ANTHOLOGY AND ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY                                     67

   Q.   As tough as it was, was it less severe than you expected? I mean, were
you expecting even worse, in other words?
   A:   It was less severe than we expected, but one of the things I attribute that
to is the fact that we went to extensive measures to try and make it less severe,
okay, and we really did. I didn't mean to be facetious with my answer, I just
got to tell you that is a very tough mission for any person to do, particularly in
a minefield.

   Q.   General, is the Republican Guard your only remaining military objective
in Iraq? And I gather there have been some heavy engagements. How would you
rate this army you face--from the Republican Guard on down?
   A:   Rating an army is a tough thing to do. A great deal of the capability of
an army is its dedication to its cause and its will to fight. You can have the best
equipment in the world, you can have the largest numbers in the world, but if
you're not dedicated to your cause, if you don't have the will to fight, then
you're not going to have a very good army.   One of the things we learned right
prior to the initiation of the campaign, that of course contributed, as a matter of
fact, to the timing of the ground campaign, is that so many people were
deserting and I think you've heard this, that the iraqis brought down execution
squads whose job was to shoot people in the front lines.
   I've got to tell you, a soldier doesn't fight very hard for a leader who is
going to shoot him on his own whim.   That's not what military leadership is all
about.  So I attribute a great deal of the failure of the iraqi army to fight, to
their own leadership. They committed them to a cause that they did not believe
in. They all are saying they didn't want to be there, they didn't want to fight
their fellow Arabs, they were lied to, they were deceived when they went into
Kuwait, they didn't believe in the cause, and then after they got there, to have
a leadership that was so uncaring for them that they didn't properly feed them,
they didn't properly give them water, and in the end, they kept them there only
at the point of a gun.
   So I can't--now, the Republican Guard is entirely different. The Republican
Guard are the ones that went into Kuwait in the first place., They get paid more,
they got treated better, and oh by the way, they also were well to the rear so
they could be the first ones to bug out when the battlefield started folding, while
these poor fellows up here who didn't want to be here in the first place, bore
the brunt of the attack. But it didn't happen.

   Q.   General, could you tell us something about the British involvement, and
perhaps comment on today's report of 10 dead through friendly fire?
   A:   The British, I've got to tell you, have been absolutely superb members
of this coalition from the outset. I have a great deal of admiration and respect
for all the British that are out there, and particularly General Sir Peter de la
Billiere who is not only a great general, but he's also become a very close
personal friend of mine.   They played a very, very key role in the movement
of the main attack. I would tell you that what they had to do was go through this
breach in one of the tougher areas, because I told you they had reinforced here,