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Priests Of Power

© Phil Carpenter

"The expanded air war ... provided the pretext for the introduction of the first U.S. ground forces into [Kosovo]. [A general] expressed grave concern about the long-range implications.... He questioned whether American combat forces were adequately trained for ... warfare in the [Yugoslavian mountains], and he warned that the introduction of such forces would encourage [NATO] to pass military responsibility to the United States. Most important, the introduction of even small numbers of combat troops with a specific and limited mission would violate a ground rule the United States had rigorously adhered to since the beginning of the [Serbian war], and once the first step had been taken it would be 'very difficult to hold [the] line.'

"As [the general] had predicted, once the first step had been taken it was very difficult.... Alarmed by the slow pace of the [NATO] buildup and fearful of a major [Serbian] offensive in the ... Highlands, [the general] concluded ... that if the United States was to avert disaster in [Kosovo] there was 'no solution ... other than to put our own finger in the dike.' He therefore advocated the immediate commitment of two U.S. Army divisions....The Joint Chiefs forcefully endorsed [the general's] request. Long impatient with the administration's caution and eager to assume full responsibility for the war, they even went beyond [the general], pressing for the deployment of as many as three divisions to be used in offensive operations against the enemy...

"At a conference [administration and military officials] put aside their differences and agreed upon ... a strategy, the object of which was to 'break the will of [Serbia] by depriving [it] of victory.' The bombing would be maintained at its 'present tempo' ... but ... that bombing 'would not do the job alone.' They therefore decided that ... U.S. ground combat forces should be sent to [Kosovo]. The new strategy shifted emphasis from the air war against [Serbia] to the war in the south, and by adopting it, the administration at least tacitly committed itself to expand its forces as the military situation required."

In the above passages, replace "Serbia" and "Kosovo" with "Vietnam," and "NATO" with "ARVN" (Army of the Republic of Vietnam). You then have a verbatim citation from George Herring's history of America's early commitment to a land war in Southeast Asia, from his book "America's Longest War."

The similarities, though eerie, are not singular to Herring. One could also borrow extensively from Halberstam's "The Best and the Brightest" and Fitzgerald's "Fire in the Lake" to illustrate the obvious but nevertheless explosive combination of faith in superior fire power and stubborn

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