So much for "fight". Though Mr. Panetta didn't say so, this strategy implies another big U.S. troop reduction in 2013, beyond the pullout of about one-third of troops already planned for this year.
On 15 April 1992, the multi-ethnic Army of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (ARBiH) was formed, with slightly over two-thirds of troops consisting of Bosniaks and almost one-third of Croats and Serbs.
In 2013, more than a third (37percentt) of troops were LDS sponsored, accounting for 18percentt of the BSA's 2.4 million total membership (Mormon troops, while more numerous, tend to be smaller in size).
At the other end, for a typical long-run fight where you have to rotate troops in and out of the theater of war, only about a third of the troops will be fighting at any one time.
About a third of American troops will move, consolidating all American forces at 23 facilities.
Contra commanders said about a third of their troops, which numbered more than 22,000, received land.
After dusk, rain still falling, with a third of his troops dead or wounded, Washington sought terms for their surrender.
It need not be huge no fewer than 12,000, informed generals reckon, but no more than 20,000, with NATO allies providing about a third of the troops.
And defections and low re-enlistment rates are also troubling — the government has to replace about a third of its troops every year.
Wellington too had to rally supporters from all over Europe to stop Napoleon: at Waterloo, only about a third of the troops under his command were actually British.
Our generals and foot soldiers know who is supplying the "explosively formed penetrators" that are killing almost a third of our troops in Iraq.
