NationStates Jolt Archive

Hi

I did some maths the other day and wanted to know what other people thought!

150,000 US soldiers

divided by

9,000 polling booths throughout Iraq

equals

16.666666667 soldiers guarding each booth.

In this situation, I personally would be sh*t-scared. Especially as air cover at polling booths probly won't happen.

Does anyone know how this is going to work? :confused:

Cheers

Actually US presence is scheduled to be increased to 150k, there isn't that many there now. And subtracting support personel, your figures are way high. Iraqi forces will actually provide most on scene presence.

true.

can anyone update the numbers for

- (add) trained iraqi forces

- (subtract) US support personnel

?

I think the usual estimate is that the US Army has a 1:4 "tooth to tail" ratio of guys-with-guns to cooks/chaplains/mechanics/etc.

the iraqi army?

many of them are deserting with more going over to the insurgents side.

face it no one except the govt held in power by the US wants the US in Iraq.

I wouldn't be surprised if the army decided to do their duty for the american government and offered (out of the kindness of their hearts) to actually do the voting for the Iraqi people, it would save a lot of time and effort, and the US would get the result they want.
Sorry, I'm in a bad mood, i have nothing against the US troops, just the government that sent them there.

the iraqi army?

many of them are deserting with more going over to the insurgents side.

face it no one except the govt held in power by the US wants the US in Iraq.
Where are you getting this? Deserting yes, because they can't defend themselves since they can't carry their guns home from work.

thanks...

so just for the record

150,000 US troops, 1 in 5 is combat, = 30,000

Iraqi army is according to GWB @ 125,000 trained by the end of the year.

still 9,000 polling booths

equals 3 full-sized soldiers + 1 midget for each booth, plus a dozen ING.

Much of the country is peaceful. It's mainly the few large cities in the Sunni Triangle (Basra, Mosul, Fallujah, Baghdad) that have all the troublemakers. Kurdish Northern Iraq has few problems, as does the southern portion of Iraq. That will allow the US to concentrate more soldiers where they're needed.
Plus a half-dozen US soldiers are worth twenty insurgents combat-wise.

Much of the country is peaceful. It's mainly the few large cities in the Sunni Triangle (Basra, Mosul, Fallujah, Baghdad) that have all the troublemakers. Kurdish Northern Iraq has few problems, as does the southern portion of Iraq. That will allow the US to concentrate more soldiers where they're needed.
Plus a half-dozen US soldiers are worth twenty insurgents combat-wise.
However, if we do that then the insurgents know where we won't check and stop the voting there.