Have we lost the will to WIN any war?

[Moonbeam]

STARK KILLING THOSE MUSLIMS YOU F@CKING ARMY. MY BRAIN IS STARTING TO SMOKE FROM FEAR THEY WILL CRAWL OUT FROM UNDER MY BED.

 

[brandonbull]

I think it is good that the American people don't have the desire to wage war on other countries without being attacked first.

 

[Arkaign]

I was preparing to write a massive written analysis on this subject, but Rainsford basically covered it all perfectly.

:thumbsup:

 

[Craig234]

My larger concern is whether the right - and people like cwjerome - are able to distinguish between 'good war' and 'bad war'.

I'll admit we on the left don't have all the answers. For example, as repugnant as it was, as contrary to our values across the spectrum today, for us to steal the land of the native nations who were here in North America, and target them for genocide, was the answer to not take any of their land? What really would the world look like in that case?

A bit grayer area, the issue was pretty black and white when the democratic president chose to launch an aggressive war against Mexico 150 years ago, using a phony pretense, and to steal half their land. Also clearly wrong today, and again, would the world be a better place had he not done it?

We liberals face these things all the time. Our plans are often not quite up to solving a problem. Take the UN - it's had bi-partisan support and is very important, yet its core structure is paralyzed for the most important issues, because the world's most powerful, competing nations can veto each other.

If you think the Korean War was justified, consider how it came about with the UN in place - the USSR, who would have vetoed the resolution, was boycotting the meeting because they were protesting the treatment of Communist China on joining the UN. Their absence was the only reason the war was able to happen. Is that a good mechanism?

Consider the Iraqi no-fly zones: the US wanted them for both good and bad reasons: to protect the shiites and kurds, and to use a an excuse to justify an invasion if they wanted, respectively.

The US tried for years and was never able to get language passed approving them; they tried even in 1441, putting it into a draft where the rest of the council removed it. And yet the opponents were also unable to get language condemning the no-fly zones the US had implemented without authorization; if all else failed, the US could veto that.

Having said all that, what I'm getting to is that while we liberals don't have all the answers, the right has worse problems, IMO. They have the mirror problem - an inability to question the US as doing wrong, the rush to military solutions, the blind arrogance of power which makes enemies slights seem large and their own huge wrongs seem ok.

I guess this is the difficulty of balancing the 'might makes right' rule on the one hand, in which questions of 'right' are not asked and the policies are just to take and kill as your interests demand, and the civilized approach on the other which can raise questions of taking action when it'd be productive.

But I'll mention a few examples of the problem with the right. Note how the OP here has no questions about whether the US wars are *right*; he asks only about the military outcome. This is the sort of thinking in which 2 million vietnamese killed are invisible, while similar behavior by our enemies is called an atrocity.

Today, I read an op-en by a former Bush speechwriter, including this:

Second, no soldier dies in vain who goes to war by virtue of the Constitution he swears to defend. This willingness is called "duty," and it is a price of admission into the highest calling of any free nation--the profession of arms. We have suffered more than 2,300 combat deaths in Iraq so far. Not one was in vain. Not one.

Note how he is just incapable of recognizing the possibility that the president and congress could war for the wrong reasons. He's perfectly able to see any nation who wars against US as in vain - their foolish choice resulted in needless carnage - but not his own side, much less seeing our leaders as killing the other side 'in vain'.

Finally, I'll note the broader trend in the right-wing public to wanting flags in their music, on their cars, on their porches, on their Fox News, on the boxes of food they eat as they pour white milk onto red and blue cereal while humming a patriotic song - the hypnotic seduction of nationalism parading as patriotism.

The syndrome was written about beautifully by Chris Hedges, a war reporter, in his book "War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning", the best titled book I've seen in a long time.

For justice to prevail, better policies need to take place than our current system of so often just using our military might for an interest and trumping up a justification.

What we need is to improve and strengthen the international rule of law, not weaken it. Those who blame the UN now are the types who would give a blind man the sherrif's badge, no gun or jail, telling him to talk people out of committing crimes, and when he gets shot by the first crimnal, saying "See, law and order doesn't work."

The US is not in a position of having to defend itself against being overthrown. Rather than using our great strength to make other nations more secure and increasing the rule of law, we're the most feared nation in the world, seen as the leading threat to world peace by the people of the world while the republicans can't begin to understand the reason.

 

[cwjerome]

Craig234, being able to distinguish a good war from a bad war is a great topic, although something entirely different from what I'm getting at here. I think I can tell the difference, but I'm trying to stay focused on the strategy and tactics of warfare, and not rehash the usual anti-Iraq war diatribes. So for now, the question is how do we wage our wars, not why do we wage our wars. It's obvious you put a lot of time and thought into your post, and I'd like to hear what you have to say concerning the topic.

Take Korea: I don't consider the Korean War a sparkling success. We lost way too many lives fighting a restrained war... and never actually won. All we got was a ceasefire that exists to this day. Meanwhile, the people of North Korea have suffered tremendously for 50 years and there's a dangerous nutcase still in power causing problems. Gulf War One was similar.

