Pre-election musings on Vietnam and Iraq: the bitter end?
Saddam Hussein has been sentenced to hanging. Nothing is likely to save him, not even the antics of lawyer Ramsey Clark, who was thrown out of the courtroom yesterday for disrespect.
But despite all the charges against him, no one’s ever accused Saddam of being dumb. Here’s an interesting tidbit that shows how smart he really was: in the buildup to the Iraqi war in 2003, Saddam was already making the Vietnam analogy:
In the days leading up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq, television stations there showed 1975 footage of U.S. embassy support personnel escaping to helicopters from the roof of the U.S. embassy in Saigon. It was Saddam’s message to his people that the United States does not keep its commitments …
Of course, Saddam’s enemies in Iraq had already learned that particular lesson the hard way–from bitter personal experience after the Gulf War, when they were encouraged to revolt against Saddam by the US, which then looked the other way when they were slaughtered. But Saddam wanted to remind them, complete with visuals, that this was a recurrent US pattern.
Tomorrow’s election has been billed as a referendum on the Iraq war, and the Democrats feel poised to win. But they are divided and planless, with some fearing an early pullout in Iraq and others desiring one. The former probably have studied the bitter lessons of the end stages of the Vietnam War, while the latter probably consider those end stages to have been a victory for their side.
Here’s an article describing the debacle of the end game in the Vietnam War. Worth noting: once the US had withdrawn its forces, the North Vietnamese correctly surmised that we hadn’t the stomach to return, no matter what the provocation. So they decided they could violate the terms of the Paris (how apropos!) Accords with impunity. When they did just that, the US responded by doing essentially nothing, giving the de facto green light to the North’s final offensive against the South.
In a fascinating although lengthy article by Nixon’s former Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird, published about a year ago in Foreign Affairs, Laird writes:
Mine is not a rosy view of the Vietnam War. I didn’t miss the fact that it was an ugly, mismanaged, tragic episode in U.S. history, with devastating loss of life for all sides. But there are those in our nation who…wait for opportunities to trot out the Vietnam demons whenever another armed intervention is threatened…
…during [1973-1975, when US combat forces had withdrawn], South Vietnam held its own courageously and respectably against a better-bankrolled enemy. Peace talks continued between the North and the South until the day in 1975 when Congress cut off U.S. funding. The Communists walked out of the talks and never returned. Without U.S. funding, South Vietnam was quickly overrun. We saved a mere $297 million a year and in the process doomed South Vietnam, which had been ably fighting the war without our troops since 1973….
Vietnam gave the United States the reputation for not supporting its allies. The shame of Vietnam is not that we were there in the first place, but that we betrayed our ally in the end. It was Congress that turned its back on the promises of the Paris accord.
Laird supervised the slow withdrawal of US troops from Vietnam, known as Vietnamization. It took four years. He makes it clear that it’s not Congress that should be setting some sort of artificial timetable in such a process, it’s the executive branch that should be responding to conditions in the field:
In those four years of Vietnamization, I never once publicly promised a troop number for withdrawal that I couldn’t deliver. President Bush should move ahead with the same certainty. I also did not announce what our quantitative standards for readiness among the South Vietnamese troops were, just as Bush should not make public his specific standards for determining when Iraqi troops are ready to go it alone. In a report to Congress in July 2005, the Pentagon hinted that those measurable standards are in place. However, it would be a mistake for the president to rely solely on the numbers. Instead, his top commander in the field should have the final say on how many U.S. troops can come home, commensurate with the readiness of Iraqi forces.
Sounds reasonable to me. But I don’t have confidence that a Democratic Congress won’t try to force the issue and bring the troops home as soon as possible. After all, they may feel they won the election on that platform, and that their constituents demand it. As a USA Today article points out:
Bush has said repeatedly that he refuses to end the war according to an artificial timetable set by politicians in Washington, but if the polls are borne out in Tuesday’s elections, the public will be setting timetables, and they will only accelerate if the situation inside Iraq continues to deteriorate.
This would be a tragedy of major proportions, both for the Iraqis, the US, and our reputation for staying the course. My hope is that, if the Democrats do win control of the House, enough of them will have learned all the lessons of Vietnam, including that of the bitter end:
Just days before his execution at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, Cambodian statesman Sirak Mitak penned a final note to the U.S. ambassador refusing his offer of evacuation.
“I cannot, alas, leave in such a cowardly fashion. As for you and in particular for your great country, I never believed for a moment that you would have this sentiment of abandoning a people which has chosen liberty….You leave and my wish is that you and your country will find happiness under the sky.
“But mark it well that, if I shall die here on the spot and in my country that I love, it is too bad because we all are born and must die one day. I have only committed this mistake in believing in you, the Americans.”
