čimbenika u ratovanju. John Keegan, ugledni povjesničar ratovanja, tvrdi da je kultura glavni odrednica prirode ratovanja. Za razliku od uobičajenog načina Europskoj ratovanja koje on naziva "licem u lice", Keegan prikazuje rane arapske vojske u islamskom razdoblju kao majstora utaje, kašnjenje, i indirection.12 ispitivanje arapski rat u ovom stoljeću dovodi do zaključka da Arapi i dalje uspješniji u pobunjeničkim ili političke warfare13-ono TE Lawrence nazvao "pobjedu ratove, bez borbe." 14 Čak je toliko hvaljen egipatski prijelaz od Sueza 1973. u svojoj srži podrazumijevao majstorskim obmane plan. To svibanj dobro biti da su ti naizgled stalni atributi proizlaze iz kulture koja rađa suptilnost, indirection i pretvaranja u osobnom relationships.15

U tom smislu, Kenneth Pollack zaključuje svoju iscrpnu studiju arapske vojne učinkovitosti primjećujući da je "određeni obrasci ponašanja njegovala dominantne arapske kulture su najvažniji čimbenici koji doprinose ograničenog vojnog učinkovitosti arapskih vojski i zračnih snaga od 1945. do 1991. godine. "16 Ovi atributi uključuju pretjerano centralizacije, obeshrabrujući inicijativu, nedostatak fleksibilnosti, manipuliranje informacijama, i obeshrabrenost vodstva na razini mlađeg časnika.

The barrage of criticism leveled at Samuel Huntington's notion of a "clash of civilizations"17 in no way lessens the vital point he made—that however much the grouping of peoples by religion and culture rather than political or economic divisions offends academics who propound a world defined by class, race, and gender, it is a reality, one not diminished by modern communications.

But how does one integrate the study of culture into military training? At present, it has hardly any role. Paul M. Belbutowski, a scholar and former member of the U.S. Delta Force, succinctly stated a deficiency in our own military education system: "Culture, comprised of all that is vague and intangible, is not generally integrated into strategic planning except at the most superficial level."18 And yet it is precisely "all that is vague and intangible" which defines low-intensity conflicts. The Vietnamese communists did not fight the war the United States had trained for, nor did the Chechens and Afghans fight the war the Russians prepared for. This entails far more than simply retooling weaponry and retraining soldiers. It requires an understanding of the enemy's cultural mythology, history, attitude toward time, etc.—demanding a more substantial investment in time and money than a bureaucratic organization is likely to authorize.

Mindful of walking through a minefield of past errors and present cultural sensibilities, I offer some assessments of the role of culture in the military training of Arabic-speaking officers. I confine myself principally to training for two reasons. First, I observed much training but only one combat campaign (the Jordanian Army against the Palestine Liberation Organization in 1970). Secondly, armies fight as they train. Troops are conditioned by peacetime habits, policies, and procedures; they do not undergo a sudden metamorphosis that transforms civilians in uniform into warriors. General George Patton was fond of relating the story about Julius Caesar, who "In the winter time ... so trained his legions in all that became soldiers and so habituated them to the proper performance of their duties, that when in the spring he committed them to battle against the Gauls, it was not necessary to give them orders, for they knew what to do and how to do it."

Baraž kritike izravnati na Samuel Huntington pojma "sukobu civilizacija", 17 ni na koji način smanjuje ključnu točku koju je dao-da koliko god grupiranje naroda od strane religije i kulture, a ne političkih ili ekonomskih podjela uvrijedila akademika koji nastupaju u svijet definira klasu, rasu i spol, to je realnost, ne umanjuje moderne komunikacije.

