The OLD Philosopher – John M. Miller
There are two ways our nation can become involved in foreign wars. One way is to send our troops to fight wherever wars are being fought. The other way is to send armaments to democracies or would-be democracies that are fighting against undemocratic foes on their own turf.
Let us consider five major conflicts following World War II in which American armed forces were involved on foreign soil on behalf of the governments of those countries: Korea, Viet Nam, the Gulf War, Afghanistan, and Iraq. From the standpoint of the U.S., we became involved in those foreign wars because we thought their nations needed our support to defeat their own internal or external enemies. From the standpoint of those four states, they were fighting civil wars against other citizens of their nations who favored rule by autocrats rather than by democratic leaders and the rule of law.
The Korean War began when the North Koreans, led by Kim Il Sung, invaded South Korea. South Korea was not truly a democracy, but it was more democratic than North Korea by every measure. Furthermore, the South Koreans were anti-communist, and America was anti-communist. Therefore the U.S. led the effort of a United Nations alliance to defeat the North Koreans. All went well until the Chinese entered the war on behalf of North Korea, and then it became a very dicey affair. The war ended with an armistice, but without a peace treaty. Technically the two Koreas are still at war, but there has been no major fighting since 1953, although there have been many skirmishes.
The War in Viet Nam also was a north-south struggle. South Viet Nam was hardly a democracy, but it was fitfully trying to become one. North Viet Nam was an autocracy, led by Ho Chi Minh. The U.S. considered Ho to be a communist, but he saw himself as a Vietnamese nationalist. From the perspective of all the Vietnamese, they were fighting a civil war against one another. From our perspective, we were fighting communism. American troops were involved with the South Vietnamese for twelve years, until the North Vietnamese won the war in 1975 and united the entire country.
In 1991, Iraq was led by Saddam Hussein, a military dictator. He invaded and quickly conquered Kuwait, a small, oil-rich principality at the northern coast of the Persian Gulf. The American president, George H.W. Bush, concluded that was a threat to world peace, and that Saddam must be defeated. In a genuine and surprisingly successful blitzkrieg, from January 16 to February 28, 1991, U.S. forces drove the Iraqis out of Kuwait and virtually destroyed the ability of Iraq to wage war, even though Saddam had declared that it would .be “the Mother of All Wars.” The Gulf War was the only undeniable complete success the US has fought in the past seventy-eight years, although afterwards Saddam Hussein was allowed to remain in power.
Afghanistan was an area of many tribes and tribal chiefs for many centuries. They successfully resisted outsiders from taking control of their land while they fiercely warred among themselves. The British, and later the Russians, tried to pacify Afghanistan, but failed. Under President George W. Bush, the United States sent troops there in 2002, remained until 2021, and failed.
In 2003 George W. Bush was still the president. He was led to believe that Saddam Hussein had acquired weapons of mass destruction, and that Saddam might somehow use them against us. Therefore, we went to war against him, again. This time he was captured rather quickly, and he was executed by the new government the U.S. had somewhat surreptitiously installed in Iraq. Warfare did not end, however, and in fact continued for the next fifteen years or so, when President Donald Trump finally withdrew American forces from that long-beleaguered country.
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The term “blood and treasure” is often used by both military leaders and by historians when describing the nature of various wars. It essentially connotes the number of dead and injured soldiers that result from wars, and how much money was expended during these conflicts.
The American Civil War was the costliest in terms of casualties. Between six and seven hundred thousand Union and Confederate troops died. They had quite lethal means of killing one another, but medical care was still rudimentary, and that is why so many died. The financial costs to both sides were devastating, but especially for the South.
Because the USA entered World War I three years after it started, our losses were relatively small compared to those of our primary allies in that conflict: Britain, France, and Russia. Still, over 115,000 doughboys died. In World War II, slightly over 400,000 Americans died. In Korea, 36,000 were killed in action, and in Viet Nam 58,000.
Improvements in various types of protection for soldiers meant there were far fewer deaths per capita in the Gulf War, Afghanistan, and Iraq than in previous wars. In Afghanistan 2400 Americans were killed, and 4400 in Iraq.
