I tried to get a dialog about similarities before and it pretty much failed. I want to try again.


National Intelligence Director John Negroponte says Iraq is far more precarious than much of Vietnam was when he served as a U.S. diplomat there in the 1960s.

An expert on Vietnam and one-time adviser to former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Negroponte said he sees more differences than similarities between the two conflicts. In Vietnam, for example, there was a clear enemy, given Soviet support of the North Vietnamese.

Additionally, "in Vietnam, the cities were secure. The province capitals were secure. I walked around that country as an unarmed civilian for almost four years without ever having any serious brushes," said Negroponte, who served in the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. "In Iraq, even the capital is highly insecure — perhaps one of the most insecure places in the country



I say it is the same. The same lame policies, the same lame rhetoric, the same outcome.


Spy Chief Cites Perils in Iraq

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Well, one thing that comes immediately to mind is just who we are fighting over there. In Vietnam you had a combination of uniformed troops and armed civilians where in Iraq you have nothing BUT armed civilians.

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In both cases we seem to be sticking our nose into something we had no business being involved in. We ended up making matters worse in both cases and the conflict was resolved or will be resolved after we leave.

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Military might doesn't make up for political stupidity.

No not really, and thats the problem.

You are fighting against good organized combatants, that camouflage themselves as civilians. Al Sadrs army has shown the Americans already how well organized and trained it is.

After all, it might not be that much of a difference after all, as uniforms won't be too common nonetheless, but I think its worth mentioning.

How does this differ from my comparison? I don't care if they are organized and well trained or not. The point is they do NOT wear a uniform and the China-backed North Vietnamese DID! Our (the US) military is second to none when it comes to fighting OTHER organized militaries. The thing is, we need to know they ARE the enemy's army and you need UNIFORMS to do that. At the heart of it is we would rather not exterminate the indigenous population of Iraq or anywhere else. When the "enemy" looks like the civilian population and hides among them it hampers our ability to shoot "the bad guys".
This is why I said the difference was that only some of the "enemy" was not in uniform while in Iraq they ALL are.

And I agree with you that the wearing of a uniform will fade out, mainly because of what I just pointed out. You just can't WIN against a superior fighting force. The moment you put on that uniform you become a visible target.
People see us as two things. One, the best armed, supplied and best trained military in the world. And two, the military that can't win a war against guerrillas who conceal themselves among the innocents. So anyone who sees us as an enemy would be crazy to adopt uniforms.

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Not a day goes by that I don't see something that reinforces my belief that people are idiots.

This true, but the bullet you hear is the one that kills you and it does not matter who is holding the gun. Uniforms, terrain, language are about the only differences.

The simialarities out weigh the uniform argument. Lies, rhetoric, tactics and blunders are the same. The biggest blunder was not including the Iraqi people in the decisions. Same in Vietnam, we only considered what a power mad leadership told us and tried to win a guerilla war using WWII strategies.

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Actually I believe you DON'T hear the one that kills you as the bullet travels faster than sound. But I get your point.
In any case, what I meant was we not only don't WANT to kill civilians we look bad when we DO kill them. Not having an easily identified soldier to fire at makes it almost impossible to fight such a war on the terms we are familiar with. If someone take a shot at a US soldier, ditches the gun and joins a crowd at a bus stop we really have no target to return fire to unless we mow them ALL down.

Agreed, I was only arguing about the difficulty of FIGHTING such a war.
The other monumental blunder was disbanding Iraq's military. Not keeping them under governmental control and cutting loose an army of trained and armed military men into a country with no other jobs for them was insane at best.

__________________
Not a day goes by that I don't see something that reinforces my belief that people are idiots.

Well one of the major things in a coup is to make sure the existing military cannot remain in control. The US had to disband the military units for safety sake, ironic isn't it? That is one of those things that if not careful will bite you in the butt. The teeth marks are there.

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They sure are. I remember talk about what a mistake disbanding them was less than a year into this war. There's a guy who does the news on a local station who has contacts all over the world who he interviews. He had some Imam or some other big shot in the British Muslim community and even HE said what a mistake that was.

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Not a day goes by that I don't see something that reinforces my belief that people are idiots.

I recall reading some articles just after the start of the war and there were those in this country and overseas that foresaw the probs we are having now. For the most part, their views and opinions were pretty much ignored because they were not in step with the parade of patriotism.

It is a shame, because some of this crap could have been avoided and there would be a few people breathing today.

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