"In our own case, the Viet Cong and the Somalis were devastated by our military." (A)
You blame it on the US citizens?? How about this: we carpetbombed them and they didn't stop fighting. Just like we wouldn't give up if a foreign enemy attacked us. Scoreboard: guerillas
"In Somalia......It naturally looked like we 'tucked tail and ran', which was what many of us feel was its purpose in the first place." It was a mission/action, not a war. Scoreboard: doesn't apply, not a place where we landed and "made freedom for the Somali people". (B)
"The Russian misadventure in Afghanistan" Russians lost and left. Scoreboard: guerillas What else we got? The Tamil Tigers forced a stalemate over there in Sri Lanka, so now they have their own piece of the property. The Chechnians, the IRA... even Israel couldn't defeat Hamas and endless human bombs so they gave em some land! Quagmire baby, know it when you see it. Bush 1 did, Bush 2 didn't want to see it. Bush has blindness - not bravery. (C)
(A) You miss the strategic, and even tactical, aspects of the discussion, which was that NO guerilla force has EVER been successful in a military campaign against our forces. You also miss the point, and in fact even illustrate the point, that it's a lot easier to intimidate the civilian and political leadership backing the military, into giving up the fight. Insurgents particularly count on this when it comes to use of 'low technology-high concept' or 'low technology-low concept' weapons like airplanes flying into buildings or roadside bombs, which are indiscriminate in which targets they kill. Again, it's a page right of Ho's book. Not original in its thinking, but prescient in what it could do to our own people. Also, the VC didn't choose to stop fighting...they were an utterly spent fighting force by 1970. And the North Vietnamese have admitted that they were ready to capitulate, at least in the short-term, when we offered them a chance (and some time with which to delay and stall) to engage in so-called 'peace talks'. Again, that's a failure of the WILL of the people, not of the military. Scoreboard: Utter defeat for the guerillas.
(B) Our aim was to separate the warring militias in order to allow the U.N. to feed the Somali people. This was done under U.N. aegis, and it was 'mission creep' on the part of the Clinton administration, and Les Aspin, as an inexperienced Secretary of Defense, that brought about a sour end to what was initially an altruistic goal. If feeding people, and disarming those who were busily trying to kill them, isn't a mission 'to make freedom for the Somali people', than we need to redefine the meaning of the term 'free'.
Also, my point was that no guerilla movement EVER defeated our military 'on the ground'. Certainly, by the time that the 'Blackhawk Down' episode occurred, we were in a low-intensity conflict with a group of people who exhibited every characteristic of carrying on an insurgent struggle against us, with the ultimate aim of running us out of the city of Mogadishu and the wider countryside, as well. Whether you choose to call it a 'mission' or a 'war' is a technical term. I assure you that the folks on the ground, trying to execute a poorly-ran U.N. and U.S. mission, felt that it was a war in every aspect but name. Another point that I made was that the Somali militias/insurgents/whatever were soundly defeated in every contact that they had with our fighting forces, and that's the plain, hard truth. We literally could have reached out and 'touched' them at any time.
What they knew, though, was that by that time, we lacked the political will to do so. I'd say that a casualty-to-casualty comparison of that night proves me right, regardless of the wider political implications. Available intelligence also shows that the end result of that set-piece battle was a loss of appetite by the insurgents to continue the fight, and a cessation of hostile activity against us until we could pull back and exfiltrate our troops. The battle was won by us on the ground, and the wider struggle against these folks was consistently won by us. We lost the big one, though, because of a civilian distaste for the really dirty things necessary to bring about solution to getting the non-combatants over there fed, housed and clothed and a chance at a freer society. The fact that that place is still a cesspool tends to highlight my point. Scoreboard: A sound defeat of the guerillas on a military level.
(C) You also missed the point I was making about the Russians, which was that OUR forces have never been defeated by a guerilla force. The Russians basically highlight every WRONG thing that a military should do, if it wants to remain stuck in a place for years to come. Would you agree that our military campaign to overthrow the Taliban was masterful, for the most part, and that Afghanistan is today more free and more stable than at any time in its recent past? Also, would you say that if an insurgency exists, that at the present time, it's neglible and easily-defeated by us? Indeed, our campaigns over the last 3 years have shown that the old '10 infantrymen to 1 guerilla' ratio needed to defeat an insurgent force may need to be revised. Scoreboard: Another sound defeat of Mullah Omar and his Taliban stooges.
a. The Tamils and their struggle again highlight a poorly-executed military/politcal campaign. Not even a valid use of the 'guerillas can never be defeated' supposition.
b. You again use a poorly-led Russian force, with uncertain civilian and political backing as yet another example. Again, it's invalid.
c. I don't think the IRA, once cut off from its primary U.S. source of funding, and a pariah in the eyes of the international community, has ran the British out of Northern Ireland, as yet. And isn't even Gerry Adams persona non grata over here, and with Teddy Kennedy, for gosh sakes? Another weak supporting argument.
d. Israel has been forced by the U.S., knowing that its biggest supporter in the world wasn't happy with it, into handing over land to the P.A. Do you really think that Hamas shared in one iota of responsibility for that? Hell, I'd argue that it's a failure of will on the part of the American people, and its government, that's forced Israel into basically making a deal with the Devil on this one.
I understand that a superficial reading of so-called insurgent movements might give one the impression that they're successful. I disagree. They generally have neither the logistics nor the manpower to support a meaningful campaign. What they count upon, and what you and others enable them to count upon, is a failure of will (or a fear of conflict) on the part of the people to do for them that which they would never be able to accomplish, themselves.
T.
