[Siddhi]

narwan:

- good point on the technolgical equipment of the dutch, as to pointing out my reversing the belgium and dutch army traints. are you sure the dutch had leo-2s as well as massed heavy IFVs in BEFORE 1985? also, again without notes in front of me, I don`t think ANY of the category A MRR regiments deployed on the IGB at that time had more then a single BN of BTRs,if that, and the BMP is a great piece of equipment, if only for it's low profile and manuverability.

- the abilty of VII Corps (? i forget) to deploy to NORTHAG in time is seriously questionable. IIRC it would take 10 days for REFORGER to completete the first phase, the NATO Rapid Reinforcement Plan would take 30 days at least. The ability of the soviets in particular to get their units up to war strength much quicker is a very complicated debate, but in my view, true. The biggest mistake in my view is your appraisal of the political component - the ability of NATO to actually mobilise in time is by no means certain, it requires substantial political will and in RL would also require bruxelles to agree IN TOTAL for it to go ahead. In terms of "pre-emptive strikes", i think you can forget it - there is no way that such on order would be sanctioned by NATO unless there had been tensions for a long time (over a month) and enough time for political consensus to be built.

- on fortifications and obstacles. i have to admit this is actually one my old duties, and something i know a bit about. it short: it's all a bit different, people have spent over 50 years working on the problem, there is quite a lot of give and take - effectivly it comes down to terrain however. obstacles in the hills/mountains is one thing, the north german plain is another.

- as to germans willing to nuke on their border: sorry, completly, irrefutably, wrong. Not even Kohl would have agreed to it, according to him, and he was by far the most aggressive.