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Comment by 67726e | Hacker News Reader

My point is that a war with China would resemble a more traditional war as opposed to an insurgent conflict as in Iraq or Afghanistan. Why would we assume fighting a proper nation state would resemble fighting random lots of terrorists with varying agendas?

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Your point falls through either way. A traditional full-out war is an improbability, because of any number reasons (balance of power between Russia/China/US, destructive capability of respective nuclear arsenals for MAD). With a proxy war more like recent conflicts (korean war, vietnam), a pyrrhic victory or an uncertain resolution is the most likely outcome. There's no point arguing who wins a global war in the 21st century because WW3 ends in irradiated hell on earth for all involved and would usher in the rise of whichever country was insignificant/uninvolved enough to avoid the ICBMs

You're assuming that what made the Iraq/Afghanistan invasions different from previous wars was the opponent rather than the advance of technology.

> You're assuming that what made the Iraq/Afghanistan invasions different from previous wars was the opponent

Is that not the case? What does technology have to do with these cases?

I would say the biggest effect is that modern media makes America much more sensitive to casualties, in contrast to the past where broadcast-style media like TV and newspapers were essentially hijacked for uncontested government propaganda. I'm sure if an expert thought about it for a while he/she would come up with more stuff around homemade explosives/IEDs, small arms, and the like, but I think media is the main one.

So your theory is that lack of political buy-in from the populace, exacerbated by our access to technology and thus free information?

If that is the case, again, I contest that the real issue was fighting an unwinnable war for no real reason. Having a true, blue enemy to fight is an important difference. A war with China would be a Nazi Germany situation, whereas Iraq / Afghanistan were clearly a Vietnam.

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