The Northern Alliance commanders, relying on what they say are their agents inside the city, estimate the number of Taliban troops at about 20,000, with as many as a third of those from foreign countries.
The hardening Shiite feeling in Baghdad opens an opportunity for the American military, which has long struggled against the Mahdi Army, as American commanders rely increasingly on tribes and local leaders in their prosecution of the war.
Air commanders will rely on a small but essential fleet of surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft, including the radar-jamming EC-130H Compass Call and electronic-eavesdropping RC-135 Rivet Joint.
Some Afghan army units are capable of standing up on their own, but the vast majority are not.Already, there are signs that Afghan commanders, who rely on the greater firepower of NATO's forces and who lack the training to call in close air support, are becoming more reluctant to engage with the enemy.
Virtually all of the modern military allies of United States — Britain, Canada, and others — have removed the prosecution of military crimes from commanders, relying instead on military prosecutors.
A phalanx whose ranks were thrown into disorder and penetrated by the enemy's infantrymen was usually lost; a legionary commander could rely on his soldiers' swords to deal with intruders, meanwhile bringing up additional units from both flanks.
The demagogue tribune or consul could use the legal machinery of the popular assembly (hence such men are called populares), while the commander could rely on his army in the pursuit of private ambition.
In Iraq, American commanders relied almost exclusively on tribal leaders to put Sunni gunmen at their disposal.
Errant American fire has taken an unacceptably high toll, especially from the airstrikes that American commanders came to rely on because they lacked sufficient ground troops.
So commanders must also rely on scores of Army helicopters, from Black Hawks to the giant, twin-rotor Chinooks, and a fleet of Air Force cargo planes to ferry ammunition, equipment and personnel on hundreds of flights a day across Iraq.