[ADDENDUM: What those serving in Iraq think, according to the Washington Post.]
South Vietnamese forces were NEVER going to be ready, just as Iraqi forces will NEVER be ready, so long as it’s the U.S. or any foreign power pulling the strings, because the Vietnamese and Iraqis did not and do not want their country ruled by people who are controlled by the American government. The Iraqis have already undergone that with a fellow named Saddam Hussein, whom you may have heard of, and they are not eager to do so again.
While the US is there, the Iraqis feel that they are fighting not for Iraq but for American regional power interests, which it’s hard to risk your life for.
The fact is that the neocons cannot stand the idea of an independent and democratic Iraq. If that were to actually happen, the whole neocon project would be a failure.
South Vietnamese forces were NEVER going to be ready, just as Iraqi forces will NEVER be ready, so long as it’s the U.S. or any foreign power pulling the strings, because the Vietnamese and Iraqis did not and do not want their country ruled by people who are controlled by the American government.
‘Cuz, of course, the Iraqi Police and Army would rather get killed by Iranians and Syrians than serve an Iraqi Government recognized by the US….
You are a geopolitical genius! What year did you attend Command and General Staff College? What was your thesis subject at the JFK School of Government?
You gotta share these thoughts with the US Army leaders ‘on the ground’ over there!
This generation of Iraqis fought an 8 year war with Iran, but they would rather be Iranian than Iraqi with US support.
Such insight!
Well gosh, your onslaught of sarcasm has left me too ashamed to come up with a rational response.
Unlike the U.S., Iran doesn’t have the ability to force their will on Iraq UNLESS a large segment of the Iraqis support it (as many of them do). In any case, it’s something for the Iraqis to decide, no?
As for Syria I don’t know where you’re getting that from.
Don’t forget, also, that the Iran-Iraq war was an INVASION of Iran by Iraq, and not the other way around, as you seem to think. Also don’t forget that this was the brainchild of Donald Rumsfeld’s best pal Saddam, and after a couple of years it couldn’t have gone on unless Reagan had decided to intervene in the hopes the two sides would destroy each other.
Well gosh, your onslaught of sarcasm has left me too ashamed to come up with a rational response.
Based on your loopy response, I guess it did….
You don’t really know much of anything about this stuff do you?
I think you’re a young guy trying this wierd leftist viewpoint on for size.
Grow up: snarky cynicism only works until about 25, then people actually expect you to know things and not just poke fun at stuff…..
Loyal, you yourself sum up my feelings about you and your two-cents worth of dogma in your own bio from your blog. I couldn’t say it any better (I’ve added bold print for emphasis):
About Me (Loyal Achates): “I am Noah from Washington DC; the land of fake people, according to every politican…I was born screaming, and have continued that tradition to the present. I am often insane, but I have my lucid moments, in which I’m merely stupid.”
Iraqi people already can decide do they want US troops stay or leave, as was repeatedly declared by every high-ranking US official. They have elected government, remember? But without these troops they never can defend themselves against Iranian aggression, and aytollas do have plans to invade Iraq in case of US withdrawal. This is Iran and Syria who stay behind violence in Iraq, and most of so-called IED are not improvized at all, they are made in Iran and smuggled to Iraq by specially trained agents of Revolutionary Guard. This is Comintern tactics, adopted and used by Iran for quarter a century.
how is killing saddam going to improve things? how is killing anyone in iraq improving things? it will create yet more mayhem, while you neo-cons insist that the killing will eventually work. you are wrong and are being proved so day by day in the news fron iraq.
“A Vietnam lesson for Iraq” an Op-Ed by Quang X. Pham, The Orange County
Register, 3/19/06
Former U.S. Marine and entrepreneur Quang X. Pham is the author of “A Sense of Duty: My Father, My American Journey.” http://www.quangxpham.com
The first Americans I met were military advisers, much like the ones who are training security forces in Iraq. That year, 1970, the United States was in the process of Vietnamization – turning the war over to the South Vietnamese as U.S. troops simultaneously departed.
I remember as a boy visiting my father’s South Vietnamese Air Force squadron and shaking hands with U.S. pilots who wore reassuring smiles, green flight suits and pistols.
Today, three years into the war in Iraq, memories of Vietnamization come
back when I hear President Bush talk about his eventual plans to withdraw
U.S. troops. “As the Iraqis stand up, we will stand down,” he has said. Yet,
Vietnamization is not the model for Iraq…
“how is killing saddam going to improve things?”
It will make the French, and the trolls cry their rotten little eyeballs out.
