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[Lee Haslup <biglee AT haslups.com>]

Curse you, David, for your post!!  It has cost me hours and hours of 
time that I could have spent painting my garage door.  

My problem, of course, is your table which was interesting but 
tantalizingly incomplete, or at least, made a point in which I wasn't 
that interested.  Since you started with a list of the 100 largest armed 
forces in the world, your list has lots of zeros.   I suppose that is 
your point -- that we are getting no help from China or Russia or  India 
or Pakistan, etc. etc., but the thing is, I don't care.  Most of those 
countries oppose any action by the US out of reflex.  That the US 
proposes something is reason enough for them to oppose it -- any other 
rationale they might offer is after-the-fact and secondary. 

It was, I'll admit, a bit of a disappointment about Germany and Turkey-- 
but not really a surprise.  One could image the Russians joining in if 
Saddam hadn't owed them a ton of money and they weren't so strapped for 
cash.  But for the rest of your zeros -- a coalition including all of 
them would starve before they could agree on what to have for lunch. 

What is more interesting is to look at who IS in the coalition and what 
level of commitment they have made.  I spent a silly amount of time 
tracking down some more-or-less reliable numbers (from nationmaster.com, 
www.globalsecurity.org and the CIA world fact book.)  and I came up with 
the following:

Country     Armed Forces  In Iraq   As %    Per 100k (pop)
----------  ------------  -------   ----    --------------
US               1366000   170000   12.4                58
UK                212000    12000    5.7                20
Netherlands        52000     1400    2.7                 9
Latvia              5000      122    2.5                 5
Denmark            22000      496    2.3                 9
Tonga               2000*      45    2.3*               41
El Salvador        17000      380    2.2                 6
Mongolia            9000      180    2.0                 6
Australia          51000      600    1.2                 3
Poland            217000     2400    1.1                 6
Estonia             5000       55    1.1                 4
Italy             251000     2700    1.1                 5
Lithuania          13000      105    0.81                3
Hungary            44000      300    0.69                3
Bulgaria           80000      485    0.61                6
Georgia            27000      159    0.59                3
Macedonia           5000*      28    0.56*               1
Ukraine           304000     1576    0.52                3
Korea             683000     2800    0.41                6
Romania           207000      700    0.34                3
Japan             237000      750    0.32                1
Portugal           45000      128    0.28                1
Slovakia           39000      105    0.27                2
Azerbaijan         72000      151    0.21                2
Czech Republic     58000      110    0.19                1
Thailand          301000      451    0.15                1
Albania            54000       70    0.13                2
Singapore          60000       33    0.055               1
Kazakhstan         64000       29    0.045              .2
Norway             27000       10    0.037              .2
Moldova            44000**     12    0.027**            .3

* Armed Forces data not available -- I guessed a number.
** Based on 1 year service reqt. and number
  of males coming of age each year.

This shows the current coalition, as well as I figure it.  Some of the 
countries listed plan to pull their troops (mostly because they are 
coming up on the end of their commitment periods) but others have 
announced plans to send more so the overall troop levels is 
approximately a wash.

The forth column shows the percentage of the armed forces of the country 
that is committed to the coalition and the fifth shows the number of 
troops in Iraq or the theater for every 100000 population of the 
country.   The list is ordered by the percentage of the armed forces 
committed but the troops by population column is interesting, too.  It 
is that column that puts lie once and for all to the claim that the US 
is going it alone.  The Tonganese are right in there with us, not to 
mention the Brits, the Dutch and the Danes.

In a parallel posting Jim Allman mentioned that there were no Islamic 
states in the list.  Azerbaijan qualifies, actually, although they are 
pretty far down in the ranking. 

BigLee

David Minton wrote:

> On 10/2/04 10:04 AM, "Jim Allman" <jim AT ibang.com> wrote:
>
>  
>
> > On Oct 1, 2004, at 5:46 PM, David Minton wrote:
> >    
> >
> > > From these numbers, looks like the US is doing it alone, despite Bush's
> > > claims to the contrary.
> > >      
> > Still, it's very un-cool to dismiss their help. I'll wager that a small
> > country with 100 people in Iraq is watching the situation (and our
> > reactions to it) closely.
> >
> > Just showing up is an act of courage (physical and political), and I
> > hope Kerry can provide the "coalition reality-check" without dissing
> > them.
> >    
>
> That is an interesting point. I made a table to put things in perspective,
> based on the size of the standing military for each nation from this site:
>
>  http://www.nationmaster.com
>
>     Nation       Total Troops  in Iraq  Coalition Rank
> -------------------------------------------------------
>  1  China         2,810,000        0
>  2  Russia        1,520,000        0
>  3  United States 1,366,000  170,000         1
>  4  India         1,303,000        0
>  5  Korea, South    683,000    2,800         3
>  6  Pakistan        612,000        0
>  7  Turkey          610,000        0
>  8  Iran            513,000        0
>  9  Vietnam         484,000        0
> 10  Egypt           448,000        0
> 11  Ethiopia        352,000        0
> 12  Burma           344,000        0
> 13  Syria           316,000        0
> 14  Ukraine         304,000    1,576         6
> 15  Thailand        301,000      451        11
> 16  Indonesia       297,000        0
> 17  France          294,000        0
> 18  Brazil          288,000        0
> 19  Italy           251,000    2,700         4
> 20  Japan           237,000      750         7
> 21  Germany         221,000        0
> 22  Poland          217,000    2,400         5
> 23  United Kingdom  212,000   12,000         2
> 24  Romania         207,000      700         8
> 25  Saudi Arabia    202,000        0
> ...
> 45  Bulgaria         80,000      485        10
> 92  Denmark          22,000      496         9
>
> After looking at these numbers, someone please convince me that Bush
> assembled a true coalition. Looks more like the US, with help from UK. All
> of the other contributions are merely window dressing.
>
> Notice the major players not part of the coalition? Notice the percentage of
> troops a number of the coalition members sent?
>
> Or, compare the troops in the Iraqi Theater of Operations:
>
>    United States:        170,000 (approx)
>
>
>    United Kingdom:        12,000 (approx)
>    Remaining 36 members:  16,630 (approx)
>                           ------
>                           28,630
>
>    Size of NYPD           39,110
> <http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/misc/pdfaq2.html#41>
>
> Bush could not get all of the nations of the world to contribute more troops
> to keep the peace in Iraq than the size of the New York City Police
> Department.
>
> David
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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