How does the Iraq war compare with hostory's other greatest boneheaded disasters? Have there been worse?

Question

history's, that is.
Does it compare with Napoleon invading Russia in 1812? How about the Japanese emperor bombing Pearl Harbor? Were there debacles that compare from ancient history?

Answer 1

Vietnam was the biggest military blunder I've seen in my lifetime. And ya know, people said back then, "This is one grade "A" boneheaded disaster!"

But there were a whole lot of Americans who had an answer for that. They said, "How do we know it's a disaster? Don't you think our Government would pull our boys out if there wasn't very good reason for them to be there?? This will probably turn out to be...a blessing!"

Well, only if you call many thousands of dead Americans, a country left in ruins and absolutely no good achieved..."a blessing".

But it did teach us something didn't it? It wasn't for nothing, because we learned our lesson, didn't we?

...No. No, I guess we didn't.

Answer 2

It compares with Hitler invading Russia, the US siding with a puppet government in Vietnam, or the French knights invading Switzerland in the 1200s.

Answer 3

The persians didn't have that many troops. Try more like 120,000.

Anyway, there have been many worse disasters. The Roman loss at Teutoburg Forest, the US 1950 retreat during the korean war, and Battle of the Somme.

Answer 4

Plenty is the best answer I can come up with, although events leading up to the crusaders defeat at the Horns of Hattin are a good starting point. Have a look at Barbara Tuchman's book 'The March of Folly: Troy to Vietnam'. Basically a catalogue of nations acting contrary to their own best interests. Of course it also depends on your definition of disaster and what happens when you ask 'disaster for who?'. Most folk, and nearly all politicians, have no grip on history, and fail to see how it is relevant to what's happening in the world today. We like to think we are 'different' and 'more sophisticated in our thinking' than previous generations, and hence have nothing to learn from them. I guess it's natures way of culling the human herd.

Answer 5

The russians invading Afghanistan, britain invading Egypt in 1956.

Answer 6

To properly answer this question, we will need time to see the effects of the hatred this war has created among a generation of millions of Muslims for the West. Bush had made bin Laden more popular than ever, and this problem will be with us for decades.

Answer 7

Comparing a war to an invasion is apples and oranges.

Compare wars with other wars.

U.S. Losses by war:

WWII 405,000
Korean War 37,000
Vietnam War 58,000
Iraq II: 2,876 (at the time of this posting and 4 years into it)

Answer 8

The brainless twits out-thunk themselves this time. Cheney was in Saudi Arabia explaining the pull-out to the Sunni Princes. Getting rid of Rumsfool won't get this off of Bushwacks' back. The country is destroyed and 2 million Iraqis have left. There's nothing like leaving a burning, bombed-out mosque to have kerosene thrown on you and set on fire! All of the Iraqis say that things would improve if the US would leave! The Boneheads don't want to admit they were wrong!

Answer 9

the Battle of Agincourt, France...The French had the Henry V trapped..his army was a shambles...worn out, starving...the French marched in gallantly knights and all...The English ended up killing 10,000 of them and lost only 500....cut them down with arrows

Answer 10

Vietnam was a close second in the disister dept. Russia into afghanistan was boneheaded.But me marrying that broad was by far history's biggest FUBAR I've ever seen.