Why is understanding history important to understanding politics?


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outlaw1 is offline outlaw1 Post #1  May 19,2009, 6:39am

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Anyone care to answer this without googling it? I might not be able to answer this till tonight. Have a go at it will ya! Hint-you don't have to talk about the Vietnam War if you don't want to. I just put the image there.
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Rand_011 is offline Rand_011 Post #2  May 19,2009, 7:34am
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As an over-quoted individual once stated ... "History is bunk"
 
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Jacquesne is offline Jacquesne Post #3  May 19,2009, 9:52am
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Is this a trick question? Oh, I get it.

This is like the answer to life, the universe, and everything. We know the answer...42. What we don't know is the question.

So we have our answer...stamp-with-a-helo-on-it. Now we must determine the question. Is the question "What is an example of a war that failed because it had no clear objective for success?"

No, can't be that...we could say the same thing about Iraq and Korea. Ok, how about "Example of the media being retards?" Too general. "Example of one president messing up a war and passing it on to another president who then lies about ending it to win his campaign?" Nope, we're talking about modern times again, although it applies to this war as well.

How about "Example of a war where the government discovered it's initial objective was a waste of time and then didn't call it quits in order to justify all the money they wasted?" Oops, too general again. I could keep going but I don't think I'm going to find that elusive question proposed by this darn stamp.

You got me, outlaw. Your Jeopardy skills obviously surpass mine. So I'll answer your question with a question.

What is the question?

Jacquesne
 
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outlaw1 is offline outlaw1 Post #4  May 19,2009, 2:15pm

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Rand_011 wrote :
As an over-quoted individual once stated ... "History is bunk"


Maybe he or she is right. But I don't think so. Do you? I've seen some of your posts, you are an intelligent guy. History can be used to determine certain courses of action.

Example an NFL Coach want's to contract a former collegiate Defensive End. What does the Coach know? Well he knows the DE was a standout in his Sophmore year-most tackles in his conference + 15 quarterback sacks.

However in the beginning of Junior year the kid gets a bad break. He gets suspended for three games (loses his starting DE position) for having a party with weed found by campus security in his room.

The DE after his 3 game suspension never gets his starting position back (his replacement goes on to be a high draft pick in the NFL.) In fact he flounders with only 3 sacks, etc. Instead of joining the College football team for his senior year, he tries out for the NFL draft but goes undrafted.

So how does the Coach make his decision to see if the kid can fit into the NFL? He checks out the kids history of his injuries, his attitude & his high school years (tapes, etc.) Interviews his High School and a College Coach. Finds out the DE has a good attitude, is positive and has a great work ethic.

The Coach invites him for a tryout and gives the kid a contract. True story about a rookie DE for the NY Giants.

PS: I forgot, you can read "The Art of War" written 2,000 years ago by Sun Tsu. In it you will understand about military history that still applies to the American Army of today (and Iraq) politics including office politics, social discourse of humans, etc.
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Jacquesne is offline Jacquesne Post #5  May 19,2009, 2:53pm
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Ah, hah! Are you comparing the mistakes of Vietnam with the current conflict?

Is that the point of the stamp? I don't know. I believe understanding history is vital to understanding life in general. Much of our personal views and knowledge are based on our own experiences, correct? So without a perspective of the past how can you possibly claim to possess any sort of wisdom? If you stop at only seeing into your own past it seems like a waste of the vast stores of knowledge gained by those before us.

Then again my father was a history major and much of my major involves history so I'm perhaps a bit biased. Much of my own worldview is shaped by things I've read and lessons I've seen by learning about the past.

Take our conflicts in the Middle East. Without any historical perspective how can we understand why they hate us? If I didn't know the past hundred years events in the region I'd probably assume they were just a bunch of Arab sociopaths that hate freedom. And I would be ignorant, wrong, and bigoted.

History has so much to teach us. One important thing I've learned is that time changes but people don't. Sure, their culture, fashion, and technology changes. But the basics...their fears, loves, motivations, capabilities, essence, that doesn't change. Anyone who thinks we're smarter than the people of ancient times might want to take a glance at the pyramids, the Greek philosophers, the Mayan calender, the Phoenician maps of Antarctica, the ancient Chinese civilizations...the list goes on and on.

