Zephyr Net

just a speculative question. Based on the vast technology gap between the U.S. military of the 1960s and today, and that we have leaders today who know they need to keep the political shit out of the military decisions, I think we would overwhelmingly crush them. Even in a guerrilla war.

One of the main reasons we lost vietnam is because our planes were so helpless to SAMs and enemy Migs due to rules of engagement. nowadays most everything is done with cruise missiles, and stealth. If we were to hit them today no target would be off limits IMO, and their SAMs would be useless against our stealth bombers and would get taken out in the opening hours. their entire airforce would be reduced to shit while still on the ground, and we would have unchallenged air dominance.

a ground war in the jungle would make our M1 tanks useless and we would be forced into another dirty jungle war. but i think we would win

Well we had the technological edge over North Vietnam then and our leaders now aren't that much brighter than those from back then. Bush is a moron and a half so no I doubt we'd win even today. First off they had 500,000 soldiers there and the admin only wanted a status quo. In Iraq it was 250,000 at the most and obviously no status quo. However, the idiocy of Rumsfeld & Bush isn't all that different.

We could have won back then if we were fighting to win. But you can thank LBJ for setting that up the way it was and prior to him, Kennedy.

As of right now though, the US cannot fight on a third front without seriously depleting what little resources it has.

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Centurian

well in vietnam the militarys hands were completely tied. SAM sites were allowed to be fully built even though intelligence knew all about them, due to soviet ground presence at those sites. Haiphong harbor was spared until nixon took over due to soviet ships. Bridges had to be bombed from a perpendicular approach making the bombs miss most of the time. Little or no action was taken against the ho chi minh trail in the 1960s. airbases were spared even though critical NVA fighter squadrans were operating from them.

had these targets been hit 10 years or so before Operation linebacker, we would probably have won the war.

the military has learned from that fiasco as has been shown by the great successes we had in desert storm, and the conventional war of Iraqi freedom. the generals dont have their hands tied anymore

Have they learned? ODS was nothing even remotely similar to Vietnam and we weren't fighting for a status quo with people who didn't even want democracy. We were expelling a nation from a foreign nation, very different.

Albeit Vietnam and OIF are nothing alike, the rhetoric of both wars is exactly the same. Listen to the language, listen to the game plan, and look at the rules of engagement. It isn't very different.

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Centurian

Short answer ... NO

Men win wars NOT machinery or hardware.
Physical bodies can be destroyed easily.
Ideals can not.

A big maybe ....
We might have been able to stablise South Veitnam, but we could not have claimed the North, that's my opinion.

(edited from origional post to stay on topic)

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"cool beanz"
D. "FETCH" Jordan

By all means we could have definitely stablized South Vietnam. Right on there. I think we could have defeated the North but we'd have been foolish to try to govern the North. Keep in mind though, in their hearts, the South wanted communism as much as the North.

Damn domino theory was actually a good one. Beat the hell out of "containment" (yeah that one worked).

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Centurian

We actually did defeat the North militarily. we forced them to sign the peace accord after Linebacker 2. But then it was like we didnt give a shit anymore and we just pulled out and let the NVA roll right back across the border.

We should have started Linebacker 3 when they broke the treaty.

Hell if we were just going to lay down and let them have the south, we could have done that in 1963 and saved thousands of our troops.

It was a cease-fire. Well the thing is that our withdrawal was on the contingent that the South would be safe. If the North invaded again we would act. When the North invaded, the Democrat controlled Congress refused to allow Ford to recommit forces.

Like I said, the commie's, no democrats, only wanted to appear hard on communism when, in reality, they only wanted to waste money losing.

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Centurian

Slighty off.
We lost the political will to continue, remember about all the anti-war deminstrations.

Now I must point out a person opinion I have.
When that trator falsely wrote about the Koran being flushed in a toilet at GETMO and started roits in Pakistan, he said he never intended to start such riots.
A lie.
They (the lib press) do want to start riots ... just not there, but HERE, just like Nam all over again.

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"cool beanz"
D. "FETCH" Jordan

Well sort of false. Pentagon admitted abusing the Koran. I mean after they lie and make the paper retract the story. Why admit it at all? Stupid assholes!

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Centurian

Geeze, give me a break.
What by throwing it on a bed.
Handleing it with one hand.
That story was a total fabrication ... an outright lie.
They never "flushed" a Koran.

The very word abuse implies intent, I think the words you seek might be improperly handled .... and by who's standard. I got a copy I toss around like any other book right here in my office.

But at any rate, if that's all they've got to cry about it's a non starter.

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"cool beanz"
D. "FETCH" Jordan

No Pentagon came clean. They got them wet (i.e. threw em in the toliet) and pissed on em (inadvertantly? how do you inadvertantly piss on a book lol).

I think there was more to it than they admitted and shit, it's interrogation, if that's all they are doing then they need to step it up. They're not POWs, they don't qualify under Geneva, and they don't deserve civil rights.

Basically it went like this:

story
pentagon calls story false & demands retraction
story retracted
pentagon admits story may have been true

Latest flip-flopper: Pentagon

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 01654.html

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Centurian

I dont understand why everyone is making such a big deal of the GITMO thing. i mean if you want to find some REAL atrocities, how about you look at the things the prisoners there did? look at all the buildings, cars, busses, women, and children they blew up, or were planning to blow up.

Also why not look a few miles to the west at Castro and all the hainus crimes hes been committing for 50 years? wait a minute, arent they on the UN human rights council? Yeesh ill never understand the world we live in

eh those even aren't atrocities. You want atrocities look at Sudan, China, Rwanda, where the UN never opened its mouth and let millions die by now. Sudan, that still has slavery, is on the human rights council. China is on the human rights council.

And remember the US was initially denied admittance because it had capital punishment.

THE UN is an atrocity.

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Centurian

is china really on the human rights council? God what a joke! I wonder what the people that were in the tienamin square protest think of that? or all the millions of chinese infants killed in the 1 child policy?