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> Burmese regime is one of world's most unruly, despotic, prolific, and it can be wiped out clean by US military with ease, without involving any of its allies

by beachy 5y ago

> Burmese regime is one of world's most unruly, despotic, prolific, and it can be wiped out clean by US military with ease, without involving any of its allies Maybe you missed the memo, but there is plenty of precedent for US getting its ass handed to it trying to "clean up" despotic states in SE Asia. And as far as doing it without allies, to quote Robert McNamara: > What makes us omniscient? Have we a record of omniscience? We are the strongest nation in the world today. I do not believe we should ever apply that economic, political, or military power unilaterally. If we had followed that rule in Vietnam, we wouldn't have been there! None of our allies supported us; not Japan, not Germany, not Britain or France. If we can't persuade nations with comparable values of the merit of our cause, we'd better reexamine our reasoning.

baybal2 5y ago
I am glad you unearthed NcNamara here. US lost in Vietnam because people like him were idiots. US military was not attacking, nor defending, but doing god knows what for entirety of the Vietnam campaign because cool kids like McNamara, Nixon, and Kisinger were coming up with their "innovative theories," and trying "redefining the nature of warfare, and politics." For the entirety of Vietnam war, US military had the full logistic, intelligence, tactical, and technical capability to completely crush the North with ease. The question is why it didn't?
- beachy 5y ago
  I guess you're not talking about some well-executed surgical strike to take out the leadership? Because Ho Chi Minh, Giap and other NV leaders were moving around the country with impunity throughout the war, and the US never came close to working out where they were or taking them out, so poor was their intelligence. So yeah, the US could have won by going nuclear, as Nixon briefly considered at Khe Sanh. But that wouldn't have turned the war, he would have had to escalate to nuking Hanoi. And destroying an entire population to effect regime change is not really "winning" in any sense of the word. There was nothing simple about winning in Vietnam, and the US was never in any position to crush the North.

by beachy 5y ago

baybal2 5y ago

I am glad you unearthed NcNamara here. US lost in Vietnam because people like him were idiots. US military was not attacking, nor defending, but doing god knows what for entirety of the Vietnam campaign because cool kids like McNamara, Nixon, and Kisinger were coming up with their "innovative theories," and trying "redefining the nature of warfare, and politics." For the entirety of Vietnam war, US military had the full logistic, intelligence, tactical, and technical capability to completely crush the North with ease. The question is why it didn't?

beachy 5y ago
I guess you're not talking about some well-executed surgical strike to take out the leadership? Because Ho Chi Minh, Giap and other NV leaders were moving around the country with impunity throughout the war, and the US never came close to working out where they were or taking them out, so poor was their intelligence. So yeah, the US could have won by going nuclear, as Nixon briefly considered at Khe Sanh. But that wouldn't have turned the war, he would have had to escalate to nuking Hanoi. And destroying an entire population to effect regime change is not really "winning" in any sense of the word. There was nothing simple about winning in Vietnam, and the US was never in any position to crush the North.