[Madjostok]

Do you go under the name PP on CFC?

[xFZ3k8Mw]

In other words, here's a bitter pill to swallow, we've been defeated. Maybe some people have higher expectations, but who beat us? Al Qaeda? Hardly, they wont inherit Iraq - once we leave they become unwelcome agitators with quite a few people already mad as hell at them. We went in to remove Saddam and we did, now its up to the Iraqis to settle their differences. And surely we didn't lose to the warring factions, they're losing every day this continues.

[cQT6nmEc]

I'm a believer in the Cronkite bit. That was a desperate gamble on the part of the North. A great last effort which depended on American public opinion to succeed. In fact there was no reason to launch the attack otherwise since there was no chance of military success anywhere. Nice post though. The way they throw in the word 'gooks' to nail the point home.

[cigsstorenick]

Originally posted by Lancer
I'm a believer in the Cronkite bit. That was a desperate gamble on the part of the North. A great last effort which depended on American public opinion to succeed. In fact there was no reason to launch the attack otherwise since there was no chance of military success anywhere. Nice post though. The way they throw in the word 'gooks' to nail the point home.

If anything the protesters actually extended the war. Every time there was a big protest then the WW2 generation got pissed off at "the dirty hippies" and actually rallied back to Nixon. For proof just look at how Nixon won a landslide in 1972. I think he carried something like 48 of 50 states.

The protesters were not just ineffective but they were counter productive actually turning people against their cause.

[BqTyG9eS]

Originally posted by Berzerker
who beat us? Iran, Syria, Russia, China, France,...

[BeaseHoca]

It is when "who beat us" is a retort to "we lost"

[irrelaAnnekly]

Germany sucks so bad it's hard to say that they won anything.

[pkxlugbsbv]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
Germany sucks so bad it's hard to say that they won anything. It's not like Canada was ever relevant at all. At least we could start a bunch of wars.

[I9dydJrX]

Excellent and incite full thread

I've started to notice this stab in the back interpretation of Vietnam become more popular following the First Desert storm which gave the "we are invincible" macho-ism a major jolt. Its also paralleled the rise of conservatives in the US as they gain political power their interpretation of history increasingly shades debate on the subject. Its interesting to see how history can be re-written by merely changing interpretations and connotations, hard historical events don't need to be altered in an Orwellian ministry of truth fashion.

[jamisi]

I think the interesting question here, is "myth one". IE, did we lose, or did Iraq give up the chance we gave them? Both arguments have a lot of validity to them, and more to the point both arguments are quite accurate in their own way.

Personally I straddle the line a little bit. I was one of the ones, back in 2002, who knew exactly what was going to happen - to the T - and my brother (at the time, a 101st airborne soldier about to be deployed) can back me up on that. I basically told him that the "army vs army" war would be easily won, but that if Saddam was smart, he would just have the army hold us off for a short while until the rest have a chance to merge into the population and fight a guerrilla war. The war would then take years, and either Saddam or someone else (Al Sadr, etc.) would continue to fight us from the homes and the countryside for years later. I never felt we would actually win the war, without actually imposing a far stricter martial law than we were prepared to impose (or capable of imposing). It would have taken around 2 million troops to manage what I was thinking.

However, knowing all that, I am not sure I would not have gone in anyway. I still supported the decision, although I was mightily concerned about the vision of the leadership. (Of course the soldiers in the ranks won't know the details, but they were kept even more in the dark then I'd hoped.) The ultimate question that I could not satisfactorily deny is, is it better to have a group of diverse and poorly integrated ethnic groups in a situation where they will probably fight a bloody war against one another, or to have a dictator who is capable of integrating them through fear and power but is also quite willing to use said power to do awful things to people?

Basically, is Tito a hero or a villain? Is it better to murder thousands to keep the peace and keep those thousands from murdering each other? It's a very deep question, and is not easily answered. Personally I feel it is not okay, and thus would prefer a different regime in Iraq to Saddam's; but the way we did it wasn't the way to do it, obviously.

However, if anyone has a better way to accomplish said regime change, please give me (or better yet, give George) a call... after all, look what happened to Yugoslavia.

