“the US has fought a number of conventional wars since World War II, most notably the Korean War in the 1950s, the Vietnam War in the 1960s and 1970s, the two Gulf Wars in 1990 and 2003, and the War in Afghanistan from 2001 to 2021. These were costly in terms of money, lives, and public support for the United States. Were they worth it? That’s for others to decide. For the Soviet Union, which had a much smaller and weaker economy than the US, spending enough to compete with the US militarily and maintain its empire pushed it into bankruptcy.”