6 ms·

Has the US won a war since 1945?

skhunted 3y ago
The U.S. military has an unprecedented capacity for destroying organized state power. The fourth largest air force in the world is the U.S. Navy. The U.S. Army has the second most military aircraft amongst military branches of the world. To your question it depends on how you count “win”. The Gulf War was a win. Same with Panama, Grenada, and the toppling of Saddam Hussein. Was Korea a win? It wasn’t a loss as South Korea still exists. Afghanistan was a loss. China hasn’t taken over Taiwan largely due to the U.S. military’s deterrence. Is that a win? Wars in former Yugoslavia ended as a result of U.S. military intervention. EDIT: The real “win” of the U.S. military comes from the deterrent effect it has on dissuading nations from attacking our allies and the accompanying amount of political power that comes from that fact. Early in the 2000s the South Korean President made a remark about the U.S. military. Rumsfeld announced that U.S. was considering withdrawing from the Korean peninsula. As a result there was panic selling in the Korean stock market. The Korean President backtracked on the remarks. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/07/international/asia/south-korea-in-surprise-demands-us-forces-stay-in-place.html https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/07/international/asia/south-...
- nitinreddy88 3y ago
  China hasnt taken over Taiwan largely due to their financial stand and least interest in Taiwan. Yes, they want Taiwan but not at the cost of war. They would happily poach in every possible way to get Taiwan unique proposition. They never went to war with India (its only cold war) and there is no US to be feared of.
  - skhunted 3y ago
    It is unlikely that Taiwan would still be an independent nation in the absence of the U.S. military. At least as I see it.
    - Supermancho 3y ago
      China would certainly have ferried troops across the water barrier, in absence of the US military. It would be a major boon to control the manufacturing base, even without the talent who have been running the chip fabs.
  - mmmBacon 3y ago
    China aggression was largely the reason India pursued nuclear weapons. From Wikipedia: India's loss to China in a brief Himalayan border war in October 1962, provided the New Delhi government impetus for developing nuclear weapons as a means of deterring potential Chinese aggression. And of course Pakistan pursued nuclear weapons because India had them. This is how nuclear proliferation works. Your thinking is dangerously naive. China hasn’t pursued India because of India’s nuclear deterrent. US guarantees of security for Japan and Taiwan are partially due to an attempt to reduce nuclear proliferation. US involvement has been critical to Taiwanese independence going all the way back to the 1950’s when China invaded ROC held islands. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Taiwan_Strait_Crisis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Taiwan_Strait_Crisis The US deployed nuclear weapons to Taiwan during a crisis caused by China in the Taiwan Straights in the 1970’s. * During the Cold War, the United States deployed nuclear weapons on Taiwan as part of the United States Taiwan Defense Command. In 1972, United States president Richard Nixon ordered nuclear weapons to be removed from Taiwan and this was implemented by 1974. Nuclear weapons are known to have been stored at Tainan Air Force Base.*
- mjevans 3y ago
  I'd argue Afghanistan was an unclear and unfunded set of moving goal posts. There was an objective the US did succeed in; the death of the figurehead for the terrorist group that perpetrated September 11th 2001 attacks. Forcing a regime change, society modernization (E.G. value women, everyone can vote, have a not-shit quality of life so there's something to stay at home and value), general reforms like that weren't something that was a clear goal for everyone involved. There was far too much corruption, in war profiteering among contractors, political institutions and figures, etc. There was a great set of unfulfilled needs (IMO, offhand): a combination of engineers being free to do what _they_ think is necessary to build a stable and sustainable society, educators and a system of perpetuating that society in place once 'we' pull out, and politicians/diplomats to tackle and fix the social structure issues that aren't clearly objective and correctable with obvious actions, but more that require consensus and emotional support. Oh, and a lot of funding in public, audited, bookkeeping that has verifiable results. I'd really like to see the same domestically. The US GAO should produce reports for the average citizen, so they can understand where the funds going into the government come from (both per person, and broadly), and what value is derived from those funds. It's really easy to say 'blow X up', 'end entitlement Y', 'shutdown Z'; but it's much more difficult to articulate preventative care, investment in the future, and improvement of the commons. Much like misinformation is easy and it's hard to spread the truth.
