De: As I tried to explain early on, I have three factors:
(1) Did the thing we were primarily there to effect end up /not happening, anyway? If so, all the money and lives WASTED were a bad investment - and we lost the war, no matter how many "battles" we won (including all of them).
(2) I distinguish a military action from a war. You may not like my distinction, but I think it is an important distinction, with a specific - limited - scope, objective, and time period. Ideally, in a military action, few military personnel are put in harms way/ boots on the ground. So...Trump firing cruise missles at Syrian airfields while Xi Ping was having dinner with him was a military action, not a "war". It was a VERY successful military operation. Wars, to my mind, involve capturing, and generally keeping (annexing), territory. They typically have the intent of completely toppling governments.
If the INTENT was to topple a government, but the government was not toppled, then it was a failed war. Desert Storm was an interesting case. CTJ called it a successful "WAR". I considered, and still consider it, a very successful MILITARY ACTION. It certainly involved a lot of boots on the ground, but the government of Iraq wasn't toppled, and territory wasn't really captured and held by the US. But the latter two criteria were not the US objectives - freeing Kuwait SO OIL TO US WOULD KEEP FLOWING TO PROFIT OUT ECONOMY was inarguably achieved. And it inarguably a net profitable operation - despite the IMMENSE cost.
I think it is important to distinguish military actions from wars. Otherwise every action, every event, becomes a war. Also, "victory" or "defeat" can be declared by either party to their advantage. Did you do what you intended to do? Did you come out with clear objective PROFITABLY obtained?
(3) Economic PROFIT is probably the most underrated criteria. History says is also the MOST essential objective in the long run. It is foolish to lose sight of this. Once you are able to keep PROFITABIITY foremost in mind, and access the long term results in terms of economic profit, you can see wars on a larger frame.
This is where the adage about winning the battle but losing the war really comes down to bite you.
This is why the US lost, lost, an lost again. With EVERY WAR "won" - but at economic cost, you don't get back - the US has been getting inexorably closer to complete structural collapse at home. So, win or lose the war on territorial grounds, we have been losing economically. And, in the long run, that is why we will lose everything.
Look at the situation of the US Revolutionary War, and the THREE players - Colonists, Britain, and French EMPIRE, if you really want to learn why WARS WHICH LOSE ECONOMICALLY ARE WARS LOST. US unquestionably won (measure wealth). FRANCE LOST EVERYTHING. Britain lost its colony, yes, but the economic loss of the US colony, WHEN NETTED AGAINST THE ECONOMIC NUCLEAR BOMB THE WAR DROPPED ON ITS RIVAL, FRANCE set the stage for the UK to build its worldwide empire with NO competition! So...Britain, oddly enough, was a huge winner of the US Revolutionary War, even though the US colonists won even more!
I grant Desert Storm was a successful, and necessary military operation. It cost us a bundle of lost weath, and it could have been avoided by playing Saddam more intelligently earlier on (or not funding him against Iran to begin with). But, given the chain of US stupidity and strategic blundering which eventually found us with our backs to the wall (Saddam rolling into Kuwait) we had no choice. I want to stress again, we lost an incredible amount of weath pursuing that military action - but we had no choice.
Hopefully all that makes some sense. Again, the US has LOST (far more than it gained) with nearly every war it has engaged in since Ww2 (we were huge economic winners from WW2). We have sealed our fate now, bankrupted ourselves, and burned our most valuable asset of all - the Constitution - in order to gain ... what? A few more years as Policeman of the World? F*cking idiots, all of us (excepting Ron Paul, of course).
And some of us still can't admit what we have done by fighting all these idiotic - and mostly unnecessary and ALWAYS unprofitable - wars.
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