“Nation-building, a la, Japan and Germany and Italy in the late 1940s and early 1950s is a necessary component of war.”

Why is this a necessary component of war? What is the merit of “nation-building” in nations with no economic or strategic significance (Afghanistan)? More significantly, what, specifically, do you think went wrong in Iraq and Afghanistan that prevented them from rapidly becoming functional democracies in the mold of Japan/Germany? (I have my own theory, but I’d like to hear yours…)

You don’t see examples of nations defeating each other in history and then expending their own treasury to rebuild their defeated enemy.

Victorious nations either confiscated territory, extracted some type of compensation or occupied the conquered as long as they were able. Or some combination of all three.

First we play our silly little democracy game, then we see the natural result of democracy.
Karl Marx knew democracy was the road to socialism.. John Adams knew it would have a swift and usually bloody end. But we give them democracies instead of Republics.

But even that doesn’t cover it.

Their is a reason there are few if any examples of successful nation building. It is a bad idea.

Yes we have failed at it but that is because anybody would have failed at it. It’s a bad idea that can’t work.

You cannot give people freedom anymore than you can give them public housing and expect them to do anything other than abuse it, sell it cheap, demonstrate a lack of understanding about it, hate you for it.

What we see today on Wall Street is exactly the result we can expect of giving people something they have not earned and can not appreciate.

Nation building is public housing for other countries. It is appreciated exactly as much, it is cared for in the same way.

What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated. Thomas Paine ~ The Crisis

There is a reason why even here in the US freedom and civic duty are scoffed at. Few alive have done the work. Consequently, it holds no great value for them.

Relevant variables:
(1) How far are we willing/able to go to make the native population docile. It took a nuke to subdue Japan. We really can’t do much in terms of this variable anymore.
(2) Does the place have some attributes of Western-style culture if not a past history of self government. Nazi Germany was built on top of a mature and advanced society. Afghanistan? Not so much.
(3) Does at least a portion of the population genuinely want to embrace a western style government? What are they willing to do to help themselves?
(4) How much of the population is against what we are trying to do? How dedicated are they to stopping us.
(5) Are the cultural/religious elements in society that actively teach away from western style minority and human rights?

Successful nation building is usually just a matter of keeping the peace and letting the native people build something that is hopefully consistent with our values. See South Korea. The most difficult success in the realm of nation building was probably Japan, but Japan had a hierarchical society that we could benefit from (opposite of Afghanistan).

We could nation build in places like Cuba pretty easily. However, I think majority Islamic countries are uniquely UNsuited for nation building exercises. The delta between what it costs in time, blood, and treasure and what is accomplished (Sharia enshrined Constitutions where popular opinion supports the death penalty for appostates) makes nation building a problematic enterprise.

A whole bunch of our kills are coming from drones, as is. I also have no problem with bombing either country if the Taliban establishes a foothold. Occupying in limp-wristed fashion isn’t sustainable.

When Reagan whacked Ghadaffi, Ghaddafi shut up and behaved for a while.

When we crushed Iraq the whole world got friendly. North Korea came back to the table, Iran was willing to discuss their nuclear program and again with Ghaddafi who turned over his weapons of mass destruction program..

We don’t need to control Afghanistan in order for its leaders to understand messing with us is a bad idea.
Had we pulled out years ago we may have seen the Taliban re-emerge. Aren’t we talking to them now anyway?
Aren’t we after 1700 dead offering them a seat at the table? We are.

They are far more likely to use Iraq/Afghanistan as a base after we leave now than if we had left earlier. Leaving now, however Washington wants to spin it, will be seen by them as tail-between-legs.
They know we are NOT going to be coming back soon. Politics won’t allow it.

If we had totally destroyed Afghan military capacity and then left, the Taliban would have had its hands full re-establishing control. They might not have been able. They also would have been forced to work knowing we were still looking for an opportunity to pop Omar and Co.

Assad in Syria would hardly want to harbor a terrorist knowing the price might be his life.
Iran same story.

Right now, none of the nutjobs respect us. They know we have our hands full.

Nope whack-a-mole is the answer.

Make it personal.

When one of these idiots harbors or sponsors a terrorist that has or intends to hit us, hit that nation with overwhelming force. Destroy their capacity to make war, to control their population and try really hard to kill the leaders. Make it clear even if we missed the leaders now, we will still consider them an active target indefinitely.

Then, leave.

This actually applies whether we speak of terrorists or just normal run of the mill belligerent nations.