  - skhunted 3y ago
    I think the failure to “win” on the part of the U.S. since 1945 has mostly come down to lack of political will. We could have done what McArthur wanted and dropped 50 atomic bombs on China and won the Korean War. Thankfully we didn’t. Our losses have not come from the inability of the U.S. military to obliterate (in a conventional way) our opponents.
- ein0p 3y ago
  Laughs in Houtni. Word is the US is currently trying to negotiate a ceasefire with them, and they aren’t taking the bait.
  - skhunted 3y ago
    Do you think the Houthis can do more damage to the U.S. than the U.S. can do to them? I don’t understand your point. Is it a bad thing if the U.S. doesn’t want to wage war on someone?
    - ein0p 3y ago
      It doesn’t matter. Houtnis closed the trade routes and “the world’s strongest navy and air force” shat the bed pathetically trying to unblock them.
      - skhunted 3y ago
        Your understanding of the situation is badly wrong.
        ein0p 3y ago
        Are the trade routes open? No? Then my understanding of the situation is exactly right.
        skhunted 3y ago
        Yes, the Cape of Good Hope is open and as traffic through the Suez has declined the traffic through the Cape of Good Hope has increased. The U.S. has made a political calculation on how to deal with the Israeli conflict. That decision has not in any way been influenced by a lack of military capabilities by the U.S. military.
        ein0p 3y ago
        And what “calculation” would that be? To publicly condemn Israel while privately funneling billions in borrowed money to it, and ineffectually expending extremely expensive ammunition in the Gulf of Aden? Was this a part of these “calculations”: https://www-tasnimnews-com.translate.goog/ar/news/2024/04/24/3074634/%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%82%D9%88%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D8%B3%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%DB%8C%D9%85%D9%86%DB%8C%D8%A9-%D8%AA%D8%B3%D8%AA%D9%87%D8%AF%D9%81-%D8%B3%D9%81%DB%8C%D9%86%D8%A9-%D9%88%D9%85%D8%AF%D9%85%D8%B1%D8%A9-%D8%A3%D9%85%D8%B1%DB%8C%DA%A9%DB%8C%D8%AA%DB%8C%D9%86-%D9%81%DB%8C-%D8%AE%D9%84%DB%8C%D8%AC-%D8%B9%D8%AF%D9%86-%D9%88%D8%B3%D9%81%DB%8C%D9%86%D8%A9-%D8%A5%D8%B3%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A6%DB%8C%D9%84%DB%8C%D8%A9-%D9%81%DB%8C-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D8%AD%DB%8C%D8%B7-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%87%D9%86%D8%AF%DB%8C?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://www-tasnimnews-com.translate.goog/ar/news/2024/04/24...?
- gregjor 3y ago
  Gee I guess I didn't need all of those years studying military history at university after all. Thanks for the crash course. The last declared war the USA participated in was WWII. I'll count most of the many conflicts the US military has engaged in since 1945 as wars in keeping with common usage. Winning a war means achieving strategic objectives. It doesn't mean just blowing things up and killing people. Whether the failure comes from lack of military capability or failure of political will makes no difference when a civilian government controls the military, and sets the strategic (and sometimes tactical) objectives. The four big conflicts since 1945 didn't go well. Korea drew to a stalemate. True, South Korea still exists, but so does North Korea. The American strategic objective -- preventing communist takeover of Korea -- was only partly achieved. After the war South Korea suffered under military rule and dictators until the late 1980s The same strategic objective got us into Vietnam, a war we clearly lost. That war sapped political and public confidence to such a degree that the US allowed a horrible genocide to happen in Cambodia. Vietnam had to intervene. The First Gulf War, a police action to protect Kuwait from invasion, went well except the US failed to follow through and disable Saddam Hussein's ability to fight another day, which led to a second war predicated on lies and no clear strategic objective. The USA did topple Hussein, but destroyed the country and its infrastructure in the process, and set the stage for ISIS and other terrorist groups still operating there. Afghanistan didn't have clear strategic objectives, the justifications changed repeatedly. And the USA lost. The Kosovo War ended by NATO action. The USA led by President Clinton intervened. Strategic objectives met, we can call that a victory. Grenada and Panama were minor rescue operations and police actions; I hesitate to call those "wars." Panama was invaded to depose and arrest a single man, Manuel Noriega, a former CIA puppet who (like Saddam Hussein) turned on his former patrons. I think of those as Bay Of Pigs type small-scale actions, except the US succeeded in Grenada and Panama. You left out Somalia, another UN/USA operation that ended with the US evacuating. I agree that a lot of potential conflicts -- Taiwan, Iran, North Korea -- have not erupted because the United States does have tremendous military capability, reaching around the world, and that has a real and effective deterrent effect on nation states. It has not deterred Russia, though. It has less value deterring terrorists and non-state actors such as ISIS, the Taliban, Houthi rebels, communist rebels in the Philippines, and Mexican drug cartels.
