Dumb war question

When I was a kid in Oklahoma, it was Supper.
When I moved to Texas, it was Dinner

But also everything became coke (Not that kind @eman1200)

Speaking of coke, I miss the monkey.
 
Sac Arrow said:
We didn't make the mistakes of the Soviets - we weren't defeated militarily. We just severely overestimated the will and desire of the local people to be free of the Taliban.
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Im not sure how you define defeat. The USSR never controlled the country as a whole. Neither did the USA. So arguably neither won in Afghanistan. If you don’t win, you lose.

USSR did suffer a lot more loses significantly attributable to US involvement. Something USA did not have to deal with.

And USSR itself arguably fell apart in part due to Afghanistan involvement.

However, when USSR pulled out(pretty orderly), the government they left behind survived another 2 years or so. Not so much for USA. We went to get rid of Taliban, it was ruling the country before we could even leave(not exactly very orderly).

Winning every battle is pretty meaningless if you lose the war at the end
 
genna said:
...,Winning every battle is pretty meaningless if you lose the war at the end
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Perhaps the concept of losing is the fault. The idea of it seems to be the driving force of the escalation of war. It's okay when you've just got your fists but when you have a million men armed with a million weapons to kill another army of a million men it gets pretty complicated. Do I really hate that guy I'm about to kill who is trying to kill me so I can't kill him?
 
genna said:
Im not sure how you define defeat. The USSR never controlled the country as a whole. Neither did the USA. So arguably neither won in Afghanistan. If you don’t win, you lose.

USSR did suffer a lot more loses significantly attributable to US involvement. Something USA did not have to deal with.

And USSR itself arguably fell apart in part due to Afghanistan involvement.

However, when USSR pulled out(pretty orderly), the government they left behind survived another 2 years or so. Not so much for USA. We went to get rid of Taliban, it was ruling the country before we could even leave(not exactly very orderly).

Winning every battle is pretty meaningless if you lose the war at the end
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Well, I would argue that we generally -did- control Afghanistan as a whole, it just wasn't sustainable. Obviously the Taliban and AQ hadn't been eliminated but they were kept in check. I supposed it just depends on who you ask. We pulled out because we can't remain there for eternity. The Soviets pulled out because they were incurring unacceptable losses.

The biggest miscalculation was that the people were willing, in general, to subject themselves to rule under a centralized government, which hadn't been the case there in thousands of years. Right now, as we speak, the Taliban more or less control the government that has been set up. My guess is after a couple years it will revert to the status quo it has always been. Pick your local tribal warlord for protection and back them up.

Our withdrawal was necessary and should have been done far sooner than it was. But it was completely, entirely botched. If it were me, I'd keep coalition troop strengths high to defend Bagram and Kandahar, conduct an orderly evacuation of equipment, then pull the troops out lastly. Now every third Taliban carries an M4 and they drive around in armored vehicles. I doubt they have the technical expertise and support to maintain the helicopters left behind in a flyable status for very long, but we sure could use those Hawks in other places.

I agree 100% that winning battles is meaningless if you lose the war at the end. I've talked with lots of deployed troops and contractors. I have yet to meet one that thought the ANA had a single chance in hell of being successful on their own. The outcome was predictable.
 
Sac Arrow said:
The biggest miscalculation was that the people were willing, in general, to subject themselves to rule under a centralized government, which hadn't been the case there in thousands of years. Right now, as we speak, the Taliban more or less control the government that has been set up. My guess is after a couple years it will revert to the status quo it has always been. Pick your local tribal warlord for protection and back them up.
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Aka the lessons we did not learn from Soviets and British. Or Vietnam for that matter. My point was that this was always an asymmetrical war. We controlled where we had presence. We can't be everywhere. Or forever as you said

Soviets actually had a pretty good success at controlling the Afghanistan(albeit with completely different methods and a lot more cruelty) early on until Stingers came on the scene. Again, something US caused and did not have to worry about. Technology and capabilities have change in 40 years as well.

I do agree with most of everything you said, btw. We should have left long ago. Killing OBL should have probably been the end of our involvement there. This was the main and only objective we achieved or could have hope to achieve there(even if it happened in Paki).
 
I saw a documentary about Afghanistan years ago, it may have been the Soviet era and one segment showed this group of men on a mountaintop with an artillery gun of some sort. They were just sitting around on a rug talking and drinking tea then, after a while they got up, sauntered over to the gun, loaded a round and fired it. After that they just went back to the rug and continued drinking tea and chatting. It just seemed like an odd state of war. One that no one was in any particular hurry to conclude. Like they just wanted it to continue on that way forever.

When we left they grabbed all of the leftover weapons and uniforms and dressed up like some sort of elaborate cosplay convention and I was thinking - we're gone, the war is over, who are you getting ready to fight? I don't think they want the war to be over.
 
Bill said:
I think it comes from Californians. Everywhere else it would be "interstate 5", or "interstate 405" or "us highway 101", but in California it's "the 5", "the 405", and "the 101."
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That’s a SoCal thing.
May come from usage with “the Ventura highway” “the arroyo seco freeway” “the San Diego freeway” etc.
generally refer to hwy one, I80, etc, without the article, elsewhere in the state
 
One more thing about those MiGs we almost helped them get. Since the Russians mostly own the sky, seems if they did ever get them they’d be destroyed in short order anyway. At the very least they could render any airfield unusable.

Then we know what would happen if they were based out of the country.
 