“Unlike the U.S., Iran doesn’t have the ability to force their will on Iraq UNLESS a large segment of the Iraqis support it”
Don’t forget the Kurds; the forgotten Iraqis and largest stateless people in the Middle East.
I have only committed this mistake in believing in you, the Americans.”
This is a bad and dangerous reputation to have in the community of nations. It gains us neither popularity nor fear.
“I have only committed this mistake in believing in you, the Americans”
Well, there are alternatives — HoOOooOOOow about we make Guatamala a permanent member of the Security Council. I could use a coconut sandwich about now :/ . . . I know a lot of N. Koreans that sure could use one too.
Of coure I’m only teasing!!
Humor break 🙂
Neo, I think that you – and a lot of others – are making a mistake in viewing the collapse of South Vietnam in purely military terms. The real problem with South Vietnam was not that the U.S. “sold it out” – it was that South Vietnam was an imaginary country led by an unelected clique of people who had toadied to the French, then collaborated with the Japanese occupiers, then sucked up to the French again, and finally to the Americans – hardly great Vietnamese nationalists! South Vietnam never held democratic elections, and its government never commanded the allegiance of the vast majority of its population.
Under these circumstances, it’s ridiculous and unfair to blame the United States for eventually pulling the plug on South Vietnam. There was simply no way that South Vietnam was ever going to be an independently viable country – not without a completely different power structure, which wouldn’t have received American support in any case.
The mistake the United States made in Vietnam wasn’t in pulling out, or in ceasing financial support; it was in getting heavily involved in a country without knowing anything about it. At the time the U.S. got started in Vietnam, there was not a single State Department employee who spoke Vietnamese; nobody involved in making the key decisions knew anything about Vietnam’s history or culture. Had the U.S. bothered to learn about Vietnamese realities (instead of being blinded by reflexive global anti-Commmunism and failing to pay attention to local issues), there’s no way that America would have gotten involved as it did.
How does all this apply to Iraq? Good question! Iraq has, at least, held genuine elections. On the other hand, I’m not entirely convinced that Iraq is any more of a “real” country than South Vietnam was. Can a non-dictatorial government really rule effectively and hold Iraq together? Would we be better off letting Iraq split up into Sunni, Shi’ite, and Kurdish states? Obviously a united, democratic Iraq is preferable; but the jury is still very much out on whether that’s a real long-term possibility. If it isn’t, no amount of U.S. help will make it happen.
I don’t have the answer to Iraq; my personal opinion is that the U.S. invaded the wrong country, perhaps as the result of a spelling mistake. (These things do happen.) What I will say is that the U.S. must have some form of exit strategy – maybe not a defined schedule, but some kind of agenda such that Iraq must take responsibility for itself within some reasonable span of time and stand – or fall – without major American help. (I think the U.S. should have chosen a much earlier exit point – perhaps very shortly after Saddam Hussein’s overthrow. But it’s too late for that now; the U.S. has too much prestige tied up with the new Iraqi government to cut an run quickly.)
If Iraq’s government can win the allegiance of its own people, then the United States can do a good deal to help it survive and thrive.
Dear Neo, The trolls want answers. They can’t live with simply digesting your well considered and rendered food for thought. Keep it up. It’s their problem, not yours. Mark
A review of honor and duty. Blemishes and dirt like “Loyal” and Conned, have their moments, but their power is as nothing compared to the real deal.
The human gene pool for decency, is getting weaker and weaker, as the third millenium approaches.
Could be a good thing, the weaker they are, the easier they fall.
Don gets points for politeness, sanity, and reason. But still, his perspective is very different from mine, and dare I say it, Neo’s. While I think in terms of promises, oath breakings, honor and duty, Don thinks in terms of how to use hindsight to determine what history should or should not have been.
Neo, I think that you – and a lot of others – are making a mistake in viewing the collapse of South Vietnam in purely military terms.
Neo doesn’t view it in military terms, she views it in human terms, the human terms of loyalty, honor, duty, protection, keeping promises, and decency.
The real problem with South Vietnam was not that the U.S. “sold it out” –
Even now, Don, you try to butter up the situation in order to prepare it for the self-rationalization you need to sooth your conscience. Do you not notice this?
There was simply no way that South Vietnam was ever going to be an independently viable country – not without a completely different power structure, which wouldn’t have received American support in any case.
To make a long point short, South Korea wouldn’t have received American support either. So why is South Korea a prosperous democracy under American occupation and Vietnam, a former communist nation on recovery?
The mistake the United States made in Vietnam wasn’t in pulling out, or in ceasing financial support; it was in getting heavily involved in a country without knowing anything about it.
Dishonor is dishonor, no matter how much you butter it up with rationalizations.
