Gary’s Q&A

Listener question & Gary’s response · Transcript passage

Wayne Rothe asks, I’m Canadian. Years ago I met an older man in a military museum in Boston who insisted that the U.S. has never lost a war. I mentioned Vietnam and left it at that. You could also make a case for losses in Iraq, Afghanistan and the War of 1812. Do you think the U.S. has lost any wars?

It depends on what you mean by winning and losing. There is losing on the battlefield, and then there is failure to achieve objectives.

I’m not sure anyone won anything in the War of 1812. No territory changed hands. Neither side was definitely defeated. Both sides can claim that there were defensive reasons for why they could claim success.

In Vietnam, the United States clearly didn’t achieve its objectives. The communists took over the whole country, so I think that would be a loss.

In Iraq, the objective of the first war was the liberation of Kuwait, and the objective of the second war was the removal of Saddam Hussein, both of which were successful. Both conflicts also had lopsided victories on the battlefield for the Americans.

In Afghanistan, the initial objective was the removal of Al Qaeda training camps from Afghanistan, which was successful. However, the Americans then stuck around for 20 years and eventually just…..left, with the Taliban back in power.

When you get down to it, very few wars result in unconditional surrender or a complete one-sided victory.