Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Words Mean What I Want Them To Mean

One way to win an argument is to completely redefine the English language so that what you say must be true. Take this blog post about the success and failure of the US military over the course of the last half century:
The US military has fought five large-scale wars in the past fifty years, resulting in a draw in Korea[1], a defeat in Vietnam, and three inconclusive outcomes in Iraq (twice) and Afghanistan. 
It's fair to say that anyone who argues that the first war against Iraq is lying through their teeth to prove a political point. In fact it would be difficult to find a more conclusive victory by any country in any war at any time. Not only were all of the USA's objectives met it was done quickly and with very little loss of life by the USA or its allies.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

was korea a draw - can you have such a thing and claim to be a world power?

Ross said...

You can draw against another major power and remain a power in your own right.

I'd say Korea was a draw although it could be considered a victory- because the status quo was resotred which was the official war aim- or a defeat because the secondry war aim of taking all of Korea failed.

Anonymous said...

At the end was it not a possible conflict between McArthurs desired atom bombs and Chinese will and numbers that brought it to a halt..