Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I would say the Korean War was the last war that had a positive outcome for the US. (The Gulf War was a victory, but the stakes were not as high.)
Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan all became quagmires which hurt US interests more than they helped. Small scale operations like Grenada and Panama are more like police actions.
The great power conflicts of recent history such as the Soviet war in Afghanistan and the Russian war in Ukraine are even more lopsidedly in the negative column.
It seems with international economic integration and communication, that the public is losing its stomach to wage wars on others. For a national leader, starting a war now has more downside than upside.
Of course for some that is the whole point, the cessation of war and its replacement with consensus police actions. An example of a consensus police actions is the US Navy's guarantee of piracy-free international shipping.
I’d say war is basically always counterproductive save for those times when you’re literally being invaded. War sucks.
My observation is the exact opposite.
War is business as usual, an immensely profitable business, except in cases of existential threat.
So, for the most part, productive for whom? Victory for whom?
Iraq II and Afghanistan were immensely profitable. Ukraine is immensely profitable.
IMMENSELY.
Stop thinking of the military as an instrument of defense for an entire nation, which is merely an abstract concept, or of a single country in an inter-government network in which legality is dubious at best.
The military is mostly an instrument of business, worth hundreds of billions annually, in the hands of relatively few.
Fortunately in the US the average person can share a little bit in those profits through trading shares in military industrial companies listed on the stock market, among other trickle-down mechanisms.
No draft, no protests, the big dogs get meat, the little ones get crumbs, everybody is satisfied.
What do you consider the alternative? Do you assume all other world leaders and dictators have the same feelings as you? Is the whole world going to sit in a circle and sing Kumbaya?
What do you consider the alternative? Do you assume all other world leaders and dictators have the same feelings as you? Is the whole world going to sit in a circle and sing Kumbaya?
Obviously you need a defense force.
But hard power, as a policy choice, is becoming less useful. Global opinion usually sides with the defender/underdog, even in the country that is the aggressor/big dog.
It's becoming foolish to start wars, because they undermine the goal you are trying to achieve.
War is counterproductive until you lose and the losers start hearing the lamentations of their women to paraphrase Conan the Barbarian.
I'm using the term in the way Clausewitz used it, war as politics by other means.
As a policy tool war is losing its effectiveness. It's still necessary as long as laggard state actors still try to use it, but eventually it will dawn on all states that war is no longer effective.
At that point militaries become police forces guarding against non-state actors like terrorists.
War is a racket as Smedley said. I took an American economic history class decades ago and a lady told the class that her grandparents made a small fortune in the black market during WWI. My great uncle was permanently disabled by mustard gas in France. Some make money while many others are killed or crippled.
Most of the post WWII wars we have fought were based on the fantasy that the US has some holy mission to save the world from oppression. WWII was fought because a clear and present enemy attacked us and was a threat to our country.
Our political and military leaders seem to embark on military action without much forethought and never consider an endgame. Safe and sound in the Pentagon and White House once things go downhill they keep going to protect their reputations while the enlisted men and junior officers die in pointless combat.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
