vietnam (which I presume was the previous worst fiasco) (or did you mean the civil War ?) and other conflicts may have gone wrong, but they didn't change the game in terms of how the world viewed the country. Afghanistan did, a bunch of hajis didn't just frustrate them like in Iraq, they're on the point of defeating them, of showing the world how to beat the big bad bully.
the US wasn't beaten in Vietnam, but they just couldn't win. The US faces defeat in Afghanistan. In fact if the Taliban really get wiggy with cutting the overland supply routes, it could be a defeat of 9th legion proportions keep to the Fen Causeway
a) he says "may turn out to be" rather than is
b) this could turn out to be the worst timed conflict in economic terms - the money that has been spent could be the tipping point in having a seriously negative effect on the US economy - and only the Civil War could compare with that...
Frank Delaney ~ Ireland
Considering the Afghan experience of the British and Russians from the 1820's to the 1980's, nobody could have predicted... By laying out pros and cons we risk inducing people to join the debate, and losing control of a process that only we fully understand. - Alan Greenspan
... nobody could have predicted...
Is this the official/unofficial ET catch-phrase? Very useful in so many situations. In the end, might makes right. Nothing has changed since the caveman.
don't have the asteroid picture, sorry keep to the Fen Causeway
the US wasn't beaten in Vietnam,
the usa was humiliated in vietnam, and had to beat an ignominious retreat, the vietcong prevailed.
afghanistan is similar, in that the talibanis are prevailing through attrition and stubborn reluctance to cede to superior firepower.
having not learned from vietnam, this time it will be more humiliating...
especially as it cannot be said that the war was lost by jane fonda this time, indeed americans seem mostly only moved to end the occupation for solely economic reasons, unsurprising due to the much closer to absolute control of that pesky media, which was still much less muzzled back in the 60's, though still prevalently right wing.
the big difference is the draft, and the fact that vietnam was not on the chinese dime. ~"When an inner situation is not made conscious, it appears outside as fate." Karl Jung~