Forgive the tangent but evolution has taught this erroneous belief that mankind has "evolved" into smarter beings over the ages and even at certain times that different races of people are smarter than others. I'm still not certain if evolution is true or not but I'm pretty sure based on my knowledge of history that people aren't getting much smarter. Sun Tzu, who's tactics are still studied to this day, lived around two and a half millennia ago.

Anyway, I still haven't figured out what the stamp has to do with this topic. You win.

Jacquesne
 
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outlaw1 is offline outlaw1 Post #6  May 19,2009, 3:02pm

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Jacquesne wrote :
Is this a trick question? Oh, I get it.

This is like the answer to life, the universe, and everything. We know the answer...42. What we don't know is the question.

So we have our answer...stamp-with-a-helo-on-it. Now we must determine the question. Is the question "What is an example of a war that failed because it had no clear objective for success?"

No, can't be that...we could say the same thing about Iraq and Korea. Ok, how about "Example of the media being retards?" Too general. "Example of one president messing up a war and passing it on to another president who then lies about ending it to win his campaign?" Nope, we're talking about modern times again, although it applies to this war as well.

How about "Example of a war where the government discovered it's initial objective was a waste of time and then didn't call it quits in order to justify all the money they wasted?" Oops, too general again. I could keep going but I don't think I'm going to find that elusive question proposed by this darn stamp.

You got me, outlaw. Your Jeopardy skills obviously surpass mine. So I'll answer your question with a question.

What is the question?

Jacquesne

Excellent answer Jacquesne. You are right and my photo of the Vietnam stamp only confused matters more. Let's examine what you did...you thought about the situation, created ideas and then offered a solution.
You asked to clarify the question.

I like your answer per the media! You are right, it's a vague question. I'll answer it this way...while some Iraqi Vets have said Vietnam is not the Iraq (war) I'd guess they were pro-Govt. (when Bush was in office.) But let's look at a few things:

What was the Vietnam war about? (rhetorical questions.) How was the war conducted and who was the enemy? Could the enemy have been almost anyone? Were there ambushes involved?

Terrain, weather, politics, alien culture, strategy of the war-how it was fought, resources Americans (politicians, businessmen) could use, etc. I'm forgetting something because I'm at work and rushing.

Surely (and don't call me Shirley!) we can make some deductions from the Vietnam War and apply it to the Iraq War to declare who will be the eventual "winner." I'm going ahead of myself and not fully explaining it. But see Terrain, weather, alien culture, Strategy of war & how it was conducted for the conclusion of the Iraq War.

Testing toys, Geopolitics, getting resources, protecting foreign countries, etc are ok excuses. But at what expense? Would I as Commander* want to sacrifice my soldiers for a political war? I'm not saying this is a fullly political war and/or that our fine soldiers are over there for no reason. My concern is for soldiers, for example who earlier in the war did not have proper protection per equipment & their Humvees (adding metal to the doors for protection.)

I went off subject. If we dig deep enough, whether we are talking about an individual, a political party, a COUNTRY like America (it's history, culture, how it came to be and what it's like today) + looking at the present, we can make some accurate conclusions per the future. Something like that.

However the TV news (and newspapers) when talking about politics, won't go deep enough beyond the sound bites. You can't accuratly gauge or judge a political situation if you don't understand the culture involved, the history of a people (or political party or issue) etc. Too often we watch the news and make emotional decisions...based on insufficient and/or prejudiced data.

How can you tell is the news is politically prejudiced if you don't understand the underlying causes? Bottomline the more intel you have (history) the better you can make accurate, fair, solid and good decisions. By understanding the history of Iraq, you can better be able to gauge the political future of Iraq and effectiveness of what is going on in Iraq today.

In talking about the Iraq War, one should know the history of the people, geography, past, culture, natural resources, materials, supplies & $ needed for a sustained war effort, attitude of American people per the war, food, likes and dislikes of the people, terrain, weather, who their allies are, who their minorities are that might dislike the majority in power, etc in order to make the best accurate forecast per the present & near future.

