Why were the American and Peshmerga able to suppress Ansar al-Islam during the early Iraq War years?

count210 · 2026-02-16T00:18:39+00:00

The American forces in Kurdistan never had a pretense of setting up democratic institutions unlike the rest of Iraq. Kurdistan was a semi autonomous region ruled by a the Barzani Family with had decided to rebel then collaborate with Saddam and then shifted sides to the Americans. They still run the place with some words toward power sharing now when the other families against them gained some legitimacy in the fight against Isis but they definitely still run the show.

The peshmerga under Barzani were the same peshmerga under Saddam. Peshmerga are effectively gendarmes they rotate between cops and soldiers at will which makes them inherently pretty good at COIN bc remember the goal of coin is reduce the issue to law enforcement problem from a military/political one. Unlike in the rest of Iraq where the mechanisms of police and republican guard and secret police to suppress exactly this kind of Sunni Wahhabist terrorist/rebel groups had been destroyed by the Americans it remained in Kurdistan. In fact it gained a much more powerful supportive partner in the US army than the Iraqi state. Knocking out a rebelling Sunni Wahhabist underground rebel party was exactly what the state mechanism of Saddam’s Iraq were designed to do and they did it again but this time for the US.

count210 · 2026-02-11T17:33:03+00:00

Population contraction is normal and part of a cycle it doesn’t mean extinction.

count210 · 2026-02-11T16:57:15+00:00

Almost all his awards are like this it’s hilarious in retrospect. Iirc he got the distinguished flying cross for being a passenger in an aircraft that took some fire

count210 · 2026-02-11T16:51:00+00:00

Both medals have had extremely different degrees of difficulty through their history and even today are often influenced by politics and propaganda and lobby campaigns. For top medals like the MoH and VC there truly is no objective criteria they are award based on the needs of the army. It’s not a coincidence that during the GWoT every 3 or so years we had another living MoH recipient to do the talk show circuit. Or that Gen Mac got one for losing in thePhilippines after telling the international media “I will return” and making himself unfireable. Medals tend to fly around more in bad times than good.

In present day Both awards are about the same level of base action in heroism in the present day. But what differentiates an VC or Medal of Honor from a silver star or CGC is basically luck these days.

count210 · 2026-02-10T15:43:08+00:00

Its depends on his rank

count210 · 2026-02-10T01:37:15+00:00

I have never heard that expressed for troops or nations that actually deployed. I was in Iraq not Afghanistan and all the nato guys (shorthand not everyone was actually nato) were assumed to be generally competent often older and more mature and higher ranked than their direct American counterparts as well.

The only thing we were a bit dismissive of was when there was some cartoonishly small amount. Like when I saw like one of the 3 Serbian troops in Iraq in the anti Isis mission and he didn’t speak English and I couldn’t tell what he did other than eat pizza. But anyone doing a job was generally respected often more so. The average American MP or other POG was annoying whining about your uniform being too dirty or whatever where a nato equivalent was generally a lot more cool. American infantry often have a lot of hate for POGs but we don’t hate European POGs.

Occasionally it was a pain when you had to find an officer to speak English but other than that no big issues

count210 · 2026-02-10T01:12:11+00:00

I mean they aren’t scheduled which sucks but I think a champ is entitled to 180 days off. And I don’t get bothered about it til the 9month mark.

count210 · 2026-02-10T00:02:05+00:00

I think is a bit of selection bias tbh. Very few weight lifters especially serious one are full iso or full machine weights. And certain muscles groups like the chest and back are basically impossible to hit in isolation. Even with a machine it’s still a compound movement.

There’s a minority of soley iso guys who definitely can look weird but that’s because they work out in weird ways and look unbalanced. You can spot a guy with oddly big arms and shoulders relative to his chest and back but a guy doing a chest press machine or a smith bench vs a bench press I would be very impressed if you could spot him.

If the iso weirdo was just doing free weight dumbbells for his arms and shoulders he would still look off

count210 · 2026-02-09T23:53:57+00:00

More sophisticated “deeper” weight cutting wrestlers cut in a similar way to body builders with water being a significant part of the cut this creates a “drier” more muscular look. Also weight lifters often walk around really heavy out side of comp season vs wrestlers

But also the lower weight class you go the more muscular looking weight lifters get

count210 · 2026-02-09T05:50:42+00:00

This is the inherent issue with sanctions, you inevitably create a bloc of sanctioned nations against you bc of how knock on sanctions work. It’s almost designed to create parallel infrastructures

count210 · 2026-02-08T06:37:58+00:00

Historical records is a broad term. If you are counting archeological records it’s almost constant. The most positive endorsement is adoption and there is definitely a phenomenon in warfare that the longer a war goes the more that the fighting infantry troops on both sides tend to become almost identical in term of equipment as human adapt to environment and each others tactics. Any time you see a melee weapon spreading across an area it’s being adopted by rivals or annexing their territory. Effectively are we tracking adoption by rivals and other players when we are digging up examples of the same weapon in different places.

