Not learning from our mistakes

[sirs]

[sirs]

[sirs]

[_JS]

Do you have a source for the two million statistic used in the first cartoon? Does that include natural deaths or something?

Moreover, what makes you think that had we stayed in Vietnam less than two million Vietnamese would have died? How many years would it have taken to "win" the war? Would we have won the war? How?

See, a lot of the revisionists talk about how we lost the Vietnam War due to politics, protesters, and other such things...but I've yet to see the plans on how we supposedly were going to win the Vietnam War. 

[sirs]

Do you have a source for the two million statistic used in the first cartoon? Does that include natural deaths or something?

The cartoon didn't provide a source.  But perhaps later tonight, if Ami or Bt haven't donw so already, I'll try to look up some #'s, following our departure

[_JS]

The cartoon didn't provide a source.  But perhaps later tonight, if Ami or Bt haven't donw so already, I'll try to look up some #'s, following our departure

Right.

And why do you, Bush, and others believe that Vietnam was being won before we left?

[Brassmask]

Sirs,

Just curious what your take was on Kissinger throwing Bush and them under the bus Sunday?

I mean, you had Bush and them bragging to Woodward that Kissinger was advising them (like he was telling them to stay the course) and then he comes out and says there is no way to win militarily within an acceptable political timetable.

What's up with that?

B

[sirs]

Right.

And what's that supposed to mean?  Cartoons are supposed to come with disclaimers on sources??

And why do you, Bush, and others believe that Vietnam was being won before we left?

I don't particularly.  The folks in DC (LBJ & co.), weren't allowing the folks on the ground actually do their jobs with any effectiveness.  The point being, it became exponentially worse, as will Iraq with any premature withdrawl

[Amianthus]

Just curious what your take was on Kissinger throwing Bush and them under the bus Sunday?

Republicans don't mind if members "leave the plantation"?

[_JS]

The folks in DC (LBJ & co.), weren't allowing the folks on the ground actually do their jobs with any effectiveness.  The point being, it became exponentially worse, as will Iraq with any premature withdrawl

The military told them that they could win the war through attrition. They knew the style of war they were fighting and also believed they could win. Don't play the poor military versus the evil politicians card. They were in that war together, just as they are in Iraq.

Now tell me again, as your cartoon indicates, why do some - like President Bush - believe that we would have won the Vietnam War had we remained?

[Mucho]

I find it hard to accept that there are people in this country that would prefer another real 58000 US dead in Iraq and another 13 years of drain of treasure to prevent a fantasy of 2 million Iraqis killed. The ones that didnt learn are them.

[domer]

I think Sirs has a point, JS, if not the numbers to back it up. Our "intercession" in Vietnam, like our intercession in Iraq, had many and varied consequences, some direct and some remote. In Vietnam, for example, there was a purge of the South of (to me) unknown scale, presumably costing a substantial number of lives. Then, if I have my facts right, the Vietnamese engaged in a bloody war with the Cambodians (Khmer Rouge) that cost many lives, and then the Khmer Rouge, on its own, enabled by the American destabilization of Cambodia, introduced the horror of the "killing fields." Broadly speaking, these are consequences maybe of our withdrawal but definitely of our engagement. The question was, as it is now in Iraq, how much of the subsequent carnage are we truly responsible for, what steps could we have taken to prevent it, and does there come a time, almost regardless of those answers, that we can morally consider our connection to the outcome "attenuated" and thus pursue our own interests solely?

[_JS]

Of course Domer, you and I both know that that was not the intention raised by that cartoon. Yet, I don't fully disagree with your line of thought. The North Vietnamese were certainly not saints, nor would I suggest otherwise. Of course, the United States were not saints either and the appropriate response, from my point of view, is that if we had remained in Vietnam as the cartoon hints, would less Vietnamese have perished?

Let us not forget that our warring partners, the South Vietnamese also joined us in the "not saints" category and waged their own war on their own people to drive out opposing views. They were by no means an enlightened liberal government by any western standards and performed their own killings and purges. I don't imagine that process would have suddenly ended had the United States remained engaged in Vietnam.

The cartoon itself also makes light of many Vietnamese attitudes towards the United States' presence in Vietnam. It was not an overwhelming sense of love or hope. There were some of course who did embrace our presence in Vietnam, but by no means was that the majority.

To believe that remaining in Vietnam would have resulted in a victory would require a great deal of closing one's eyes to what was going on in Vietnam at the time.

How does that relate to Iraq?

A very good question.

[Universe Prince]

I hear the U.S. may pull out of Iraq before winning the war

And when will the U.S. have won the war? The actual war part of this conflict was won. We overran the country and toppled the government. Now our troops are being used as security forces. If we are waiting for an end to the threat of terrorists in Iraq or some such, that will never come so long as our troops are there. Our troops are no longer fighting a war. They are an occupying force fighting an armed and determined resistance. We are not going to outlast the resistance, and unless we start a severe military sweep across the Middle East, massacring all terrorists and terrorist suspects and terrorist sympathizers and suspected terrorist sympathizers, we will not see an end to terrorists and the like fighting our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. So I find it ridiculous to speak of pulling out before the U.S. wins the war in Iraq.

And quite frankly, if we wanted to avoid being responsible for death in Iraq, we should never have sent military forces in to start killing people.

As for not learning from our mistakes, indeed we are not. Apparently we still think we can fix the world if we just use enough military force, never realizing that the desire to fix the world is where we are going wrong in the first place.

[Brassmask]

I hear the U.S. may pull out of Iraq before winning the war

And when will the U.S. have won the war? The actual war part of this conflict was won. We overran the country and toppled the government. Now our troops are being used as security forces. If we are waiting for an end to the threat of terrorists in Iraq or some such, that will never come so long as our troops are there. Our troops are no longer fighting a war. They are an occupying force fighting an armed and determined resistance. We are not going to outlast the resistance, and unless we start a severe military sweep across the Middle East, massacring all terrorists and terrorist suspects and terrorist sympathizers and suspected terrorist sympathizers, we will not see an end to terrorists and the like fighting our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. So I find it ridiculous to speak of pulling out before the U.S. wins the war in Iraq.

And quite frankly, if we wanted to avoid being responsible for death in Iraq, we should never have sent military forces in to start killing people.

As for not learning from our mistakes, indeed we are not. Apparently we still think we can fix the world if we just use enough military force, never realizing that the desire to fix the world is where we are going wrong in the first place.

Excellent points, UP.