From your own citation:
"with each hoping that the other will collapse first"
This in no way demonstrates a belief that both sides thing they are made of tougher stuff. In fact, it says explicitly that both sides are "hoping" that the other side "collapses first". This is in no way indicative of any self value of positive strength and thus a premise of your argument is false. Therefore you conclusion is false. If you would like to submit another attempt at providing reasonable evidence to back up your claims, I'm more than happy to review them.
This subject is one of my (very amateur) interests so I'd be happy to, but I don't think I understand our point of disagreement. Would you mind expanding on it or rephrasing it? Is it the difference between belief in one's own side's strength and hope in the other side's frailty?
This in no way demonstrates a belief that both sides thing they are made of tougher stuff. In fact, it says explicitly that both sides are "hoping" that the other side "collapses first". This is in no way indicative of any self value of positive strength and thus a premise of your argument is false. Therefore you conclusion is false. If you would like to submit another attempt at providing reasonable evidence to back up your claims, I'm more than happy to review them.