The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway

Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by Ididntdothis on Monday July 15, 2019 @09:40AM (#20440680)

You simply don’t know. The whole country and its neighboring countries got destroyed by the Vietnam war. I am not sure if a communist takeover would have been worse for the regular citizen. When you look at Eastern Europe I think people were better off under communist government compared to the devastation a war may have brought.

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by conjectures on Monday July 15, 2019 @10:09AM (#20440956)

The problem with this as a general policy is that it is bad game theory. It means bad actors get to win by threatening to cause more damage fighting than if they win without a fight. You're always hostage to threats from bad actors.

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by Ididntdothis on Monday July 15, 2019 @10:17AM (#20441017)

I know. It’s a very complex situation. But I think we should also not blindly accept a lot of wars as “ necessary “ and better than the alternative.

It’s also often not clear who is the good or bad guy. As far as i know in Vietnam for example the main goal was to get rid of the colonialists. If the west had accepted that maybe north Vietnam wouldn’t have aligned with the Soviets. In addition the west also aligned with highly corrupt leaders in the south. We see the same dynamic in the Middle East. Out of short term interests we ally with highly corrupt dictatorial governments there and then we are surprised that things blow up in our face.

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by dondawest on Monday July 15, 2019 @10:29AM (#20441139)

All animals in the universe are “hostage to threats from bad actors.” Most fights in the animal kingdom are avoided by a simple size comparison between two animals, after which the smaller animal submits.

Size is an implicit threat, one that can never be eliminated. How exactly do you propose to eliminate the implicit threat of one animal/group of animals simply being larger than another?

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by conjectures on Tuesday July 16, 2019 @10:49AM (#20450576)

Because in reality both animals implicitly know that the conflict policies are somewhat hardwired as: 'If you push me too far, I will fight you on the beaches.'

Knowing that that is the policy that is implemented, and that fights are always risky, whether a fight occurs will be determined by the reward size and the predictability of the outcome.

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by dondawest on Tuesday July 16, 2019 @02:04PM (#20452402)

Yes, and both creatures deduce the predictability of the outcome primarily from the results of... a simple size comparison.

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by emiliobumachar on Monday July 15, 2019 @07:22PM (#20446205)

I would think most fights in the animal kingdom are predation, where the prey faces death and the predator, starvation. Perhaps you had just dominance fights within the same species in mind?

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Re:The Vietnam War Was Already Lost, but I Had to Go Anyway by dondawest on Tuesday July 16, 2019 @08:50AM (#20449518)

Predation is an example of a fight that is NOT avoided. I have all species in mind. I am almost directly quoting Dawkins’ “The Selfish Gene.” A raccoon does not attack a grizzly bear because of a simple size comparison. Thus, the lives of both animals are spared and a fight is avoided.

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