The primary reason the invasion of Afghanistan failed was because the US tried to pretend it wasn’t an invasion or domination. Telling the local warlords and factions beforehand they just had to outlast things was a plan doomed to failure before it even began.

If the government had sold “we are making this place the 51st state and it will take 100 years to make that happen” there would be an entirely different outcome.

I’m not saying that’s what should have happened. I actually feel nothing should have happened. But if you are going to take extensive lethal action like that, at least man up and be honest over what it will take to be successful.

The US populace is bizarrely afraid of admitting they live the amazing lives they do due to empire. It’s politically untenable to actually state the reality of what it takes to subjugate a population, no matter if the death numbers are similar for abject pointless failure versus eventual success.

Exactly. There's no country on the Earth today with the empire dreams and ability of the British colonial period. And nobody is willing to bring it back (and perhaps for very good reasons, mind you).

What we did in Iraq and Afghanistan is an embarrassment and black stain; had we been openly evil and empirical (?) we'd have killed less with a better result.

> If the government had sold “we are making this place the 51st state and it will take 100 years to make that happen” there would be an entirely different outcome.

Such hubris - nobody would have signed up for that