*shrugs* You have some good points, but I think you're too pessimistic on this one. We also haven't been trying to rectify our mistakes for 8 years... we've spent a good chunk of that time making the mistakes.

How much money have we spent on South Korea in the last 50-odd years? I think losing that war was a definite mistake, and it has had pretty awful consequences for the peninsula ever since. We keep our troops there to protect SK from a nutso regime up north in the faint hope that some day we can pull out after the Koreas reunify peacefully.