August 1st, 2011, 11:28 pm
QuoteOriginally posted by: zerdnaQuoteAnother reason that the U.S. can't win wars against stone age fighters is that these wars aren't military conflicts, but social conflicts. Planes, guns, tanks, and bombs do little to win the foreign public relations battle that underpins both local and global support for the enemy factions.Please, spare this stuff for crashmint and trackstar. If planes and tanks don't work, than drones and bribes do. These are not exactly mysteries -- a handful of Brits 9 times out of ten was able to win a war being outnumbered one to a million. Maybe the reason was they didn't have any bullcrap notions of how every social structure is equally unique and valuable as their own, no matter if it is a culture of stoning chicks for going out with a wrong dude. They just went about winning the wars being sure that they are the real deal, without declaring some pie in the sky goals, like democracy in Iraq, hearts and minds of Taliban, or new madrasahs in Kandahar to educate children in their unique and valuable culture that includes cutting heads of whoever changes his mind.There's some truth to what you say although the British lost twice to the Afghans and didn't have a particularly convincing victory on their third try. Also, the British enjoyed a time of tremendous asymmetry of military power -- they literally did face opponents from the stone age. The U.S. faces opponents that seem primitive, but who have significant access to the arms, explosives, electronics, and communications tools of modernity.What I said was not due to some wishy-washy politically correct philosophy but simple pragmatism and models of human behavior. Whether I believe that social structure X is valid or invalid isn't very relevant because it doesn't change the systems dynamics equation of the world. What matters is the behaviours of those that do believe in it's validity (either due to direct faith or political correctness) and the responses of those people to any prospective actions. Thus, the limits on American power become a function of foreign public opinion and not just the opinions of a few decimated villagers in some forgotten high valley. In that sense, the British enjoyed a tremendous asymmetry of political power -- they could act unilaterally with less fear foreign journalistic oversight, diplomatic disapprobation, and trading partner sanctions.