The current meltdown in Iraq has me revisiting the “Lessons Learned” topic I covered several months ago (see the post here). I’d like to address some of the readers’ comments from that post, and add some observations which have occurred to me since then. I will be discussing these thoughts in tandem with ideas from…
Tag: Foriegn Policy
Book: Unfamiliar Fishes
ALWAYS look through the bargain books at Barnes & Noble! I was flipping through stacks of surplus Chicken Soup for the Construction Worker’s Soul, Thomas Paine reprints, and Atkins diet cookbooks when I found Sarah Vowell’s Unfamiliar Fishes. Bargain-priced at $4.99. Signed by the author. Seriously! Look: I first became familiar with Sarah Vowell through…
The fallacy of American “Lessons Learned”
“Lessons learned” is an overused and useless phrase. It is batted around in educated American military circles and indicates an assumption that we made a mistake once and won’t make the same mistake again. Foreign Policy published an article last month titled “The Top 10 Mistakes Made in the Afghan War.” The line that really…