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ohomen171 says

#World War IAt 11:00 this morning Greenwich Mean Time, World War I ended in Europe 100 years ago. American casualties were as follows:

Killed in combat: 53,513
Non-Hostile Deaths: 63,195 (This is largely due to the influenza epidemic of 1918 that killed up to 20 million people worldwide.)
Wounded: 204,002

The financial cost of World War I was $32 billion dollars in 1918 dollars. Adjusted for inflation the cost today would be $ 500 billion dollars.

The US was in World War I 1 year 7 months and five days.

There are a few missing points here, one, ~50% of the US casualties was in the last campaign, the Battle of the Meuse-Argonne, which lasted the final 5 weeks up until the moment of the Armistice.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meuse-Argonne_Offensive

This would be the equivalent of the Somme but with a victory at the closure.

And then, the other battles didn't happen until Germany's spring offensive of 1918 where the US held off the Germans at Catigny, Belleau Wood, and a few other locations near the Marne river. So in effect, the entire US involved was really some 10 months.

In contrast, a majority of the US involvement in Vietnam was between the Tonkin Gulf resolution and the Paris Peace accords, 1965 to 1973. And then, the US withdrew prior to the NVA's last assault against the south in '75.

ohomen171 says

The Vietnam War cost the US government $1,770,000,000 in 20003 dollars including the massive cost of veteran healthcare

And we still lost. And what is especially ironic is that the Vietnam war was entered into and administered by the World War II generation, the so-called Greatest Generation.

P N Dr Lo R says

ohomen171 says

The Vietnam War cost the US government $1,770,000,000 in 20003 dollars including the massive cost of veteran healthcare

And we still lost. And what is especially ironic is that the Vietnam war was entered into and administered by the World War II generation, the so-called Greatest Generation.

Actually, the US military abided by the Paris Peace Accord and withdrew its standing army, during 1973. And thus, South Vietnam was on its own, circa 1974, with a handful of US military advisors hanging around. What really happened was that Congress stopped the military aid, so that South Vietnam, couldn't continue the war on its own w/o an outside army.

This was the failed 'Vietnamization', where the US govt agreed to replace lost artillery, bullets, fuel, etc, on a continuous basis, so that the civil war could go on, without American intervention. After Nixon's resignation, Congress slowly stopped this aid and soon, with the NVA fully rearmed, the South was unable to defend itself from a northern assault in '75. And thus, the Fall of Saigon was already in effect, long before the famous photo reels.



Unfortunately, a lot of ppl don't realize that when the above occurred, the entire US army as already out of Vietnam. And yes, that army, whether it was split up between Thailand, Singapore, Philippines, Japan, or Korea was ordered not get involved again.