Shit Or Get Off The Pot

[grimm]

Its a no brainer. sometimes you have to make tough decisions to guarantee a solid future. i am quoting a friend of mine on an unrelated (sort of topic) and he makes valid points about the wages of war, and long term impact as opposed to immediate...


he uses vietnam as an example, but the same could be said about japan, germany, the soviet union, etc.


"That said, reading post below reminds me that war is impersonal for
non-combatants until you personally know someone that died or came back
without limbs or with the thousand mile stare. I'd really like not to have
to send the armed forces *anywhere.* If it needs to be done, I'd sure as
hell like to know which State or Intelligence department f*cked up by not
heading off foreign issues at an impasse before the military had to get
involved.

America's biggest strengths are pop culture, economics and liberty (even
when there are major exceptions to these). As part of the menu for total
warfare, I wonder if these are not creatively utilized before it's too late
to get U.S. servicemen involved."


and in reply


"Well, having flown a fixed-wing gunship in Vietnam I can certainly identify
with the post. We had a magnesium flare stick in the flare launcher once, it
kind of started melting the whole back of the airplane. The
loadmasters/gunners were able to push the whole launcher out the back of the
airplane before all the flares cooked off. We landed without incident,
unless you count the 3rd degree burns some of the guys had.


IMHO, the U.S. economy has won more wars than the military. We, um, didn't
fare very well in Vietnam 35 years ago, but now it's becoming a bastion of
capitalism. Same can be said of Russia and China. What our military couldn't
do our market-based economy has.

Of course, none of it would have happened without our ability to defend
ourselves (and pretty much everyone else). So, the U.S. military has had a
pretty big say in the whole story."