TRYING TO PULL A TET IN IRAQ

[_JS]

This spin got a lot of RPM when General Giap said it was so in his book.

Giap also said that America had the better weapons technology, but Vietnam had the better soldiers.

He also said that:

The people in the White House believed that Americans would definitely win and there is not chance of defeat. There is a saying which goes, "If you know the enemy and you know yourself, you would win every single battle." However, the Americans fought the Vietnamese, but they did not know much about Vietnam or anything at all about the Vietnamese people. Vietnam is an old nation founded in a long history before the birth of Christ. ... The Americans knew nothing about our nation and her people. American generals knew little about our war theories, tactics and patterns of operation. ...

During the war everyone in the country would fight and they [would] do so following the Vietnamese war theory. We have a theory that is different from that of the Russians and that of the Americans. The Americans did not understand that. They did not know or understand our nation; they did not know our war strategies. They could not win. How could they win? As our president said, there was nothing more precious than independence and freedom. We had the spirit that we would govern our own nation; we would rather sacrifice than be slaves.

So I don't think he was putting the entire loss on the hands of the war protesters Plane. In fact, he seems to put much of it on the military and the Pentagon brass and White House.

[BT]

Domer asks: So? Do they portray a distortion of the overall reality?

Not necessarily. But they were effective tools of "the anti-war movement which was so brilliantly active in the Sixties."

When you think of the Iraq War what picture comes to mind?

[domer]

Is Iraq "winnable"? What is "winning"? If we win win, at what cost will it be. I pay these mother-fuckers to think about these things (and to share their ideas), not to blindly "push on because the Big Fool says so." What are the geopolitical costs of a redeployment? Is there a strategy beyond Iraq to win the War on Terror?

[_JS]

I think that's an excellent set of questions Domer.

Also, does Giap's point apply here as well? The White House seems sure of victory. We are certainly technologically superior to any enemy in Iraq. But do we really know Iraq? Do we know the tactics, theories, the people?

I hear things like "Islamofascism" (and no I'm not going to go off on that again) and administration folks grouping all of the terrorists together into one mold, and I'm not so sure. I hear the terms change from "Saddam loyalists" to "terrorists" to "sectarian violence" and again, I'm not so sure.

Are we even fighting to win? Or just fighting not to lose?

[BT]

Are we even fighting to win? Or just fighting not to lose?

Right now we are biding time.

[BT]

Is Iraq "winnable"? What is "winning"? If we win win, at what cost will it be. I pay these mother-fuckers to think about these things (and to share their ideas), not to blindly "push on because the Big Fool says so." What are the geopolitical costs of a redeployment? Is there a strategy beyond Iraq to win the War on Terror?

If this a government of the people by the people and for the people, what are your answers to those same questions?

[Michael Tee]

<<The Gulf of Tonkin lie didn't lose the will of the American People in Viet Nam. Nor did the direct involvment of the NVA during Tet do it. >>

Tet was the turning point.  The Gulf of Tonkin lie was the start of a continuous chain of lies.  I mentioned it in particular only because it was the first big lie and it set the stage for all the lies that followed.

The war was maintainable only because a certain critical mass of the U.S. public still had some basic level of faith in their leaders.  When Tet occurred, it was kind of like the moment when the little boy in the crowd says "But the Emperor has no clothes" and the scales drop from a lot of eyes.  Suddenly they see what until then they did not want to see:  the "Emperor" was naked, the trusted leaders were liars and con artists.

From that point it was all downhill.  The photographs you posted were just additional hammer-blows to the government's credibility.  What had been portrayed as a noble and worthwhile crusade was irredeemably exposed for the criminal atrocity that it actually was. 

But I would still have to say the turning point was the Tet Offensive - - that really opened a lot of eyes.

[Xavier_Onassis]

Winning in Iraq (Whatever that means) will not cause a victory to the "War on Terror".

It seems improbable that they will win miliotarily in Iraq. After all, there are 22,000,000 Iraqis and the US and thye UK have well under 200,000 troops. The Iraqi military ranges from barely competent to hideously wimpy.

Tet was a psychological victory of the Viet Cong and NVA over the US, if not a military one.

The Iraq War, like the Vietnam War, is a war of an occupying force, which everyone knows, must someday leave, over a native insurgency, which everyone knows, is bound to stay. The US cannot win this militarily. There could be a political solution that is less than a total train wreck for the USW, but they will need better and more flexible diplomats than the clowns Juniorbush has hired.

[Plane]

"It seems improbable that they will win miliotarily in Iraq. After all, there are 22,000,000 Iraqis and the US and thye UK have well under 200,000 troops. The Iraqi military ranges from barely competent to hideously wimpy."


Most of these Iriquis are looking out for themselves , that is why we have a lot more of them volenteering to be police and army than are volenteering to be suicide bombers.

[Michael Tee]

<<Most of these Iriquis are looking out for themselves ,>>

That's one of your problems right there.  A guy who is looking out for himself (a) lets the Americans do the heavy lifting and tries to keep out of the line of fire; (b) knows that the Americans will be gone one day and he will have to face a lot of pissed-off Iraqis much the same as the Vichy loyalists had to face a lot of pissed-off Frenchmen only with this difference: the pissed-off Iraqis tend to take out their anger on the traitors' families as well as the traitors themselves, and favour executions with gruesome tortures rather than a clean shot to the back of the head and consequently (c) tries to build up a little favour bank with various Resistance figures just in case the day comes when he needs a friend in that camp.

If you recall your last quagmire, the local puppet army (about whom the American commanders of the time had pretty much the same words of qualified praise and the same grandiose expectations ("Vietnamizationi") as we have been hearing about this "new Iraqi army" but in the best of times they were running on a desertion rate of about 10%, which tended to escalate fairly sharply every time the shit got a little closer to the fan.

You would have to be crazy to think that you will get a committed, motivated, diligent and dedicated military force serving the interests of the foreign invaders of their country, invaders who, at this point, look to be responsible for over half a million Iraqi deaths.  This is not the kind of reliable force you would want watching YOUR back and I don't care what fucking bullshit the American military has to say about them, common sense tells me not to believe a word of it.

[Plane]

We have made our promises , how well we keep them makes more diffrence than the eventual success or failure of the project.

[Michael Tee]

<<We have made our promises , how well we keep them makes more diffrence than the eventual success or failure of the project.>>


The whole world recognizes America's pursuit of a criminal aggression for exactly what it is.  Your attempt to portray it as an honourable attempt to keep a promise is ludicrous.  Nobody is fooled.  Your excuses are increasingly pathetic.

[Plane]

"the pissed-off Iraqis tend to take out their anger on the traitors' families as well as the traitors themselves, and favour executions with gruesome tortures rather than a clean shot to the back of the head and consequently (c) tries to build up a little favour bank with various Resistance figures just in case the day comes when he needs a friend in that camp."

[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]


So we need to be meaner?

[_JS]

We have made our promises , how well we keep them makes more diffrence than the eventual success or failure of the project.

So we should "bide our time" and follow the current strategy of not trying to win the war (or whatever the hell it is we are doing over there) to keep our promise to the Iraqis and the world?

Won't that cause the same problem with the troops that Vietnam did? Who wants to die in a lost cause so that we "keep our promise?" That's a real morale booster you and Bt have stumbled upon.

Some of you may die out there today, but know that you die so that we can bide our time and keep the president's promises. That's a sabre-rattler for sure.

[BT]

The current strategy is to maintain enough order in country so that Iraq can take over that responsibilty eventually.

That takes time.

or should we just turn our backs on those millions of voters who risked life and limb to help form their new government?