Ali kako se može integrirati istraživanje kulture u vojnoj obuci? Trenutačno, to je gotovo nikakvu ulogu. Paul M. Belbutowski, znanstvenik i bivši član američkog Delta Force, jezgrovito navodi nedostatak u našem vojnom obrazovnom sustavu: "Kultura, sastoji se od svega što je nejasan i nematerijalna, ne općenito integriran u strateškom planiranju, osim najviše površnoj razini. "18 A ipak je upravo" sve što je nejasno i neopipljivo ", koja definira niskog intenziteta sukoba. Vijetnamski komunisti nisu boriti u ratu su Sjedinjene Države osposobljen za, niti su Čečeni i Afganistanci se bore u ratu Rusi spremni. To podrazumijeva mnogo više nego jednostavno retooling oružje i prekvalifikaciju vojnika. To zahtijeva razumijevanje neprijateljskoj kulturne mitologije, povijesti, odnos prema vremenu, itd zahtjevne više značajna ulaganja u vrijeme i novac od birokratske organizacije je vjerojatno odobriti.

Svjestan hodanje kroz minsko polje prošlih pogrešaka i sadašnjosti kulturnih senzibiliteta, nudim neke procjene o ulozi kulture u vojnoj obuci arapski govornog časnika. Ja sam ograničio prvenstveno za obuku iz dva razloga. Prvo, primijetio sam mnogo treninga, ali samo jednu borbenu akciju (jordanskoj vojsku protiv Palestinske oslobodilačke organizacije u 1970). Drugo, vojske boriti kao što su vlak. Postrojbe su uvjetovani mirnodopske navike, politikama i procedurama; oni ne prolaze iznenadni metamorfozu koja se pretvara civila u uniformi u ratnike. General George Patton bio sklon odnosi na priču o Julija Cezara, koji je "U zimskom vremenu ... tako trenirao svoje legije u svemu što je postala vojnici i tako ih naviknuti na ispravno obavljanje svojih dužnosti, da kada je u proljeće je počinio ih u boj protiv Gali, nije bilo potrebno da im daju naredbe, jer su znali što učiniti i kako to učiniti. "

Information as Power

In every society information is a means of making a living or wielding power, but Arabs husband information and hold it especially tightly. U.S. trainers have often been surprised over the years by the fact that information provided to key personnel does not get much further than them. Having learned to perform some complicated procedure, an Arab technician knows that he is invaluable so long as he is the only one in a unit to have that knowledge; once he dispenses it to others he no longer is the only font of knowledge and his power dissipates. This explains the commonplace hoarding of manuals, books, training pamphlets, and other training or logistics literature. On one occasion, an American mobile training team working with armor in Egypt at long last received the operators' manuals that had laboriously been translated into Arabic. The American trainers took the newly-minted manuals straight to the tank park and distributed them to the tank crews. Right behind them, the company commander, a graduate of the armor school at Fort Knox and specialized courses at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds ordnance school, collected the manuals from the crews. Questioned why he did this, the commander said that there was no point in giving them to the drivers because enlisted men could not read. In point of fact, he did not want enlisted men to have an independent source of knowledge. Being the only person who can explain the fire control instrumentation or boresight artillery weapons brings prestige and attention. In military terms this means that very little cross-training is accomplished and that, for instance in a tank crew, the gunners, loaders, and drivers might be proficient in their jobs but are not prepared to fill in for a casualty. Not understanding one another's jobs also inhibits a smoothly functioning crew. At a higher level it means there is no depth in technical proficiency.


