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Vietnam... If fought today

Rakewell

Rakewell

Platinum Member
Been watching Vietnam in HD this week. Fantastic series.

Which got me thinking,

What if this war were fought today? I.E., our modern military -vs- the army of '65-'75.

Would the "search and destroy" mentality still be used? Would there be less boots on the ground? Would airborne intel successfully penetrate the jungle environment/VC?

Discuss.

Oh, and PLEASE:

This is just a thread to discuss tools and tactics in this jungle theater. No political discussion. (That's why I'm posting here, and not P&N.)
 
Take Iraq. Replace buildings with trees.

We get the same thing, except possibly a bit less willingness to wipe out civilian villages.
 
Same result. You can't fight a war without the will to win. We'd still be pussies too afraid to escalate things lest the big bad Chinese get involved. So we'd half-ass it and we'd lose.
 
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I could be wrong but I think the ability to see heat signatures would make it a completely different war.
 
The focus of military action is on command and control now, so Hanoi would have been a primary target. I don't know enough about to comment beyond that.
 
If you are going to fight it today, why give one side present tech/tactics and the other side past tech/tactics? Thats like saying, what if the Nazis fought the Red Coats? Who would win?


My guess is that we would just carpet bomb/bunker bust the enemy strong holds.
 
SithSolo1 said:
If you are going to fight it today, why give one side present tech/tactics and the other side past tech/tactics? Thats like saying, what if the Nazis fought the Red Coats? Who would win?


My guess is that we would just carpet bomb/bunker bust the enemy strong holds.
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Tried that in vietnam. Didn't work.

BTW, the reason we didn't "win" vietnam is because the local populace DID NOT SUPPORT US! On the whole, the Vietnamese people voted FOR communism and the US didn't want another communist nation, so they stepped in, declared the vote a fraud and thus got is into the quagmire.
 
Broad use of carpet bombing, napalm, and the defoliation projects would probably not be allowed because of the public outcry.
 
Here is perhaps better question. What if we had the exact same military equipment today, and the war was fought, but with today's military doctrine?
 
Josh123 said:
I could be wrong but I think the ability to see heat signatures would make it a completely different war.
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The abilities of thermal imaging systems are over-exaggerated. The Vietnam heat, humidity, and vegetation will rendered that tech useless most of the time.
 
Simple guess is a similar result except the public wouldn't allow it to last as long as it did.

The jungle is still the jungle and without boots on the ground down there to root out the extremely self sufficient and hardy NVA troops, you will not win anything.
 
feralkid said:
What if Napoleon had used Abrams Tanks to invade Russia?
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Depends, can Russia muster 10,000 horsemen?

Back on topic, air superiority would be a given. Playing by the rules of the day, about the only thing that I could see changing is lower causalities for our side. What I could see be game changing is Special Ops. Current gen SpecOps would be ideal to combat the guerrilla tactics of that war. Blackhawks and Apaches would work better as air cavalry than the Hueys if that kind of mobility was still used.
 
I bet that we would be killing VC wholesale with drone strikes, with much fewer US casualties.

We wouldn't need many boots on the ground, either... Just a carrier group to launch air strikes, and then a quick amphibious launch to mop things up.
 
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