Of the ethicness of Killing Children and its dependence on context.

As for the religious sectarianism, I think a huge part of the blame lies with misguided American initiatives. Dividing a country and its administrative functions by confessions, ethnicities and other groups has always been a recipe for disaster, as proven in Lebanon and elsewhere. People must be given a framework in which the nation functions as one whole, in which the discussion is "what is the common interest" not "what group's interests should be favored over another's"

^^ Due you're clueless. Did you read my post about the Bush-Maliki Security Pact of 2008? The Iraqis have been in charge of everything for over 2 years now. Attacks are at an all time low. Combat troops are gone from Iraq.

There's no leaving in defeat. Iraq is a stable democracy (and suffering teething issues like all democracies in regards to the Parliament thing that was recently somewhat resolved) and nobody can take that result away from us.

The soldiers know we won in Iraq. The intelligent folks know we won in Iraq. Hell even the liberal anti-war groups like Moveon.org gave up on Iraq-as-lost-cause.

You're being one of those people who stubbornly refuses to accept that we made results happen in defiance of your predictions and likes. Or in the immortal words of then Senator Hillary Clinton regarding Gen. Petreus' command of the "surge" in Iraq: "I'm going to have to suspend disbelief". (Which really killed her politically with a lot of folks.) That despite the fact she got a mountain of hard evidence thrown right into her face disproving her idea that we would lose in Iraq.

edited 4th Jan '11 8:45:05 AM by MajorTom

The Security Pact is as much of a victory as the Paris Peace Accords. It's just a waiting game. As soon as US forces are out, the US-established Iraqi government will either have to accommodate the insurgency (kinda making the whole war pointless), or die.

Honestly, the whole Kurdistan project has worked pretty well. Kurdistan is probably the least disastrous part of Iraq. The invasion was very successful, the problem was "nation-building". It takes a long time to socially reform a foreign nation, and time is something that the US foreign policy establishment never has on its side. Honestly, I think the best idea would to have been just to lop off Saddam's ruling clique, establish a less anti-American, less genocidal, and less unstable strongman/ruling clique, and get the heck out before shit hits the fan.

@Tom: Dude, why are you trying to discourage tsukubus? His posts are awesome. I've never laughed so hard in my life.

You had me at "spiritually incapable", but I really laughed at your assertion that America has lost every prolonged war since Korea. And with the exceptions you numerously listed, it basically comes down to "we didn't win Vietnam". I love it.

Also, saying we went to stalemate against an enemy that was outnumbered 10-1, outmatched, and out-armed was awesome. I completely forgot that China is actually a myth.

I've never seen such successful tolling in my life. MOFW, my friend.

Or we could have not invaded Iraq and focused on Afghan, but if we want to open that debate I guess we'll open up another thread.

Exactly how I feel.

^^ Perhaps now you know how many of Tom's post make most of us feel.

US popular history tends to whitewash how much of a basketcase the Chinese army was at the time, probably in order to save face (kind of like what China does to every war except Korea). When the Chinese entered the war, the North Korean army was pretty nonexistent, and Chinese government documents reveal an army actually outnumbered by the Korean/UN forces and with no armored, air, or fire support. Infantry weapons were generally pretty inferior, comprising almost entirely of captured Manshoukoku-era (Japanese but with shoddier construction) bolt-action rifles and light mortars. They even had to scavenge clothes from American soldiers, which is why frostbite devastated the Chinese. The PVA wasn't sent in Korea to win, the intention was that they'd be slaughtered and then the Mao could use the nationalist fervor and anger to get a rally-around-the-flag effect for his class struggle schemes while simultaneously weakening the anti-class struggle army. Didn't quite turn out like that.

^^Yes, but I'm pretty sure that has more to do with Tom saying "you pretty much have to be a dick" rather than "because fuck history".

^Love it.

edited 4th Jan '11 9:19:24 AM by Scrye

Vietnam was a failure but not a tactical one, we won the battles but ultimately Ho Chi Minh understood he could not stand up militarily to the United States so he fought it politically and in this arena he achieved victory in most of his fights. The Tet Offensive, militarily, was a failure. My dad summed it up as, "We could drop paratroopers into Moscow anytime and yes we could say that we would be invading their capital, but it would be thirty minutes before they were torn to pieces."

But the media reported it as a failure and it showed that the VC wasn't defeated (even though the Tet Offensive destroyed the VC as a paramilitary force).

Hell, Vietnam could have been one with another two weeks of the blockade and bombing campaign but the damage was already done.

Also weird since my dad mentioned that Ho Chi Minh would have been supported, and should have been, except he was communist but evidently not one of the Beijing or Moscow communists.

@Tsukubus: You are forgetting how effective a mass infantry rush can be in the 40s and 50s, the Russians were able to use that tactics throughout World War II to great success, it was just that the Chinese could take the losses more than we could.

edited 4th Jan '11 9:14:54 AM by saladofstones

@Tsukubus: You are forgetting how effective a mass infantry rush can be in the 40s and 50s, the Russians were able to use that tactics throughout World War II to great success, it was just that the Chinese could take the losses more than we could.

Successful human wave attacks usually require you have numbers on your side. The Chinese didn't. And the gap between the USSR and Germany narrowed very quickly. Both sides had sophisticated armored, artillery, and air corps. The Chinese couldn't build an airplane or tank if their lives depended on it. The Chinese had a larger reserve (Mao had a lot of PLA soldiers and officers he wanted to conveniently get rid of), but in terms of absolute numbers of the field, they were generally outnumbered, only reaching parity a year after the Chinese entry.

