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The US has lost all wars in the last five decades: Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq. War is merely a tool to achieve political goals, and none of these goals were

The US has lost all wars in the last five decades: Vietnam, Afghanistan, and Iraq. War is merely a tool to achieve political goals, and none of these goals were achieved. This means all the effort and resources spent on these wars were wasted, and the wars were effectively lost. The US has never faced an opponent like China. Nazi Germany is a joke compared to China when you consider their access to resources, production capacity and technology. There is a lot of mythology surrounding the idea that the US won WWII alone, but without the Soviet Union's effort, they would likely have lost that war as well. Now, you have Russia and China in the same corner. People should read the Pentagon report[1][2] from a few days ago, which states that China is already almost on par with the US military in most categories. 1. https://media.defense.gov/2024/Dec/18/2003615520/-1/-1/0/MILITARY-AND-SECURITY-DEVELOPMENTS-INVOLVING-THE-PEOPLES-REPUBLIC-OF-CHINA-2024.PDF https://media.defense.gov/2024/Dec/18/2003615520/-1/-1/0/MIL... 2. https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/12/18/china-military-power-report-pentagon/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/12/18/...

rich_sasha 2y ago
Is it fair to say the US easily won the "hot" stages of each of these wars, but struggled and failed with the counter-insurgency bits? And possibly the same is happening in Yemen. These are totally different tasks, and I'm not sure you can deduce much about one from the performance in the other.
- tomohelix 2y ago
  The US's main strategy is to dominate the battlefield and achieve the objective as fast as possible using technology and overwhelming firepower. So yes, they could and did win the "hot" stages where they were able to deploy all they have. But when the fight dragged out, as it has always done and absolutely will be in a peer or near peer conflict, the effectiveness of the US military drops like a rock. It is here that I question what is the point of all the expensive toys and the trillion dollars budget.
  - rich_sasha 2y ago
    True, but also as these wars have dragged out, they have turned to counter-insurgency. Are you saying the US would also do badly at a dragged out "conventional" conflict?
    - tomohelix 2y ago
      Yes, very likely. The US has no means to rapidly switch into wartime production. It is woefully inadequate when you realize that there is only one factory making tanks and it almost got shutdown. Even Russia is out producing the US. China would absolutely embarrass the US if it comes to sustained conflict and supply chain. And the US military is still stuck in the past in term of strategy for all out conflicts. A bunch of drones scared the entire nation the last few days and the army literally has no effective means to immediately response or track them. Meanwhile, billions are poured into aircraft carriers, all of which are easy targets for mass drone strikes or an ICBM attack. The US has no way to recover even a single carrier loss. There is simply no time or material to build them faster. Yet they are still the backbone of the US force. A bone that is getting more and more vulnerable every day.
      - rich_sasha 2y ago
        I'm not sure how you can deduce this. All these previous wars were definitely not cases like this. There was no shortage of kit or firepower. It was rather that the US didn't know how to fight a counter-insurgency. That is a strategic failure, but seems to tell you nothing about matching up to Russia or China. Industrial production, hmm, maybe. I guess its hard for anyone to compare to China, and I really hope we never live to find out. But Russia is no great comparison point. US is certainly out producing Russia in terms of aircraft and lots of ammunition types, so much so that the small part that makes it to Ukraine is just-about a match for what Russia produces and imports in a wartime economy, with nothing diverted to reserves. And why do you conclude the US couldn't ramp it up? It hasn't tried for many decades, I guess since Vietnam. My impression, if anything, is the opposite. It has plenty of spare capital which could be put to that use, should the political will arise. As for broader US strategy and carriers being easy targets for ICBMs or drones, I would think this is speculation at this point. Until there is a hot war, it's so hard to know. And with 11 carrier groups, the US can afford to lose a lot of them and still have substantially more than the next opponent. Russia lost many ships to Ukraine drones, but in incomparable scenarios, such as a lone cruiser with its air defences unmanned, pretty close to the coast. I think that's hard to compare to how a carrier group might fare hundreds of miles offshore.
analognoise 2y ago
The same people who lied about how tough the Russians were, lied about WMDs, lied about how well the ANA was going to withstand the Taliban, lost the last 5 decades of wars while spending more than anyone else on Earth, have a report that demands we increase spending on their stuff. Along the way we became a country where it was legal to torture people, have secret courts, and 2/3 of Americans outwardly state they don’t trust the judicial system (so, basically Russia/China/authoritarian shit hole levels of “trust”). What if they’re just full of shit?
- aguaviva 2y ago
  The same people who lied about how tough the Russians were, lied about how well the ANA was going to withstand the Taliban, There's a difference between "lying" about things, and being simply deluded or deeply misunderstanding them. Of course they lied about WMD. But they didn't "lie" about those other two situations. Whether you like it or not, there's a major distinction at play here. lost the last 5 decades of wars It's true that they lost the 3 major wars (Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan). But they didn't lose all of their pet wars in this time period. The Gulf War (I betcha forgot that one!) was a very, very major conflict that they won unambiguously. So already, you're completely out to lunch, right there. But there were numerous second-order conflicts that they won also during this time period. This most significant was the proxy war against the USSR in Afghanistan (effectively the "First Afghan War" from the US perspective) which was unambiguously won, also. Which BTW had some pretty huge consequences (though it seems you've forgotten about those, as well). And several second-order conflicts in addition (Panama, Yugoslavia, Kosovo) that were effectively won also, even if others (Syria, Libya) were not. I know, I know - like Reagan said, "facts are boring things". What's my point, you ask? Let's get right to it. What if they’re just full of shit? Of course they're full of shit. But what's vastly more important point is -- if you can't be even ballpark correct about the stuff above -- or (as seems to be more likely the case) you plainly don't care -- then what does that make you full of? If it's all just word salad to you -- if the basic factual accuracy of stuff like this just doesn't really matter to you; as long as you can smoosh the various bullet points together somehow, and sculpt them in your into whatever broad, sweeping, hypermoralistic narrative that your worldview seems to hinge on -- then not only are you no different, really, from "them" and all of their big, fat stinking lies. Effectively, you're on the same team.