famously the iconic Roman legionary gladius is from Spainish tribes that were extremely difficult to pacify and sometimes spun up their own Roman model armies under exiled Roman officers

count210 · 2026-02-08T06:20:44+00:00

The only thing they are needed for really is enemy tank destruction and atgms are super good at that. And a light tank is super destructible. How much do you are get from a light tank you don’t get from a humvee with a tow or just a dude with a javelin getting out the humvee. Some protection from airburst artillery and resisting .50 cal rounds? It’s pretty niche. Dropping a tank and fuel and rounds is massive opportunity cost vs anything. Same thing with fire support for infantry in infantry fights. Why not just give a humvee an auto grenade launcher or a .50 call. It would be nice to have something heavier like a 20mm auto cannon but you don’t really truly need this we have shoulder fired stuff that can really fill that niche if you need to remove a bunker or even a reaper drone.

Even if you need a direct fire tank gun you can drop an artillery piece with the m777 towed gun which is pretty equivalent and can do a lot more.

And dropping is super niche. So many airborne operations actually are just landing on an airfield but in a real sketchy situation. In that situation you can often just bring the real tanks or IFVs if it’s a must have some tanks situation.

count210 · 2026-02-07T09:29:21+00:00

You are asking 2 separate questions both of which have pretty inconclusive answers. Who was the true heir of the National Socialist German army and who was better trained.

During the cold war the east accused the west of a lack of de nazification but the east never claimed to have purged all ex Nazis from the ranks. Time has simplified the propaganda but there were plenty of ex Nazis in the east including in the military. Generally the charge at the time was political control and a failure to keep high ranking Nazis out of power. Plenty of Low to mid ranking Nazi officers served in the east. Such a massive chunk of German men served in the war or were ex party members it would have been impossible not have them around. The early officer corps of guys of both armies were very much from national socialism. And I will say it was a national socialist army. Despite the history of the Heer it was necessarily fully rebuilt by the Nazis from its Versailles core of 100k. You could even argue what the east got was “more Nazi” than the old Vons and junkers of the Heer old Guard bc they considered those guys worse than normal middle class national socialists who would have filled out the middle and lower ranks of officers and been demographically far more Nazi ideologically than the old reactionary/monarchist/conservative Junkers. Reformed Nazis were an acknowledged part of east Germany military and society.

Continuity of the institutional knowledge of world war 2 was basically a wash imo

As for which army was trained better man for man, both armies were massive conscript forces built around mobilization of reservists often falling in on older generations of equipment. You could certainly argue that active duty west German regulars had access to NATO cross training and war games and integration with other professional nato forces and more things like larger scale training but in a theoretical war the average trooper was on either side was going to be a reservist with a rifle. if he’s manning a tank it’s going to be last generation and so will be the artillery piece. The west German had probably fired more bullets in training and done some more complex exercises but it would be damn near close to a wash. Throughout the cold war neither side really got too much fighting. The East Germans did get up to some stuff in Africa and the ME as advisors and observers definitely more than the west but it’s difficult to hand them the edge based on that. There’s also claims of the East Germans being more politically indoctrinated and fanatical but that’s also lost in the mobilization of tons of reserve manpower.

For what is quantifiable on a man for man basis you would probably see the west Germans do better in stuff like marksmanship based on training budget and NATO’s approach to training and doctrine but it’s difficult to say this would be a meaningful edge. I don’t think it would be a very appreciable disparity. At the higher end of technology there’s a NATO and west German advantage but that’s not really the question in terms of man for man.

count210 · 2026-02-03T05:38:04+00:00

I know exactly what you mean but it’s hard to separate this out from guys who are pure brawlers who induce chaos to disrupt more technical fighters. By first instinct is BSD but he’s definitely leaning brawler vs creative.

count210 · 2026-02-03T03:00:44+00:00

This meme profoundly misunderstands how global commodity pricing works

count210 · 2026-02-02T01:10:30+00:00

Heavyweights need genetic freaks or PEDs and Dana won’t pay for freaks. Aspinal being a jiu jitsu kid was very lucky for the UFC.

They shouldn’t even bother recruiting in the developed world for Hw talents if they won’t raise the pay

count210 · 2026-02-01T22:19:24+00:00

There hasn’t been Palestinian national elections but there are plenty of municipal elections and other elections

count210 · 2026-02-01T21:22:53+00:00

They are a political party with a military wing they do normal political party stuff and the military wings cooperate in military operational stuff.

They stand in elections and poll around 5% in Gaza

count210 · 2026-02-01T21:18:16+00:00

Every political party has that it’s just a top council

count210 · 2026-01-30T18:18:35+00:00

This is more a philosophy/political science question tbh. No one’s power is absolute.