Informacije kao snaga

U svakom Informacijsko društvo je sredstvo zarađivanja za život ili wielding moć, ali Arapi muža informacije i držite ga osobito dobro. Američki treneri često su bili iznenađeni tijekom godina uz činjenicu da informacije koje ključno osoblje ne bi mnogo dalje od njih. Nakon što je saznao za obavljanje neke komplicirane procedure, arapski tehničar zna da je od neprocjenjive vrijednosti, tako dugo dok je on jedini u jedinici imaju to znanje; Jednom ga dijeli s drugima on više nije jedini font znanja i njegova snaga nestaje. To objašnjava uobičajena gomilanja priručnika, knjiga, obuke letaka i drugog treninga ili logistike književnosti. Jednom prilikom, američki mobilni trening tim koji radi s oružjem u Egiptu napokon dobila priručnike operatera koji koji su marljivo su prevedene na arapski. Američki treneri uzeo novouspostavljene priručnike ravno u park spremnika te ih distribuira u spremnik posade. Odmah iza njih, tvrtka zapovjednik, diplomirao na oklopa škole u Fort Knox i specijalizirane tečajeve u Aberdeen Proving Grounds ubojnih sredstava škole, prikupljeni priručnike iz posade. Pitaju zašto je to učinio, zapovjednik je rekao da nema smisla u davanju ih vozača jer upisanih ljudi ne može pročitati. U stvari, on nije htio ostatak posade muškaraca da imaju nezavisnu izvor znanja. Budući da je jedina osoba koja može objasniti kontrole požara instrumenata ili viziranje topničkih oružja donosi prestiž i pažnju. U vojnom smislu to znači da je vrlo malo cross-trening se postiže i da, primjerice u posadi tenka, Topnici, na točkovima, i vozači mogu biti stručnjak u svojim poslovima, ali nisu spremni ispuniti za nezgode. Ne razumiju jedni drugima poslovi također inhibira glatko funkcioniranje posade. Na višoj razini, to znači da nema dubina tehničke osposobljenosti.

Education Problems

Training tends to be unimaginative, cut and dried, and not challenging. Because the Arab educational system is predicated on rote memorization, officers have a phenomenal ability to commit vast amounts of knowledge to memory. The learning system tends to consist of on-high lectures, with students taking voluminous notes and being examined on what they were told. (It also has interesting implications for foreign instructors; for example, his credibility is diminished if he must resort to a book.) The emphasis on memorization has a price, and that is in diminished ability to reason or engage in analysis based upon general principles. Thinking outside the box is not encouraged; doing so in public can damage a career. Instructors are not challenged and neither, in the end, are students.

Head-to-head competition among individuals is generally avoided, at least openly, for it means that someone wins and someone else loses, with the loser humiliated. This taboo has particular import when a class contains mixed ranks. Education is in good part sought as a matter of personal prestige, so Arabs in U.S. military schools take pains to ensure that the ranking member, according to military position or social class, scores the highest marks in the class. Often this leads to "sharing answers" in class—often in a rather overt manner or junior officers concealing scores higher than their superior's.

American military instructors dealing with Middle Eastern students learn to ensure that, before directing any question to a student in a classroom situation, particularly if he is an officer, the student does possess the correct answer. If this is not assured, the officer will feel he has been set up for public humiliation. Furthermore, in the often-paranoid environment of Arab political culture, he will believe this setup to have been purposeful. This student will then become an enemy of the instructor and his classmates will become apprehensive about their also being singled out for humiliation—and learning becomes impossible.

Obrazovanje problemi

Trening tendira biti nemaštoviti, izrezati i suši, a ne izazov. Budući da je Arapska obrazovni sustav počiva na napamet pamćenja, službenici imaju fenomenalan mogućnost počinjenja ogromne količine znanja u memoriju. Sustav učenja teži se sastojati od predavanja na visokim, sa studentima uzimanje voluminozne bilješke i ispituje o tome što im je rečeno. (Ona također ima zanimljive posljedice na inozemnim instruktorima, primjerice, njegov kredibilitet se smanjio, ako on mora posegnuti za knjigom.) Naglasak na pamćenja ima svoju cijenu, a to je u smanjenu sposobnost prema razumu ili sudjelovati u analizi na temelju općih načela , Razmišljanje izvan okvira ne potiče; Pritom se u javnosti može oštetiti karijeru. Instruktori nisu izazvan i ne, na kraju su studenti.

Head-to-glavu natjecanje među pojedincima općenito izbjegavati, barem javno, jer to znači da je netko osvoji i netko drugi gubi, a gubitnik ponizilo. Ovaj tabu ima posebnu uvoz kada je klasa sadrži mješovite redovima. Obrazovanje je dobar dio tražili kao stvar osobnog prestiža, tako da Arapi u američkim vojnim školama se bolovi da se osigura da u rang člana, prema vojnom položaju ili društvene klase, ocjene najviše ocjene u razredu. Često to dovodi do "dijeljenja odgovora" klase često u prilično očitim način ili mlađi oficiri concealing rezultate veće od njihovih vrhunskih godina.

