The way we've squandered our initial successes in both theaters, I'd say he's right. Remember the treatment of a battalion commander, who having successfully performed his assignments during the move on Iraq then, as ordered, transformed his 700-person artillery battalion into infantry/MP footsloggers for patrold and residence searches, and did so without any fatalities among his unit, right up until the time that he was charged with a war crime and relieved of his command.
Both of these judgements are wrong and nothing anyone says by way of empirical evidence changes his judgment.
Could be Yon is noticing parallels with previous militarily successful counterinsurgencies [Algeria, Vietnam, Rhodesia] that became defeats via political sellouts. And he accurately sees another coming.
I think your conclusion is Yon's problem. He sees Vietnam coming.
I translate this as-- he will interpretively help it come along.
I think Afghanistan and Iraq have been catastrophic successes.
The anti war fools that dominate our discourse have suffered and absolutely stunning set of defeats. The easy roll back of the Taliban and the paper tiger army of Saddam has left the anti military culture of our time mad as hell.
Consequently, we are treated to the most absurd exaggerations of failure in these theaters in order to re establish the war is hopeless hell meme.
Carl Levin, the lead Dem in the Senate said a minimum of 10,000 US troops would die in the first six months of taking Bagdad.
That was just a shade wrong.
Al Qaeda promised to establish an Islamic Western office in the nation state of iraq. Now they have a four percent approval rating among the Iraqi public and they are getting whipped by everone from Anbar chieftains to Sunni Baathists of Bagdad.
The fact that mistakes have been made by the US are hardly as interesting as the COMPLETE FAILURE to report the crushing defeats of our enemies in AFghanistan and Iraq and the unsurpassed heroism of our American troops in achieving these victories.
Michael Yon can get a clue and start acknowledging the HEROISM that forms a thread of success. He does not need to supply the desperate subtext of Vietnam. It ain't there-- except for Al Qaeda. Mark my words, Iraq was Al Qaeda's Vietnam. They are done for.