4/24 Hey, where is the long vietnam war thread? Did I miss any
insights from psb?
\- see http://csua.com
for me vs AMC --psb
\_ Wow. Pretty sad debate. I'm sure liberals and Democrats will
be faulted for the failures in Iraq too. The next person to
say Iraq == Vietnam needs to be slapped.
\_ Yah -- the problem wasn't lefties or liberals, it was the
60's counter-culture and 'free love' social phenomenon.
Without the support of the people, the government was
never able to muster sufficient support for our (better
trained, better equipped) troops to hold onto any tangible
victory. It was a pretty sad conflict. Though there may
be some peripheral similarities to Vietnam, the conflict in
Iraq actually has a fair degree of popular support.
\_ And the guerilla warfare, lack of clear goals, lack of
cooperation between the branches, and an utter lack of
what would constitute winning the war certainly didn't
help. Now, which war am I talking about?
\_ Stop. Stop right there. Vietnam and Iraq are two
different wars being fought for different reasons in
different parts of the world with different goals in
mind. They are DIFFERENT!
\_ Clear goal: democracy in iraq. What would constitute
winning the war: democracy in iraq. Utter lack of
cooperation between the branches: source-p.
You are repeating things you heard without thinking.
\_ That's a clear POLITICAL goal. What's the clear
MILITARY goal? We had a clear political goal in
Vietnam too.
\_ The Vietnam war had huge amounts of support until people
started doubting the bright and sunny forecasts and began
to see the effects on the vets returning.
\_ What made Vietnam so terrible was the fact that everything that
could be screwed up there, was. Eisenhower screwed 'Nam for
the French, JFK wouldn't let it die, LBJ tried to micromanage
it, and made the rules of engagement ridiculous. Nixon took a
shot a fixing things, but popular support was gone, so he
finally gave up, only to have congress completely screw Vietnam
over so the South couldn't continue fighting on it's own.
We've screwed somethings up in Iraq, but it's still nowhere
near 'Nam. Stop smokin' so much pot and come back to reality.
\_ No. What makes Vietnam so terrible *for Americans* was retreat
after so many years of war. Had Vietnam somehow stablized into
a situation akin to Korea, it would have been touted as a huge
success. The Vietnamese have their own view of the conflict
in their country. POV is important here.
\_ It's a bird, it's a plane, no it's "Captain Obvious!"
\_ Believe me, if there was an option not to retreat, we would've
stayed. Despite what you hear in the 'free media', we retreated
because the PRC was engaged in the war and we had no other choice.
We retreated and and established diplomatic relationship with the
PRC. It was the only exit strategy. The PRC can afford keep
fighting the war, we can't. We also 'gave' up Taiwan alone
with Vietnam. You honestly think we would've done so if we had
a choice? So don't just say "oh why did we retreat", it's like
saying, oh why did we use the A-bomb. We did because we have
no other choice. |
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