In brief, you will find that the illogical direction the Pentagon and Department of State have directed this nation’s foreign affairs and military has its roots in the defeat of the United States Military in Vietnam. The Vietnamese used terrain and guerrilla (insurgency) strategy to oppose the US tactical deployment which was organized to fight like a WWII main force enemy. The US fielded a military force of draftees and inexperienced officers to fight a war they did not understand or desire to participate. As the war lingered on, much of it on TV, the American wins were insufficient to continue the support for the war back home. General Westmoreland’s light at the end of the tunnel was fading. President Johnson sent the "A" team into the war to reorganize it under one director, combining all military and civilian personnel into the organization CORDS. This did not help; the tactics only got worse.
With new organization came new tactics, the strategy was the same, that of full military dominance of the population of South Vietnam and total destruction of the North Vietnamese communist government. (As an embarrassment for Russia, I assume). There were two misguided tactics promoted; the first was the "Oil Slick" theory which believed if the military continued to cover more area the security and pacification would spread like oil on water. The trouble with it was the lack of enough military to secure the ever-enlarging perimeter; it often created a safe haven for the enemy.
The second tactic, if I heard once in briefings I heard it 40 times, "Cut the head off the snake and the snake dies." In short, the American strategy for victory in Vietnam was to kill the leaders and anyone who happened to be in the path to the leaders, whether they were soldiers or civilians, government officials or innocent women and children. It is unbelievable the military has continued to this day to deploy resources following this tactic. This is one of the prime reasons the American Military was thrown out of Vietnam in defeat and cannot claim a military victory in any war or deployment since.
Anyone can determine from collective news sites that the "counter" insurgency Afghanistan war is not going well. It is a complex problem that many think is unsolvable. Like the Vietnam War, the government is placing the American military’s mighty and powerful war machinery up against the determined indigenous population that wants no part of the western nation’s controls over them. A lesson that never seems to be learned by Americans is that our culture, style of living, and the constant hammering of our doctrine of government into the lives of Third World populations are not welcome and violently opposed on occasion.
It is impossible to obtain dominance by an outside force, however powerful, without completely destroying the society. This is counterproductive as the world media exploits the results. US Military must be transitioned from belligerent war mongers to keeping peace while actively defending our country. The repercussions of the US military’s failed yet aggressive deployments, from Vietnam to Afghanistan, will bring more violence and even more militarization into the lives of Americans.
Harry Wagner is an 88-year-old veteran of Korea and Vietnam. He worked in Military Intelligence, Psychological Operations, USAID, and the Phoenix Program. He has written a book about his experience in Vietnam; The Headless Snake is available on Amazon. He can be reached by email at peaceteamforward@gmail.com. You can follow his blog peaceteamforward.wordpress.com.
“A lesson that never seems to be learned by Americans is that our
culture, style of living, and the constant hammering of our doctrine of
government into the lives of Third World populations are not welcome and
violently opposed on occasion”
Defeat is because people think this is the lesson you’re supposed to learn.
“Defeat is because people think this is the lesson you’re supposed to learn.”
Is this some kind of Zen koan, or oxymoron, meant to expand our awareness through ambiguity? Seriously, I have no idea what you intended to say here.
See you below post if you want to scratch your head at full on blathering BS.
“our doctrine of government”
That has absolutely nothing to do with anything that has been or is going on in third world countries.
“A lesson that never seems to be learned by Americans is that our
culture, style of living, and the constant hammering of our “economic system” into the lives of Third World populations are not welcome and
violently opposed on occasion.
There, I fixed it for you.
Our military needs transforming due to the fact major players in our economy have hijacked our government(once again) for the sole purpose of exploiting the entire planet for their own personal gain at the expense of everyone else.
“In brief, you will find that the illogical direction the Pentagon and
Department of State have directed this nation’s foreign affairs and
military has its roots in the defeat of the United States Military in
Vietnam.”
The illogical direction has always been driven by industrialists and speculators dating back to this country’s origins.
Please don’t bullshit us by insinuating people in government just get a wild hair up their butt and decide to start a war. Everyone knows all these wars are bought and paid for on K-street or financed through the laughable campaign finance and fake two party system.
After all, this is a “republic”, remember ?? Follow the money and you’ll see where the real problem resides. Our militarism is due to capitalism, one of the most easily corruptible economic systems since communism.
Now guess who won’t allow us to change this corrupt, insufficient, inefficient system….. Once again, just follow the money.
When an economic system relies upon the exploitation of both natural resources and labor for the profit of the few at the expense of the many you end up with an empire that cannot afford to check its own appetite and that will resort to mass murder as it’s main export up until the day it needs to import that mass murder in order to maintain the “system” and it’s royalty.
So you chide the author for blaming government policy—not capitalism itself—for militarism and foreign intervention. In other words, everyone else must see the world through your own particular prism. Has it ever occurred to you that real change can only be effected when people stop dwelling in their ideological citadels, and come together for a common purpose? I would suggest that human behavior is determined by a confluence of factors—not just one single cause.
So in other words you chide me for pointing out that the author is dwelling inside an ideological citadel ?
Then follow up by hypocritically suggest I see the world through your own particular prism.
The confluence of factors may be many but they are still subject to the one economic system that determines behavior more than any other due to the fact basic survival depends upon your economic circumstances.
We all know what the common denominator is here. When the bare necessities of life are not only commoditized, but weaponized to the point of being used for mass murder, you can’t accurately say there is a wide variety of factors that determine that policy.
What determines that policy is the people on top desperately trying to stay on top.