  - 3y ago
ipnon 3y ago
The US hasn’t fought a war since 1945. The Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928 made war illegal. This pact was the basis for the war crimes tribunals after WWII, because Germany and Japan were signatories they were deemed to have violated the treaty by waging war. Likewise Congress has the sole authority to declare war, and this authority hasn’t been used since December 1945. International law is weird.
- skhunted 3y ago
  As the term “at war” is commonly used the U.S. has definitely been at war many times since 1945.
- MeImCounting 3y ago
  " The pact had no mechanism for enforcement, and many historians and political scientists see it as mostly irrelevant and ineffective." Regardless of international law (which is for the most part, not particularly effective at changing the behavior of nations) war has been waged throughout the 20th century and into the 21st
lostlogin 3y ago
The US airforce is one hell of a deterrence - I'd argue that it's a more effective deterrence than the nuclear threat. The nuclear option is just too nuclear.
chrisco255 3y ago
You should ask the Soviet Union that question.
eh8 3y ago
Absolutely, people fixate on Korea and Vietnam while ignoring that the US has won many ”fast” wars since 1945. Operation Desert Storm is a perfect modern example. The US doesn’t lose wars, it loses interest
- euroderf 3y ago
  A fast war is long enough to shake the bugs out of new toys. Even Grenada revealed deficiencies.
fxd123 3y ago
The Gulf War was absolutely a US victory
downboots 3y ago
> has the US won a war since 1945? has humanity ever won in wars?
sgc 3y ago
Obviously the US military has absolutely crushed their enemies as far as not having their hands tied by politics has allowed. And that is important, whether for better or for worse. In at least 70% of the major conflicts since then, US has absolutely failed in almost every respect in terms of reforming the countries they go to war with, and in bringing about any objective benefits for others or for themselves. But, until now the deterrent effect of the US military just existing has undoubtedly saved many countries from being overrun by a neighboring thug with despotic tendencies. It is trivial to think of several plausible scenarios for the last 80 years that are far darker than what actually transpired. So that deterrent effect is by far the most important one, and an excellent reason for the US military to remain strong as we move into the future.
karaterobot 3y ago
Yes, in Lebanon, the Dominican Republic, the Korean DMZ, Grenada, Libya (twice), the Persian Gulf, Iraq (three times), Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Haiti, Serbia, Pakistan, and Uganda. But the bigger question might be, how many wars has NATO prevented since WWII? I believe the answer is: a lot.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
matheusmoreira 3y ago
The US has nukes. It has a fleet of B-2 Spirits which are essentially unkillable and can deliver nuclear weapons anywhere on the planet. Does it need to win anything? If it ever loses, it could just nuke everybody out of spite and call it a day. Its victory over Japan in WW2 was a foregone conclusion due to sheer industrial output. There is literally nothing Japan could have done to avoid being utterly defeated, it was but a matter of time even without the nukes. The US would just keep spamming war materiel and personnel at the enemy until the enemy was destroyed. It's truly mind boggling the scale of it. Now factor in the fact that America is basically asleep right now. More or less deindustrialized, in world boss mode, it views itself as the highly paid managers of the other shithole nations where the cheap manufacturing actually occurs. And it still projects absurd amounts of power by just sending carrier groups to random places. Imagine what's going to happen once they start reindustrializing. They don't even need to win anything, they have people like the CIA and NSA making sure that winning is not even necessary to begin with. You don't need to actually get americans killed if you can get your enemies to kill each other by destabilizing their nations.

