Looks like I need to clarify my previous post...:xp:
A "base", the way the US military uses it for a permanent, staffed facility, typically has at least a brigade (1500-4000 troops) and associated support staff.
In post #60 you defined "base" differently...in your opinion, which definition do you believe to be more accurate? I'd be more willing to go with the definition in post #60 although admittedly it is wikipedia so it may not be 100% accurate. If you could provide a source for the alternate definition it would be appreciated. :)
If you look at the list of forts and bases that the various armed services have, they are all quite a bit bigger than the smaller facilities you listed above.
The list was actually taken from the source that was used in post #60. If you can offer an alternate definition I'd be more willing to go with that (distaste for wiki again, although it has been used a bit and may not be a bad launching point for finding information). Based on this comment I'm assuming you’re not 100% sold on the source previously used...?
In addition to the quote below...all the quotes stated above are related to this as well, but I didn't want to fill my post with duplicate quotes.
The use of the term 'base' or 'fort' in the US Military is more specific than the way the article writer appears to be using it.
An interesting read... (
http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/20050527_2005BSR.pdf)directly) from the DOD. This document is from September 30 2004, however, I'm only noting the terminology used in relation to the installation size. Also, this is a fair sized (1.8 Megs) document to open in a browser so please be aware (not sure anyone is on dial-up anymore but just in case :) ).
Bases:
Thule Air Base - 138 active military were assigned, 2 civilians, 0 "others"
Florennes Air Base - 7 active military were assigned, 0 civilians, 0 "others"
Karup Air Base - 4 active military were assigned, 0 civilians, 0 "others"
Forts: (only U.S. ones found in the document)
Fort Lesley J McNair - 913 active military were assigned, 580 civilians, 191 "others"
Fort Juan Muna (Guam) - 273 active military were assigned, 0 civilians, 0 "others"
Barracks:
Campbell Barracks - 1,304 active military were assigned, 462 civilians, 236 "others"
Barton Barracks - 126 active military were assigned, 130 civilians, 117 "others"
Garrisons:
US Army Garrison Selfridge - 154 active military were assigned, 65 civilians, 373 "others"
Given the sizes of the installations/bases/forts we could easily have another 50 bases in Iraq without a large ground presence. In fact with these numbers we would only need 200 active military personnel to run 50 air bases (Although completely unlikely)...or 18,650 personnel to have 50 Barracks...my guess is that we would be somewhere in the middle, maybe leaning towards 18,000.
Now, there are bases, forts, barracks, and garrisons with significantly more people attached to them, however, it would seem the number of people associated with them has no impact on how the installation is named, so the reporter referring to 50 bases in Iraq could actually be very accurate.
Interesting to note...we have approximately 38 medium to large foreign installations. A medium to large installation is defined using the installations Plant Replacement Value (PRV) "which is the cost to replace these facilities using today’s construction costs" (DOD - 3, Page 4 (in adobe) - Portfolio Summary)...Kind of harsh in a way, but maybe we are looking at the wrong information in regards to how they really define a base/fort/installation/etc. Like they say...It's all about the benjamins.