Hacker Newsnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

I don't know how much I agree with the statement "even the Cold War was really just the US and Russia building to re-win WWII until Russia ran out of cash". Not that it matters for this discussion, because I think its clear that the U.S. military is still trying to design itself for a Cold War scenario, and encountering huge problems when faced with asymmetrical opponents.


I think the USA are doing smashingly well against their current crop asymmetrical opponents. Wikipedia has the GWOT American casualties count (military and civilian) at 8800 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_on_terror#Casualties). Far more American citizens than that died the last time we faced a serious asymmetrical opponent (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_Wars).


I would consider Vietnam largely asymmetrical. Wouldn't you?


The North Vietnamese had a uniformed, regimented army. Al-Qaeda and the American Indians did/do not.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: