Americans are repeatedly frustrated by their inability to turn military prowess into satisfactory endstates. We believe that previously, wars ended decisively, with an absolute and obvious termination point that was recognized as such at the time. However, since the end of World War II, such decisive conclusions have been elusive. Modern strategists, so the narrative goes, find themselves in a more complex environment. As a result, strategic leaders, and the public they serve, find themselves frustrated by the messiness of modern war termination.
Modern strategists should, however, stop looking for that decisive end. This understanding that war termination is messier since World War II owes more to selective memory, false nostalgia, and myopia than history. The problem is not a change in the environment in which wars are fought, but in a false understanding of how wars in the past concluded, abetted by historical narrative that places past American wars into neat sets of dates that upon closer inspection, have little basis in reality. Strategic problems are complex problems, and complex problems seldom end cleanly. Modern strategists concerned with war termination would be better served by taking a closer and deeper look at the conclusion of past wars, which strongly suggests that an ambivalent, uncertain petering out of war has been the rule rather than the exception.
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Take three obvious examples of what are normally thought of wars that ended decisively: the War of American Independence, the Civil War, and World War II. Each has a popular image of a decisive end. The Revolutionary War ended with the surrender of Lord Cornwallis to George Washington at Yorktown, followed by the Peace of Paris that recognized the independence of the United States. The Civil War ended at Appomattox Court House, when General Robert E. Lee surrendered to General Ulysses S. Grant, and World War II ended with either the meeting of American and British Soldiers with their Soviet counterparts in the wreckage of Germany, or on the deck of the USS Missouri with the surrender of the Japanese. However none of these examples look so clean and decisive upon an even a cursory look at the events that followed apparent conclusion.
After a tactical and strategic victory over Cornwallis at Yorktown, Washington had to struggle to keep his army together for more than a year, well aware that the British still held New York City, Charleston, and part of Rhode Island. Likewise, the Continental Congress signed a separate peace with Great Britain, reneging on its alliance with France. The treaty hardly ended strife with Great Britain, which maintained troops in some of the western territories ceded to the United States, and maintained good relations with Indian tribes hostile to the United States, not to mention the British naval and army presence in Quebec, Halifax, Bermuda, and the Bahamas. That many Americans considered the War of 1812 the Second War for Independence was not for nostalgia, but because to many, Britain remained a real threat long after the surrender of Cornwallis and even the signing of a peace treaty.
Finally, the ending of World War II was perhaps the messiest. While the Germans and Japanese largely accepted their defeat and little in the way of irregular war continued after the formal acceptance of surrender, it hardly ended strife. Indeed, much of European history, and US and Soviet involvement in Europe, from 1945 until the early 1990s, was part of the complex task of turning a military victory over the Third Reich into a desired strategic endstate. In the Pacific, the Chinese Civil War, Korean War, Vietnam War, and other wars and insurrections should be seen as part of the holdover from World War II. That Japan has never accepted Soviet/Russian sovereignty over some of the Kuril Islands suggests that the Pacific War is still not completely over.
Other American wars had equally or even less clean endings, but the myth of the formerly decisive war termination continues. Strategic leaders and the American public would do better by recognizing the complexity of war, and accepting the likelihood that the ending of war will be messy and often will result in something different from what was sought at the beginning. Expecting or seeking a clean, definitive end is a historical and not productive.
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Marine Corps Maj. Gen. Roy S. Geiger, who along with the rest of his men had steeled themselves for what they expected to be their bloodiest fight yet, was just as dumbstruck as he walked around the apparently abandoned island.
Veteran American troops and observers knew it would. An objective this close to the Japanese home islands would not be secured without a fight from a cornered nation whose troops had all but refused to surrender at Iwo Jima and other outposts on the long slog across the Pacific.
The regiment of marines that I am with landed this morning on the beaches of Okinawa and were absolutely unopposed, which is indeed an odd experience for a marine. Nobody among us had dreamed of such a thing. We all thought there would be slaughter on the beaches. There was some opposition to the right and to the left of us, but on our beach nothing, absolutely nothing.
Pyle noted that he had come ashore in the seventh wave of landings; correspondents were forbidden to arrive before the fifth wave. As usual, the 44-year-old wrote openly about his apprehension over what awaited him on shore.
It seems possible to hope that the Japs have been badly outguessed again, that their troops on Okinawa are far from their best either in quality or equipment, and that the conquest of this valuable prize may not cost many American lives.
Organized Japanese defenses superior to any encountered in the Philippines slowed the Yank troops today. The Japanese apparently withdrew great masses of guns and material from the central part of the island to defend the south.
One could argue that Buckner got it right, eventually, but he never could have imagined what it would take to get to that point. When the Americans officially declared victory on Okinawa two and a half months later, the entire landscape of the Second World War had changed dramatically.
By the time the flag-raising ceremony was held on June 22, the fighting in Europe had been finished for six weeks and U.S. scientists were only about three weeks from testing the secret weapon that would end the war and change the world.
We know now that Okinawa would be the final large-scale battle of the war, but in the summer of 1945 everyone on all sides assumed a ground invasion of Japan was inevitable. Taking stock of the costly victory, the New York Times editorial board wondered in its June 25 editions about what Japanese resistance on this stepping-stone island would mean in the big picture.
There are two ways of viewing the victory on Okinawa. One is to assume that if we could take this island fortress, held by the best army Japan could assemble, we can take any position the Japanese attempt to defend.
The other lengthens the prospect of final victory over the enemy. If it took almost three months to conquer Okinawa, how much life, treasure and time must we expend to conquer Kyushu and Honshu? From either viewpoint the cost of the conquest is sobering. It makes the invasion of Japan seem no less hazardous than the invasion of Europe.
Minnesota blitzed out to an 11-1 lead in its season-opening game and never looked back. The Gophers built a dominating 49-18 halftime lead, then maintained the defensive pressure allowing the Jaguars only 41 points, the lowest point total allowed by Minnesota in the NCAA era. The previous low was 42 points scored by St. Louis in a 68-42 Minnesota victory on Dec. 15, 1999.
Shannon Schonrock, who drilled a three-point field goal in the Gophers' first possession, scored all 12 of her points in the first half, tying her career high. Minnesota ran its transition game almost at will in the first half, sprinting to a 24-5 advantage in fast break points.
Minnesota kept the pressure on in the second half, shooting 60 percent from the floor (15-25) and turning the ball over only four times (nine in the game). While all 11 Gophers who suited up played, nine of them scored.
Lindsay Whalen led all scorers with 27 points, hitting 10 of her 13 field goal attempts, in just 24 minutes played. Freshman Kelly Roysland enjoyed an impressive start to her collegiate career, scoring 16 points.
Brooks was the star of the night yet again, grabbing a double-double with 20 points and 11 rebounds. This is his third straight game with 20+ points. Jahmyl Telfort bounced back after a tough outing against DePaul with 17 points on 60% shooting from the field.
Butler forced Georgetown to take tough, contested shots which led to the Hoyas shooting a mere 34.8% from the field. The poor shooting night for the home team allowed the Bulldogs to jump out in transition and grab easy baskets to grow their lead.
The defensive improvement is a good sign for the rest of the season, especially heading into a hard matchup against Villanova. If Butler plays like they did tonight, they will match up well against the Wildcats.
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The gymnastics team won easy victories over the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Springfield College at a meet held at MIT on Tuesday. The team had already beaten Springfield once and MIT twice this season, and this winning trend continued as Brown placed in the top two in all four events, and the top five on the beam. 152ee80cbc
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