Iraq as Korea

Matthew Yglesias flags the Philippines analogy in this Ross Douthat column but I actually think the reference to the Korean war is more apt:

These twists and turns make Iraq look less like either Vietnam or World War II -- the analogies that politicians and pundits keep closest at hand -- and more like an amalgamation of the Korean War and America’s McKinley-era counterinsurgency in the Philippines. Like Iraq, those were murky, bloody conflicts that generated long-term benefits but enormous short-term costs. Like Iraq, they were wars that Americans were eager to forget about as soon as they were finished.

And like Iraq, the war in Korea never formally ended and the U.S. never left. To this day North Korea remains one of the most dangerous countries in the world despite a formidable American military presence in Japan and South Korea. Many decades after the end of the Korean War, it still falls mainly to the United States to take the lead in cajoling the North Koreans to stop acting crazy.

All of which is to say that even an ideal long term outcome will still be messy.

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The Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea. Photo credit: AP Photos.