Article About the Korean War Recommended By Defense Secretary Mattis

During a recent interview with Defense Secretary James Mattis conducted by a high school journalism student; Secretary Mattis recommended that people read a 2013 article in the Atlantic by James Wright that discusses what was learned from the Korean War.  The main point the article makes is that the Korean War began a trend of the US becoming involved in military conflicts before settling on political objectives:

Korea established a pattern that has been unfortunately followed in American wars in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. These are wars without declaration and without the political consensus and the resolve to meet specific and changing goals. They are improvisational wars. They are dangerous.

The wars of the last 63 years, ranging from Korea to Vietnam to Afghanistan to Iraq (but excepting Operation Desert Storm, which is an outlier from this pattern) have been marked by:

• Inconsistent or unclear military goals with no congressional declaration of war.

• Early presumptions on the part of the civilian leadership and some top military officials that this would be an easy operation. An exaggerated view of American military strength, a dismissal of the ability of the opposing forces, and little recognition of the need for innovation.

• Military action that, except during the first year in Korea, largely lacked geographical objectives of seize and hold.

• Military action with restricted rules of engagement and political constraints on the use of a full arsenal of firepower.

• Military action against enemy forces that have sanctuaries which are largely off-limits.

• Military action that is rhetorically in defense of democracy–ignoring the reality of the undemocratic nature of regimes in Seoul, Saigon, Baghdad, and Kabul.

• With the exception of some of the South Korean and South Vietnamese military units, these have been wars with in-country allies that were not dependable.

• Military action that civilian leaders modulate, often clumsily, between domestic political reassurance and international muscle-flexing. Downplaying the scale of deployment and length of commitment for the domestic audience and threatening expansion of these for the international community.

• Wars fought by increasingly less representative sectors of American society, which further encourages most Americans to pay little attention to the details of these encounters.

• Military action that is costly in lives and treasure and yet does not enjoy the support that wars require in a democracy.  [The Atlantic]

You can read the rest at the link.