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by bell-cot·11d ago·view on hn ↗
> I'd personally label the factions within the military that view aerial bombing as an effective strategy as "conservative"...

If "aerial bombing as an effective strategy" still means "you can win wars just by dropping enough bombs", I'll disagree. Because that use of "conservative" (simplistic maximum macho force) is equally applicable to Army leaders who want to occupy every square inch of the enemy's territory, or to Navy leaders who want to sink everything associated with the enemy and establish a water-tight blockade.

There's nothing liberal about a political leader reining in a nut case like LeMay. George Wallace quickly regretted his selection of LeMay as his '68 running mate. Or look at America's military actions during President Reagan's terms - for all the big talk and military build-ups, actual military actions were very carefully limited.

But in a very different sense of the word "Conservative", aerial bombing is often extremely Conservative. That sense is minimizing political commitment to a conflict. A leader (with effective air superiority) can drop some bombs or launch some missiles, talk tough about having "delivered a message" - then quietly drop the whole thing, having risked fairly little, and without giving the impression of having failed or retreated. From the PoV of a political leader managing risks, putting boots on the ground would be far less conservative.

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> But in a very different sense of the word "Conservative", aerial bombing is often extremely Conservative. That sense is minimizing political commitment to a conflict. A leader (with effective air superiority) can drop some bombs or launch some missiles, talk tough about having "delivered a message" - then quietly drop the whole thing, having risked fairly little, and without giving the impression of having failed or retreated. From the PoV of a political leader managing risks, putting boots on the ground would be far less conservative.

Based on this paragraph, I think we are in agreement?

My point is basically that conservative leadership, both within and outside of the military, has sought (and implemented!) simple solutions to complex problems that end up backfiring immensely. In this case, the problem is “enemy country bad”, and the solution is “bomb them submission”. I’m not sure we need to go into details on how that’s a terrible idea?

That’s not to say that liberals don’t put forth simple solutions to complex problems, it’s just that conservatives have successfully implemented obstructionist strategy starting with Newt Gingrich in the 90s, and the closest we’ve come to anything on the national level to liberal policy has been the ACA, which was so hamstrung that it was nearly unrecognizable when compared to the Romneycare it was modeled after. It’s also the stated goal of Project 2025 to roll back nearly all of the progressive policy wins of the Obama and Trump 1 eras (the latter wins coming only via judicial decisions, not executive or legislative).