American citizens have become much more resistant to combat deaths since World War II. Politicians in Washington became increasingly aware of that trend. However, that did not prevent the USA from entering and even spearheading the wars in Korea, Viet Nam, the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan, and Iraq.
Since the end of World War II, the United States of America has become the most prolific manufacturer of weapons of all the nation-states on earth. We make armaments that do everything that armaments can possibly do, at least up to the present. Serendipitously the past year has illustrated that it may be better to manufacture weapons to sell or give to would-be democracies than it is to put them into the hands of American military personnel who go to help fight battles with the soldiers of these other lands.
The War in Ukraine may represent a major shift in what Congress and the president perceive is the wisest way to support nations or peoples we believe are under attack from foes we consider to be politically and morally unacceptable. We have not publicly sent any troops to help the Ukrainians fight the Russians (so far as we know), but we have sent billions of dollars of our treasure in the form of weapons to assist the Ukrainians to defeat Mr. Putin in his brazen attempt to conquer an independent democracy on Russia’s southwestern border.
Not only that, we have convinced several European NATO allies to do the same, including some, like Poland and Germany, which heretofore have been very leery of getting involved in other peoples’ wars. But because the Russian bear is so close to these states, and because they too are happy to send arms to the Ukrainians, it is conceivable that Ukraine, with this huge influx of western armaments, might be able to defeat the Russian bear. Should that happen, virtually every state in the western world will be delighted. Russia under the leadership of Vladimir Putin will be a clear and present danger as long as President manages to stay in office or remain alive, whichever comes first.
So here is an idea to think about. Would it not be a more enlightened policy for the United States of America, Arms Manufacturer for the World (slightly to alter a Sandbergian phrase) to somewhat shrink the actual size of our armed forces, and instead, to keep warehouses filled with munitions of all sizes and shapes to sell or give to other nations whom we believe are “good guys” fighting “bad guys” when they need those particular kinds of materiel? Might it not even be a less expensive policy were we to do that?
Those kinds of questions also require the consideration of other kinds of questions. When a fight is not our fight, might it be more moral to supply arms to people or foreign states our government supports than to enter their wars with our own troops? Since we are the world’s No. 1 maker of all kinds of armaments, might we better serve democracies fighting autocracies or those people we consider good guys fighting those we consider bad guys to supply them with what good old American capitalism has supplied for decades? Arms makers are some of the most heavily government-subsidized industries in the USA, so why not encourage them to keep some of them on hand if any of our friends need them in a hurry?
Historically, when any nation or empire has been the strongest in the world, they either felt compelled to enter other states’ squabbles or somehow they found themselves coerced into doing so. Might it not be wiser, as Winston Churchill said to FRD and to America before Pearl Harbor, “Give us the tools, and we will finish the job”? Isn’t “Lend-Lease” better than “Blood-Bombs,” our blood as well as OUR bombs?
International relations are expensive for superpowers, regardless of what particular policies are followed. Perhaps Americans, especially American politicians, have discovered that it is less expensive in both blood and treasure to supply arms to those we think are worthy of our largesse than directly to involve ourselves in the wars in which they believe they must become engaged.
Because we have hitched our wagon to Ukraine’s star, we should give them all the munitions of which we are capable of producing and they are capable of handling, if only because they find themselves fighting a war against Russia that we are wisely loathe to fight. We also are correct in trying to convince every ally who can be convinced that they too need to ship multitudes of arms into Ukraine to deter the Russian aggressor.
War is horrible under all circumstances. Nevertheless, as long as there are nations and ethnicities, there shall be wars. Furthermore, war by proxy is preferable to first-hand war. In the first quarter of the twenty-first century, it may behoove the United States of America to become much less of a combatant and much more of a supporter of other carefully chosen combatants. If we did that for the rest of this century, we might conclude, as the old spiritual says, that we personally “ain’t gonna study war no more.”
April 1, 2023
John Miller is Pastor of The Chapel Without Walls on Hilton Head Island, SC. More of his writings may be viewed at www.chapelwithoutwalls.org.