(06-04-2024, 08:29 PM)FlickerOfLight Wrote: All these splling over conflicts into different territories is what has me most concerned.
Those F-35's are badass.
The problem there is that asymmetrical forces don't "fight fair" - they'll slap you, and then try to run to a "neutral" corner and stick their tongues out at you. Iran's proxies are doing that now, and it's been a problem for a very long time. In Vietnam, most of the Ho Chi Minh trail ran through Laos, because Laos was not a "party to the conflict", and so they were essentially untouchable so long as their main supply routes ran through "neutral" territory.
Or so they thought. We did send some Special Forces folks into Laos to "monitor" that network of trails... and Nixon did famously order the bombing of the trail in Cambodia, which is what sparked the Kent State "protests".
The thing is, to hit your enemy, then you have to go to where he is sitting. If that is in "neutral" country, then so be it. Go in anyhow, pound the enemy into the ground like a tent peg, and then leave. If anyone complains about it, well, they shouldn't have been hosting your enemy as their guest to begin with, now should they?
We've seen the same thing in countries and conflicts around the world - we saw it in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala too, in this hemisphere. We are seeing it now with the cartels in Mexico at our southern border.
Folks shouldn't think they get to slap other folks and then run and hide in the neighbor's basement. That's a good way to get a bullet in the head when you slap someone that doesn't give a damn and will chase you down to slap back.
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