I agree. I abhor political talk on HN, but this resonated true with me when hearing the comparison of US troop operations in Iraq to that of Vietnam in those i

I agree. I abhor political talk on HN, but this resonated true with me when hearing the comparison of US troop operations in Iraq to that of Vietnam in those instance. The idea of kill counts, popular in Vietnam, and targeted assasinations by militant leaders in Iraq (made famous by the playing card where people were ranked) and general metrics based on opposition death counts. I reflected on this and wondered how so many officers who survived Vietnam and saw who defining performance metrics the wrong way come back to let the same or even courage it later as officers in Iraq is this recurring horror story in large org management. It scares me that these mistakes are repeated, from war to situations with far less consequence like software development. I am sure there are good psych articles for more details on such issues, and I have always been interested in why such problems recur.