RWFT, I spent three decades in the Army, and like most senior guys have pretty strong impressions of George Patton - both positive and negative. I have read H on W, and in turn, I would stongly urge you to read the Patton Papers. It is a two volume set which is quite readable, and will give you an unfiltered window into his mind. There are both brilliant and inexplicable things to be found.
I am less anguished about our post Vietnam military actions, primarily I suppose, because I served in that volunteer army. It is the first truly professional Army in our history, and I am afraid that as a people we are still struggling with the difference between the citizen soldiers of WWI & II and the warrior class we are creating today. Their job, as Clausewitz put it, is to prosecute wars as "a continuation of politics by other means." In the larger scheme of things, I would prefer that prosecution take place on the marches of empire rather than the core. Those sorts of politics should, also, only be prosecuted after a full and cold-blooded analysis of our critical national interests.
I have little patience with the bunting we have tended to put up about our more recent actions. We are certainly not "preserving freedom" or any of those other patriotic slogans. What I would hope we are doing, is acting to safeguard our national interests. Sometimes we have.
Unfortunately, the use of a professional military in such a way requires civilian leadership of the first order. In the last forty years, I believe were abysmally served by two SECDEFs in particular - McNamara and Donald Rummsfeld. That doesn't let LBJ or Bush of the hook, but different vision and less arrogance in those cabinet posts could have led to far better decisions and outcomes.
