And it would be a mistake to think the regular UK forces are not trained and adept to close quarters fighting. As a fairly recent example 'Scots Guards' in the battle for Mount tumbledown in the Falklands, once reaching the top troops were nearly out of ammo so resorted to using bayonets/shovels to finish the job....
So to consider certain forces superior in their barbarism is an obscene generalisation. 'You either have it in you, or you don't' those that do rarely play at bravado.
[we are so far of topic]
Paul
Actually let's also not forget the USMC training, Rangers training and Seals and other special forces training, etc. By no means do I wish to skip them either.
In Israel's case there has been a traditional hand to hand approach the Palmach (Haganah) came up with if for no reason back in 1949 they just did not have many guns or weapons.
Actually the Israeli military for your curiousity does take seriously the military training at Sandhurst and borrows from it with certain protocol and traditions although some would say Sandhurst got them from the ancient Hebrews. Lol who knows.
Israelis in the military have been known to say other warriors in history they arr impressed with are the Scotts and Girkhas but the reality is when Israelis have been used at NATO echanges, their training of regular soldiers in anti-terrorist techniques was embraced by Ukrainians and Macedonians not Americans. The Americans, British and French as you know would never ask for training for their regular soldiers. The special forces of these armed forces of course compare tactics and techniques but with the regular units , lol, no, too much pride with certain armies.
I think if we were to look at the special training of SAS, SEALS, or Russian or Israeli special elite commando units or Canada's or West Germany's, they would be similiar enough. They all have unique tactics and approaches but they all pretty much have to learn the same things and hand to hand is at the basic core of it. If you can't master the martial arts, the rest is a waste of time.
I think the one major weakness of the U.S. military and their own brass openly admit it, is because they have always had the best weapons they have become too reliant on them and let them take away from the basic skills and rely too much on them to make up for lack of basic skills.
I know my friends who came back from Vietnam said the M-1 would melt on them and many of them preferred taking Kalitnikovs off of the Viet Cong and using them. I also know Israelis who preferred Kalitnikovs to the Uzi.
Sometimes simplicity in design is a virtue I suppose. You listen to pilots and they rave about the F-14 Tomahawk but don't rave and tant about the F-16 or F-18 the same way. You tell me why. Some again say, the more advanced the jets would become the less virtue they had for the pilot.
The Israelis I know loved the Sky Hawk and F-14 and are so so on the F 16. Go figure.
Listening to a good friend of mine who came back from Iraq, and did street patrols, it was interesting to hear despite some very good cutting edge equipment it all came down to his gut to keep him alive when walking the street-that deep gut feeling of knowing when and where to walk and keep the head down. He did have confidence in his equipment which helped his morale but only to a limited extent-then he knew it was all up to him.
I know Israeli pilots who told me when they built the Kfir fighter jet they loaded it with state of the art computer systems but the pilots disconnected many of the programs saying in a dog fight they had to rely on themselves not the computers to make the difference in split second manouvering and decisions.
Lets also not kid ourselves. the US and Israel have worked heavily on developing new urban warfare techniques. Since the war with Hamas, the IDF completely revised its approach and relies on armoured vehicles far larger and differently constructed than what is being used in Iraq and Afghanistan or was used in the former Yugoslavia.
They have had supposedly more success in containing Hamas.
The bottom line though is, civilians in Gaza will die. The confined quarters and proximity to Hamas is such they will be in the line of fire even when Hamas is not intentionally using them as shields.
Being in a certain place at the wrong time gets you killed in Gaza. Simply being in your apartment or walking a street or in an open space walking might kill you. Its cold, its arbitrary, its unfair, it incites anger and hatred and a never ending cycle of hatred between Palestinians and Israelis and I know soldiers that have to live with what they have done and they live with a deep malaise that never lifts.
You know I do not relish civilians dying for any reason. I also deeply resent soldiers forced into the role of urban police officers. They were trained to fight a visible enemy not civilians or an enemy that dresses like civilians.
The longer you put a soldier in a war of attrition with no visible enemy and having to fight shadows, the more likely they will burn out, over react, become emotionally dettached from their actions, etc.
All armed forces are faced with this. Israel faces the exact same phenomena the UK did in Northern Ireland and the US in Vietnam, Iraq, and forces now in Afghanistan or other occupation forces.
I read interesting materials from the Australians which said when they went in to East Timor to stop the Indonesians from massacering them, they had a very tight time line and made sure not to stay on the ground longer than necessary.
As much as the IDF has made mistakes it has physically pulled out of Gaza, Lebanon, and huge chunks of the West Bank as a result of lessons learned. People do not see that part of this mess but things have changed and continue to change. The IDF can not openly discuss its internal changes, disciplinary measures sometimes taken, etc.
Military analysts though do report huge changes happened as a result of the way Olmert handled the Lebanese conflict. Some say the strain between the military and Olmert a first time civilian politician (one with no military background) can never be repeated again.
Its not a coincidence other then Olmert every Israeli leader has been a senior military leader or in Levni's case intellgence. Military tactics and training is a must to be the leader of Israel. That is the cold reality and it was Olmert's greatest weakness. The tactics he used to keep control of Jerusalem as Mayor kept him in power longer then many thought but in the end his lack of understanding of military strategy brought him down and exposed the IDF to a crisis it had never faced before with its elected officials.
In the U.S. the only two Presidents to really go the distance with their military and disagree were Truman and Kennedy. Some say it led to Kennedy's assasination if you buy into those theories. None the less Kennedy was a genuine naval man who survived a pt boat sinking and Truman was trained as a Captain. Very few civilian only politicians survive disagreements with their military over tactical decisions.
Certainly Churchill could never have been what he was without first being in charge of the navy. It trained him to strategize. Eisenhower's ability to lead a large spectrum of swollen egoes was directly attributed to his military training.
The wild card as we speak now though is Syria. Mira thought I was nutz with an earlier thread but I was dead on in saying the instability in Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Yemen, are all fueling Hamas' moves. Hamas feels it must act now to seize an opportunity to take down the Abbas wing of Fatah-Hamas is beginning to fear it may not be able to rely on Syria or Hezbollah soon if wars break out in those countries.
Civil conflict in Syria, Lebanon and Jordan are a fact and how much they will spread no one knows but they do add to Hamas' feeling of urgency and a need to seize the moment with renewed missile and bomb attacks.
