Probably not, Ron- in my view, the world in general would not have had the stomach for it.
I know I'm gona ramble a bit here, but...
Not considering the POWs the Iraqis apparently have murdered, our (US) total KIAs are as of the latest I heard today, about a dozen. Amazing, considering the scope of the action over there.
The US Army's 3rd Inf Div (MECH) today encountered a bunch of the Medina Division of the Republican Guard about 60 miles southwest of Baghdad. We apparently had NO casualties, and reportedly inflicted 300-500 (mixed WIA and KIA).
An Allied report tonight estimates 25,000 Iraqi military dead so far, in just a week, and "collateral damage" estimates are varied, depending on whom one believes (they say thousands, we say more like possibly a few hundred)...Hitler's Blitzkrieg wasn't NEAR this fast.
A comparison on the news today alluded to WWII
American dead at about 240,000, if I remember right, 30-some-odd thousand in Korea, and about 41,000 combat deaths in Vietnam.
The true emergence of the "television war" has really come to us, when we can hear via cell- or satellite- phone.... the shrieks of reporters under fire, LIVE, and see Ollie North get into MOPP 4 NOW, (full NBC suit, gloves, boots, mask and hood) because of the chem/bio threat.
I remember reading that some 20 million died in the old Russia during WWII, and all-totalled, probably 40 to 50 million died around the world...
including Hitler's "Final Solution" with European
Jews (my guess at that total figure). Also, Lenin and Stalin killed millions of their own.
War blows Big Time...but not as much as tyranny and genocide.
No, I don't think the populace ANYWHERE could have handled the information overload in those days.
It's mind-boggling even today, but then, I boggle easily.
Lump
p.s.- that Apache Longbow outside Karbala yesterday was supposedly shot down by a FARMER WITH A SHOTGUN, according to Iraqi propaganda.
I read a report today that stated that 40 Apaches were in on that action, and ALL returned to base full of holes from small arms.