Nazi UFO's and 5-7-5 haiku

[rayheinrich]

so, in essence, in American haikus the 575 is merely a guide, and most likely has too many syllables to capture the feeling of a Japanese haiku?

IMHO: 12 or fewer is a good guide.
But:
Of the four major criteria a poem must meet to be considered a haiku,
syllable count comes in sixth.

But if you really want to be anal, click the spoiler button:

The guide I use is: 12 or fewer (mine are usually about 8)
medium length syllables. Short ones count .5 and long ones
count 1.5 .

old pond
frog jumps into
the sound of water

Long: pond, jumps, sound
Medium: old, frog,
Short: in, to, the, of, wat, er

So this (famous) one's about 9.5 .

Don't EVER be this anal (unless you're a computer nerd like me),
2 to 5 per line is fine.

And yes, again: Counting syllables is a bunch of crap.