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**juspimoubbodo** · 02-08-2010, 01:24 PM

Are you saying that the US coudda, shoudda, woudda won the war on Vietnan?

No. You cannot win a war if you cannot reach the enemy. We could reach the Viet Cong, but we couldn't reach the bulk of the NVA, or stop weapons from reaching them from China or the SOviets without sparking a war that wouldn't have been worth it.

The reason the defeat of the Viet Cong by 1970 is so important is because that's essentially what we face in Iraq and Afghanistan. There's no conventional army with modern weapons backing the guerillas up. There's no Russia or China sending them weapons.

I remain unconvinced that the West has to offer more to the Afghanis than the Taliban have

That may just be true. But do you really want to go there? If we can't win their hearts and minds, all that's left to prevent them from sheltering Al Qaeda again is to make them terrified of the consequences if they do.

We do the hearts and minds thing because we don't want to deal with the problem the way we would have 100 years ago.

02-08-2010, 01:24 PM	#16
juspimoubbodo Join Date Nov 2005 Posts 372 Senior Member	Are you saying that the US coudda, shoudda, woudda won the war on Vietnan? No. You cannot win a war if you cannot reach the enemy. We could reach the Viet Cong, but we couldn't reach the bulk of the NVA, or stop weapons from reaching them from China or the SOviets without sparking a war that wouldn't have been worth it. The reason the defeat of the Viet Cong by 1970 is so important is because that's essentially what we face in Iraq and Afghanistan. There's no conventional army with modern weapons backing the guerillas up. There's no Russia or China sending them weapons. I remain unconvinced that the West has to offer more to the Afghanis than the Taliban have That may just be true. But do you really want to go there? If we can't win their hearts and minds, all that's left to prevent them from sheltering Al Qaeda again is to make them terrified of the consequences if they do. We do the hearts and minds thing because we don't want to deal with the problem the way we would have 100 years ago.
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