the one event that helped the Americans win the revolutionary war
was Benjamin Franklins eventual success in getting the French to send over an army.

regarding the Schwarzkopf quote - its hard to imagine the US losing the 91 gulf war given the firepower, number of troops and total superiority the US and the coalition had. (and yet...

Schwarzkopf claimed that when the Iraqis sat down to negotiate they
outsmarted the US by asking if they could fly helicopters.
(Schwarzkopf felt that since the roads were destroyed that it was ok,
when they then asked if they could fly ARMED helicopters - he decided thats ok too). (which they then used to brutally put down the rebellion
- that George Senior called for - with his comment that the Iraqi people should rise up and topple Saddam)..

one thing that (Damn they Outsmarted us!) Schwarzkopf failed to mention in his memoirs is that -and that is obvious to everyone- the US had complete military (land air) superiority , why should a bunch of Iraqi negotiators have any power at all?