Saddam to Swing

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by yesman065

Bruce, so what you're saying is we did just enough to get the help we needed, but still left the locals to decide whatever they wanted instead of going in and completely taking over a country and making them do whatever we wanted? Like we got the support we needed without destroying what individuality they had?

Yeah, we didn't want more territory or people to become part of our family. We just wanted to use their island to support our Navy, and supply materiels/labor that we would willingly pay for. Do what you want but don't interfere with out operations.

The fly in the ointment is Americans, being Americans, got involved with the natives on a personal basis. The lives of many of the natives and our military/support people got very intertwined and codependent. And you know, breaking up is hard to do.