Posted on 11/28/2006 7:27:16 AM PST by areafiftyone
Sen. John McCain says the Vietnam War taught a generation of U.S. leaders two lessons, both of them ignored in Iraq.
* You must have the public’s support to wage war.
* Use overwhelming force while waging it.
“We seem to have forgotten them in the conduct of this conflict and it’s costing us an enormous amount – not just in Iraq but all over the world,” said the likely Republican presidential candidate in 2008. He is joined by three other veterans, including Washington fixture Jack Valenti, on a HOTSOUP.com Hot Issues panel about the Iraq-Vietnam parallels.
McCain supported the Iraq war, but has criticized the Bush administration’s planning and execution. While calling for more U.S. troops in Iraq, the former Vietnam prisoner of war has implied that he’d prefer immediate withdrawal to a politically motivated staggered pull-out. “What I cannot do is ask (a U.S. soldier) to return to Iraq, to risk life and limb, so that we might delay our defeat for a few months or a year,” McCain said in a Nov. 16 address.
(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...
Sadly. I think McCain is still in Saigon, in his mind...
However, McCain forgot to mention the lesson about politicians not running a war from Washington, DC.
Gee, Abe Lincoln only had it half right in 1864-1865, according to McCain.
Not since WWII have we declared war, but it has been weighing on me that perhaps we ought to revert back to the Constitutional model and not undertake major actions without a congressional declaration of war. I know that is unlikely to happen, as the constitution has been ignored since WWII and we have been more or less at war every few years since then....even so, it might be a good idea. Once congress declares war, then it is not the President's War. Is is both parties' war. The American people will be much more likely to get behind and stay behind that sort of effort. What we have here is sort of the worst of all possible worlds.
McPain is ALL OVER THE PLACE on this war. What day is it?
How do you think this would have changed things? The Democrats overwhelming supported action against Iraq. At the first sign of trouble they ended up shrieking like the Nancy Boys they are. I can't believe they would have stood behind a declaration of war any more than they did the vote for regime change or military action in Iraq. I think a declaration of war would just make Conservatives feeeeeeel better. It wouldn't at all make Democrats act better.
I have thought since 9/12/2001 that Congress should have been convinced by GWB to formally declare war against every entity on the State Dept.'s Designated Terrorist List, as well as their state and private supporters both here and abroad.
The list includes organizations such as Shining Path and the Tamil Tigers, but we would have taken no requisite obligation to attack them while maintaining a national and international focus on smashing all of the Muslim Nazis from the very outset.
The Constitution places no particular limits on who or what may be the target of a formal Declaration Of War.
This is the MOST important lesson forgotten by almost EVERYONE. There's also a lesson about not letting the media define the war without severe fact checking. TET anyone? Walter Cronkite anyone? Sy Hirshman anyone?
As I said in a previous post. I think a declaration of war would just make Conservatives feeeeeeel better. It wouldn't at all make Democrats act better.
There's just one problem. War's become too politicized for that to work. Unless a party holds both the House and The Presidency, there'll only be endless political hoohah over going to war. It would probably only make going to war even more of a political headache.
What lesson would that be? Perhaps how to cut and run, making way for a bloodbath to follow the totalitarian takeover?
STFU, McLame. You and your buds in the press have made sure that the public would not support this war.
I agree. When critters can hide behind the fact that they only voted to "authorize" the President's actions, instead of explicitly declaring war, they can then speak as if the President dropped the ball and its all on his shoulders.
Yup, the fourth estate is the fifth column.
McCain has a point. Sherman, for instance, marched from Tennessee to Atlanta, from Atlanta to Savannah, from Savannah into S.C., while Grant pounded away on Lee relentlessly in Virginia. Brutal, yes, but after that the enemy didn't have the will to carry on as guerrillas or anything else. The lesson: Totally defeat the enemy FIRST, and then worry about the rebuilding.
(Sorry neo-confeds, but the strategy worked...and it still would.)
McPain_in_the_poopa strikes again!
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