Middle East Wars Worse for America Than Vietnam

It is time to finally admit it: America's Middle Eastern wars, now in their 17th year and counting, are Vietnam 2.0, except in many ways they are worse. Setting aside the disparity in casualties between the two wars (Vietnam was about six times worse), the Middle Eastern wars are more poorly conceived, less necessary, and much more deleterious to American interests, both short and long term, than the Vietnam war had ever been. The war in Vietnam was part and parcel of the struggle against Soviet and Chinese expansionism and a check on their drive for ideological supremacy. In that sense, it was a war against totalitarianism and in support of freedom. Letting communist puppet regimes such Hanoi gain the upper hand and obliterate their more western-oriented neighbors unopposed would have been an unacceptable show of weakness on America's part.