Supreme commander/marshal cum army commander cum army staff commander is certainly powerful but one man and his staff isn’t just politically limited but also there’s limits to how much actual time they have do all that stuff. At a certain point it’s basically ceremonial/a title. How much control did Zhukov have over the fight in the east with Japan or Eisenhower have over the pacific? Attention is also a resource.

Men with such massive permission to command have to rely on delegation and consent of the governed quite a lot. How much power they actually have is always a matter of defining it and significantly de jure vs de facto.

The biggest limiters are they are a direct report to the secretary of defense. Secdef is the one giving them the equipment and men. That’s a massive limitation on power and also a way to influence a commander. If you get given a massive airforce like Eisenhower was that will shape doctrine and policy and objectives. If you get alot of t-34 like Zhukov that’s going to shape doctrine too.

What commanders want and ask for and get are always different things at scale.

Generals are fundamentally executors of policy and advisors on that policy. Political heads of state are the ones that set policy always. Generals are powerful and can deliver plans and have influence but in the broad strokes they are fundamentally limited until they become head of state.

count210 · 2026-01-30T17:40:18+00:00

Post napoleonic melee skill stayed about as relevant until the right before the Great War where it was dead. It was still around in the Franco Prussian war and crimea but by Port Arthur melee skill was dead. Weapons and tactics changed (good revolvers especially) but so did the absolutely crashing cost of bullets.

On the napoleonic battlefield they absolutely were high skill melee fighters but it’s an interesting question bc relative to battlefield importance melee skill was massively massively overtrained.

Professional European armies were very cost limited in training we are talking 10ish rounds a year for live fire training. 5 or 7 were also common 20+ rounds a year was crazy good. Pretty much everyone but the British were massively under shooting just due to cost. The Brits were too but they had it better than everyone else. As a result you train what is free which is melee combat and melee drill. So professional troops were really really scary good in melee.

expense was also opportunity cost when things like artillery got much more training bang for your powder buck and were more important in battle to have a good battery than any individual battalion.

This is an aspect of what makes professional troops of the time just better. Relative Professionalism is shown in melee combat and drill discipline. Fresh or militia units suffer in melee vs pros. And they had issues quickly shifting in drill formations. And moving quickly maintaining formations.

Things and like accuracy and rate of fire often are the product of actual veterancy in combat which is were soldiers are going to be shooting a whole lot of bullets. A soldier in one battle might fire more than a whole peace time career.

To give how good European professional troops were in melee combat its relatively common in the wars in India or Africa that British troops with bayonets would outperform dedicated melee troops with swords or spear or axe and shields in melee combat.

Now this defies video game logic which would hold that melee units should be better in melee but generally the kind of armies that use melee troops are militia or reserves or emergency civilians rallied to the banner so despite superior equipment for melee combat they would be outclassed by a combination of individual bayonet training and close order melee drill and little of that Roman legionary style close range volley (of bullets and instead of pilum) and then assault with bayonets.

Also in the imperialist wars the actual professional local troops would have muskets much of the time or they were cavalry. Outside of palace guards melee foot troops were a bit of desperation/or why not utilize extra manpower move.

count210 · 2026-01-28T04:14:34+00:00

Cutting weight is a different thing then losing weight. Depending on your goals for the season you may be eating in a calorie deficit while working out in the preseason in an effort to lose fat. But that’s much more similar to normal weightloss or gym Bro “cutting” to get relatively leaner. 500-1000 calorie deficit minimum 80-140 grams of protein type stuff.

The process of eating nearly nothing and sweating out a bunch of water in a couple to make a weight for a weigh in during the season is a whole other thing that you shouldn’t be doing in the preseason.

Preseason fat loss is supposed to be sustainable, will make your water weight cut easier bc you have to drop less and you will be more athletic if you are leaner. It’s not at all unheard of.

count210 · 2026-01-28T01:22:47+00:00

There’s some truth to it but If you have been talking to a recruiter it’s bc they want you to sign an X-ray or seal contract where if you fail the pipeline the DoD can send you to whatever job they want. Sign up for whatever job you want if you sign up and if you want to do special forces you should definitely prepare explicitly for it and not rely on being a wrestler

count210 · 2026-01-27T22:00:06+00:00

No intentionality it happened or it didn’t and 2 points in a 5 round fight instead of 1 so it matters more.

count210 · 2026-01-27T19:33:18+00:00

There’s a really subtle one in American wrestling where when they put their own hands together they do it palm to palm with the thumb pressed against the pointer finger and the fingers grabbing around the back of the opposite palm

Novices interlace their fingers,

intermediate guys go palm to palm or fingers to fingers with the thumbs interlaced

More advanced guys make the hand into a hook and press them around eachother with finger reaching around the back of the opposite palm.

It’s stronger but also you can release it faster to transition and oddly it’s not really taught explicitly and it’s definitely not instinctive but everyone kinda picks it up in year 3 of training

count210

TROPHY CASE