Yes, that's a fair assessment, but then general context is still one of very specific strategic targeting. And FYI it's not just about 'Oil Prices', the US has left many other strategic industries in place whereas by any other ugly consideration, they would just 'blow up whatever'.

I'm not sure how far the Administration would go but they are very strongly restricted by US Armed forces procedures and just norms.

It's fair to say overall engagements were bad, but it's hard to argue that a military looses when it streamrolls the opponent, and then 'decides to leave'.

The US generally wins wars, but can fail on occupational and grander objectives, which are different things.

The US 'tied' in Korea, eventually 'won' in Vietnam but then quickly decided to leave - strategic failure), 'won' in Iraq but a grinding occupation left it a strategic quagmire but no total failure.

Middling intervention in Syria was effective in bringing down Assad and now there is a transition to 'something somewhat better'.

There was no fight to even win in Afghanistan as the Talibain was overthrown without direct intervention - the follow up was entirely occupational - and though it was a strategic failure, it wasn't a military defeat. The West just did not want to continue paying the cost of keeping the fighters at bay. That's a 'stupid set of decisions' which is different than 'losing'.

This is all different from Russian failure in Ukraine where it cannot meet it's military objectives.

Iran is shaping up to be a 'military tie' - because US is engaging from afar it' abilities are limited and is taking real losses ... and a pretty big strategic failure, having lost control over the Gulf, no 5th fleet presence in the Gulf, allies attacked, Iran emboldened. Bad.

Hi, the guy with the original claims here: You can really argue this one either way - If you look at Wikipedia, the field seems fairly even, but when you start looking into the details, things don't look quite as rosy: There's a few "wins" that are literally just a plane getting shot down or similar, there's a lot of revolutions they were involved in (some turning out good, some bad) But as you've observed: the big, memorable ones they lost. even the ones Wikipedia claims as wins/mixed bags are sometimes consequences of an earlier battle that they lost. For example, Korea: the division counts as a 'win', because it happened during WW2 and the US were part of the victors of WW2. Defending the south in the Korean war counts as 'mixed' and gets thrown in with the lost counteroffensive of taking the north. You can play the numbers however you like here, it feels like.

The difference is deliberate and arbitrary attack of civilians at scale and total lack of concern - popularly, politically, operationally, and practically for casualties outside military targeting.

The notion one would even try to compare 'the Caribbean' - where USN is destroying drug running boats - which is arguably against some maritime laws but is nevertheless exceedingly acute, I think shows how wound up people are in the political context.

There is no relevant kinetic fallout in the Caribbean - it's an Elephant precisely stepping on a single ant.

Capture of Venezuelan Oil ... almost certainly illegal.

But that's a different thing

As for Vietnam - start by laying the context for why the N. Vietnamese imprisoned, tortured, killed 100's of thousands of political dissidents and civilians of all kinds, and continued that horrible repression for decades even to this day as they continue to crack down on mild dissent. The actual facts on both sides are actually ugly, but woefully misrepresented and the same utterly bizarre dual moral lens is applied ... a bit like in the Iranian situation as well.

Implied in the question is the despotism in plain site: why did N. Vietnam invade Cambodia? Against the will of those people? And murder and maraud in that territory?

The difference is between that, as a starting point, and strategic bombing of rural roadways (Ho Chi Min trail) etc., which ironically was in lieu of actually bombing North Vietnam which should have been done right from the onset, would have prevented a war, and saved 1/2 the population from a perennial nightmare and given the citizens some say in their future.

But it's also an example of the extent of the ability of superpowers to project power.