modern wars among major powers are fought at industrial scale. a few pieces of ultra-expensive, overengineered weapons won't win wars and doesn't even scare the Houthis.
the US military muscle memory is fighting insurgents, peasants in sandals riding on scooters. their war experience is not just irrelevant but a deadly liability on the next battlefield - as the military will keep fighting yesterday's wars. Michael Hudson, the best economist in the west nobody listens to, said it well: the US army is a spending army, not a fighting army.
Also don't forget mercenary armies like the US don't fight wars with the high probability (even certainty) of death. It takes a brave man (more likely a brainless man) to die for the military industrial complex and a president who conveniently pardons his own son for all crimes committed (or may have committed) under the sun.
My letter to Santa Clause includes a wish China would dramatically increase its aid and development assistance to Syria to help it weather the crushing sanctions imposed by the United States to effect regime change for Israel. Syria is a BRI member and China has done much to help, diplomatically, economically, and as Syria's top trading partner.
But a lot of the help looks good on paper, like the "strategic partnership" of 2023 without providing real defensive help. Israeli jets fly around the Middle East bombing anyone and anything they want with impunity. Syria is high on its list with a hundred bombings a year, roughly. Reconstruction projects will help in the future, but meanwhile Syria could use some of those vaunted anti-aircraft systems that no one seems willing to supply.
modern wars among major powers are fought at industrial scale. a few pieces of ultra-expensive, overengineered weapons won't win wars and doesn't even scare the Houthis.
the US military muscle memory is fighting insurgents, peasants in sandals riding on scooters. their war experience is not just irrelevant but a deadly liability on the next battlefield - as the military will keep fighting yesterday's wars. Michael Hudson, the best economist in the west nobody listens to, said it well: the US army is a spending army, not a fighting army.
Also don't forget mercenary armies like the US don't fight wars with the high probability (even certainty) of death. It takes a brave man (more likely a brainless man) to die for the military industrial complex and a president who conveniently pardons his own son for all crimes committed (or may have committed) under the sun.
My letter to Santa Clause includes a wish China would dramatically increase its aid and development assistance to Syria to help it weather the crushing sanctions imposed by the United States to effect regime change for Israel. Syria is a BRI member and China has done much to help, diplomatically, economically, and as Syria's top trading partner.
But a lot of the help looks good on paper, like the "strategic partnership" of 2023 without providing real defensive help. Israeli jets fly around the Middle East bombing anyone and anything they want with impunity. Syria is high on its list with a hundred bombings a year, roughly. Reconstruction projects will help in the future, but meanwhile Syria could use some of those vaunted anti-aircraft systems that no one seems willing to supply.
I agree. It's baffling that neither China nor Iran has done much to date.