[Gunner]

It's a complete side issue, but Vietnam was not winnable on any terms. It was not a matter of the politicians refusing the grunts three more rounds for their sixteens. It was a matter of using a European castle-to-castle military style to fight a totally decentralized opponent. No matter how many rice paddies we bombed into mud, Charlie always had more right nearby.

And had we actually started to enter and control North Vietnam, we would have had a repeat of Korea on our hands: no longer facing little brown guerrillas, but the Russian and/or Chinese armies. The North Korean army was almost insignificant in Korea; we kicked their butts quite thoroughly once we had the support infrastructure in place... but then there was no way we were ever going to win against China.

This isn't my opinion - this is the consensus opinion of most modern historians, many of whom have revised their position from a "we coulda won" stand a few years ago. Even McNamara conceded none of their planned tactics would have worked, politicians or no. And the Russians exactly repeated our experience ten years later, in different terrain but the same kind of unequal but unwinnable conflict.