'Course, since the Iraqis are fighting on home turf, it IS possible that they're relying more on land-lines.

The question is the extent to which the Chinese-supplied fiber-optic lines have been cut by the bombing (or SF guys).

Relaying from Dan (who's gone to pick up Chinese take-out): Their orders have been issued for weeks, probably months. Any soldiers not in the Republican Guard are nothing more than cannon fodder and need no further orders.

I hate to bring a down note, as well, but they might also be relying on HUMAN chatter--guys in trucks conveying messages on paper. Low tech, I know, but it's a possibility.

Trucks -- or anything else moving on the road -- will get bombed. Runners might get through, but they can't move faster than 3rd Infantry Division.

Hmm... good point. What about carrier pigeons? ;)

>>

In country with an excess of firearms and a shortage of food?....

::PULL::

Ahh dinner.

About communications........

You might want to think about the Brits at Arnhem. Their radios wouldn't work at the below sealevel altitude, and were effectivy cut of at both the unit (on the ground) and command level. Best I can come up with for now.

I remember reading somewhere that those fiber-optic lines were very hard to cut and keep cut in 1991.

You might have noticed that one of the leaflets recently dropped on Iraq specifically told people not to repair them. They're evidently considered important.

Hi.

For communications just being shut down, this is at the bad end of the spectrum. But for communications domination, it's not even close to the worst ever.

In my opinion, the all-time booby prize goes to the Russians in World War I. They had a code, but didn't trust everyone to be able to decode it. Nervous about this, they transmitted an early order >in code and in clear

With code and clear to compare, the Germans immediately broke the Russian code. Since the Russians were indeed shaky on their staff work, the efficient Germans then got all the Russians orders decoded and translated as fast as >or faster than

To make things better, two Russian armies were out of communication, because their commanders (Rennenkampf and Samsonov) hated each other and would not talk to each other. The Germans concentrated their forces to catch and crush one isolated Russian army, then the other, while the Russians wandered about in mutual ignorance, on opposite sides of the Masurian Lakes.

I'm not a big fan of Communism in general, but I am a big fan of the ability the Red Army showed in its heyday to evolve and learn from experience. What the Reds did was justifiable, at least as opposed to continuing to do what the Tsarists had done. Paranoid security was better than what had gone before. Murderous discipline and Zhukov's routine orders to his commanders to do exactly what you're told to do, when you're told to do it, with no independent thought >or you'll lose your head, "comrade"

Never let the American tell you they've achieved "unprecedented" information dominance. Credit where credit's due, they are great. But I think it would be hard for them to beat that example. Normally soldiers who are being spied on at least get their orders while the enemy also reads them, and not some time later. And the fate of Rennenkampf's men, standing idle and clueless while the Germans calmly finished "harvesting" Samsonov's army (in Hindenburg's expression) and reformed to kill them as well was truly pathetic. The Iraqis will know much more than that from watching CNN.