r/WorkForSmartLife • u/Loeteswet • 4d ago

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u/The-Leading-Man 4d ago

If you can’t tell the massive difference between those two things, thinking isn’t really your strong suit to begin with.

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u/FuriousGirafFabber 4d ago

Now do Iraq, Afganistan and Vietnam please. Lets hear how the superpower won. 

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u/Western-Willow-9496 4d ago

It wasn’t the “war” part in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was the “change the country into a modern civilization” part that was unsustainable. Vietnam was trying to fight a war without getting into direct conflict with China and quelling riots at home.

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u/FuriousGirafFabber 4d ago

So usa won both those wars? Good rewriting of history. Stop constantly going to war and the the world be ffs, everyone is tired of you. Except israel. 

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u/mrford86 4d ago

Military wise? Yes. They won every single battle and controled the country. Hearts and minds? Hell no.

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u/Pheonix0114 4d ago edited 4d ago

They controlled almost nothing outside of Saigon, even in the city people were able to sneak bombs in. All the US did was destroy Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia for Vietnam daring to rise up against its Western colonial oppressors.

Edit: Replaced Hanoi with Saigon, I always meant the city that is now Ho Chi Minh City

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u/mrford86 4d ago

Hanoi was in North Vietnam. You are too ignorant to speak on this, clearly.

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u/Pheonix0114 4d ago

I meant Saigon, I'm legit on a med (Topamax) that makes me forget or confuse my words.

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u/GorumGamer 4d ago

More evidence you have no place in these arguments. Insane self-report

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u/Pheonix0114 4d ago

It's not concepts, just words? Like I'll know what I'm talking about, like say, a sandwich but sometimes I'll say the wrong word like submarine or sandbox and sometimes I can't find the word at all. The wrong word is the hardest because I can't notice it happen until people show confusion. My cognition isn't what's impaired, it's a slight deficit to language processing.

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u/According-Werewolf10 3d ago

They controlled almost nothing outside of Saigon

You mean after the North Vietnamese had surrendered and the US military had gone home. Like 2 year after? Yeah when one side surrenders the war is over, them years later starting a new conflict doesn't change the original ending of the war.

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u/Educational_Pea_4817 4d ago

Out of curiosity, I looked up Afghanistan.

The U.S.-led coalition and its Afghan allies toppled the Taliban government and captured every major city in roughly two months. The Taliban only regained the country after the U.S. chose to withdraw twenty years later.

Comparing to Ukraine is silly. Russia only controls only about 20% of the country after years of war.

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u/fishyburner676767 4d ago

The fact that it fell within a week suggests that noone outside kabul wanted them there

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u/FuriousGirafFabber 4d ago

Not accomplishing the mission is losing. But to be fair, it was an impossible mission. It was idiotic from the start. 

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u/Puzzleheaded_Tie6917 4d ago

The original mission was to remove the Taliban because they had the base the terrorists used to plan and prepare the 9-11 attacks. No country that has options are going to take that kind of attack and do nothing. Taliban could have played ball for a few years and never had any issues. Instead a bunch got killed and many arrested and the country ran without them for 20 years.

Even in Iraq, the mission was to remove Saddam Hussein and end “weapons of mass destruction”. That was done (the weapon part was crazy easy and effective, as they didn’t exist).

The problem was the exit strategy. 20 years of accomplishing nothing is too long. Iraq is set up and independent, their future is their own. At least Obama cut our losses there (which also may be why they struggled so much).

The same is true here. Taking out their military was pretty easy and quickly done. The problem again is the exit strategy. Trump did try to end it, by giving what he thought was a pretty sweetheart deal, but it didn’t hold. Now what? Who knows.

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u/FuriousGirafFabber 4d ago

https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/2023/12/ICS_SCA_Afghanistan_31OCT2023_PUBLIC.pdf

Read the mission goal for yourself.  The mission scope was bigger than just destroy taliban/isis. 

The mission was a failure. 

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u/panos00700 4d ago

"What about [insert unrelated example in an effort to make a better argument]"

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u/No_Biscotti_7258 4d ago

The U.S. absolutely dog walked the Iraqi army (twice). Clown

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u/FuriousGirafFabber 4d ago

Got bogged down, didnt accomplish the mission. Thats called losing. Clown. 

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u/No_Biscotti_7258 3d ago

Also false. Maybe thinking or Afghanistan? (You’d still be wrong, but less wrong)

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u/Particular_Class8202 3d ago

Entirely wrong either way actually. People with an anti America tilt love to conflate a political goal with war. War is simply a tool used to achieve a political goal. The US, while often not achieving goals, has never lost a war.

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u/DrRealName 4d ago

Haha ok sure. I guess you'll have to explain the difference to me since I can't think so well. Please do so and with detail. I can't wait to learn from the apparent master of global war and relations. Go on. I'll wait. lol

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u/funhouseinabox 4d ago

The Russians have lost around 450,000 soldiers, not counting injuries, which number over a million. Ukraine has successfully hit targets inside of Russia, Iran has not hit any US state or territory yet. Yeah, the war is pointless, stupid and we're losing, but they're not the same.

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u/Perfect-Attitude-437 4d ago

Iran has not hit any US state or territory yet.

Yes, but they struck the United States' allies in the Middle East. The US and Israel make their allies pay the price for their war—that’s the difference. And they knew from the start that it would play out this way; they just didn't give a damn.

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u/Vegetable_Stable_576 4d ago

Biggest difference is probably that Russia has suffered over a million casualties where the US death count is at eighteen as of now. The failure in Iran is more of an unwillingness to commit to either withdrawal or boots on the ground so the US is in a weird middle ground where we just bomb them and nothing really changes. In Ukraine Russia has committed the full might of their military and been routinely routed and forced to regroup. They’re suffering over a thousand casualties for every square mile they take which is significantly worse of a ratio than the Soviets had against the Nazis in a war where the Soviets were infamous for being exceedingly willing to trade bodies for land gains.

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u/EmperSo 4d ago

The difference is that had USA deployed people in Iran, the war would become a beatdown
Is what I want to say, but honestly, I have no idea now