Quote:
Originally Posted by Edmond_Outsider
I never really thought about this before, but it is notable that for all the sabre rattling, Reagan didn't start any wars. Grenada doesn't count although it was a good model for how to design a winnable conflict.
He gets too much credit for ending the cold war and not enough critisism for the intrigue of the Iran/Contra dirty mess.
However, he was smart enough to not get into multiple wars with too few troops and no defined objectives or end points.
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I think the credit is well deserved, the contra thing was a mess, and we couldn't have known what supplying all those ass holes with weapons would have turned into 20 years later. He bankrupted and defeated the Russians without firing a single american bullet. No, occupation...didn't have to worry about a pull out plan, he funded people fighting for their own freedom.
He also gets a lot of flack for funding afghani rogue groups, who fire those bullets at us now. The enemy of my enemy is my friend doctrine is pretty sound though. Without Russian support we wouldn't have been able to take control of Japan and introduce to them the free market, or defeat the nazi's and vice versa. Just the way things are sometime, I think very highly of Reagan.