America at War: A Record of Unparalleled Failure

Started by AllPurposeAtheist, June 12, 2014, 01:55:53 PM

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stromboli

The vast military indusrtrial complex built in WW2 was held over because of the threat of the Soviets. There was a great deal of downsizing prior to Korea, and they had to reverse that to build back up to fight what they envisioned would be a massive war with China and Russia. We have people on here who were stationed in Germany during the Cold War. You can ask them about it. Our whole strategy is built around the idea of a huge unstoppable force, a la WW2, but what we ended up fighting in real life wasn't a mass of Russian tanks and artillery but a bunch of guys in black pajamas-or desert Keffiyah- packing AK-47s. The mindset continues. The B-2 bomber, for all its touted capabilities, is a hugely expensive weapon that sees little real use.

The Russians learned the hard way in Afghanistan. And good ol' boy Ronnie Reagan equipped the Mujahadeen with Stinger missiles to fight that goldurn commie threat, and in so doing ended up empowering the Taliban and Al Queda. Our soldiers are well trained and equipped, but end up fighting ridiculous limited wars they can't win. 


Hakurei Reimu

All of our recent wars were total wars? I didn't realize that I was living in a country whose industry was tooled for a war footing, its resources rationed, and a draft.  :think:

I think you need to go back to your cage, drunkie.
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Solitary

You can't win a war trying to fight an idealist cause. This is something the Christian should learn: no one, or government, can take away their beliefs. Communism is still here, Christianity is, and all the other religions as well as atheism, and no war or government can ever change that, as 6,000+ years of history has shown to be true. How many have died, and will die trying to prove it isn't true? Solitary
There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action.

Hakurei Reimu

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 24, 2014, 04:40:41 PM
It's about what the power zone can afford to do and will do. You don't need to fit a fucking set of conditions just because a 150 year old term gives a definition.
I'm not engaging in a semantics debate with you.

"Total war" does not mean what you want it to mean: a war for which the entire country is mobilized for that war, and one in which â€"according to your own definitionâ€" "a war which is unrestricted in terms of the weapons used, the territory or combatants involved, or the objectives pursued, especially one in which the accepted rules of war are disregarded." Every war post-WWII has left nuclear weapons off the table. Every war post-WWII has had a restricted theater of operation, and its objectives more or less limited, especially post-Vietnam. They are not total wars. No amount of your rhetoric will change that.

We're examining why US wars post-WWII seem to be such failwars. I theorized that was because we were fighting those wars in a specific way using specific terms to describe those type of war: "restricted war" and "total war." You're trying to muddy the issue when you jump in with your rhetorical spew of "Every war is a total war." Sorry, but it isn't true. "Total war" has a definition that distinguishes it from other kinds of wars, your argument from semantics notwithstanding.
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Shiranu

But... but guys... France! LOL Those Frenchies, amirite, always losing wars and running and stuff? Rite? RITE?!?!? LAUGH WITH ME, I'M AMERICAN FRENCH PEOPLE SUCK AT WAR!

For once, I finally find the "Lol french are bad at war!" jokes funny... simply because we are even worse than I thought.
"A little science distances you from God, but a lot of science brings you nearer to Him." - Louis Pasteur

Mandingo

Quote from: Hakurei Reimu on June 24, 2014, 04:04:01 PMI didn't realize that I was living in a country whose industry was tooled for a war footing

That's because you have never lived in a country that wasn't. You wouldn't know the difference if it hit you in the face. But the reality is that the US started some 2 or 3 dozen wars, armed conflicts, and invasions since WWII. So the reality is that the US was and is the de facto aggressor in all of those cases. And the reality is that the US racked up a national debt of 14 TRILLION bucks doing it. Outspending itself royally. That, my friend, is a war economy! Which will come back to bite you. Hard! The US is effectively bankrupt. But blissfully doesn't realize it. Yet. As you so painfully demonstrate.

Nam

Americans realize it, most of them just don't care.

