While Westmoreland is an interesting choice, and is one I am certainly not a fan of, in justice it must be remembered that he was one of, if not, the most politically hamstrung general in history. The entire Vietnam war is a classic example of why war fighting should be left to the generals. Politicians need to lay out specific goals and general rules and then get out of the way. More than once, our forces had N Vietnam on the ropes only to have politicians order a change of strategy allowing them to recover.
Those same politically driven orders cost many lives, both over the North and the South. Vietnam was a failure, of that there is no doubt, but in the end, the fault lays with the wiz kids micromanaging the war from Washington DC. It was their decisions that time and again gave the N Vietnamese time to recover and rearm. It was their insistence that they approve every target before attack that allowed hundreds, if not thousands of target's of opportunity to escape unharmed, and it was their limiting of areas subject to attack that allowed the N Vietnamese to establish logistic and tactical defense facilities inside of safe zones surrounding strategically critical installations and structures. The loss in Vietnam was not that of Westmoreland, nor any of the commanders or soldiers involved. Rather if names are to be named, they should be Johnson, McNamara, etc. Ultimately their orders were the cause of our loss.
I think you have to give ole' Nap a little more credit. Sure, he blew it in Russia, but he actually got French troops to attack, and win, many battles and campaigns, and against Germans & Brits, even...
While Westmoreland is an interesting choice, and is one I am certainly not a fan of, in justice it must be remembered that he was one of, if not, the most politically hamstrung general in history. The entire Vietnam war is a classic example of why war fighting should be left to the generals. Politicians need to lay out specific goals and general rules and then get out of the way. More than once, our forces had N Vietnam on the ropes only to have politicians order a change of strategy allowing them to recover.
Those same politically driven orders cost many lives, both over the North and the South. Vietnam was a failure, of that there is no doubt, but in the end, the fault lays with the wiz kids micromanaging the war from Washington DC. It was their decisions that time and again gave the N Vietnamese time to recover and rearm. It was their insistence that they approve every target before attack that allowed hundreds, if not thousands of target's of opportunity to escape unharmed, and it was their limiting of areas subject to attack that allowed the N Vietnamese to establish logistic and tactical defense facilities inside of safe zones surrounding strategically critical installations and structures. The loss in Vietnam was not that of Westmoreland, nor any of the commanders or soldiers involved. Rather if names are to be named, they should be Johnson, McNamara, etc. Ultimately their orders were the cause of our loss.
I think you have to give ole' Nap a little more credit. Sure, he blew it in Russia, but he actually got French troops to attack, and win, many battles and campaigns, and against Germans & Brits, even...