useless american military .. from the GATEWAY .., page-17

Probably best if you look at this stuff in context. Its not just the US, this article applies equally to all the major powers including Russia. No major power has successfully achieved very much in their conquests since WW2. The invention of nuclear weapons largely prohibits any all-in battles so all wars are small scale proxy wars now.

Any territory captured is hard to keep since other countries simply keep pouring in weapons to support ongoing rebellious actions by the inhabitants upon the occupying force. At some point in most cases its just war of attrition. The invading force eventually finds the resources and cost of indefinite occupation are just too much. Westerm countries find it even harder due to the ongoing battle with their own media and generally higher accountability.

That said, Russia tried for decades to take Afghanistan. The cost in financial terms and life was massive and in the end they went broke and walked away. They then also lost most of the other countries which they had taken control of. In fact most European nations lost most of their empires after WW2.

Its easy to criticize the US because great power is always accompanied by great corruption. The need to lie about mistakes. The need to make up stories to legitimize things which won't be popular. Not a big problem in dictatorial environments where the govt controls the press but much harder in the west where they also have to justify the cost aspects.

Overall the US has done a pretty good job in the last 80 years compared to what any power ever did previously with a similar level of global power. They have tended to influence rather than govern. Intervene when necessary. Yes its been in their best interests but nobody expects otherwise. Its easy to see the mistakes since there have been many. None of this sh1te is easy and there are often no good or easy answers. Sometimes its just the least sh1te option which you have to chose. The world wasn't designed by Walt Disney. There are usually no goodies and baddies and no happy endings for all. Just millions of innocents trying to live their lives under the influence and control of the minority of hard line scum.

To get large numbers of people to put their lives on the line to protect innocents from the scum isn't easy. Sometimes you need the scum leaders of one country to help deal with even scummier leaders of another. Its not nice. Its not perfect but the alternative is often to do nothing at all as the majority of the US population would have preferred going into WW2. If the Japanese hadn't made a stupid mistake in bombing Pearl Harbour and in doing so changed the political will in the US, its likely that the Nazis / Japanese / Itialians would have won the war. Huge numbers of people would continue to have been purged from existence because they weren't the ideal physical specimens, or had strange beliefs, or worse still opened their mouths and said something which the dictators didn't like.

Its funny looking at the tens of thousands of views expressed on this forum on a daily basis. Some are pretty extreme and some are quite obviously linked to political ideologies which would never allow a forum like this to exist if they were in control. The biggest problem with freedom of speech is that it gives equal rights to those who plot take take that right away from you.

Anyhow, not always a fan of all things US, like fat food franchises, however I like the idea of bring poisoned by Putin or locked up by the CCP even less. I respect the US and what they have tried to do, even if not always successfully.