And This Is The Optimistic Vietnam Comparison

Can't get enough of these Gates exit interviews (and the more I read them, the happier I am that I didn't ask to do one). Newsweek places this disturbing observation deep, deep down in its addition to the genre:

Gates acknowledges a historical similarity to the Vietnam War. “There is one parallel that I think is appropriate, and that is we came to the right strategy and the right resources very late in the game,” Gates says. “President Obama, I think, got the right strategy and the right resources for Afghanistan—but eight years in.”

First, color me surprised that Gates thinks the U.S. ever developed the "right" strategy for the doomed Vietnam war. More to the point: we have the benefit now of knowing that the Vietnam war was a costly, generational folly. If you see an apt parallel to Afghanistan, how can you not favor shifting the policy toward extrication? More to the point, if you see this parallel --  "we got all the parts in order even as we approach the futility of their construction -- how can you not favor getting the fuck out yesterday? 

Comments

[Marshall]

You don't think he meant we finally decided to go home??

[Arapaho415]

Why don't those in power who are against this costly Afghanistan folly emphasize that it's a landlocked country, which means our supply lines are *dependent* on other countries (e.g., Pakistan) to get materials in and out of the country? A better analogy would be Laos, another landlocked country, which did suffer our meddling during the cold war era.

We need to get out of the war business and start focusing on our country's future by investing/subsidizing efforts that will pay off in the near and long-term future (education, infrastructure, incentives for those young people most at risk). Thousands of lives sacrificed, billions of dollars wasted; the nightly news should be responsible enough to air a short clip of one KIA every night until the public pressure to get the heck out the war business becomes a priority that the military cannot continue to justify.

[mikey]

Mr. Gates?

Sir, I have a follow up.

Just exactly WHAT strategy did we arrive at late in the Vietnam conflict that was the 'right' one? Precisely what 'resources' were the right ones to dedicate to that project?

At what point 'late in the game' did we arrive at this epiphany, exactly? Was it when we drew down our combat forces in the highly effective process of 'Vietnamization'? Was it when we evacuated our last personnel from the roof of the Embassy in April of '75?

Was it before that? Or after that?

Because we 'escalated' until we 'deescalated' and I can't remember when the 'strategy' was anything other than political in nature.

But I dunno. Maybe you saw something I couldn't see from the fucking Cambodian border...

mikey