Wheew...I think I blew this one! I think I'm gunking this up & repeating myself. I've made it more difficult than it is. I'm not an expert on the Iraq War.

Peace!

*what is the politics behind wars? And by studying military history, can one deduct that efforts on the part of our fine Army were curtailed by Politicians? Can we also make guesses per Geopolitical reasons on why we are or have fought in a region?

The above needs to be re-written and sent to the washer. Er I mean editor...

Dedicated to the Vietnam War Vet, the Iraqi War Vet and all Vets. Thanks to them/you, we are free.
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Jacquesne is offline Jacquesne Post #7  May 19,2009, 3:53pm
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Ah, I see. I was wondering if you were going to go on that angle.

I would argue that while Vietnam and Iraq have certain similarities they are definitely different wars. Some of the same mistakes were made, for sure, but it's not quite so black-and-white.

One of the first similarities I see is that in both instances the military advisers gave the president bad information or at the very least good information that was wrong. It's easy to look at that stuff in hindsight but take a closer look at the history.

When we went into Iraq the president claimed there were WMDs there. This wasn't just Bush, though. Our intelligence community, the British intelligence, the French intelligence, and the Israeli intelligence communities all agreed that Sadam had weapons of mass destruction. Bush didn't just glance at some papers and say "I think Sadam has WMDs! Let's go, boys!" There was a virtually unanimous consensus within the community both in the US and abroad that Sadam was carrying some bad stuff.

And they were all wrong. Sadam said he got rid of those things and, well, he kind of did. We searched the whole freaking place and didn't find a single WMD. We found MiGs buried under the sand. We found torture houses and some pretty bad stuff. We found Sadam himself hiding in a hole in the ground. The WMDs, however, were nowhere.

You can blame Bush for that all you want but the truth is we had a genuine reason to go into Iraq. It was in our best interest at the time and everyone agreed until we found out that we were all wrong.

We had a couple objectives. First, take Baghdad. We did that in three days. Second, defeat Sadam's army. That was over quickly too. Third, find the WMDs. Woops, they weren't there.

That should have been it. Take Sadam, let the people put him on trial like they did, let them decide on a new leader and get the heck out of there. If they pick some leader that we like, great! Support him and let the Iraqi people live their lives however they want. If the pick another psychopath we can always go back in a whip them in three days again. That's a heck of a lot safer and more efficient than sitting around trying not to get blown up in the middle of a civil war.

Instead we stuck around for eight long years. We tried to turn our very effective fighting force into a police academy with rather hazy results. Most importantly we didn't have an objective anymore.

And that's the biggest similarity between Vietnam and Iraq in my opinion. There wasn't a clear objective. The second question proposed in the Powell Doctrine developed after Vietnam and mostly during the Gulf War is "Do we have a clear attainable objective?" Number 5 is "Is there a plausible exit strategy to avoid endless entanglements?" There are other aspects that were broken but those are the big ones.

"Winning the War on Terror" is not a clear, attainable objective. Neither really was "Prevent the Communists from influencing Vietnam." And in both we stuck around long after we should have left in order to complete these mysterious objectives.

Perhaps if our leadership (including, amusingly, Powell himself) had paid a bit more attention to those rules we might have had a more successful war. "Winning" doesn't mean sitting around in a conquered place while getting blow up by psychotic civilians. "Winning" is when you go in, complete your objective, and get the heck out. That's one of the reasons the Marine Corps is so successful; that's their entire combat strategy.

So my argument is that Iraq initially was the right choice. Everyone was behind the decision and we had a clear objective. We just stuck around too long and ended up turning a clear victory into a mess. Perhaps Bush didn't want to stand down and look weak. Perhaps he wanted to take out Sadam who had embarrassed his father during Bush Sr.'s presidency and make up for that period of time. Who knows.

Vietnam was probably a good choice in the beginning too. It doesn't seem that way because we're once again looking at it in hindsight but the problem was we just stayed too long once we realized that our objective wasn't attainable. In a way it's sort of like the gambler that starts losing all his money and starts thinking "well, if I just keep going my luck will change eventually!" until he's totally broke.