The U.S. military has an unprecedented capacity for destroying organized state power. The fourth largest air force in the world is the U.S. Navy. The U.S. Army has the second most military aircraft amongst military branches of the world. To your question it depends on how you count “win”. The Gulf War was a win. Same with Panama, Grenada, and the toppling of Saddam Hussein. Was Korea a win? It wasn’t a loss as South Korea still exists. Afghanistan was a loss. China hasn’t taken over Taiwan largely due to the U.S. military’s deterrence. Is that a win? Wars in former Yugoslavia ended as a result of U.S. military intervention. EDIT: The real “win” of the U.S. military comes from the deterrent effect it has on dissuading nations from attacking our allies and the accompanying amount of political power that comes from that fact. Early in the 2000s the South Korean President made a remark about the U.S. military. Rumsfeld announced that U.S. was considering withdrawing from the Korean peninsula. As a result there was panic selling in the Korean stock market. The Korean President backtracked on the remarks. https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/07/international/asia/south-korea-in-surprise-demands-us-forces-stay-in-place.html https://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/07/international/asia/south-...

nitinreddy88 3y ago
China hasnt taken over Taiwan largely due to their financial stand and least interest in Taiwan. Yes, they want Taiwan but not at the cost of war. They would happily poach in every possible way to get Taiwan unique proposition. They never went to war with India (its only cold war) and there is no US to be feared of.
- skhunted 3y ago
  It is unlikely that Taiwan would still be an independent nation in the absence of the U.S. military. At least as I see it.
  - Supermancho 3y ago
    China would certainly have ferried troops across the water barrier, in absence of the US military. It would be a major boon to control the manufacturing base, even without the talent who have been running the chip fabs.
- mmmBacon 3y ago
  China aggression was largely the reason India pursued nuclear weapons. From Wikipedia: India's loss to China in a brief Himalayan border war in October 1962, provided the New Delhi government impetus for developing nuclear weapons as a means of deterring potential Chinese aggression. And of course Pakistan pursued nuclear weapons because India had them. This is how nuclear proliferation works. Your thinking is dangerously naive. China hasn’t pursued India because of India’s nuclear deterrent. US guarantees of security for Japan and Taiwan are partially due to an attempt to reduce nuclear proliferation. US involvement has been critical to Taiwanese independence going all the way back to the 1950’s when China invaded ROC held islands. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Taiwan_Strait_Crisis https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Taiwan_Strait_Crisis The US deployed nuclear weapons to Taiwan during a crisis caused by China in the Taiwan Straights in the 1970’s. * During the Cold War, the United States deployed nuclear weapons on Taiwan as part of the United States Taiwan Defense Command. In 1972, United States president Richard Nixon ordered nuclear weapons to be removed from Taiwan and this was implemented by 1974. Nuclear weapons are known to have been stored at Tainan Air Force Base.*
mjevans 3y ago
I'd argue Afghanistan was an unclear and unfunded set of moving goal posts. There was an objective the US did succeed in; the death of the figurehead for the terrorist group that perpetrated September 11th 2001 attacks. Forcing a regime change, society modernization (E.G. value women, everyone can vote, have a not-shit quality of life so there's something to stay at home and value), general reforms like that weren't something that was a clear goal for everyone involved. There was far too much corruption, in war profiteering among contractors, political institutions and figures, etc. There was a great set of unfulfilled needs (IMO, offhand): a combination of engineers being free to do what _they_ think is necessary to build a stable and sustainable society, educators and a system of perpetuating that society in place once 'we' pull out, and politicians/diplomats to tackle and fix the social structure issues that aren't clearly objective and correctable with obvious actions, but more that require consensus and emotional support. Oh, and a lot of funding in public, audited, bookkeeping that has verifiable results. I'd really like to see the same domestically. The US GAO should produce reports for the average citizen, so they can understand where the funds going into the government come from (both per person, and broadly), and what value is derived from those funds. It's really easy to say 'blow X up', 'end entitlement Y', 'shutdown Z'; but it's much more difficult to articulate preventative care, investment in the future, and improvement of the commons. Much like misinformation is easy and it's hard to spread the truth.
- skhunted 3y ago
