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Author: AgProv

Oct 17th 2012 at 12:18:20 PM

General Rommel in WW2, who frequently got up front to see what was going on and was nearly captured on three different occassions: on the last time he tried to reach a war front, an Allied aircraft strafed and trashed his car, seriously wounding him. In more recent years: the Western  intervention in Yugoslavia in the early 1990's saw a race between NATO and Russian troops to control a strategic airbase. The Russians got there within  minutes of the British, who were ordered by the American general officer commanding to capture the airbase, whatever it took. Fortunately the British officer leading from the front was General Jackson, a man with the clout to take the radio, point out to the Yank that odd numbered world wars tend to begin in  Yugoslavia, the next world war would be number three, an odd number, and he wasn't going to go down in history as the man who started World War Three for ''anybody''. It is possible a lower-ranking officer might have been intimidated into doing something stupid.