I'll have cut in and return to the topic for a moment. It's ok. Engineers are used to not being recognized. The truth is modern society exists because of engineering, not politics or ideologies. Those are generally more destructive than good. Everything from empirically observable technology to the process of making a Subway sandwich has the fingerprints of an engineer. And most recently, envirnomental engineering has been developed to counteract what we do to the envirnoment. So, soon even the natural world will be technology based.
As to ethics and war, well that's a more sensitive issue. The science is easy. The ambitions and the self-indulging tendencies of humanities make it difficult. That's is why I find myself to be libertarian most of the time. Newton wasn't thinking atom bomb when he developed calculus. We're experiencing a tipping point when it comes to war toys. There is enough social awareness that eventually, like the Dalai Lama says, 'bullets will have a conscience.'
And no I dont see vietnam, not in terms of lives lost or stupidity. that is partly due to, ironically, the advancement of war toys and a reluctance to just nuke the poop out of anything.
