I was born roughly ten years after the end of World War 2.
Since then, we've fought in Korea, what's called "Vietnam" (Although it's certainly also Laos and Cambodia as well as, perhaps, Thailand) did those FTX's in Panama and Grenada, screwed up the Kuwait operation with Bush 1, totally screwed up Afghanistan and Iraq for the purest of political reasons under Bush 2 and Obama.
What we've essentially learned to do is lose.
Beginning with Korea, we failed to fight most of the wars we've been involved in.
The mere threat of communist involvement was enough to keep us from doing what should have been done.
We fought the wars under the rules. In Korea, for example, a mere 5 years after becoming the mightiest Armed Forces the world had ever known, we allowed the Chinese and the Russians to tie us up in knots because we refused what needed to be done. And what needed to be done was to treat those two countries like we treated Italy and Romania and all the other Axis allies during WW2.... in short, bomb the crap out of them.
Make it expensive enough and they would have stayed out of it.
That failure has led to North Korea as we know it today. Man, has that worked out for us.... or what?
And then, failing to have learned from those mistakes... we doubled down with how we ran the war in Vietnam.
Ran it the same way we ran Korea... if not worse... restricted flight paths that the Russians then set up all their AA missiles along... a murderers row that cost us hundreds of lives and planes... couldn't bomb shipping in the harbors because, well, hell, we might actually sink ships and we wouldn't want to do anything to interrupt the flow of munitions and equipment the North needed to fight with, could we? Go in, blow crap up, and then leave.
"We had to destroy the village to save it."
How did that all wind up?
AGAIN, having failed to learn from those mistakes.... for the third major conflict in a row... we failed to do what needed to be done.
Iran killed thousands of Americans in Iraq/Afghanistan. Thousands. Wounded tens of thousands more.
They did that by providing the bad guys with weapons, ammo, explosives, technical know-how, logistical support and terrorist support.
We knew this was going on. We had the proof of it. And what did we do about it? How did we retaliate?
And NOW, the scumbag in the White House is "negotiating" with the same vermin who've been slaughtering us?
That makes as much sense as "negotiating" with Hitler.
And the parallels in all of this... besides the obvious... was the first strategic consideration expounded by Hitler's Western Strategy beginning with the Ardennes Offensive... aka, the Battle of the Bulge.
His plan was to split the Americans from the British both militarily and politically.
He had determined that we lacked the stomach to fight a protracted war with massive casualties and he believed that had he been capable of executing the plan to split allied armies through to the Port of Antwerp that we would sue for peace and they could turn their attention back to the East (Soviets).
Clearly, he had miscalculated in every sphere. Even had he been successful, it only would have delayed the inevitable.
But that was, essentially, the LAST time any such leader who arrived at such a decision would be wrong.
Since World War 2, every leader of our enemies has determined that we, as a nation, have grown so soft that all they have to do is survive... and they will win and we will grow disinterested or tired and want to quit because doing what must be done is just too unpleasant a task for the soft, and now cowardly United States to consider.
I'm not going to just blame Obama for that: I also blame the Bushes.... both of them... for failing to understand the strategic significance of the opportunities presented and the impacts of our failures to take advantage of them.
It has been said many times that both nature and politics abhor a vacuum.
Since from before the Korean War to today, opportunity after opportunity has presented itself to us, only to be rejected by whoever is in charge because we lacked the guts to do what needed to be done.
We had a 5 year window to end the Soviet Union after World War 2 and Communist China with it because we were the ONLY nuclear power on the planet.
Pick up the phone; tell Joe Stalin to dissolve the Soviet Union in 30 days or we'll turn Moscow into a parking lot.
Send Mao a letter (He was a bright guy) and tell him something similar.
But nope... we didn't do that. And the immediate result?
The Korean War.
Imagine: had we dissolved the Soviet Union and Communist China (Which would not have existed without aid from Stalin) there would have been no Korean War. There would have been no Vietnam War.
And had we destroyed Iran when we knew for a fact they were killing us in Iraq... we wouldn't have ISIS, Yemen would still be intact, Afghanistan would likely be more stable...
And that scumbag Putin likely wouldn't have invaded either Georgia or Ukraine.
You see, we have become a country of ostriches.
We refuse to do those things that MUST be done NOW, because we refuse to see what the outcome is going to be when we just sit there, listening to talking heads solemnly tell us that the people "won't support a war with Iran."
Well, war is coming with Iran. The only questions are when and where.
And that war is coming because of the incompetence or cowardice shown by the last two presidents.
The rest of the world is pissing all over us because we refuse to do what must be done. We refuse to face the coming unpleasantness because it's just too tough. But we ARE going to face it. And in the worst possible way: on the other guy's terms.
Meanwhile, ISIS grows exponentially, Iran gets a bigger and more advanced nuclear program leading to a middle eastern nuclear arms race... and we, essentially, do next to nothing about it.
Because, as our enemies have learned.... time is on their side. And because they know we hate doing what must be done... their rifles will defeat our F22 Raptors.
Yes... the parallels are obvious.
And so are the outcomes. Except next time, I fear... we won't be capable of withstanding another loss.
And then what?
Since then, we've fought in Korea, what's called "Vietnam" (Although it's certainly also Laos and Cambodia as well as, perhaps, Thailand) did those FTX's in Panama and Grenada, screwed up the Kuwait operation with Bush 1, totally screwed up Afghanistan and Iraq for the purest of political reasons under Bush 2 and Obama.
