We may have a very distorted view of our own history. Do we always lose our wars?
Independence
Start with our War of Independence. Did we win? Britain gave up. Really France won. The Treaty of Paris 1783 makes it clear. France as the winner was given Senegal and Tobago by Britain. The Colonies agreed to leave the Crown but share access to the Mississippi with Britain and accepted convivial conditions of trade with Britain. The American Colonies didn’t WIN. They got partial independence with their co-victor, France.
How can you lose a war of independence? You can’t. France won and the colonies took advantage of it.
Twenty years later Britain reminded the Colonies that they gained independence but never defeated the British military.
1812
America lost the War of 1812 decisively. Total loss. Britain with only one war to fight won overwhelmingly. Britain destroyed whatever they wanted to destroy.
Civil War
Did the Union Army win the Civil War? In deed only --The Confederacy signed a peace treaty. Lincoln’s priority—shared by Grant—was “to bind up the nation’s wounds” and unite the country together again as a functioning democracy under the Constitution. Lincoln’s plan for reconstruction of the South and help for the blacks didn’t get very far.
Lincoln was assassinated days after the peace treaty, by a Confederate supporter. Vice President Andrew Jackson, a Democrat supporter of slavery, became president and did little to carry out the reconstruction plans.
Reconstruction only began two years later when Grant became president. The ostensible losing side, the Confederate states resisted Reconstruction and it was defeated within twelve years, totally. From 1877 forward, blacks lost their economic and political rights and the whites from the Confederacy regained nearly all their rights and power.
Seventy years later blacks were still being lynched by the KKK, couldn’t buy homes in white neighborhoods and were rarely employed in white businesses. The Southern Wing of the Democrat Party by 1965 had been in power for thirty-five years.
One hundred years after the end of the Civil War, there was no victory celebration. None. Because the Union didn’t win.
Spain
There were battles in the late 19th century with Spain but no real battles over the four months of active Cuban hostility. The U.S. gained control of Cuba, Guam, and the Philippines by paying Spain $20 million. Nothing resembling a victory occurred from a nearly non existent Spanish military.
WWI
World War I saw America enter the War late, the American president demanded a peaceful settlement at the end of the war. The war ended because of influenza.
The influenza hurt the German side the most because the German soldiers had to ride in trains back to their homeland for food and treatment, while the French went home on weekends during the war. The Germans agreed to the American proposed peace treaty, but the French and British dictated the actual terms without regard to the Americans. President Wilson had many strokes as the Treaty of Versailles was being worked on and was unable to have any influence on the outcome.
WWII
World War II was an absolute military victory for the Allied troops. But the final outcome was determined by the Yalta Conference in February 1945. By the previous Fall president Roosevelt was medically weak, could not stand and by April of 1945 he died. At Yalta, the USSR designated the meeting place, and the USSR demanded control of all of Eastern Europe. Roosevelt conceded and asked for democrat rule of the area the USSR controlled. Didn’t happen. Berlin was divided in half and the USSR demanded that the Allied half be divided among France, Britain and the U.S. The USSR also took all of Siberia and Mongolia in return for a promise to send troops to fight Japan. The USSR never did help.
The American military victory in WWII led to the United Nations. A seventy year failure for the U.S. The United Nations are united 150 to 1 against the U.S. most of the time.
Korea
The war in Korea was a settlement with an armistice much to the favor of North Korea, which is still a belligerent.
Vietnam
The Vietnam War was militarily won by the U.S. and then completely abdicated by the U.S. Democrat Congress which refused to help the South Koreans as the U.S. promised in the peace treaty. U.S. lost entirely.
Iraq and Afghanistan
Iraq and Afghanistan. Not much to say. The first Iraq war was a complete loss, Saddam Hussein remained in power. The second dragged on for more than twenty years with no end, no cessation of hostilities. Afghanistan was another complete loss.
America often wins the major battles but loses the war.
And now the losers of Afghanistan, the Biden Democrats, are advising Israel to lose its war against the Gazan terrorist government.