It's easy to make judgments on the past with the perspective of the present. That doesn't mean those judgments are fair or accurate, however. I would challenge everyone to make sure you have a fairly balanced historical perspective before trying to decide if people made the "right" choice or just screwed everything up.

One thing you learn in leadership is that a 70% solution now is better than a 100% solution when it's too late. Sometimes that solution ends up being a bad choice. That's life.

In this case I think they tried to turn their failed 70% solution into a 100% solution and ended up making the whole thing worse. Nobody likes admitting to being wrong or making mistakes, especially not leaders of the free world.

I suppose we'll have to see what history writes.

Jacquesne
 
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outlaw1 is offline outlaw1 Post #8  May 19,2009, 6:26pm

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Holy gosh I fell into a quagmire! No Vietnam pun intended. First I was supposed to have talked about learning about politics thru understanding history.

Then I veered off into Vietnam to taste Mamasan's food. Hmm then off to Iraq per the weather, terrain, etc where I stayed too long.

I agree with your post. You picked up the ball and ran with it. You got a touchdown as you added good content here. Heck I was lost like a lone American scout car in the former Russian Caucasus Mts.

There are many benefits to what we did. It's too bad we didn't get out quicker. Maybe you are right per Bush wanting to get even for his father.

Or we wanted to "train" our Army more in desert warefare per future "terror" wars. Perhaps trying to compare the two does an injustice to the men fighting over there now.

They have their own unique stressors and problems. And I agree with you that it's easy to be a Monday morning Quaterback.

One interesting statement that we both agree on is "The War on Terror" statement. That's an unattainable political, military & I believe economic statement (a Terror War created to last forever.)

Now I'm mindful of a Navy Seal who says "there are real bad guys over there." My concern is not to condemn what has happened. But to make sure we don't create a million new Terrorists and to protect our soldiers.

The interesting part is when Politicians create sound bites "a War on Terror" to get the Citizens mentally prepared. But when I ask the average Citizen what that means their eyes kinda glaze over.

Then I get a recital of the news...I'm wondering, have we purposely created a war that is semi-permanent? Someone suggested there was going to be (or is already being built) one or several permanent American Military Bases in Iraq.

In a way, are we being proactive per any possible threats ala WW3-Muslims, etc vs USA?

btw I had to google the spelling of Caucasus. And saw a map of the area, heck I forgot Iran is right below former Russian territory.
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Rand_011 is offline Rand_011 Post #9  May 20,2009, 10:18am
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outlaw1 wrote :
Maybe he or she is right. But I don't think so. Do you? I've seen some of your posts, you are an intelligent guy. History can be used to determine certain courses of action.
Ahh ... I was being a bit facetious ... I just recall in high school for Ancient history, one of the individuals stated 'History is bunk' and I happened to miss that on a quiz and it stuck with me ...

The quote is from Henry Ford as follows .. "History is more or less bunk. It's tradition. We don't want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker's dam is the history we made today."

On a serious note ... History is important as a tool ... But just as a carpenter may use many tools to do his job, so must we use many tools as well.
 
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outlaw1 is offline outlaw1 Post #10  May 20,2009, 4:49pm

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Rand_011 wrote :
Ahh ... I was being a bit facetious ... I just recall in high school for Ancient history, one of the individuals stated 'History is bunk' and I happened to miss that on a quiz and it stuck with me ...

The quote is from Henry Ford as follows .. "History is more or less bunk. It's tradition. We don't want tradition. We want to live in the present and the only history that is worth a tinker's dam is the history we made today."

On a serious note ... History is important as a tool ... But just as a carpenter may use many tools to do his job, so must we use many tools as well.

I like that, history is a tool than can be used. And the more tools that are used, the better picture we can get.
As for Ford...I think Napoleon Hill wrote: "Ford had enemies and some slandered him as being uneducated and dumb (I'm not sure if it was dumb, stupid or ignorant.)

It actually got to court somehow. This is what Ford said, I'll paraphrase "it's true I didn't go to school. But in my office on my desk is buttons. And I can touch a button and get a lawyer, a rubber engineer or any expert for that matter to answer my questions."

Ford won that court case. I'm sure I've forgotten most of what transpired.
 
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