Američki vojni instruktori bave bliskoistočnih studentima naučiti kako bi se osiguralo da se, prije nego usmjeravanje na bilo koje pitanje da student u učionici, posebno ako je službenik, student ne posjeduje točan odgovor. Ako to nije zajamčen, službenik će osjetiti da je postavljen za javnog poniženja. Nadalje, u često paranoidnog okruženju arapske političke kulture, on će vjerujem postava bila svrhovita. Ovaj student će tada postati neprijatelj instruktora i njegovi kolege će postati prestrašen o njihovoj također se izdvaja za ponižavanje-i učenje postaje nemoguće.

Officers vs. Soldiers

Arab junior officers are well trained on the technical aspects of their weapons and tactical know-how, but not in leadership, a subject given little attention. For example, as General Sa‘d ash-Shazli, the Egyptian chief of staff, noted in his assessment of the army he inherited prior to the 1973 war, they were not trained to seize the initiative or volunteer original concepts or new ideas.20 Indeed, leadership may be the greatest weakness of Arab training systems. This problem results from two main factors: a highly accentuated class system bordering on a caste system, and lack of a non-commissioned-officer development program.

Most Arab officers treat enlisted soldiers like sub-humans. When the winds in Egypt one day carried biting sand particles from the desert during a demonstration for visiting U.S. dignitaries, I watched as a contingent of soldiers marched in and formed a single rank to shield the Americans; Egyptian soldiers, in other words, are used on occasion as nothing more than a windbreak. The idea of taking care of one's men is found only among the most elite units in the Egyptian military. On a typical weekend, officers in units stationed outside Cairo will get in their cars and drive off to their homes, leaving the enlisted men to fend for themselves by trekking across the desert to a highway and flagging down busses or trucks to get to the Cairo rail system. Garrison cantonments have no amenities for soldiers. The same situation, in various degrees, exists elsewhere in the Arabic-speaking countries—less so in Jordan, even more so in Iraq and Syria.

Oficiri vs. Vojnici

Arapski mlađi časnici su dobro obučeni o tehničkim aspektima svojih oružja i taktičkih znanja, ali ne u vodstvu, subjekt daje malo pozornosti. Na primjer, kao što je general Sa'd ash-Shazli, egipatskog šefa osoblja, što je navedeno u svojoj procjeni vojske je naslijedio prije rata 1973. godine, oni nisu bili obučeni da iskoriste inicijativu ili volonter izvorne koncepte ili novi ideas.20 Doista, vodstvo može biti najveća slabost arapskih sustava obuke. Ovaj problem proizlazi iz dva glavna čimbenika: iznimno naglašen klase sustava graniči na kastinskom sustavu, i nedostatak programa razvoja ne-naručila časnik.

Većina arapskih službenici postupati uvršten vojnika kao pod-ljude. Kad vjetrovi u Egiptu jedan dan provesti grizu pješčane čestice iz pustinje tijekom prosvjeda na posjeti američkih dostojanstvenika, gledao sam kao kontingent vojnika prosvjedovalo i formirao jedan čin za zaštitu Amerikance; Egipatski vojnici, drugim riječima, koriste povremeno kao ništa više nego vjetrobran. Ideja brigu o nečijim muškaraca pronađena samo među najelitnijim jedinicama u egipatskom vojskom. Na tipičnom vikend, službenici u jedinicama stacioniranih izvan Kairu će dobiti u svojim automobilima i otjerati u svoje domove, ostavljajući angažirao ljude da se brinu za sebe tako trekking kroz pustinju do autoceste i označavanje dolje autobuse ili kamione da bi se na Kairo željeznički sustav. Garrison cantonments nemaju pogodnosti za vojnika. Ista situacija, u različitim stupnjevima, postoji i drugdje u zemljama-manje arapski govornog područja tako u Jordanu, pa čak i više u Iraku i Siriji.