-Nam
Mad cow disease...it's not just for cows, or the mad!

Mandingo

#37
Quote from: Nam on June 24, 2014, 11:53:26 PM
Americans realize it, most of them just don't care.

Until, one day, they wake up in a third world country. A third world country without jobs, without housing, without cars, without hospitals, and without schools for their kids. A miserable third world country.
But then it's going to be waaay too late to reverse that.

Nam

Quote from: Mandingo on June 25, 2014, 12:02:41 AM
Until, one day, they wake up in a third world country. A third world country without jobs, without housing, without cars, without hospitals, and without schools for their kids.
But then it's going to be waaay too late to reverse that.

Elect idiots, you get an idiotic country.

-Nam
Mad cow disease...it's not just for cows, or the mad!

EnvireMental

when realizing USA's enemies' weapons are product of USA, you will get who have won the war already...

of course, winner never be american nation. they will be who dictates(with indirect way) the amerikan nation...

Gawdzilla Sama

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 25, 2014, 04:53:17 AM
But it doesn't fit the military text definitions!
Special definitions, the black holes of forum discussions.
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Mandingo

Quote from: EnvireMental on June 25, 2014, 12:23:41 AM
when realizing USA's enemies' weapons are product of USA, you will get who have won the war already...

In that case it's the USSR that 'won' all those wars, my friend. Start counting the AK-47s!

Quoteof course, winner never be american nation. they will be who dictates(with indirect way) the amerikan nation...

So the multi-billionaires are the winners.
And the taxpayers are the losers.

Jason Harvestdancer

The US cannot win the wars it is in, but that is because of the nature of the wars it is in.  It wages the wars stupidly, and in entirely the wrong way.  William Lind has some great analysis on this with his four generations of modern warfare, starting with the Treaty of Westphalia.

The US could have won a long time ago with the war in Afghanistan or Iraq.  It would have been easy, but to do what is necessary would have destroyed us.  Any of the following would have worked.

1.  Find the general in charge of the war, change his name to "Sherman".  Tell him the locals are Sioux.  Open up settlement to any American that wants to move there.  Give him permission to claim any parcel of land not already claimed by a different American.

2.  Institute a strict militaristic rule in which heavy penalties are meted out for various crimes.  If a US civilian is killed, 3 locals are executed.  If an E1-E3 is killed, 5 locals are executed.  If an E4-E6 is killed, 8 locals are executed.  If an E7-E9 is killed, 12 locals are executed.  If an O1-O3 is killed, 20 locals are executed.  If an O4-O6 is killed, 30 locals are executed.  If an O7 on up is killed, 50 locals are executed.

3.  Kill every male over the age of 15, kill every female over the age of 30.  Offer up all the women from 15 to 30 as wives to any American soldier or settler who wishes to take one and stay. in the

It would destroy what is left of the soul of the US to do any of those, but it would indeed win the war.  Iraq would be completely different, Afghanistan would be completely different, the US would be an evil country, and the rest of the world would hate us.
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Hakurei Reimu

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 25, 2014, 04:51:39 AM
You are arguing semantics yourself and operating under the rhetoric of a very well known specific US made American history.

You cannot just include what you want from a definition and leave the rest to categorise something, because you want to see it that way.
Even though I was using your definition of "total war"? Do you get what I'm saying? Even by your own definition of "total war," America's post-WWII wars don't fit.

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 25, 2014, 04:51:39 AM
That definition does NOT belong to me.  It's not my personal desire to determine its design. Total war is a war which is unrestricted in terms, weaponry meaning which the attack is carried among civilians; to the whole population in an area hospitals, schools...you name it, in an indiscriminated way.
What about weaponry, which is also a part of your "total war" definition â€" like the lack of the afforementioned nukes? What about when those wars never expand beyond the specific country the US was fighting? Remember that US wars during the Cold War were proxy wars; those countries had allies that would be fair targets for a total war doctrine â€" that's a restriction in terms.