The masses are not marching in the street demanding more inequality and more war.
Why anyone would want to deflect from the fact capital is flowing into our government from all over the world into covert slush funds on K-street whose only motivation is profit, should be the rallying point for anyone searching for a “common cause”.
I could have found this at any socialist website. Was it really too much to expect a little originality?—to encounter ideas not borrowed, but arising from your own nature and experience? How can we have an honest discourse if everything you say is derived from elsewhere?
Still, I must work with the ideas you have chosen to present. In my opinion, the best part of your reply was this: “The confluence of factors may be many but they are still subject to the one economic system that determines behavior more than any other due to the fact basic survival depends upon your economic circumstances.”
A plausible statement, no doubt, but is the truth so simple and straightforward? Is the majority of human behavior actually driven by rational self-interest, or by the desire for mere survival?
If such is the case, then why do so many people act in a manner which is contrary to their personal survival? Of course, suicide is the most obvious example. But consider also the many people who have willingly sacrificed their lives on the alter of some secular or religious ideal. In these cases, at least, ideology or religion can triumph over the instinct for self-preservation.
And while you may claim that such acts are aberrations—something outside the human norm—consider the way many “normal” people actually behave. Is the abuse of alcohol, or other toxic drugs, conducive to self-preservation? Of course, some of this is physical addiction, and yet it’s also manifestation of a self-destructive impulse which drives many people to prolonged suicides. At the same time, we often sabotage our personal relationships, indebt ourselves by purchasing useless items, gamble away money, make absurd financial speculations, and act in many other ways which clearly do not enhance our material well-being.
Finally, consider all the people living in third-world slums who choose to have a large number of children—even when contraception is readily available. Clearly, by creating more mouths to feed, they are not pursuing a course of action which promotes their chances of survival. On the contrary, they make a dire and dismal situation even worse.
Even these few examples are sufficient to show that people act from a large variety of motivations—many of which do not serve a mandate for self-preservation. Hence, while your assertion may appear convincing at first, with further scrutiny the truth becomes far more complex and ambiguous than you wish to present it.
More filibustering ? Why must you use so many fallacies in order to keep changing the subject ?
Thanks for proving my point about the culpability of capitalism though.
Capital markets are based upon the theory of everyone acting as if they are rational. Right there’s your problem sparky.
Like I said, you’ve got an inherently flawed economic system that relies upon exploitation of both resources and labor in order to survive. This is held in place by the very people that refuse to allow any attempt at designing a new system, due to the fact it would end their advantage over the masses.
You haven’t proven anything by saying people lead empty lives, which then contributes to irrational action due to increased competition to pay for the essential things like food, shelter, health care, and energy.
You can blather on as much as you’d like but it’s plain to see all you’re doing is trying to distract and use a straw man argument by utilizing the “socialist” dog whistle to try to dismiss any critique of capitalism. It’s the oldest trick in the book to get out the trusty red baiting rhetoric as an ad hominen attack on anyone that points out class warfare via capitalism.
The fact you would defend a system that has nothing to do with reality only shows your indoctrination to that system.
Trying to say a world wide economic system that relies upon the few putting the many in debt is the fault of the many, or that an economic system cannot be the driving force behind the societal dysfunction and endless wars for profit that are the new norm, can only be due to the delusion that the people that don’t want war and don’t want corruption are at fault or that those who suffer from it.
Once again, blame the victims in order to excuse the excess of the few by insinuating the false narrative that it’s impossible for societal problems to have one cause.
Did you cut and paste this last comment from somewhere else? Not only is it devoid of originality, but the style is so generic that it feels like I am not engaging a real person. Also, I’m not defending capitalism or anything else. Why the need to uphold one particular view of the world with such fervor and tenacity? I’ll leave that for the religious fanatics and secular ideologues. Since you are obviously not receptive to any new ideas, but only desire to maintain what you already believe, I see no point in further discourse. So goodbye, Dave.
Yep, I’d run too if I couldn’t refute the supposition I was attempting to refute with my utter bullshit that I pulled out of my ass and stirred into a word salad that boiled down to “well… it’s complicated”.
Trying to conflate how “original” a position is or the points that support it is just intellectual cowardice.
We need only read your other holier than though smart ass posts to see you’ve confused vocabulary with intellect. Still waiting for an explanation as to how one single cause cannot negatively effect an entire society………….
Every economic system relies on resources and labor. Humans have been waging war since forever and as long as people are in charge of governments they will game the system for advantage. Peace requires an effort to not resort to might, rather than a magic bullet economic system.
And once again that in no way means or proves that an economic system cannot be the cause of societal woes.
You’re in denial that economics can cause perpetual war.
Humans have been practicing economics of one sort or another just as long as we’ve had war.
Every since humans replaced the hunter gatherer way of life and took up farming plants and raising animals “ownership” of land and the raw materials associated with it changed.
And appeal to tradition does not rule out economics as a cause for perpetual mass murder.
Hey Dave, I just found a group for you called “Ideologues Anonymous”. Since it may be against the rules, I won’t post a link here. But I’m sure you could find it with any search engine. Overall, it’s a 12-step program intended to free the mind from the pernicious and asphyxiating influence of an all-encompassing ideology. Within the program, however, everybody is permitted to advance at their own pace. As a new member, you will only be asked to introduce yourself and say, “Hi, my name is Dave and I’m an ideologue”. Best wishes, MR.
Bingo. The author has it exactly right. What astounds me is that intelligent people, civilians and military, continue to buy into this regime change and nation building nonsense.