Putting aside small brush fire engagements (i.e., Grenada, Panama, etc.), they've all been either "Die-for-a-tie" or "win-all-the-battles-but-lose-the-war" type situations (Korea, Vietnam). Perhaps this made marginally more sense during the Cold War, with the Soviet nuclear arsenal threatening to engulf the world, but that threat ended de facto in 1989 and de jure in 1991.
I remember about a year ago when I expressed the sentiment in several threads that Fallujah should be leveled for both tactical and strategic reasons: tactical to destroy the insurgents and their fellow travelers in a sympathetic environ, and strategic to send a harsh, loud and clear message that the United States was done with fighting wars on the "limited" model, and back to the 1945 version of waging conflict: we win, you lose, period, a la the campaigns we waged against Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Imperial Japan. I was flamed to cinders, accused of being a troll, a liberal (!), and so on.
Here we are a year later, and as I'm sitting here typing this the newscaster in the background is saying that a group of Marines were ambushed, with six K.I.A. and many more wounded today...in Fallujah.
Rant now officially *OFF*.
Well said AJC. I couldn't agree more.
And a fine rant it was.
In referance to Korea, I recall reading this story a couple of years ago. A group of Korean war vets retunred the the ROK, they were asking themselves "Why'd we fight this war?". They were on a tour bus going through Seoul on the way to the DMZ, they got stuck in traffic, they looked out and saw a bunch of kids on a playground. Then they knew why they fought that war, so those kids didn't have to live like the kids in North Korea.
(IMO) WWII is the wrong war to look at when thinking about the GWOT. The Cold War is the correct model. Think of this as 1947-8.
AMEN! We seem to have lost our will as a nation. :-(
My most realistic hope is the Iraqi army will come more and more on line and will fight like the other armies in the region, with the gloves off.