I don't think a lot has changed. We still limit our goals and objectives. We still limit our military scope and effectiveness. And then we have to spend a lot of extra time, blood and money because of this. Finally, what we're usually left with in an incomplete resolution (and something we have to continue to deal with for years to come) OR some protracted insurgency-type quagmire... both totatlly self-inflicted.

Of course the insurgency type conflict is a big subject because those are the kinds of conflicts we'll be mostly dealing with a lot in the next few decades. There are currently about 120 active insurgencies around the globe, and this creates a lot of instability. This is why the new COIN FM 3-24 is so troubling. Religious wars and tribal conflicts are immeasurably crueler and tougher to resolve than ideological battles. So why are they basically ignored in the new manual?

Vietnam was bad. What do you do when you help a village build a bridge or help create a crop field and the VC come in and kill a few people as punishment once the Americans leave? Nice gestures and progressive ideals fall short when the other side wields the ultimate bargaining chip of life or death?

Now add these newer dynamics to the mix, and the counterinsurgency issue gets even messier. It's the old hearts and minds concept. Can the US effectively win hearts and minds with kind words and handshakes given the foreign religious, tribal, and cultural aspects of today?

 

[conjur]

Originally posted by: Rainsford
You want to know why the public hasn't reacted to Vietnam and Iraq (undoubtedly the wars you were thinking of) the way it reacted to WWII? Here's a hint, it's not that the people or culture is changing...it's that the WARS are changing. Gone are the WWII like moments of utter clarity, where one side was clearly good and one side was clearly bad...and we were clearly on the right side. Where the other side was the aggressor, attempting to force everyone else to live under their rule and killing everyone who resisted. Where defeat meant the very possible destruction of our way of life. Instead, WWII has been replaced with wars that involve far more occupation than actual fighting, where the threat isn't quite clear, where there is no end in sight and no real reason to care whether or not we reach it, where the only people less committed to the war than the public are the leaders, where our powerful and determined armed forces are treated like the big green police machine, where the entire purpose of the war seems at times to simply prove to the world that we can kick some ass and where the war is a dangerous distraction from the very real problems our government SHOULD be dealing with instead.

I have ZERO doubt in my mind that if we are faced with a WWII situation in the future, EVERY man, woman and child would react with the kind of dedication and will to win that would make the "greatest generation" look like a bunch of peacenik hippies. The enthusiasm and will was never about "winning wars" it was about the REASONS to win the conflict...nobody who's not a sociopath LIKES war or wants to win wars for the sake of winning wars. If you want people to line up behind a conflict, they need some reason to do so.

We really weren't far from that in the days after 9/11. Aside from the hard-core peacenicks, this nation was pretty solidified behind Bush.

 

[PrinceofWands]

Originally posted by: conjur

Originally posted by: Rainsford
You want to know why the public hasn't reacted to Vietnam and Iraq (undoubtedly the wars you were thinking of) the way it reacted to WWII? Here's a hint, it's not that the people or culture is changing...it's that the WARS are changing. Gone are the WWII like moments of utter clarity, where one side was clearly good and one side was clearly bad...and we were clearly on the right side. Where the other side was the aggressor, attempting to force everyone else to live under their rule and killing everyone who resisted. Where defeat meant the very possible destruction of our way of life. Instead, WWII has been replaced with wars that involve far more occupation than actual fighting, where the threat isn't quite clear, where there is no end in sight and no real reason to care whether or not we reach it, where the only people less committed to the war than the public are the leaders, where our powerful and determined armed forces are treated like the big green police machine, where the entire purpose of the war seems at times to simply prove to the world that we can kick some ass and where the war is a dangerous distraction from the very real problems our government SHOULD be dealing with instead.

I have ZERO doubt in my mind that if we are faced with a WWII situation in the future, EVERY man, woman and child would react with the kind of dedication and will to win that would make the "greatest generation" look like a bunch of peacenik hippies. The enthusiasm and will was never about "winning wars" it was about the REASONS to win the conflict...nobody who's not a sociopath LIKES war or wants to win wars for the sake of winning wars. If you want people to line up behind a conflict, they need some reason to do so.

We really weren't far from that in the days after 9/11. Aside from the hard-core peacenicks, this nation was pretty solidified behind Bush.

I disagree. I think a huge number of people were scared to death of Bush (at least most everyone I knew). The nation was solidified against the individual terrorists and plotters responsible.

 

[Gigantopithecus]

Lost the will to fight? Haha. Impose rationing, reinstate the draft, & put military funding at levels approaching what they were in WWII & we'll see how long the 'insurgents' last in Iraq. Too bad our fearless leaders know that if they actually called for the American people to make any real sacrifices to fight this so-called 'war' on 'terror', we'd vote (or impeach) them out of office in a heartbeat.

 

[LegendKiller]

The problem is not the will of the American people, it is the politicians choosing wars without merit.

The real question is this; Do Americans have the will to stop corrupt and non-servile politicians from entering into wasteful and stupid wars that only benefit the politicians and their special interests?

 

[DealMonkey]

Frankly, I'm surprised we haven't yet evolved past the need for war to settle our international agreements.

 

[LegendKiller]

Originally posted by: DealMonkey
Frankly, I'm surprised we haven't yet evolved past the need for war to settle our international agreements.

No, Intelligent Negotiation should have taken care of that, but it hasn't How dare you suggest we evolve...