  I think the failure to “win” on the part of the U.S. since 1945 has mostly come down to lack of political will. We could have done what McArthur wanted and dropped 50 atomic bombs on China and won the Korean War. Thankfully we didn’t. Our losses have not come from the inability of the U.S. military to obliterate (in a conventional way) our opponents.
ein0p 3y ago
Laughs in Houtni. Word is the US is currently trying to negotiate a ceasefire with them, and they aren’t taking the bait.
- skhunted 3y ago
  Do you think the Houthis can do more damage to the U.S. than the U.S. can do to them? I don’t understand your point. Is it a bad thing if the U.S. doesn’t want to wage war on someone?
  - ein0p 3y ago
    It doesn’t matter. Houtnis closed the trade routes and “the world’s strongest navy and air force” shat the bed pathetically trying to unblock them.
    - skhunted 3y ago
      Your understanding of the situation is badly wrong.
      - ein0p 3y ago
        Are the trade routes open? No? Then my understanding of the situation is exactly right.
        skhunted 3y ago
        Yes, the Cape of Good Hope is open and as traffic through the Suez has declined the traffic through the Cape of Good Hope has increased. The U.S. has made a political calculation on how to deal with the Israeli conflict. That decision has not in any way been influenced by a lack of military capabilities by the U.S. military.
        ein0p 3y ago
        And what “calculation” would that be? To publicly condemn Israel while privately funneling billions in borrowed money to it, and ineffectually expending extremely expensive ammunition in the Gulf of Aden? Was this a part of these “calculations”: https://www-tasnimnews-com.translate.goog/ar/news/2024/04/24/3074634/%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%82%D9%88%D8%A7%D8%AA-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D8%B3%D9%84%D8%AD%D8%A9-%D8%A7%D9%84%DB%8C%D9%85%D9%86%DB%8C%D8%A9-%D8%AA%D8%B3%D8%AA%D9%87%D8%AF%D9%81-%D8%B3%D9%81%DB%8C%D9%86%D8%A9-%D9%88%D9%85%D8%AF%D9%85%D8%B1%D8%A9-%D8%A3%D9%85%D8%B1%DB%8C%DA%A9%DB%8C%D8%AA%DB%8C%D9%86-%D9%81%DB%8C-%D8%AE%D9%84%DB%8C%D8%AC-%D8%B9%D8%AF%D9%86-%D9%88%D8%B3%D9%81%DB%8C%D9%86%D8%A9-%D8%A5%D8%B3%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A6%DB%8C%D9%84%DB%8C%D8%A9-%D9%81%DB%8C-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85%D8%AD%DB%8C%D8%B7-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%87%D9%86%D8%AF%DB%8C?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp https://www-tasnimnews-com.translate.goog/ar/news/2024/04/24...?
gregjor 3y ago
Gee I guess I didn't need all of those years studying military history at university after all. Thanks for the crash course. The last declared war the USA participated in was WWII. I'll count most of the many conflicts the US military has engaged in since 1945 as wars in keeping with common usage. Winning a war means achieving strategic objectives. It doesn't mean just blowing things up and killing people. Whether the failure comes from lack of military capability or failure of political will makes no difference when a civilian government controls the military, and sets the strategic (and sometimes tactical) objectives. The four big conflicts since 1945 didn't go well. Korea drew to a stalemate. True, South Korea still exists, but so does North Korea. The American strategic objective -- preventing communist takeover of Korea -- was only partly achieved. After the war South Korea suffered under military rule and dictators until the late 1980s The same strategic objective got us into Vietnam, a war we clearly lost. That war sapped political and public confidence to such a degree that the US allowed a horrible genocide to happen in Cambodia. Vietnam had to intervene. The First Gulf War, a police action to protect Kuwait from invasion, went well except the US failed to follow through and disable Saddam Hussein's ability to fight another day, which led to a second war predicated on lies and no clear strategic objective. The USA did topple Hussein, but destroyed the country and its infrastructure in the process, and set the stage for ISIS and other terrorist groups still operating there. Afghanistan didn't have clear strategic objectives, the justifications changed repeatedly. And the USA lost. The Kosovo War ended by NATO action. The USA led by President Clinton intervened. Strategic objectives met, we can call that a victory. Grenada and Panama were minor rescue operations and police actions; I hesitate to call those "wars." Panama was invaded to depose and arrest a single man, Manuel Noriega, a former CIA puppet who (like Saddam Hussein) turned on his former patrons. I think of those as Bay Of Pigs type small-scale actions, except the US succeeded in Grenada and Panama. You left out Somalia, another UN/USA operation that ended with the US evacuating. I agree that a lot of potential conflicts -- Taiwan, Iran, North Korea -- have not erupted because the United States does have tremendous military capability, reaching around the world, and that has a real and effective deterrent effect on nation states. It has not deterred Russia, though. It has less value deterring terrorists and non-state actors such as ISIS, the Taliban, Houthi rebels, communist rebels in the Philippines, and Mexican drug cartels.
- 3y ago

