I'm an ordinary Filipino citizen and in my country we have always feared and respected America for it's military prowess. But in the recent years of my life I have noticed that the Americans no longer has will to wage wars in the scale that their ancestors fought in, this is a personal question to all Americans, if a war was to ever occur between America and another nation that is a genuine threat and has the military strength that's just as strong if not stronger can the Nation of America contend with the threat after being traumatized by the Cold War?
I was not asking if the Americans has the ability to produce troops and weapons. I was asking if America can still have the will to wage a war despite the fact that the military would be criticized for the most meager of actions, that some soldiers and sometimes officers even are discharged just because they were video taped saying obscene things.
Unfortunately your reply is not the answer to my original question which was, If a war was to ever occur between America and another nation that is a genuine threat and has the military strength that's just as strong if not stronger can the Nation of America contend with the threat after being traumatized by the Cold War?
I see what you're going at, and honestly, I'm not entirely sure. It really all depends what country the US would be fighting. I am confident that we can defend ourselves, but I don't think we have the military power to invade another large powerful country and come out on top. Although, anything is possible really.
Traumatized by the Cold War? Are you mad, man?! But seriously, we can kick anybody's ass at the moment. Not that we need to, or particularly want to. But the capacity is there.
I think its more a question of what modern war is becoming, total war, no doubt America has the capacity for. Whether America has the resolve to involve itself in another prolonged war against a guerrilla force (aka another Vietnam, 'ghan, Iraq) is another question.
America could wage more wars if it wanted albeit at great cost. Right now it is engaged in relatively small wars and it seems to have done more harm than good. Now imagine the US going against a large power or two. Anyway, wars are annoyances nowadays. We must progress with the Age of Union.
Sun Tzu once made a remark concerning that the Leader/Ruler of a country should never interrupt the decisions of his Generals because that only screws things up, it was the generals job to run the military and win the wars while it was the politician's job to run the country and the government. I wonder what Sun Tzu would say once he finds out how goddamn annoying Modern Warfare can be?
The wars that the US is fighting at the moment are a totally different kind of war then large-scale state to state wars. The wars being fought right now are for the lack of a better word small wars, wars that are more limited, guerilla-like, longer and in a sense closely resemble police actions. These kinds of wars have been succesfully fought by dominant countries troughout history using armies that are largely conventional and that were able to switch between these two types of warfare at relative ease. I dont get why people constantly have to whine about how warfare has changed or that dominant dont have the stomach to fight these kinds of wars.
This wars have ben fought entirely different in the past. America tries to fight this wars under the geneva conventien and such. Earlier in history if a colony rebeled the countries just went there and slaughtered large parts of the population. Just an exemple some partisans in yugoslavia killed a german soldier, the ss goes and kills all men in a town. That was ocfcourse in the early 20th and 19th century really comon for occupational forces to state a example. Thats what changed.
Counter insurgency methods have indeed changed somewhat, nevertheless the core principles of these small wars havent actually changed that much. Plus most of those brutal tactics generally dont have much long-term effects.
The thing is, you're asking how well America would fare in a war in which two powerful nations fight each other. But, since the end of the Korean war, our wars have for the most part been against an ideology, not a country. The capability to fight a modern war no longer is dependent on manpower, and we don't fight large battles in which swarms of soldiers charge at each other, trying to gain territory. The ability to carry out modern warfare is determined by technological superiority, and battles are fought by small, mobile squads of soldiers. Our effectiveness against the guerrilla warfare we have seen so much of post-ww2 can be debated, but we haven't had a chance to see how modern soldiers perform in a fight against a country of similar strength.
No, we don't have the will to fight a long bloody campaign for the glory of America. But a short in-and-out invasion of some small African/Middle Eastern country is sitll can do. We're not as strong as a decade or so back, but we're not sleeping at our job as World Policeman or anything.
no war between two first world states would be long and bloody it would likely last a few weeks to a month and we are much more powerful then we were a decade back