What we've essentially learned to do is lose.
Beginning with Korea, we failed to fight most of the wars we've been involved in.
The mere threat of communist involvement was enough to keep us from doing what should have been done.
We fought the wars under the rules. In Korea, for example, a mere 5 years after becoming the mightiest Armed Forces the world had ever known, we allowed the Chinese and the Russians to tie us up in knots because we refused what needed to be done. And what needed to be done was to treat those two countries like we treated Italy and Romania and all the other Axis allies during WW2.... in short, bomb the crap out of them.
Make it expensive enough and they would have stayed out of it.
That failure has led to North Korea as we know it today. Man, has that worked out for us.... or what?
And then, failing to have learned from those mistakes... we doubled down with how we ran the war in Vietnam.
Ran it the same way we ran Korea... if not worse... restricted flight paths that the Russians then set up all their AA missiles along... a murderers row that cost us hundreds of lives and planes... couldn't bomb shipping in the harbors because, well, hell, we might actually sink ships and we wouldn't want to do anything to interrupt the flow of munitions and equipment the North needed to fight with, could we? Go in, blow crap up, and then leave.
"We had to destroy the village to save it."
How did that all wind up?
AGAIN, having failed to learn from those mistakes.... for the third major conflict in a row... we failed to do what needed to be done.
Iran killed thousands of Americans in Iraq/Afghanistan. Thousands. Wounded tens of thousands more.
They did that by providing the bad guys with weapons, ammo, explosives, technical know-how, logistical support and terrorist support.
We knew this was going on. We had the proof of it. And what did we do about it? How did we retaliate?
And NOW, the scumbag in the White House is "negotiating" with the same vermin who've been slaughtering us?
That makes as much sense as "negotiating" with Hitler.
And the parallels in all of this... besides the obvious... was the first strategic consideration expounded by Hitler's Western Strategy beginning with the Ardennes Offensive... aka, the Battle of the Bulge.
His plan was to split the Americans from the British both militarily and politically.
He had determined that we lacked the stomach to fight a protracted war with massive casualties and he believed that had he been capable of executing the plan to split allied armies through to the Port of Antwerp that we would sue for peace and they could turn their attention back to the East (Soviets).
Clearly, he had miscalculated in every sphere. Even had he been successful, it only would have delayed the inevitable.
But that was, essentially, the LAST time any such leader who arrived at such a decision would be wrong.
Since World War 2, every leader of our enemies has determined that we, as a nation, have grown so soft that all they have to do is survive... and they will win and we will grow disinterested or tired and want to quit because doing what must be done is just too unpleasant a task for the soft, and now cowardly United States to consider.
I'm not going to just blame Obama for that: I also blame the Bushes.... both of them... for failing to understand the strategic significance of the opportunities presented and the impacts of our failures to take advantage of them.
It has been said many times that both nature and politics abhor a vacuum.
Since from before the Korean War to today, opportunity after opportunity has presented itself to us, only to be rejected by whoever is in charge because we lacked the guts to do what needed to be done.
We had a 5 year window to end the Soviet Union after World War 2 and Communist China with it because we were the ONLY nuclear power on the planet.
Pick up the phone; tell Joe Stalin to dissolve the Soviet Union in 30 days or we'll turn Moscow into a parking lot.
Send Mao a letter (He was a bright guy) and tell him something similar.
But nope... we didn't do that. And the immediate result?
The Korean War.
Imagine: had we dissolved the Soviet Union and Communist China (Which would not have existed without aid from Stalin) there would have been no Korean War. There would have been no Vietnam War.
And had we destroyed Iran when we knew for a fact they were killing us in Iraq... we wouldn't have ISIS, Yemen would still be intact, Afghanistan would likely be more stable...
And that scumbag Putin likely wouldn't have invaded either Georgia or Ukraine.
You see, we have become a country of ostriches.
We refuse to do those things that MUST be done NOW, because we refuse to see what the outcome is going to be when we just sit there, listening to talking heads solemnly tell us that the people "won't support a war with Iran."
Well, war is coming with Iran. The only questions are when and where.
And that war is coming because of the incompetence or cowardice shown by the last two presidents.
The rest of the world is pissing all over us because we refuse to do what must be done. We refuse to face the coming unpleasantness because it's just too tough. But we ARE going to face it. And in the worst possible way: on the other guy's terms.
Meanwhile, ISIS grows exponentially, Iran gets a bigger and more advanced nuclear program leading to a middle eastern nuclear arms race... and we, essentially, do next to nothing about it.
Because, as our enemies have learned.... time is on their side. And because they know we hate doing what must be done... their rifles will defeat our F22 Raptors.
Yes... the parallels are obvious.
And so are the outcomes. Except next time, I fear... we won't be capable of withstanding another loss.
And then what?
I still don't understand when we began engaging in combat with a pre-fixed "exit strategy."
ReplyDeleteI was given to understand the only exit worthwhile is victory.
Somehow, that no longer seems to matter, just kill a bunch of people, walk away and hand everything back to the enemy on a silver platter.
Seems kind of pointless when you think about it. Kind of like telling the terrorists when we're going to leave.
ReplyDelete