Quote Originally Posted by [b
Quote[/b] (PseRamesses @ April 14 2004,04:36)]What really scares me is that if USA can´t contain theese rebellions that she´s faced with a situation worse than Vietnam. Atleast the Vietnamese didn´t have fundamentalists and suicide bombers and yet they managed to kick USA out. That´s why USA now need the UN otherwise the situation can´t be controlled.
This is a common misconception about the Vietnam War. The US was not kicked out. The war took on many stages. There was the French involvement (let's not even go there ;), then various stages leading up to a high level of US military involvement. First the VC tried their luck against the US. At first they were successful in small raiding groups, but nothing that was overly effective. When they did try a large offensive, they lost a million men, a third of their force, to a vastly superior US military (the Tet Offensive).

Following this, the VC became mostly support for the NVA. The US took losses, but the NVA took far more. The American public wanted out, so the US and the RVA negotiated a ceasefire with the NVA and VC, and pulled their troops out. Three years later came the fall of Saigon, when the US had a very small number of troops in the country, mostly protecting the embassy. The American public was more responsible for kicking out the US forces than the NVA and VC were.

The US can easily contain these rebellions, but it's the reaction at home that they're more worried about. Every US soldier killed is seen as almost an apocalyptic event, yet the number of rebels lost is many folds higher.

Ever played Civilization? Under democracy, it was very hard for me to fight a war. One attack and I would have massive rebellions everywhere, even though I was more than capable of defeating the enemy. It's similar to both Vietnam and Iraq.