Originally posted by moca:
Where got? They helped us set up our armed forces but kept the
British regimantal system. They trained our first few batches of
recruits on how to behave like soldiers. They trained our initial
core of NCO's and officers. They taught us how the basics like how
to operate in squads, sections, platoons, company level etc. These
apply whether you are in jungle or desert or in HDB estate.
Where did you get the information that we learnt jungle fighting
from them? Or are you just guessing?
They ? You mean the Israelis
?
Yes, they did helped us set up our armed forces, and the British
Regimental System is also followed by the Israelis, as Israel was
also ruled by the British Colonial Office - (did you know about
this small fact ? ). It is no surprise that the British Regimental
System was retained by the Israelis, as an army had to start and
exist in some form.
Training our recruits to "behave like soldiers" do not necessarily
make good soldiers for combat when wrong doctrine is
incalcated.
The British certainly did not train our infantry in the early days
of the SAF, so who else do you think organised and wrote the
training doctrines for jungle warfare ?
In dessert warfare, the Israelis had the passion to navigate at
night, and their standard reactive training when ambushed - was
typically, "Enemy LEFT, charge" and firing on the run at the enemy,
to throw the surprise back at the enemy with aggressive
reaction.
This was a disaster in jungle warfare.
The British Jungle Warfare Doctrine dictates that all movement has
to be conducted before nightfall, unless very necessary - as any
movement at night is considered to be hostile - unless known in
advance.
The British Doctrine will have the ambused personnel take cover and
return fire, while the rear force will co-ordinate a reactive fire
and movement counter-attack, as well as defending the
rear.
Correction, the Korean War was a stalemate, nobody won or
lost.
The most significant interference was the Pentagon stopping
MacArthur from invading China and using nuclear bombs on China.
Which would've resulted in a global nuclear war.
Would invading or bombing China helped win the war. Absolutely not.
The Americans could hardly beat the overstretched and ill-equipped
PLA in North Korea. Had the Americans entered China, they would be
utterly destroyed.
Had they used nuclear weapons, Russia would've have responded in
kind. Besides, it would be absolutely immoral to nuclear bomb
civilians when the US is not threatened in any way and it was
officially in US a "police action" in Korea.
Otherwise, it was the poor tactics of US commanders and individual
soldiers that prevented USA in achieving outright victory in both
conflicts.
Please read up on at least some books that's not written by
red-neck US authors before adopting the US propaganda stance of
blaming everything on politics and civilians. If the US was
perfoming well no politician would tell the army to stop
fighting.
The US Armed Forces didn''t win the fight -
period.
Unfortunately, your statements
above is full of contradiction.
First you claim that the Pentagon stopped MacArthur, when everyone
- including Baer, see my above reply to his post - had known that
it was Truman who prevented MacArthur from widening the war, and
hence shut down his aggressive strategy to push the PLA and North
Koreans further back.
"the Pentagon stopped MacArthur" ? Where did you get your history
from ?
You will have sounded at least 'half-correct' if you had written that
the Pentagon stopped MacArthur on the instruction of the President;
but then it will contradict your statement that 'it was propaganda to blame politics and
civilian interference'.
Try reading this 'Why Did Truman
Really Fire MacArthur ?.... The Obscure History of Nuclear Weapons
and the Korean War Provides the Answer'.
The author is certainly not a red-neck American, and also confirmed
all historical writings that President Truman prevented MacArthur
from conducting a more aggressive strategy, so as to stop the war
on the Korean Peninsular from getting out of hand.
It was NOT poor tactics or
strategies that the US Military could not cope with the aggressive
communist forces, it was simply that the United Nations troop under
the command of the US Military was overwhelmed by the human wave
attacks from China's massive PLA numbers. (Incidentally, I suppose
you know that the War on the Korean Peninsular was not just a US vs
North Korea war ? )
If MacArthur had his way, there may not have been any PLA to defend
the China Communist Party, as there were plans to use atomic and
nuclear weapons to stop the mass human wave doctrine adopted so
effectively by the PLA, and cost massive losses to the US and UN
Forces.
If the PLA and North Koreans troops were nuked and annihilated, and
the war on the Korea Peninsular was effectively concluded in favor
of the UN Forces under US Command, there would not have a Communist
China to trouble South-east Asia in the 1950s and 1960s, the
Vietnam War would have different results, and there will certainly
be no mad man leading North Korea to trouble us today.
It is debateable if Soviet Russia would have faced up to the US in
a nuclear confrontation at the time of the war on the Korean
Peninsular, as the Soviet was playing a 'catch up role' to the surprised
atomic weapons that the US possessed as WW2 came to a close.
The Soviet certainly had no credible means of making any atomic or
nuclear attacks, as missile delivery technology and systems were
still experimental.
Your statement about 'Immorality
to attack civilians' is laughable, when atrocities have been
committed by all Allied and Axis forces during WW2, with the fire
bombing of all major cities in England, all of Europe, Russia,
Japan, Pearl Harbor, and all major cities attacked by Japan.
No, the US did not win the war on the Korean Peninsular, as it was
brought to an inconclusive stalemate by political interference from
the US President's Office; much like when the first President
George Bush stopped a victorious US led UN Force from heading into
Baghdad and get rid of Sadam during Dessert Storm
1.
Have you served your NS yet?
If you cannot discern from the
information revealed in my posts, then you must be younger than
your writing reveal.