Personally I'm all for splitting up Iraq, but the problem with that is you still have to uproot millions of people. That combined with the fact that Shiites and Sunnis aren't separate ethnicities, but simply separate religions essentially, and religions that share enough in common that it's simple to 'convert' from one to the other - I've read that it happens all the time, especially in Baghdad - that it's probably not going to work out that way.

My guess is we'll just have to wait it out. The reason we're there now is to make sure someone we like wins the power race, and not some Al Quaeda frontman. I'm not sure why the fighting isn't dying down slowly - or maybe it is, and the media just isn't reporting it that way - but eventually it should slow down, and things settle a bit. I suspect we'll have to live with a charismatic leader eventually, and not have a perfect democracy ... but that is better than what they had, as long as it is still a democracy.

[favwebbb]

I believe that Turkey has started working more with the Kurds... Or at least I read something to that affect recently.

JM

[VINPELA]

Get Turkey to accept Kurdistan, and go even further as being a guarantor of Kurdistan, on the condition that the Kurds accept the current border with Turkey.

[TpDoctorOneTp]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
that the Tet Offensive was actually proof we were winning, and Charlie was desperate Well it did destroy the Viet Cong as an effective fighting force for the rest of the war. No, it didn't though it most certainly did hurt them for several years. I not that the Vietcong did continue to engage the Americans though instead of continuing with costly full frontal assaults they went back to hit and go tactics. Rather then destroying them as an effective fighting force it merely reinforced that they couldn't go toe to toe with the US Army and so guerrilla warfare was the favored tactic.

[Allbrunette]

Originally posted by Oerdin


They beat the French in the Franco-Prussian war and they were a big factor in the end to the Napoleanic period. Of course both times it was against the French. I was actually talking about since WWII

[V8V8V8]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I believe that Turkey has started working more with the Kurds... Or at least I read something to that affect recently.

JM Make no mistakes about this. Turkey will go to war against a Kurdish Free State because 40% of its population along with 40% of its territory would want to secede to join it. The Turks have fought for 25 years to prevent that and they've been so indoctrinated that they'd likely fight for another 25 years if they thought they could prevent it. That's the lessons Turkey learned from the collapse of the Ottoman Empire; never give up territory no matter how much suffering must go to stop it.

Turkey can accomplish that because Turks really believe that and they'd support a military over throw of the government to accomplish that. Western Democracies would attempt to find a less expensive and less bloody compromise but if a government is determined enough and doesn't care about the human cost then it can be done. Witness Communist China, Soviet Russia during the civil war, turkey, and a host of others.

[LoisCampon]

Iran, Syria, Russia, China, France,... Iran is about to get invaded, or bombed... Syria will then be alone, and without highly desired resources - which is why they'll be alone France? They just elected an anti-Muslim immigrant candidate...

And if you buy into the bigger picture, we're surrounding the Middle East with bases and pipelines will be going westward from the Caspian, not thru Afghanistan and Pakistan which benefits China more.

It is when "who beat us" is a retort to "we lost" Lost what? Seems to me we got what we wanted, enhanced presence, a battlefield for terrorists to engage both our military and Iraqis, and the gratitude of millions of Iraqis. Sure, our continued presence and the violence are wearing thin, but once Iraq stabilizes - and it will - we will have a much more friendly country in Iraq.

[BronUVT]

We dont live in a world without Iraq, first things first... We'd get the least amount of international guff by invading Iraq, but Iran is next and we'll see the shift toward war

iran is building nukes...Iran in building nukes... IRAN IS BUILDING NUKES!!! Repeat and swallow until a majority is either supportive or apathetic about attacking Iran...

[hereiamguy]

Originally posted by Oerdin


Won't happen. Every Kurd I met in Iraq was endowed with the same nationalist propaganda that Kurdistan must one day be united instead of divided under Turkish, Iraqi, Syrian, and Iranian rule. Some even added in places like Armenia and Azerbaijan to their list because some small fraction of the population was ethnic Kurd. They really, really, really want to unify the county they see as under foreign occupation. You can dream.

[reaciciomarep]

Well, considering I can't trust you to accurately depict the political situation in your own country, I doubt I'll take your word for what is possible or not in an area of the globe that is full of people you believe to be barely deserving of the word barbaric.

[Immarsecice]

Originally posted by Oerdin
They really, really, really want to unify the county they see as under foreign occupation. They'll end up envying the Armenians.