Quote:
Originally Posted by pmulcahy11b
A prime example of that was the air war against Vietnam.
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Good point!
Tangentially, it's funny how we lost sight of the lessons that came out of Vietnam at the strategic level. The leaders who fought and won Desert Storm believed in applying overwhelming force AND having an exit strategy. We won the conventional parts of Iraq and Afghanistan, but we had no exit strategies. We got stuck fighting another pair of Vietnams, despite our advances in technology, tactics, and troop handling. We had no idea what it would take to win the peace in either place because we had no idea that Western democracies wouldn't spring out fully grown like Athenas from the heads of the respective Zeuses. Tactical aircraft for strategic bombing, mechanized units for peacekeeping, riflemen for nation-building. Oy!