Sac Arrow said:
Well, I would argue that we generally -did- control Afghanistan as a whole, it just wasn't sustainable. Obviously the Taliban and AQ hadn't been eliminated but they were kept in check. I supposed it just depends on who you ask. We pulled out because we can't remain there for eternity. The Soviets pulled out because they were incurring unacceptable losses.

The biggest miscalculation was that the people were willing, in general, to subject themselves to rule under a centralized government, which hadn't been the case there in thousands of years. Right now, as we speak, the Taliban more or less control the government that has been set up. My guess is after a couple years it will revert to the status quo it has always been. Pick your local tribal warlord for protection and back them up.

Our withdrawal was necessary and should have been done far sooner than it was. But it was completely, entirely botched. If it were me, I'd keep coalition troop strengths high to defend Bagram and Kandahar, conduct an orderly evacuation of equipment, then pull the troops out lastly. Now every third Taliban carries an M4 and they drive around in armored vehicles. I doubt they have the technical expertise and support to maintain the helicopters left behind in a flyable status for very long, but we sure could use those Hawks in other places.

I agree 100% that winning battles is meaningless if you lose the war at the end. I've talked with lots of deployed troops and contractors. I have yet to meet one that thought the ANA had a single chance in hell of being successful on their own. The outcome was predictable.
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“Control” as in direct influence or power over? Nah, we didn’t have that. To have that would essentially mean to win the war.

I’ve said it a million times. Both Iraq and Afghanistan were unwinable because for the most part, we were fighting insurgents and not the host government. With an adversary with a poorly organized command structure, who’s gonna be the one that steps up and surrenders? That’s the problem with asymmetrical warfare. The military can’t bring the opposition to the table. Only a political intervention can do that.

Now if you look at OEF / OIF from a military objective of winning battles, or kill ratios, we won on both accounts. We went where we wanted, when we wanted. Once an occupying force has achieved that in war, that’s all you can really ask for from your military. After that, it’s up to the politicians.
 
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Velocity173 said:
“Control” as in direct influence or power over? Nah, we didn’t have that. To have that would essentially mean to win the war.

I’ve said it a million times. Both Iraq and Afghanistan were unwinable because for the most part, we were fighting insurgents and not the host government. With an adversary with a poorly organized command structure, who’s gonna be the one that steps up and surrenders? That’s the problem with asymmetrical warfare. The military can’t bring the opposition to the table. Only a political intervention can do that.

Now if you look at OEF / OIF from a military objective of winning battles, or kill ratios, we won on both accounts. We went where we wanted, when we wanted. Once an occupying force has achieved that in war, that’s all you can really ask for from your military. After that, it’s up to the politians.
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Agreed.
 
It's possible for a modern nation to win at asymmetrical warfare. We pretty much invented it. It's a simple, step by step process. But it comes at a really high price, and the morality of it is a bit tough to justify. Once you've done it, you wait about 100 years, then you run highways through the land.

You can call them I-40, 70, 80, and 90 east-west, and I-15, 25 and 35 north-south.

If we're not willing to do the above, and I don't think there is ever any reason to, then we shouldn't be there. Occupation forces are only supposed to be around to facilitate a transition from a bad government to a good one. If that isn't likely to happen, then the only rational plan is to just leave. Permanent occupation isn't moral, in my view, and we're not suited to it as a nation, in my opinion. Freedom sometimes means letting people be miserable while they sort out their own crap, and some groups will never, ever do that.
 
SFDukie said:
That’s a SoCal thing.
May come from usage with “the Ventura highway” “the arroyo seco freeway” “the San Diego freeway” etc.
generally refer to hwy one, I80, etc, without the article, elsewhere in the state
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The Brits use the same convention when referring to highways. They probably have been doing it longer than the residents of southern California.

Palmpilot said:
I went to The University of Washington. (Ghery refers to it as "The Mistake by the Lake" IIRC. :p)
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And I'm right. ;)

Go Cougs!!!
 
SixPapaCharlie said:
I get that we don't want to go fight Russia because I saw War Games in the 80s and I know how it will end. I don't have time to track down Joshaua's dad on that island and get the tic-tac-toe game going.

BUT why couldn't we "accidentally" ship the Ukrane a bunch of A-10s.
I get my neighbor's mail al the time.

The Ukraine could be all "Oops I accidentally opened these because I thought it was for me"
The Ukraine's wife sees the planes on the counter and the envelope is in the trash so she also assumes they are theirs and decides to paint them in that weird blue and white cammo that they like over there.

Then we go on facebook and say "Has anyone seen our planes? It shows they were delivered but we ever got them. and the photo in the delivery notification looks like a different front porch"

Then the Ukraine is like "Oh crap, we accidentally used them. Thanks. It saved our lives, we will send them to you right away"

Then we would be like "Ya know what, nevermind we were going to try to retire them a few more times plus we are working on the A-11 anyway."
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Problem is…. our postal service is really bad. The A10 would probably end up in china being sent (accidentally) to Russia.

Or… if they really get where they were (not) supposed to be (wrongly) sent to… the russians have stupid people working for their postal companies, too. So this might end up in a way where we accidentally get some direct shipment from russia that should have gone somewhere else…

You can‘t rely on postal services - and you can‘t rely on them being unreliable, too.
 
Tantalum said:
Why do people say "the Ukraine" but not "the Canada" ? Is it me?
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It‘s not „the Ukraine“ either. It‘s Ukraine (or in Ukraine). But if the russians would invade Cananada… it might become „the Cananada“ for some media outlets :)
 
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