The young draftees who make up the bulk of the Egyptian army hate military service for good reason and will do almost anything, including self-mutilation, to avoid it. In Syria the wealthy buy exemptions or, failing that, are assigned to noncombatant organizations. As a young Syrian told me, his musical skills came from his assignment to a Syrian army band where he learned to play an instrument. In general, the militaries of the Fertile Crescent enforce discipline by fear; in countries where a tribal system still is in force, such as Saudi Arabia, the innate egalitarianism of the society mitigates against fear as the prime motivator, so a general lack of discipline pervades.21

The social and professional gap between officers and enlisted men is present in all armies, but in the United States and other Western forces, the noncommissioned officer (NCO) corps bridges it. Indeed, a professional NCO corps has been critical for the American military to work at its best; as the primary trainers in a professional army, NCOs are critical to training programs and to the enlisted men's sense of unit esprit. Most of the Arab world either has no NCO corps or it is non-functional, severely handicapping the military's effectiveness. With some exceptions, NCOs are considered in the same low category as enlisted men and so do not serve as a bridge between enlisted men and officers. Officers instruct but the wide social gap between enlisted man and officer tends to make the learning process perfunctory, formalized, and ineffective. The show-and-tell aspects of training are frequently missing because officers refuse to get their hands dirty and prefer to ignore the more practical aspects of their subject matter, believing this below their social station. A dramatic example of this occurred during the Gulf war when a severe windstorm blew down the tents of Iraqi officer prisoners of war. For three days they stayed in the wind and rain rather than be observed by enlisted prisoners in a nearby camp working with their hands.

The military price for this is very high. Without the cohesion supplied by NCOs, units tend to disintegrate in the stress of combat. This is primarily a function of the fact that the enlisted soldiers simply do not trust their officers. Once officers depart the training areas, training begins to fall apart as soldiers begin drifting off. An Egyptian officer once explained to me that the Egyptian army's catastrophic defeat in 1967 resulted from a lack of cohesion within units. The situation, he said, had only marginally improved in 1973. Iraqi prisoners in 1991 showed a remarkable fear and enmity toward their officers.

Mladi draftees koji čine većinu egipatske vojske mrze vojnu službu za dobar razlog i da će učiniti gotovo sve, uključujući i samo-sakaćenje, to izbjeći. U Siriji su bogati Kupi izuzeća ili, u nedostatku toga, su dodijeljeni noncombatant organizacijama. Kako mi je mlada Sirijska rekli, svoje glazbene vještine došao je raspoređen u sirijskom vojnom pojasu, gdje je naučio svirati instrument. Općenito, vojske plodne Crescent provesti disciplinu strahom; u zemljama gdje plemenski sustav i dalje je na snazi, kao što su Saudijska Arabija, prirođena egalitarizam društva ublažava protiv straha kao početni motivator, pa opći nedostatak discipline pervades.



Društveni i profesionalni jaz između časnika i uvršten muškaraca je prisutan u svim vojskama, ali u SAD-u i drugim zapadnim snagama, podoficirima službenik (NKZ) zbor ga mostova. Doista, profesionalni dočasnički zbor je bio presudan za američke vojske za rad u svom najboljem; kao primarne trenera u profesionalnu vojsku, dočasnici su ključni za programe obuke i do uvršten muškom smislu jedinice Esprit. Većina arapskog svijeta bilo nema dočasnički zbor ili je nefunkcionalna, ozbiljno hendikepiranost učinkovitost vojske. Uz neke iznimke, dočasnici smatraju u istoj kategoriji kao i niskom poslani ljudi pa ne služe kao most između uvršten muškaraca i časnika. Policajci uputiti no široka socijalna jaz između vojnik i časnik teži čine proces učenja površno, formalizirano, i neučinkovit. Emisija-i-reci aspekte treninga često nedostaje jer službenici odbijaju da se njihove ruke prljave i radije ignorirati više praktične aspekte njihovog predmeta, vjerujući da ispod njihove društvene stanice. Dramatična primjer za to došlo tijekom Zaljevskog rata kada je teška oluja puhao niz šatore iračkih časnika ratnih zarobljenika. Za tri dana su boravili u vjetar i kiša, a ne može opaziti uvršten zatvorenika u obližnjem kampu radeći svojim rukama.

