Re: Nobility.... or not....

JohnA said:
> Only if you can kick the enemy's ass on the field of
> battle--if you can't, then hearts and minds become
> irrelevant.

The point of smacking people on the battlefield is to win hearts and
minds--if not to generate enthusiasm, at least to motivate them to
quit fighting..

>  The SAS got smacked around by Iraqi
> 3rd-line troops because of this attitude.  They
> discovered that being SAS does NOT make them
> bulletproof and that numbers do tell.

If you're thinking of Andy McNab and his lads, as I recall is was 8
SAS for 250 Iraqis.  Although, given the comparative expense of
training, supplies, etc, it may be that the Iraqis won that one....