Replies

This war cannot be compared to any other as far as time.

If you want to compare the body count however, this war is a picnic compared to World War 2. (1.2 million casualties in 4 years)

Vietnam lasted 9 years and we lost 10 times what we have lost here. We either fight and win in Iraq, or we run for cover and fight here in the US later. But I will guarantee the body count to be 100 times greater if allow it to come here.

We either fight and win in Iraq

Correction: We either fight ~~and~~ to win in Iraq

But, the rules of engagement have been such that the fight was not to win, but to maintain some level of enforcement. Look at the Fallujah. It took 3 attempts before the 3rd was a serious effort; and it succeeded.

The current endeavour is for a political/diplomatic solution. That will not occur, however, until the troops are allowed to finish the war. We won WWII because the Japanese, and then the Germans surrendered. We didn't rush to a political/diplomatic solution [althought Chamberlain though he did] before the war was won.

picnic compared to World War 2. (1.2 million casualties in 4 years) And that was out of a much smaller US population. Casualities for the Brits, Aussies, and Kiwis (New Zealanders) were even higher proportional to their populations at the time. US population was about 133 million during WW-II compared to about 294 million in 2004, so 1.2 million casualties then would be like about 2.6 million casualties today. Compare that to 3 thousand KIAs and about 23,000 WIAs in Iraq. Add in about 300 KIA and no more than 1,000 WIAs in Afghanstain, and you'll see the numbers of casualties in this war is much lower, by orders of magnitude than those from WW-II.

And remember non of the Axis powers ever attacked the United States themselves. (Hawaii was a territory at the time, as were the Phillipines.) The same can not be said of the Islamist Enemy we are fighting now. Causalities on 9-11-2001 were higher than those of 12-07-1941, and the later were mostly military, while the former were overwhelmingly civilians.

In a single long battle of WW-II, near the end in fact, we lost 6,821 Killed 19,217 Wounded That battle lasted 36 days. It was for a tiny Island which while important for the bomber crews who were even then pounding Japan, and the fighter pilots sent along to protect the bombers, it really wasn't all that important a place. We would have won the war even if we'd just bombed and by passed it. But we didn't. And we likely saved as many bomber and fighter crewman, as we lost Marines, probably more in fact.

The Marines consider it one of their finest hours. They "persuaded" the Navy to name this little boat after the battle fought there.

USS Iwo Jima.