Both are examples of defeats due to lack of social and political support by the people, not technology or logistics.
The US barely lost 58,000 soldiers in VN, and only 2,000 in Afghanistan and 4,000 in Iraq.
They could have easily won if the objective had been winning. But I think we all know that the objective in both cases and pretty much in all wars the US has engaged in since 1914 wasn't winning per se.
I agree, although I think in each of those cases "selection and maintainence of the aim" and personnel choices were decisive, upstream of social and political support.
I couldn't believe it when the wikileaked Afghan War Logs revealed DynCorp was hosting paedophile parties to recruit new Afghan National Police officers.
Well, it made a sick kind of sense - they can't defect to the Taliban (who would have them buried alive as per Shariah), and their foreign sponsors will have kompromat on them from the start.
But arming and uniforming child-molesting kidnappers really wasn't a great way to win the trust of the population.
Wonder if they do this at home?