rich_sasha 2y ago

Is it fair to say the US easily won the "hot" stages of each of these wars, but struggled and failed with the counter-insurgency bits? And possibly the same is happening in Yemen. These are totally different tasks, and I'm not sure you can deduce much about one from the performance in the other.

tomohelix 2y ago
The US's main strategy is to dominate the battlefield and achieve the objective as fast as possible using technology and overwhelming firepower. So yes, they could and did win the "hot" stages where they were able to deploy all they have. But when the fight dragged out, as it has always done and absolutely will be in a peer or near peer conflict, the effectiveness of the US military drops like a rock. It is here that I question what is the point of all the expensive toys and the trillion dollars budget.
- rich_sasha 2y ago
  True, but also as these wars have dragged out, they have turned to counter-insurgency. Are you saying the US would also do badly at a dragged out "conventional" conflict?
  - tomohelix 2y ago
    Yes, very likely. The US has no means to rapidly switch into wartime production. It is woefully inadequate when you realize that there is only one factory making tanks and it almost got shutdown. Even Russia is out producing the US. China would absolutely embarrass the US if it comes to sustained conflict and supply chain. And the US military is still stuck in the past in term of strategy for all out conflicts. A bunch of drones scared the entire nation the last few days and the army literally has no effective means to immediately response or track them. Meanwhile, billions are poured into aircraft carriers, all of which are easy targets for mass drone strikes or an ICBM attack. The US has no way to recover even a single carrier loss. There is simply no time or material to build them faster. Yet they are still the backbone of the US force. A bone that is getting more and more vulnerable every day.
    - rich_sasha 2y ago
      I'm not sure how you can deduce this. All these previous wars were definitely not cases like this. There was no shortage of kit or firepower. It was rather that the US didn't know how to fight a counter-insurgency. That is a strategic failure, but seems to tell you nothing about matching up to Russia or China. Industrial production, hmm, maybe. I guess its hard for anyone to compare to China, and I really hope we never live to find out. But Russia is no great comparison point. US is certainly out producing Russia in terms of aircraft and lots of ammunition types, so much so that the small part that makes it to Ukraine is just-about a match for what Russia produces and imports in a wartime economy, with nothing diverted to reserves. And why do you conclude the US couldn't ramp it up? It hasn't tried for many decades, I guess since Vietnam. My impression, if anything, is the opposite. It has plenty of spare capital which could be put to that use, should the political will arise. As for broader US strategy and carriers being easy targets for ICBMs or drones, I would think this is speculation at this point. Until there is a hot war, it's so hard to know. And with 11 carrier groups, the US can afford to lose a lot of them and still have substantially more than the next opponent. Russia lost many ships to Ukraine drones, but in incomparable scenarios, such as a lone cruiser with its air defences unmanned, pretty close to the coast. I think that's hard to compare to how a carrier group might fare hundreds of miles offshore.

analognoise 2y ago

The same people who lied about how tough the Russians were, lied about WMDs, lied about how well the ANA was going to withstand the Taliban, lost the last 5 decades of wars while spending more than anyone else on Earth, have a report that demands we increase spending on their stuff. Along the way we became a country where it was legal to torture people, have secret courts, and 2/3 of Americans outwardly state they don’t trust the judicial system (so, basically Russia/China/authoritarian shit hole levels of “trust”). What if they’re just full of shit?

aguaviva 2y ago
The same people who lied about how tough the Russians were, lied about how well the ANA was going to withstand the Taliban, There's a difference between "lying" about things, and being simply deluded or deeply misunderstanding them. Of course they lied about WMD. But they didn't "lie" about those other two situations. Whether you like it or not, there's a major distinction at play here. lost the last 5 decades of wars It's true that they lost the 3 major wars (Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan). But they didn't lose all of their pet wars in this time period. The Gulf War (I betcha forgot that one!) was a very, very major conflict that they won unambiguously. So already, you're completely out to lunch, right there. But there were numerous second-order conflicts that they won also during this time period. This most significant was the proxy war against the USSR in Afghanistan (effectively the "First Afghan War" from the US perspective) which was unambiguously won, also. Which BTW had some pretty huge consequences (though it seems you've forgotten about those, as well). And several second-order conflicts in addition (Panama, Yugoslavia, Kosovo) that were effectively won also, even if others (Syria, Libya) were not. I know, I know - like Reagan said, "facts are boring things". What's my point, you ask? Let's get right to it. What if they’re just full of shit? Of course they're full of shit. But what's vastly more important point is -- if you can't be even ballpark correct about the stuff above -- or (as seems to be more likely the case) you plainly don't care -- then what does that make you full of? If it's all just word salad to you -- if the basic factual accuracy of stuff like this just doesn't really matter to you; as long as you can smoosh the various bullet points together somehow, and sculpt them in your into whatever broad, sweeping, hypermoralistic narrative that your worldview seems to hinge on -- then not only are you no different, really, from "them" and all of their big, fat stinking lies. Effectively, you're on the same team.