We should demand guesstimates, even over a wide range of 'active threats', right? This will prevent under-promising and over-delivering. A fair calibration is required.
The degree of militarization of Arab countries and even of Turkey is high. Iraq can probably get by with a lot less than where it has been:
During the late 1970s and the mid-1980s, the Iraqi armed forces underwent many changes in size, structure, arms supplies, hierarchy, deployment, and political character. Between 1980 and the summer of 1990 Saddam boosted the number of troops in the Iraqi military from 180,000 to 900,000, creating the fourth-largest army in the world. With mobilization, Iraq could have raised this to 2 million men under arms--fully 75% of all Iraqi men between ages 18 and 34. The number of tanks in the Iraqi military rose from 2,700 to 5,700 and artillery pieces went from 2,300 to 3,700.
The regular Army in mid-1990 consisted of more than 50 divisions, additional special forces brigades, and specialized forces commands composed of maneuver and artillery units. Although most divisions were infantry, the Army had several armored and mechanized divisions. Some armored units had a small amount of modern Western and Soviet equipment, but most of the Army had 1960s-vintage Soviet and Chinese equipment. Training and equipment readiness of Army units varied greatly, ranging from good in the divisions that existed before the Iran-Iraq war, to poor in the largely conscript infantry formations.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/army.htm
The regular Army in mid-1990 consisted of more than 50 divisions, additional special forces brigades, and specialized forces commands composed of maneuver and artillery units. Although most divisions were infantry, the Army had several armored and mechanized divisions. Some armored units had a small amount of modern Western and Soviet equipment, but most of the Army had 1960s-vintage Soviet and Chinese equipment. Training and equipment readiness of Army units varied greatly, ranging from good in the divisions that existed before the Iran-Iraq war, to poor in the largely conscript infantry formations.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/iraq/army.htm
