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Comment by robertlagrant | Hacker News Reader

The US picks extremely difficult battles to fight in a way its citizens deem acceptable, and they aren't wars of conquest. Those factors are going to make it very hard to point at a simple winner.

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All the wars mentioned have ckear, internationally acknowledged winners and loosers as well as treaties.

Vietnam ended in US defeat, and French defeat before that.

Afghanistan ended with US / NATO defeat and the Taliban taking over the country.

The Korean War isn't over yet technically, all we have there is a cease fire. Stalemate, nobody surrendered.

The US won the second Gulf War, Panama and some smaller stuff I am too lazy to look up.

Would you mind providing some “clear and internationally acknowledged” sources for the Korean War that stated it’s still ongoing or that Afghanistan was an undisputed loss?

It 'feels' like a loss. I'm sure there are other ways to spin it.

The “clear and internationally acknowledged” criteria for a 'loss' is being caught on camera while the last soldiers evacuate and the enemy takes over.

So technically Vietnam and Afghanistan are losses. Because of the video's.

As for the Korean war, it's kind of a fuzzy topic. There was no formal peace deal, just an armistice that became the status quo. And there are still occasional clashes. These probably aren't the kind of sources you're looking for but it's a weird topic. To me it's more obvious that we lost Vietnam than Afghanistan yet I've heard so many arguments the US did win Vietnam (usually where "winning" means something different to different people). Either way Afghanistan was at least an embarrassment.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_conflict

https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.cnn.com/cnn/2021/12/30/asia...

How about the videos of the US military retreating from the country? what other indication would you require?

You obviously completely missed the point

I guess so? what was your point?

edit: to be clear, you don't dispute that the taliban has retaken the country from US forces right?

I’m not sure why people care to mention Vietnam and Afghanistan in the same breath as real wars. These are wars against insurgencies, populations, and ideologies, not governments.

They’re inherently different and the only way to “””win”””(which is a loaded term with wars against insurgents. We accomplished important strategic goals in Vietnam before leaving the country to self determine) is to resort to tactics employed by folks like The Butcher did in Cuba.

Vietnam, the US war, was dought in South Vietnam against local insurgents and regular North Vietnamese forces. It ended with a formal peace treaty, in which the US agreed to withdraw all troops, not send further military aid to the South, return prisoners, remove mines from North Vietnamese harbours and pay, even if called differently, reparations. Vietnam was pretty much a war the US lost, and one that was not exclusively fought against insurgents.

The US won zero strategic goals, Vietnam was reunited by force under the communist North. The US goal was to orevent exactly that. Nice spin so, calling Vietnam a defacto strategic victory for the US.

And Afghanistan, seriously? Before, anti-Talobam forces controlled at least parts of zue country. Nowy the Taliban are in full controll after they over ran Kabul following a hasty retreat of NATO forces from the country, that is as clear cut a loss as it gets. Had the US led coalition left after Bin-Laden was killed, one could have declared a victory. By staying and tuening the whole affaire into a foreign occupation without clearly defined goals, the US-led coalition could only loose. And they did.

> The US won zero strategic goals

That’s completely false. A large strategic goal of USA in Vietnam was to show strategic partners and allies the extent to which USA was willing to go for its commitments.

> And Afghanistan, seriously?

I have no idea what you’re asking. Vietnam and Afghanistan were simply not real wars in the traditional “win-loss” sense for USA; Afghanistan moreso than Vietnam.

Vietnam War was a conventional war between two governments and their international supporters. The government the US supported lost the war, because the US was unwilling to commit sufficient forces to win. Largely because they were afraid of a repeat of the Korean War, with China and possibly even the USSR joining the war for real. And because the US lacked the will to win, they eventually lost the will to maintain the status quo.

The Vietnamese didn't need active participation from China or the USSR to win. It was seen as a war of independence, with a popular Northern Vietnamese government and a US puppet South Vietnam government, whose soldiers were unmotivated. The South Vietnam government only lasted as long as it did because of US assistance.

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