Quote:
Originally Posted by Splitter
Friendly,
I would just point out that North Vietnam attacked the South. North Korea attacked the South. Those wars were against Communist expansion and the US was not alone in Korea as it was a UN operation. Later wars have similar causes, but it is a matter of one's perspective. It's is true the issues were not as black and white.
BTW, while we may not lose in Afghanistan, we will not win either. Oh, we have the capability, just not the backbone.
My point was mainly that weakness breeds contempt. Contempt leads to attack. As "we", meaning the former Allies, get weaker and weaker, the tyrants get more bold. They won't attack directly and conventionally, but they will attack our allies and unconventionally. Add their acquisition of nukes to the equation and you see the danger.
The weaknesses our countries are experiencing are not military. The weakness is a degradation of moral fiber, of the willingness to step up and make sacrifices. Instead of defeating an enemy, we put off the fight. We make concessions and worry whether or not we are being too harsh.
Neville Chamberlain should have taught us the lesson, but we have short memories. As I said, what we lack these days is backbone. We don't remember we have a backbone until times are desperate. That applies to all of the western Allies.
We are all repeating the mistakes that lead to WWII.
Splitter
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Regarding the national willingness to fight, 'moral fiber', and back-bone - these are all things which were used by you-know-who to get the German nation to war. Clearly that nation was so willing to fight that it bought the government's rhetoric, and became the 'bad guy', so I don't think you can say that it's always a good thing... Especially as the information that the government and large parts of the media gives the poplulation, is their version of events.