Defence spending

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Originally Posted By: Cutehumor
it must be working, we haven't lost a war yet.
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This may get the thread shut down, but I don't for a second consider Vietnam a 'win'...yes, I belive it is officially classifies as a 'stalemate', but, just after the U.S. pulled out, the North swiftly overran the South.
 
I think the way they get around that is by classifying Vietnam as a "conflict" rather than a "war". Whatever that means.
 
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/series/pt_06.html

NARRATOR: Johnson turned the troop request over to Clark Clifford, his new secretary of defense, a trusted adviser and supporter of the war from the beginning.

CLARK CLIFFORD: President Johnson appointed a task force as soon as I went into the Pentagon and named me chairman of the task force. The reason was that the military had specifically requested 206,000 more troops to be sent to Vietnam. He wanted that analyzed, he wanted us to determine how the troops could be gathered and sent, what the social, political, economic impact might be on the United States.

........

CLARK CLIFFORD: I know for three full days I spent down in the tank with the Joint Chiefs of Staff, where you sit with all of the communications devices that go all over the world. We had long talks. How long would it take? They didn't know. How many more troops would it take? They didn't know. Would 206,000 answer the demand? They didn't know. Might there be more? Yes, there might be more. So, when it was all over, I said, "What is the plan to win the war in Vietnam?" Well, the only plan is that ultimately the attrition will wear down the North Vietnamese and they will have had enough. Is there any indication that we've reached that point? No, there isn't.

As a result of that kind of interview, and that kind of information, before the final examination was over and we submitted our reports to President Johnson, I had turned against the war.
 
Quite often other militaries ride on the coattails of the US during invasions/occupations. Compare who owns/establishes the bases in hot zones and what countries use those bases. That certainly doesn't account for a huge amount but we shoulder some of the financial burden for other countries.
 
TS Australian SAS were im Iraq a year before the U.S. scouting military air bases and such. Australia is right at the forefront particularly Afghanistan and were ambushed this week, a big fire fight with many injured. It's where the real fight is and the coaltion are getting very worried. Oh and the U.S billed us for all the hw we dropped/fired in the Gulf War. No free rides here. Cheers..s
 
I seriously don't understand why Australia is involved in anything? You guys are out there in the middle of ocean and the only close one to worry is Indonesia. If you get that taken care of you don't need to worry much.
 
Originally Posted By: PandaBear
I seriously don't understand why Australia is involved in anything? You guys are out there in the middle of ocean and the only close one to worry is Indonesia. If you get that taken care of you don't need to worry much.


We've played peacekeepers in the region, which I support, but otherwise, I agree wholeheartedly.
 
We've done some really stupid spending with our $20B 'though, like buying tanks that if based in Sydney cannot defend me a mere 80 miles away...they cannot negotiate the railway bridges between Sydney and here, and tread-wear rules them out travelling the roads.

We bought (recently) planes that cannot make it from here to Indonesia and back...they need a tanker.

4Corners had two retired Generals, playing simulated wargames, one playing Indo with their migs, one playing Oz with the "superhornet" and aerial refueling. General playing Oz was bemused when the Indo's migs split, with two bypassing the fray...

They went after the tanker, scored, and left.

He turned to the other General and informed him that his Hornets were now (or soon) at the bottom of the sea.
 
Shannow, you're just a parking lot for the tanks. That was part of the Japanese:OZ:US Mitsubishi auto plant jobs program. A good party for everyone. We had Mitsubishi plants here ..but for some odd reason, materials from Japan, assembled in OZ, shipped to US were bought here. After it filtered through your economy ..you bought some Abrams tanks with the left overs. It's a much more passive filter effect than just giving them to you.

Oh ..yeah ..the "can't use them" part ..no plan is perfect
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Quote:
Our Navy shot a missile from a helicopter today - it made the evening news! Now they will have to save up for a year before they can shoot another one off.


A old reserve friend/neighbor (now way too old) said that they trained him on (at the time) new weapons system. The "whatever it was" cost about $40k for one round. They had 65 (or some high number) there being trained. Kinda cruel to only have one "blown up" event, don't you think?
 
Originally Posted By: Papa Bear
I bought a new box of 22LR's for the night stand revolver....does that qualify for defense spending ??
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Not really..you really can't 'defend' yourself effectively with a .22.
 
I guess that's what Ike meant by 'military-industrial complex' having undue influence on politics.
 
Originally Posted By: PandaBear
I seriously don't understand why Australia is involved in anything? You guys are out there in the middle of ocean and the only close one to worry is Indonesia. If you get that taken care of you don't need to worry much.

China is not that far away and they are building a navy.
Similar situation during WWII with the Japanese.
 
Originally Posted By: CivicFan
I guess that's what Ike meant by 'military-industrial complex' having undue influence on politics.


Well, I'm sure it's a "Hey, pal ..I need to deliver on a promise" and the pal delivers (in this case a jobs program for Oz) ..and then the pal says, "Hey, pal ..I need you to do me a favor" ..and the PM of Oz obliges. Look it as a loan with some odd barter arrangement. It's done all the time. You surely see all kinds of purchases and sales between western aligned nations that don't really seem to make sense ..or rather ..you don't see the point. Why would a German ship builder buy a defunct US shipyard to build ships? Is there a shortage of shipbuilding capacity globally? Why would a German car company buy into an American automaker? It's sorta like forming a bunch of cross members in a bigger structure. Some are for long term strength ..and some are just temporary trusses.

That's how I imagine it, anyway.
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Viet Nam was not a war. It was a political chess match engaged in by a U.S. government that had deluded itself as to what the real threats were to the U.S. The U.S. was at that time run by a bunch of elitist Ivy Leaguers who had a macho mentality, but had never been in a fight, not even in grade school or high school. The "domino theory", now long proven to be wrong, was used to project American power overseas to counter what was eventually shown to be a nonexistent threat to the U.S. As a result, about 58,000 U.S. soldiers died. I knew some of them. The VC and North Vietnamese were never a threat to the U.S. How could they have been? No Navy and no Air Force of any consequence and an army confined to their little peninsula? This was a guerilla ground war on insignificant piece of ground, fought on the U.S. side by politicians who did not understand the enemy, saw a nonexistent threat to the U.S., and, sadly, did not let our military do what was necessary to win the war, which was, quite simply, to cross into North Viet Nam and take the war to them. Any student of warfare knows that you can't win a war if your leaders forbid you to fight on the other guy's turf. The sad thing is that the U.S. won almost all of the battles, but lost the war because the politicians would not let the soldiers do what was needed to win, which was, go into and decimate, North Viet Nam. Personally, I was against that war from the beginning, but I always thought that if one is going to fight one should fight, and be allowed to fight, to win. For a soldier's government to allow anything less is a disgrace to the nation and the ultimate sin against the soldier.
 
It was a money pit to drain the last of our monetary surplus into. I really doubt that it ever had any true military objectives. If it did, it was incidental. About that time (the end), the space program, the gold standard, and Fair Trade Laws were all either reduced, removed, or suspended. The fair trade laws were to keep the consumption internalized until the surplus was soaked up. Once they ran out money to keep the honey bucket going, then they started to dismantle stuff, close bases, whatnot. Need more money, broker more equity off shore.
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jmac - Vietnam was incidental - this could have happpened in various places.
This was the USA vs. Communism - Red China and Russia.
And at the time there was a very real threat both in fact, and by perception, on either side.
 
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