Hot answers tagged middle-east
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As Wladimir noted, the precise "vs" analysis is impossible since it depends heavily on what kind of armor, weapons, tactics, training and commanders both infantry and cavalry have, as well as economics of society (which heavily influences these things for the cavalry which is a lot more expensive to equip/train, especially heavy cavalry).
Also, it's ...
21
If you look only at the numbers, then Israel was bound to lose the war of course. The Arab countries had far more soldiers and they also had better/more equipment (the Soviet Union supplied them well). This view leaves out a number of important factors however:
Surprise: By launching a preemptive attack Israel took the Arab countries by surprise which ...
21
The Egyptians, along with Syria and Jordan, had worked up a plan to attack Israel a couple of weeks prior to the actual war. Apparently some recently declassified documents confirm that the Egyptians had planned to launch bombers against Israel to take out their airfields and other strategic military positions. They had also deployed a number of tank units ...
15
In 1948, the Arabs attacked first. A few hours after Israel became an independent country, most of the Arab countries of the region invaded.
But that's just the 1948 answer.
Local Arab and Jewish militia forces had been clashing for years. A few months earlier (in 1947) bombings and shootings had increased to the level of a civil war. Jews were being ...
14
During the last one hundred fifty years or so, the concept of Zionism, the desire of the Jews to run their own state in their historical biblical territory, become prevalent. Theoretically such a state would be free from the periodic persecutions Jews have suffered since the diaspora while living in other people's countries. This resulted in a large number ...
12
The most important thing for an outsider to understand is that Syria, while ethnically nearly 90% arab, is made up of a rather large amount of religous minorities. Like most middle-east states, its borders were set up by Europeans during the colonial era, and really paid no heed to any actual cultural boundries.
Only about half the population is Suni ...
11
This seemed to have come from Persia's freedom from the Qajars and some nationalism on the part of Germany during WWII influencing the Shah's decisions. So it was originally changed in 1935 and not 1979, unless you are only referring to the Islamic Republic addition, which was done at the Ayatollah's will, more than likely. The name of the country in ...
11
Jews had traditionally been a wide-ranging people. They had centers in Europe, Asia Minor, and even India. (When Thomas went to India in 52 AD, for example, he did so in part because there was already a thriving Jewish community.)
Starting in the 50s and 60s AD, many Jews were already being run out of the Israel (think Masada and all that). In 125 AD, ...
9
There are no magic recipes to win a war. Caesar's tactic was new and surprising, it demoralized the attackers who were certain of their superiority. But this only works once - once that tactic was known it was no longer effective. Note that this wasn't the only reason that Pompey got defeated, it is probably even more important that Pompey's behavior was ...
8
I'd say controlling oil possibly played some role in the desire to go to war, but it was neither the sole reason or necessarily the impetus to start the war. My analysis of why neoconservative leaders such as Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz were determined to war with Iraq was based on several factors. First, Iraq's location serves as a perfect buffer ...
8
This is an interesting question.
With the benefit of hindsight, "Russia" wasn't in a position to help Saddam Hussein in 1990-91 because the Soviet was about to implode.
The reason it probably didn't help Hussein in 2003 was that they didn't believe that President George Bush Jr. would invade Iraq; his father, Bush Sr., had declined to march on Baghdad ...
8
It was quite likely due to European scholars referring Arabic texts. These texts often drew inspiration from Eastern (esp. Indian and Chinese) works. However, the Arabic authors (for some reasons I am not aware of) did not properly attribute the works and therefore, European mathematicians may have thought of zero's origins as being Arabic.
But, of course, ...
8
The Serapeum is actually a smaller "branch" of the original library, formally part of the Temple of Serapis. The temple was converted to a Christian church by Theophilus around 390 AD, and it appears this is the reference you have noted above. This "branch" was not actually destroyed, but there is no doubt that many documents were destroyed during the ...
8
There is a notion that superpowers have, well, super powers, and can bend history to their will. There is never a shortage of conspiracy theories involving foreign agents. The reality of course is that even great powers are constrained, and the idea that Carter's appearance in Iran sparked a revolution is at the very least too Carlylian for my taste.
If ...
8
Here's my proposition, basically it's just a set of Caucasus characteristics making this region especially interesting. By which we mean: there're numerous languages, 3 distinct language families, characteristic just for this region.
My first point is, language diversity / fragmentation is normal for regions without a strong state / commerce / any unifying ...
7
The infantry-cavalry balance has changed a lot over time. And back and forth.