And the USA tactically wins all of the battles in Iraq, kind of like in Vietnam. Which is why most insurgent attacks generally target Iraqi civilians, because those usually end up as tactical victories. And the ability of the US population to sustain war has gone significantly down since Vietnam. Mostly because a significant percent of America, especially in intellectual circles, viewed Communism as an existential threat to America. It's kind of the opposite now.

Ho Chi Minh was pretty aligned with the USSR for a very long time. He didn't get along with the Communist Chinese at all, which is why it was pretty easy for Nixon to get the PRC to cut their support, apply pressure, and sponsor anti-USSR, anti-Ho Chi Minh, pro-PRC Communist regimes (like the Khmer Rogue).

edited 4th Jan '11 9:22:38 AM by Tsukubus

I don't know where you got your information from but it contradicts everything I read on it.

And I wouldn't call things in Korea sophisticated quite yet, the military for the US had a noted depreciation in quality even according the official information and a lot of the new technology hadn't found its legs yet.

The problem is that the Chinese were able to overrun each position and cut it off, forcing us to retreat. The bigger problem is that we could not risk a full Chinese entry into the war and Mc Arthur didn't understand the full implications of nuclear warfare (he wanted to nuke China into submission) and went out of control.

Tae Guk Gi is a good Korean movie in terms of accuracy, and it shows why the Chinese were able to succeed in some of their drives.

Don't forget, the Chinese took massive, massive losses but they could replace them easily while we had to go half way across the world.

Ho Chi Minh was an ally of convenience with the USSR and China, but Russia had a bad habit, along with China, of replacing regimes once the revolution is complete.

edited 4th Jan '11 9:29:47 AM by saladofstones

The Americans had planes, tanks, artillery, radio, and all of the things that Western militaries took for granted. It's pretty advanced compared to an army that had essentially nothing but bolt-action rifles, light mortars, grenades. The PVA was even less well-equipped than Titoist partisans.

Why the US army collapsed in North Korea is an interesting question. Probably a mix of surprise and lack of experience confronting infiltration tactics. The PVA honestly didn't really use many human wave attacks because numbers were not on their sides. Tae Guk Gi is not really an accurate depiction of what happened, at all. The Chinese couldn't actually use human wave attacks because it would only take seconds before their entire army was completely eradicated by American bombs and artillery, not to mention their numerical inferiority at the start of the war.

The PVA could replace a lot more losses than the UN/Korean forces, but they took a lot more losses for the sole reason that the side with rifles loses more people than the side with tanks. US popular history likes to paint the Korean War as a loss because they were swarmed with mass numbers because this ties really well with tropes in American war culture, but it was more of a severe failure in military doctrine and leadership.

Ho Chi Minh was also an ally of the USSR because CPV doctrine resembled the developmentalist Marxism-Leninism of the USSR (the ideological enemies of Mao) a lot more than it did the agrarian anti-elitism of Maoism.

edited 4th Jan '11 9:39:15 AM by Tsukubus

@Scrye: it's not beneath him to use counter-factual statements on history, especially contemporary.

^ So that is what maosim means...

edited 4th Jan '11 9:52:39 AM by RawPower

Accurate in the sense the NK and SK hated each other, it was a bit more symbolic of course. :V

Here seems to indicate large amounts of Chinese infiltrators

There were certainly failures within the US military but your underestimating the strength of the Chinese military and the nature of the terrain.

The retreat was a successful one, mind you,

A retreat against an inferior force is usually inherently a failure.

<Mod Hat ON>

Can we get back to the topic, rather than "US Military history and attitudes in general"

<Mod Hat OFF>

Its not an inferior force if it is able to secure a victory. :V

To be honest, I'll miss IJBM because of the fact we are forced to stay on topic here.

edited 4th Jan '11 10:07:57 AM by saladofstones

We've already finished that debate. I think we landed on: Killing children, it really sucks but sometimes its them or you.

Pretty much.

The use of child combatants tells me a few things: One, that they're desperate to field personnel and will stoop to that low in order to do so. Two, they might be out to use the other side's cultural fondness for children against them - see a child, think nothing more of them, until the child pulls a grenade out and lobs it at you. Three, that the usage of child soldiers and the indoctrination of their minds means that if they survive the conflict, they will have hardened young men that will be loyal. And probably very cynical and jaded if they survive into adulthood, also.

I find their use in a conflict to be morally and ethically abhorrent, no matter the culture. You're under [some age between 13 and 16], you should be learning how to read, write, play a sport (heck, play soldier, too◊), learn a skill - not off bleeding and dying in some conflict.

edited 4th Jan '11 3:07:50 PM by pvtnum11

I wouldn't say that it was just cowardice, it does seem that its part of the culture that children are part of the war machine.

Look up Sagara Sosuke's article under "Improbable Age"

This is creepy. How didn't he end up a complete cynic?

edited 4th Jan '11 4:06:44 PM by RawPower

Probably because he's too fucked up to have an ideology as complex as cynicism. This is a guy who treats everything as a battlefield situation because when he was a kid, everything was.

It's Played for Laughs, but is this really true for child soldiers in those regions?

Try Googling 'child soldier psychology'. There's a fair few articles out there, though I kind of doubt it's going to be a pleasant read.