As to civilians, troops could hardly be expected to just stand and take it when civilians themselves shoot and throw grenades at them.

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 25, 2014, 04:51:39 AM
There isn't a need of mobilising the whole country and its resources to pursue a total war described above if the aggressor CAN AFFORD TO maintain that war without doing it.
Well, yes. The same war can be a limited war to one party, yet be total war for the other. "Total war" is a term referring to how a particular country is proscecuting their war effort, which can certainly differ from country to country. It has fuck-all to do with the scale of destruction the war causes, or how horrible it turns out to be. It's irrelevant to the term.

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 25, 2014, 04:51:39 AM
As the US policy has done,as US and is allies can afford to. This is not a conspiracy theory, it is the reality we live in a 10 year old kid can get. You just don't go around and say; "oh we didn't need to fit the set of conditions of a total war in book terms, so we didn't fight any total wars." Obviously you can say it. It's a fucking politician line. Propaganda. Fucking lie. Reality doesn't change with stomping your foot down and hiding behind a military text definition.
You seem to be saying that if I don't agree that all war is "total war," then that somehow diminishes the suffering of the victims of our recent wars. It does not.

Quote from: drunkenshoe on June 25, 2014, 04:51:39 AM
No, we are examining how do you perceive your country's recent history, what you can or cannot acknowledge about it in an internet forum conversation.
Go fuck yourself. I acknowledge the fact that our post-WWII wars were horrible things that killed many civilians and caused untold suffering and destruction. However, the topic of this thread is why the US can't seem to win it's recent wars. I only brought up total war as a characterization of how the US was proscecuting its wars, not as a diminishing of the suffering of the US's war victims. This is because, callous as this sounds, this discussion is NOT about the suffering of war victims.

So unless you can explain how the US targeting hospitals and schools (when?) damaged its ability to bring those wars to successful conclusions, you are just listening to yourself talk.
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Mandingo

#44
Quote from: Jason_Harvestdancer on June 25, 2014, 02:38:09 PM
The US cannot win the wars it is in, but that is because of the nature of the wars it is in.  It wages the wars stupidly, and in entirely the wrong way.  William Lind has some great analysis on this with his four generations of modern warfare, starting with the Treaty of Westphalia.

The US could have won a long time ago with the war in Afghanistan or Iraq.  It would have been easy, but to do what is necessary would have destroyed us.  Any of the following would have worked.

1.  Find the general in charge of the war, change his name to "Sherman".  Tell him the locals are Sioux.  Open up settlement to any American that wants to move there.  Give him permission to claim any parcel of land not already claimed by a different American.

FYI: all the land in both the Americas had already been claimed by 'different' Americans millennia ago. So, by your own rules, any other person claiming it in the last 4 centuries was a usurper. A land grabbing robber.
Nothing has changed since.

Quote2.  Institute a strict militaristic rule in which heavy penalties are meted out for various crimes.  If a US civilian is killed, 3 locals are executed.  If an E1-E3 is killed, 5 locals are executed.  If an E4-E6 is killed, 8 locals are executed.  If an E7-E9 is killed, 12 locals are executed.  If an O1-O3 is killed, 20 locals are executed.  If an O4-O6 is killed, 30 locals are executed.  If an O7 on up is killed, 50 locals are executed.

That m.o. has been tried already. Hundreds of times. E.g. in WWII. By those other Nazis.
And in case you missed that too: they lost the war...

Quote3.  Kill every male over the age of 15, kill every female over the age of 30.  Offer up all the women from 15 to 30 as wives to any American soldier or settler who wishes to take one and stay. in the

It would destroy what is left of the soul of the US to do any of those, but it would indeed win the war.  Iraq would be completely different, Afghanistan would be completely different, the US would be an evil country, and the rest of the world would hate us.

They already do, my friend. The rest of the world hates your arrogant, sadistic, gun-slinging, murderous, self-centred, and egotistical guts. With a vengeance. But since Americans are not in touch with reality they keep dreaming that they are the envy of the world.