In primitive warfare, the addition of a large animal gave the advantage to the cavalry. This changed during the times of the Greeks and Romans, who invented the phalanx and legion INFANTRY formations that had no cavalry counterparts.
By "stabilizing" riders in horses, the ...
7
The question as it was posed is not entirely accurate. The Sephardic Jews are, rightly, the most famous Jewish community of the Ottoman Empire. However, in Istanbul, you could find synagogues and associations belonging to Ashknazi immigrants from Europe. These were all pre-Zionist immigrants from, if memory serves, Russia. In fact, there was a power struggle ...
7
Russia was the ally of the socialist Baath party in Iraq, of which Saddam was a member. However, the Iran-Iraq war changed this allegiance. Since during the cold-war there were really only two poles (in military, economic, and ideological power), most countries allied with one or the other. This ultimately became a binary decision, as allying with one ...
7
The Khazar's have no known descendents.
Their language is dead, with no successor languages. It is currently considered to have been Turkic, of the Oghur branch. The only remaining living language of that branch is Chuvash in Central Russia, but those would at best be descendents of sort of cousins of the Khazars (the Bulgars).
There have been lots of ...
7
According to "Logistics of Warfare in the Crusades", Ibn Battuta noted the use of personal water-skins in the ninth century:
People had the organizational skills and means to equip armies for crossing deserts and some glimpses of how this was done can be gleaned from Ibn Battuta, probably the only author to pay attention to such problems. Although he ...
6
Not to dismiss political philosophy, but pragmatism drives most behaviors in goverment-
Russia's only warm-water port (also the only one in the Mediterranean) is in Syria. It just got re-built.
Russia sells about $5 Billion worth of arms to Syria every year.
Syria willingly obliges Russia's pressure to confront Israel when called to do so.
"Helping Saddam" ...
6
While other posters have addressed the issue in regards to the wider region, none have addressed the issue in regards to the Syrian citizens. They have mentioned the different Syrian religions so I won't go back over that.
The current Syrian ruling family (I am referring to the Assads, not the Baath) is known to be a brutal torturer. Early in the uprising ...
5
"Wasn't Saddam an ally of Russia?"
Not really. The Baath party did the standard anti-communist purge expected of most military dictators when they came to power. They originally got soviet military kit in the 50s/60s but that was probably because the USSR handed it out like candy to anyone who promised not to join the world series.
"If Russia ...
5
The dynamics of the Cold War were such that every country outside of the Superpowers were strongly encouraged to take sides. If you were geographically close to one of them, you often didn't have a lot of choice who that was.
However, this opened oppertunity for the less ideologically rigid (and less scrupulous) to work both sides off each other to obtain ...
5
I'm adding some stuff I know about that I didn't see in the other answers.
IMHO, the best benifit is free medical care for life in the V.A. system. Most Americans either have to have a full-time (40+hour a week) job with a large company, or be really old or destitute to get paid medical coverage. Everybody else has to buy insurance themselves (and fully 1/4 ...
5
Okay, there is a very real possibility this question will be closed, because it really doesn't fit our guidelines. I may try to edit it later to make it fit in better, but in the meantime, I wanted to provide my own response. Primarily, I believe most people in the US join the military out of a sense of patriotism more than anything else. There are some who ...
5
I could imagine, it is a kind of spiritual home. Jews immigrated from Muslim countries to Muslim countries (ok, Spain was Christian when the Jews were banished, but it was a new thing, and the Jews remembered on the better days under Muslim authority.)
When Jews were evicted from Central/Eastern Europe they looked for similar societies to settle. They had ...
5
In Battle of Zama Hannibal had the army of greenhorns. Veterans were dead already. It needs a great amount of previous experience to stand against a horse that is galloping against you and even to throw something at the rider. BTW, in that battle, cavalry acted rather as a lock, as in Cannes on the Carthago side.
It would be difficult to throw a Macedonian ...
5
prohibition of polygamy most certainly doesn't correlate with democracy.
Polygamy was prohibited in the entire Christendom throughout Dark Ages and absolute monarchies - not exactly the best circumstances for Democracy. Same with USSR and Nazi Germany.
On the other side of the matter, modern western democracies and USA are fairly obviously evolving into ...
5
Well, written language was, at the time, an economic tool primarily. It was used to record business, political and liturgical transactions, and to cary on a conversation at a distance through correspondance. The things we use it for, instructive texts (such as language instruction courses) and recreational reading, developed much, much later.
But! There ...
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