Vojska cijena za to je vrlo visoka. Bez kohezije dobili od dočasnika, jedinice imaju tendenciju da se raspada u stres borbe. To je prije svega funkcija činjenice da ostatak posade vojnici jednostavno ne vjerujete svojih časnika. Nakon službenici polaze područja trening, trening počinje raspadati kao vojnici početi splavarenja off. Egipatski službenik jednom objasnio mi je da egipatske vojske katastrofalnog poraza u 1967. rezultat nedostatka kohezije unutar jedinice. Situacija je, rekao je, bio je samo neznatno poboljšalo u 1973. iračkih zatvorenika u 1991. pokazala izuzetan strah i neprijateljstvo prema svojim časnicima.

Decision-making and Responsibility

Decisions are made and delivered from on high, with very little lateral communication. This leads to a highly centralized system, with authority hardly ever delegated. Rarely does an officer make a critical decision on his own; instead, he prefers the safe course of being identified as industrious, intelligent, loyal—and compliant. Bringing attention to oneself as an innovator or someone prone to make unilateral decisions is a recipe for trouble. As in civilian life, conformism is the overwhelming societal norm; the nail that stands up gets hammered down. Orders and information flow from top to bottom; they are not to be reinterpreted, amended, or modified in any way.

U.S. trainers often experience frustration obtaining a decision from a counterpart, not realizing that the Arab officer lacks the authority to make the decision—a frustration amplified by the Arab's understandable reluctance to admit that he lacks that authority. This author has several times seen decisions that could have been made at the battalion level concerning such matters as class meeting times and locations requiring approval from the ministry of defense. All of which has led American trainers to develop a rule of thumb: a sergeant first class in the U.S. Army has as much authority as a colonel in an Arab army. Methods of instruction and subject matter are dictated from higher authorities. Unit commanders have very little to say about these affairs. The politicized nature of the Arab militaries means that political factors weigh heavily and frequently override military considerations. Officers with initiative and a predilection for unilateral action pose a threat to the regime. This can be seen not just at the level of national strategy but in every aspect of military operations and training. If Arab militaries became less politicized and more professional in preparation for the 1973 war with Israel,22 once the fighting ended, old habits returned. Now, an increasingly bureaucratized military establishment weighs in as well. A veteran of the Pentagon turf wars will feel like a kindergartner when he encounters the rivalries that exist in the Arab military headquarters.

Odlučivanje i odgovornost

Odluke se donose i isporučena s visine, s vrlo malo lateralnog komuniciranja. To dovodi do vrlo centraliziranog sustava, s autoritetom rijetko delegira. Rijetko se časnik kritički odluku o vlastitu; umjesto toga, on preferira siguran tijek biti identificirani kao marljiv, inteligentan, odan-i popustljiv. Dovođenje pozornost na sebe kao inovator ili netko skloni da jednostrane odluke je recept za nevolje. Kao u civilni život, konformizam je ogromna društvena norma; nokat koji stoji dobiva hammered dolje. Narudžbe i protok informacija od vrha do dna; oni ne mogu reinterpretirati, izmijenjena ili mijenjati na bilo koji način.

