Oops I’ve Done It Again!

I will state at the beginning of istnthis article I am patriotic to my country [Britain] and my family has a well proven and brave military tradition.  Every time I turn on BBC 24 or CNN and watch our progress in the Afghanistan conflict, that Britney Spears song keeps playing over and over in my head you know the one “Oops Ive done it again I’ve made up my mind” etc etc, I,m not a huge Britney fan ill be honest,  However those particular lyrics remind me of the recent history of N.A.T.O. and British and Americans conflicts of the last 50 years.

I will write in general terms to get my point across hopefullywithout going too deeply into every conflict else this will become a history lesson and I’m sure you don’t need one!

The war in Korea the 38Th Parallel, American and British and Australiantroops died by their thousands in this almost forgotten war, As far as the research I’ve done is concerned allied troops did not win this war, they made a tactical withdrawal.  The North Korean defences came up and to this day they still exist and in actual fact peace was never declared.  To this day major mistrust still exists on both sides of the conflict.

Fast forward if you will to Vietnam in the 1960s early 70s a bitter jungle warfare ensued thousands of American lives were lost, trying to fight a guerrilla type battle in someone Else’s back yard is a very hard task indeed.  All the technology didn’t help, the helicopters, the fast jets, the high level saturation bombings, didn’t help.  America pulled out in the end and the north invaded the south unifying the country.

It saddens me the thought of all these young men fighting and dieing for another country who’s people seemed indifferent to the occupying American troops, of course that’s my opinion, I know there is a very different train of thought on this conflict.  I wasn’t there all I can do is read books study personal diaries of politicians and troops alike.   However when all is said and done the troops were ordered out, call it a tactical withdrawal? or a defeat? I have no right to say and it would be dis-respectful if i did.

The first Iraq war “Desert Storm” allied troops again came to another countries aid Kuwait.  After “Saddam Husain’s”army invaded their territory.  A seemingly brilliant victory by the allies in a matter of days, the whole conflict unfolding on television night after night, we marvelled at the “Smart bombs” the “Apache” gunship helicopters, the British “Tornado” ground attack aircraft.  When the army was defeated what did we do? we pulled out leaving Saddam in power?  A matter of years later for a different reason we invaded again [Ssh don't mention oil then i wont ssh] this time Saddam was defeated again and brought to justice by his own people and hung.