What am I talking about? The decline and fall, the loss, of the French empire in Indochina and North Africa.
It's a long, bloody, tragic story on both sides, but the end result was that the French were first soundly thrashed militarily in Indochina (Vietnam), which we were then unlucky enough to inherit, and then routed from Algeria by Arab terrorists. It's part of modern history that has greatly impacted America, and yet is little known here, I think.
Wretchard puts many things into perspective, as per usual, in his comments on same in No More Groupement Mobile 100s
A generation obsessed with Vietnam was blind to the fact that the Algerian war provided a far more powerful model of offensive action against the West than Indochina. It was always impossible for Giap to transport his coolies and NVA regiments overseas, but it was clearly feasible, indeed only a matter of time before the Arabs extended their operations overseas. And extend it they did. The methods of assassination, terrorism, intimidation and political warfare rapidly became internationalized, reaching Europe as early as 1972 during the Munich Olympics. It took easy root in the secret societies of the Middle East and spread outward from there. When radical Islamism found its confidence in Afghanistan and its money in Saudi Arabia, it found its weapon in terrorism: the Arab Way of War. From the very beginning the plan of campaign was never strictly military. It was always politico-military, tuned to the internal weaknesses of the Western enemy. The French had been understandably evicted from Indochina by being militarily beaten by the Vietnamese. But the French had been ousted from Algeria -- part of Metropolitan France -- despite beating the FLN; that was the lesson and legacy of Algeria....
Osama draws confidence from his belief that the new Arab Way of War has never been defeated, not in Algeria, Soviet Afghanistan nor in Somalia. The possible withdrawal of Honduras, the Dominican Republic and perhaps Thailand from Iraq truly shows the power of his methods. Most conventional military establishments are simply incapable of surviving on the terrorist battlefield, their armed men no better than civilians. But the withdrawals solve nothing. Radical Islamists know there is no reason in principle why they cannot follow retreating European forces to their home ground and rout them there, where they will if anything be more hamstrung, using the immense Islamic immigrant communities as their base. For the first time in 600 years, Western Europe stands before an Oriental enemy it cannot defeat on the battlefield. The commander of the 18th Airborne Corps, Lt. General John Vines contrasted the GWOT to Vietnam. This, he says, is a "national war for our survival as a nation". Europe knows this too but are subconsciously already beaten.
Ok, so that's the bad news.
Here's the good news.
The sole obstacles to the wave of darkness are the Anglosphere -- and ironically for the Europeans -- Israel. The strongest proof against the irresistibility of terrorism is Israel, which is often dented, but never seriously hurt by Arab Way of warfare. Indeed, at each clash the terrorists whine at being unfairly worsted because the Israelis have shown themselves capable of dealing out punishment an order of magnitude greater than they suffer. Israel is particularly irksome because it diminishes the psychological aura the Islamists work so hard to achieve. How can terrorism plausibly defeat America if it cannot beat a handful of Jews?
An excellent point. I don't see America proper ever being really cowed by all this. We're a tough people at core and will do whatever needs to be done to secure our homeland. If we have to have fleets of ambulances, and citizens taking turns guarding the streets, most folks with concealed carry - yes, that could happen here, Leftist cringing notwithstanding. If there's one thing about Leftists, they're not one bit ashamed to turn to the gun when they are personally threatened.
Israel's response to terror reminds me of my own initial desired response to 9/11: don't change anything in our daily lives. Rebuild the Towers exactly the same. Spend the smallest amount of time and energy decency allows on mourning. Continue to laugh and be free and do all the things Osama so hates. NOTHING would give Osama the finger more than that. Nothing. It would have been a huge victory for the West if we had done that
At the same time we should engage in all-out war against the enemy. We should change his world. We should make him change his society. We have done medium-well on that front, but there have been large gaps in our seriousness on various issues. I fear and dread that we will not really wake up until we take a major hit.
But that we will awake I have no doubt. We will triumph eventually. The only question is how long and how hard we make it.