Američki treneri često iskustvo frustracija dobivanja odluke iz kolegom, ne shvaćajući da je arapsko službenik nema ovlast za donošenje odluke-a frustracije pojačan arapskih je razumljivo nespremnost da prizna da mu nedostaje taj autoritet. Ovaj autor je nekoliko puta vidio odluka koje bi mogle biti napravljene na razini bojne vezi područja poput vremena klasa za sastanke i mjestima koja zahtijevaju odobrenje od ministarstva obrane. Sve što je dovelo američkih trenera da razvije pravilo: narednik prve klase u američkoj vojsci ima toliko ovlasti kao pukovnik u arapskom vojskom. Metode nastave i predmeta diktiraju iz viših vlasti. Zapovjednici jedinice imaju vrlo malo za reći o tim poslovima. Politiziranom priroda arapskih vojski znači da politički čimbenici otežavati i često nadjačati vojnih pitanja. Policajci s inicijativom i sklonosti ka jednostranom akcije predstavljaju prijetnju režimu. To se može vidjeti ne samo na razini nacionalne strategije, ali u svakom aspektu vojne operacije i obuku. Ako arapske vojske postao manje ispolitizirano i profesionalni u pripremi za 1973 rat s Izraelom, 22 nakon borbe završio, stare navike se vratio. Sada, sve birokratiziran vojnog establišmenta teži kao dobro. Veteran od Pentagona travnjaka ratova će se osjećati kao iz vrtića kad se susretne s rivalstva koje postoje u arapskom vojni stožer.

Taking responsibility for a policy, operation, status, or training program rarely occurs. U.S. trainers can find it very frustrating when they repeatedly encounter Arab officers placing blame for unsuccessful operations or programs on the U.S. equipment or some other outside source. A high rate of non-operational U.S. equipment is blamed on a "lack of spare parts"—pointing a finger at an unresponsive U.S. supply system despite the fact that American trainers can document ample supplies arriving in country and disappearing in a malfunctioning supply system. (Such criticism was never caustic or personal and often so indirect and politely delivered that it wasn't until after a meeting that oblique references were understood.) This imperative works even at the most exalted levels. During the Kuwait war, Iraqi forces took over the town of Khafji in northeast Saudi Arabia after the Saudis had evacuated the place. General Khalid bin Sultan, the Saudi ground forces commander, requested a letter from General Norman Schwarzkopf, stating it was the U.S. general who ordered an evacuation from the Saudi town.And in his account of the Khafji battle, General Bin Sultan predictably blames the Americans for the Iraqi occupation of the town. In reality the problem was that the light Saudi forces in the area left the battlefield. The Saudis were in fact outgunned and outnumbered by the Iraqi unit approaching Khafji but Saudi pride required that foreigners be blamed.

Preuzimanje odgovornosti za politiku, rad, program za status ili obuke rijetko događa. Američki treneri mogu ga pronaći vrlo frustrirajuće kada se više puta susrećemo arapske časnika stavljanje krivnju za neuspješne operacije ili programa na američkom opreme ili neki drugi vanjski izvor. Visoka stopa ne-operativne američke opreme krivi na "nedostatak rezervnih dijelova" -pointing prst na nereagiranje američkog opskrbnog sustava, unatoč činjenici da su američki treneri mogu dokumentirati dovoljno zalihe stižu u zemlji i nestaju u neispravnim sustavom opskrbe. (Takva kritika nije bio oštar ili osobno i često tako neizravna i uljudno isporučena da je tek nakon sastanka koji kosi reference su shvaćene.) Ovo je imperativ radi čak i na najuzvišeniji razinama. Tijekom Kuvajt rata, iračke snage preuzeo gradu Khafji u sjeveroistočnom Saudijskoj Arabiji nakon Saudijci su evakuirani mjesto. Opće Khalid bin Sultan, saudijska zapovjednik kopnene snage, zatražio pismo od generala Norman Schwarzkopf, navodeći da je to američki general koji je naredio evakuaciju iz Saudijske town.And u svom račun Khafji bitke, general Bin Sultan predvidljivo optužuje Amerikance za iračke okupacije grada. U stvarnosti, problem je da svjetlosni Saudijske snage u području napustio bojno polje. Saudijci su u stvari takvoj situaciji i brojčano iračke jedinice približava Khafji ali Saudijska ponos zahtijeva da stranci mogu kriviti.