Guerulla army tactics in history

[manfredvonrichthofen]

Ok so i can't figure out how to delete my account

[davidsinn]

Ok so i can't figure out how to delete my account

You can't. If you don't want to participate just don't come back. The better alternative would be to learn from this and move forward.

Why would you use a perversion of language like "police action" to satisfy the PC crowd? I'm not nor have ever been in the military and will never be in for medical reasons and I consider calling Vietnam a "police action" to be offensive. It is disrespectful to my family and friends that were over there. Political correctness is an attempt by cowards to change reality into something that it's not.

[manfredvonrichthofen]

This is from Wikipedia, not that I agree but this is how it is explained and this is why some call it a police action.

Police action in military/security  studies and international relations is a euphemism  for a military action undertaken without a formal declaration of war.

Since World War II, formal declarations of war have increasingly become a rarity. Instead, nations involved in military conflict (especially the major-power nations) often attempt to justify their conduct by fighting the war under the auspices of a "police action".

The 1948 Indian  annexation of the Hyderabad State, codenamed Operation Polo, was referred to as a police action by the government.

The Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the Kargil War were undeclared wars and hence are sometimes described as police actions.

The Soviet war in Afghanistan was an undeclared war and hence also could be described as a police action, especially since the initial troop deployments into Afghanistan were at the request of the Afghan government.

Again, not my words, but the words of Wikipedia and some history books. I DO STILL BELIEVE VIET NAM TO BE A WAR.

[shorning]

  Let it go and move on........

[Майор Хаткевич]

The reason I say "Police Action" was that the history books call it a police action... or at least they did when I was a kid. I just din't want to offend anyone by calling it a war. But I guess the offense could go either way. I do still think it was a war.

I was just curious about anything that might have been really controversial that was sanctioned by the US Govt. Like inhumane torture of enemy soldiers.

This is one forum where using the leftist description of Vietnam is not apprecaiated. Korea was described  as a "Police Action" by the United Nations to justify commiting troops to stop the" illegal" invasion of the South by the North. Again PC BS.  Hint, If you're being shot at and wearing a uniform, IT's A WAR!! No matter what others may call it.

What exactly is leftist about it? I'm more liberal than not, and I don't consider it a police action.

[N Harmon]

I tend to have neoliberal conservative views and see no offensiveness as calling the Vietnam War a "police action". Anybody who gets bent out of shape because of a label needs to take a step back and think about whether substituting their label for another is worth the bickering that will result.

In any case, getting back to the topic at hand, there have been quite a number of covert espionage, sabotage, and even assassination attempts of foreign countries and nationals before, during, and even after World War II. One of my favorites was the CIA's Operation Mongoose which included a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro by planting a box of exploding cigars in his office. Of course, the plot failed but it was a pretty crafty idea.

[cap235629]

I tend to have neoliberal conservative views and see no offensiveness as calling the Vietnam War a "police action". Anybody who gets bent out of shape because of a label needs to take a step back and think about whether substituting their label for another is worth the bickering that will result.

In any case, getting back to the topic at hand, there have been quite a number of covert espionage, sabotage, and even assassination attempts of foreign countries and nationals before, during, and even after World War II. One of my favorites was the CIA's Operation Mongoose which included a plot to assassinate Fidel Castro by planting a box of exploding cigars in his office. Of course, the plot failed but it was a pretty crafty idea.

Everybody sing " We three men of CIA are, trying to light Castro's cigars, they were loaded, they exploded....Boom! We two men of CIA are....

[Gunner C]

I know, Inglorious Basterds was totally fiction. That's what makes it so awesome. I personally love the tactic scare the livin [Filter Subversion] out of the hearts and minds of the enemy much more than winning them. I would use the tactic given the opportunity in Iraq and Afghanistan.

You must've been a private and a stupid one at that.  Scaring the locals will only make them hate you.  Those who hate you will either actively or passively work against you.  If you lose the populace, you lose the war.  In the American Revolution only 1/3 of colonialists were on our side.  Another third didn't care, and the last third were pro-British.  Where do you think we won the war?  In keeping that middle third either neutral or at least not helping the enemy. 

Oh yeah, go ahead and call VN a "police action" at the local VFW and see if you don't get your ears pinned back. 

Unconventional warfare? There's only one unit in the military that does that - Army Special Forces.  If the unit doesn't wear a green beret, it doesn't do UW.  Period.

Blisterheads who want to scare the (whatever) out of the locals will lose this war for us (sounds like that's what you did).  The war will be won with people sitting with the village chief, sitting cross legged on the floor eating goat, and learning to trust one another.

[N Harmon]

There seems to be a lot of misunderstanding here. The premise of "Inglorious Basterds" was not of a clandestine force terrorizing the local populace, but rather a force terrorizing an occupying army. The premise was that of a special service force made up entirely of jewish soldiers who organize what their commander called "an apache resistance" (think Geronimo's resistance of Mexico and later the United States).

Just about everything in the movie is a fiction, although there actually was an all-jewish commando unit. And there were clandestine units throughout Europe. They weren't scalping Nazis though, mostly blowing up oil refineries and the like.

As for emulating the movie's tactics in Iraq and Afghanistan? I do not see how anybody would consider in legal.

[shorning]

The war will be won with people sitting with the village chief, sitting cross legged on the floor eating goat, and learning to trust one another.

Absolutely amazing what can be done when you take time to see things from the other culture's point of view....

[FlyTiger77]

The war will be won with people sitting with the village chief, sitting cross legged on the floor eating goat, and learning to trust one another.

Absolutely amazing what can be done when you take time to see things from the other culture's point of view....

Recommended reading:

"Learning to Eat Soup with a Knife" by Nagl (The title alludes to a quote by T.E. Lawrence, Lawrence of Arabia, about the difficulty of fighting guerrilla warfare.)

"The Defense of Jisr Al-Doreaa" by Burgoyne and Marckwardt, which is an update of "The Defense of Hill 781" by McDonough, which, in turn, updated the classic "The Defence of Duffer's Drift" by Swinton.

"Learning" contrasts the successful counterinsurgency during the Malay Emergency with the unsuccessful one in Viet Nam, while "Defense" speaks directly to the point made by both GunnerC and Shorning directly above.

Nagl is a retired Army lieutenant colonel while both Burgoyne and Marckwardt were both Army captains with two tours each in Iraq when "Defense" was published.

[RiverAux]

I've never heard the term "police action" used in any other context other than the Korean War and was pretty sure that it was just a term of convenience used by the government at the time to account for the legal basis behind what was being done under the auspices of the UN.  Never heard it applied to Vietnam and I'm pretty sure the liberals of the day were the ones calling it a war and that it was the government using other terms for it for a while. 

Its a common practice.

[Raja1020]

Id really love to say something to you, but since im only C/A1C i can't


*whisper* (jerk)

[Raja1020]

And if I'm right at first we were only there to advise the South Vietnamese, and eventually it was a war.