America’s bitter experiences in Vietnam and Afghanistan have shown that more soldiers does not always mean victory—and that public opinion at home is just as important as battlefield success.
After over 1.1 million casualties and almost four years of intense combat in Ukraine, the Russian military has discovered that winning a war is not an easy feat. But the lessons coming out of Ukraine are universal, and the US military should pay close heed.
In war, one can overcome an enemy’s forces with superior numbers, technology, tactics, and even better luck. But wars can be lost despite military success on the ground. Vietnam and Afghanistan highlight that seemingly contradictory statement.
The Vietnam War Was the World’s First Television Conflict
The history of the Vietnam War is well-known in the United States. Throughout the 1960s, America deployed more and more US troops to prop up the unpopular and corrupt South Vietnamese government. Despite valiant efforts on the ground, sea, and air and tactical victories throughout, the US military was unable to stop the North Vietnamese troops and Viet Cong Communist guerrillas from infiltrating and subverting South Vietnam.
The Vietnam War was the first televised conflict, and television was key to its eventual failure. It kept the conflict front-and-center as a political issue in the United States, and as it went on, it became immensely unpopular with average Americans who could not understand why US troops had to die in a faraway Southeast Asian country. Although the US military was winning on the ground, it was losing back home.
There is no better example of this victory-on-the-ground-but-defeat-at-home situation than the Tet Offensive. In January 1968, North Vietnam and the Viet Cong launched a large-scale offensive throughout South Vietnam, catching the US and South Vietnam by surprise. The offensive was a military disaster, costing the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong tens of thousands of men. But the significance of a simultaneous attack that caught the US military off-guard—after months of promises that the war was being won—was not lost on the American public, which thereafter considered the war a lost cause and increasingly protested against it. Although it would be another seven years before the final US forces pulled out of Vietnam in a dramatic fashion, the end had begun during the Tet Offensive.
Afghanistan Showed the Limits of a “Surge” Strategy
More than 25 years after the last US troops left Vietnam as Communist tanks were entering Saigon, the US found itself embroiled in a war in Afghanistan. Following the terrorist attacks of 9/11, the Taliban regime declined to expel al-Qaeda from Afghanistan. Soon thereafter, a handful of US special operators and CIA paramilitary and operations officers were in the country, coalescing different anti-regime forces into one fighting army that defeated the Taliban and al-Qaeda in just a few weeks.
For several years, the situation in Afghanistan seemed stable. Money poured into the country, leading to infrastructural development hitherto unseen. The Afghan security forces received training from the US-led international coalition. US and allied troop numbers stayed relatively low.
Then, in the late 2000s, came the “surge.” As in Iraq, the US followed a surge strategy in Afghanistan, pouring tens of thousands of troops into the country in an effort to defeat the insurgency once and for all. However, while the strategy had worked in Iraq, it failed to change the situation in Afghanistan, and incurred significant political costs along the way. The fighting was decentralized, and more troops did not mean better chances of victory. The insurgency was able to withstand the heavy battering until US public opinion had had enough with a seemingly endless war that was nearing two decades.
The United States gradually withdrew from the war, ceding more and more responsibilities to the Afghan security forces. Then, in August 2021, everything collapsed. In a Blitzkrieg-like advance, the Taliban rolled up the Afghan security forces and reached Kabul in just a few days. A hectic evacuation, all too reminiscent of the Saigon evacuation, saved tens of thousands of people from the clutches of the Taliban. Then everything was over.
The examples of Vietnam and Afghanistan show that victory on the battlefield is a necessary but not sufficient condition for winning a war. Moreover, the longer a conflict lasts, the more likely it is that it will be lost due to the pressures of public opinion and natural political changes. Further, the two conflicts verify the maxim that military operations should be subordinate to clear political and strategic objectives. Anything else risks endless wars doomed to fail.
About the Author: Stavros Atlamazoglou
Stavros Atlamazoglou is a seasoned defense journalist specializing in special operations and a Hellenic Army veteran (national service with the 575th Marine Battalion and Army HQ). He holds a BA from the Johns Hopkins University and an MA from the Johns Hopkins’ School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). His work has been featured in Business Insider, Sandboxx, and SOFREP.
Image: Shutterstock / Ryanzo W. Perez.
