The Long Crisis

Posts Tagged ‘President Obama’s war’

As a US Vietnam veteran I saw for myself how careless the American military machine was in “protecting” the people we were supposed to be helping. No one knows for sure how many Vietnamese we dispatched to an early grave but it was probably between 2,000,000 to 3,000,000, the vast majority of them civilians. The tonnage of bombs that we dropped on that small Asian nation was more than all of the bombs dropped in World War Two.

The justification for the massive cost of the war in blood and treasure was based upon the absurd assertion that the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong were a clear and present danger to the security of the United States. What complete nonsense. Pure BS is a better description and all but the most rabid of the troops who served in Vietnam for more than a month or two knew it.

The Vietnamese were first of all dedicated nationalists fighting a war to reunite the two Vietnams that emerged by decree of the allies after World War Two while the US mistook the war effort by the VC to be the first step in expanding communism across SE Asia. This misreading by US leadership as to the intentions of the Viet Cong cost the US and the Vietnamese people dearly. One clear fact is that in both Vietnam and Afghanistan the US threw its support to corrupt and inefficient governments while losing the support of the general population.

It seems that US “leaders” have learned nothing from the Vietnam experience. In Afghanistan Obama is making the same sort of claims that were made so many years ago by Johnson and Nixon about the critical nature of the Vietnam War to American security. Obama is saying that a rag tag group of probably no more than 20,000 Taliban fighters, who want foreign troops out of their country and the right to install their form of government in their own country, are a grave threat to the security of the US. The Taliban, while certainly fanatics with a style of governing that is harsh, are a local organization, not an international terrorist group.

The Bush position, now adopted and promoted by President Obama, that if the Taliban win they will give al Queda secure bases in Afghanistan from which to plot further attacks upon the US just doesn’t make sense. If we are so concerned about al Queda bases why don’t we take on al Queda in Somalia or Yemen? No matter what Dick Cheney may say the Taliban are not al Queda; in fact the Taliban considers al Queda fighters as unwanted foreigners much as they look upon US troops as unwanted foreigners. Today Al Queda is no more welcome in Afghanistan than American and NATO forces and have almost no presence in the country.

As with Vietnam the frequent use of air power by the America military and the resulting “collateral” damage to civilians is one reason that Americans are far less welcome in Afghanistan than they were eight long years ago. While the military has promised to be “more careful” in calling in air strikes the occasional bombing of peasant villages, wedding parties, and funeral processions along with the initial denials of such acts by the military until evidence of the destruction pours in, only gives strength to the Taliban. Afghanistan is really a war that American can not win. President Obama is a smart guy and deep down must know that. Or judging from his actions maybe not.

I’m very disappointed in President Obama for adopting the same mantle of hubris, arrogance, and fuzzy thinking that has kept the US mired in one war after another since World War Two. By escalating the Afghanistan War into the Af-Pak theater Obama stands a very good chance of reaping a completely unmanageable set of unintended consequences that will hasten America’s fall from status as a first rate world power.

Sadly, the refusal to admit mistakes seems to be a requirement to become President of the United States. Presidents seem to be so fearful of “losing” any war on their watch that they are willing to continue on and escalate a path of destruction even when they know the probability of a favorable outcome is poor to none.

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