But Poland only has some 128 Leopard MBTs and those were acquired used from Germany. While Russia has over 4,500 T-80 MBTs which are comparable to the Leopards. Poland does indeed have some 994 tanks but most are twenty to thirty years old and are classified as light. While, the Russians claim to have 22,000 tanks, in all liklihood the number is much lower, around 7,000, and most are the most modern equipment the Russians have.

So being outnumbered almost 7 to 1 by a country that can attack Poland from two directions and just recently had no problem invading a much smaller nation is not cause for Sikorski's concern then I must ask what would be a legitimate fear? It also should be noted that Russia/Soviet Union forces have invaded Poland over four times just in the last 100 years so there might be some anxiety on the part of the Poles that can't be solved by maybe a bump of 1.5% in military spending might alleviate.

That's why I used the lower number whiahc are from Russian sources who claim that only the smaller number are actually deployed and operational. And as the Germans discovered during World War II in regards to the Sherman and the T-32 (I could have the wrong designation) numbers overwhelm superior firepower and weight every time.

The Poles are upgrading but are refusing to buy the new Leopards and instead are purchasing the Ukrainian T-84 which is combat capable against any MBT in the world. What is also interesting, but slightly off topic, is that in October the Georgian army replaced some of the equipment lost in the war with the new Ukrainian MBT. They still won't have enough to really forestall the Russians in another war but coupled with their purchases of the Indian Su-30 upgraded model and the tanks might make Russia think twice about using narrow tunnels or mountain roads to attack Georgia.

But I most emphatically agree that the Poles and the other near frontier (I'm having some mental blocks today and can't view more than one tab at a time) countries should think less about helping set up road blocks in Lebanon and Kosova and more to their strategic situation.