ipnon 3y ago

The US hasn’t fought a war since 1945. The Kellogg-Briand Pact of 1928 made war illegal. This pact was the basis for the war crimes tribunals after WWII, because Germany and Japan were signatories they were deemed to have violated the treaty by waging war. Likewise Congress has the sole authority to declare war, and this authority hasn’t been used since December 1945. International law is weird.

skhunted 3y ago
As the term “at war” is commonly used the U.S. has definitely been at war many times since 1945.
MeImCounting 3y ago
" The pact had no mechanism for enforcement, and many historians and political scientists see it as mostly irrelevant and ineffective." Regardless of international law (which is for the most part, not particularly effective at changing the behavior of nations) war has been waged throughout the 20th century and into the 21st

lostlogin 3y ago

The US airforce is one hell of a deterrence - I'd argue that it's a more effective deterrence than the nuclear threat. The nuclear option is just too nuclear.

chrisco255 3y ago

You should ask the Soviet Union that question.

eh8 3y ago

Absolutely, people fixate on Korea and Vietnam while ignoring that the US has won many ”fast” wars since 1945. Operation Desert Storm is a perfect modern example. The US doesn’t lose wars, it loses interest

euroderf 3y ago
A fast war is long enough to shake the bugs out of new toys. Even Grenada revealed deficiencies.

fxd123 3y ago

The Gulf War was absolutely a US victory

downboots 3y ago

> has the US won a war since 1945? has humanity ever won in wars?

sgc 3y ago

Obviously the US military has absolutely crushed their enemies as far as not having their hands tied by politics has allowed. And that is important, whether for better or for worse. In at least 70% of the major conflicts since then, US has absolutely failed in almost every respect in terms of reforming the countries they go to war with, and in bringing about any objective benefits for others or for themselves. But, until now the deterrent effect of the US military just existing has undoubtedly saved many countries from being overrun by a neighboring thug with despotic tendencies. It is trivial to think of several plausible scenarios for the last 80 years that are far darker than what actually transpired. So that deterrent effect is by far the most important one, and an excellent reason for the US military to remain strong as we move into the future.

karaterobot 3y ago

Yes, in Lebanon, the Dominican Republic, the Korean DMZ, Grenada, Libya (twice), the Persian Gulf, Iraq (three times), Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Haiti, Serbia, Pakistan, and Uganda. But the bigger question might be, how many wars has NATO prevented since WWII? I believe the answer is: a lot.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

matheusmoreira 3y ago

The US has nukes. It has a fleet of B-2 Spirits which are essentially unkillable and can deliver nuclear weapons anywhere on the planet. Does it need to win anything? If it ever loses, it could just nuke everybody out of spite and call it a day. Its victory over Japan in WW2 was a foregone conclusion due to sheer industrial output. There is literally nothing Japan could have done to avoid being utterly defeated, it was but a matter of time even without the nukes. The US would just keep spamming war materiel and personnel at the enemy until the enemy was destroyed. It's truly mind boggling the scale of it. Now factor in the fact that America is basically asleep right now. More or less deindustrialized, in world boss mode, it views itself as the highly paid managers of the other shithole nations where the cheap manufacturing actually occurs. And it still projects absurd amounts of power by just sending carrier groups to random places. Imagine what's going to happen once they start reindustrializing. They don't even need to win anything, they have people like the CIA and NSA making sure that winning is not even necessary to begin with. You don't need to actually get americans killed if you can get your enemies to kill each other by destabilizing their nations.