If Iraq’s government can win the allegiance of its own people, then the United States can do a good deal to help it survive and thrive.
Without the proper perspective on honor, duty, and loyalty, nobody is going to win anyone’s “allegiance”, Don.
Ymasakar, I know a lot of Frenchmen who could rip your head off as easy as they light a cigarette – the French aren’t weak my friend. And anyway if the Uk was attached to mainland Europe, they would have got blitzkreiged as well (WW2) and America aswell, Id say that the Americas would not have come back like the Russians.
Honor? Honor? Go tell that to the chickenhawks.
As Powell said early on to Armitage..’the trouble with these guys (this Admin) is that none have ever been in a bar fight.’
The world changed quickly in the 60s and 70s, Vietnam was a cause that became a casualty itself. Prez Ford was playing golf the day the final peace talks took place.
Endless war is not an aim in itself.
People here always quote one side of the Iraqis or Viets, how many Viets were on the ‘communist’ or should I say ‘nationalist’ side? And if you are talking realpolitik as is your want, the vast majority of vietnamese voted with their fists, and won. You cannot make a child grow smaller.
Someone mentioned Kurdistan…yeah…how long b4 our ‘ally’ Turkey intervenes? Does anyone want to take bets? Turkey add it to the list of ‘with friends like these….’
Also Korea was a conventional war, Vietnam wasn’t.
Gourney,
Don’t sell the Americans short in WW2. People forget that Americans (I include colonists in this)had to fight for what they have from 1620 to 1893 or so. A lot of that fighting was done by small communities and small contingents of soldiers. Many areas in the US were still wild in the 1930s. People lived hard lives, and were tough.
Today, not so good.
Ariel.
I am not attacking/denigrating the US, nor mean to offend you or the US. Ppl round here think that WW2 was a cakewalk. 1940s were crucial years.
Just that ppl sometimes need a reality check.
But I will qualify by saying that the US would have had just as hard a time to come back as the Russians, who were basically saved by the winter of 1941.
Please accept this qualification.
G
Gourney:
So you’re into Norse legend…
Surely you missed the fact the Loki, in addition to the god of fire, is also the god of liars.
But maybe you didn’t…
Or maybe you too have let go with a Freudian slip…
How about it, dear Canadian Friend…
PS: The only country I was ever short changed in was France…three times including once in Paris. And the role call of states i traveled in included the then USSR.
Just like the French: less honest than Communists in Soviet Union, da!
Grow up: snarky cynicism only works until about 25, then people actually expect you to know things and not just poke fun at stuff…..
“how is killing saddam going to improve things?”
It will make the French, and the trolls cry their rotten little eyeballs out.
Dear Neo, The trolls want answers. They can’t live with simply digesting your well considered and rendered food for thought. Keep it up. It’s their problem, not yours.
Even now, Don, you try to butter up the situation in order to prepare it for the self-rationalization you need to sooth your conscience. Do you not notice this?
Wow Neo, you’ve got quite the army of booger flickers.
Don Radlauer posted a mature, well reasoned and heartfelt response to you that still stands.
It would be interesting if you responded, rather than the mental midgets that have posted thus far.
Gourney:
Europe and the USSR was largely saved by the conservative stubborness of Winston Churchill. Not that the Russian people didn’t do their share.
But – if England had followed the example of France and roled over, as many ex-appeasement Brits were hoping, Nazi Germany would have:
1) Gone into Russia with roughly double the Luftwaffe it did;
2) More satellites from Eastern Europe would have joined in the fun;
3) The Wehrmacht would not have had to expend divisions doing garrison duty in Western Europe;
4) The Russian invasion would have started about one month earlier, and the effects of winter would have made no difference if Moscow feel just as winter arrived.
Germany came close in the initial invasion…and also the next summer. The above factors might have made all the difference.
Give it a thought, pal…
My uncle used to say about his homeland (and mine partly) ‘These lands were paid in full with our blood.’
He is a retired General. When I was flippant a long time ago he turned to me and said in a stern tone, “And you think that waging war is as simple as that?”
Sorry, that’s “…if Moscow fell just as winter…”
Too many papers to grade tonight…
Gourney:
And what is your homeland..???
Gourney,
No offense taken. I hear/read the “Americans have never been attacked on their homeland so they don’t know…” when most of US history is pure struggle.
The Russians took the brunt of the European portion of WW2, but then Stalin’s stupidity, incompetence, and brutality cost the Russian people dearly.
Charlie…I agree with everything you said. Ok I see what you mean, Churchill’s resolve, yes, and I hold Churchill as one of, the if not the statesman of the 20th century actually.
Britain in WW2 did what the Athenians did to the Persians in the Persian Wars against all odds.
But without the English Channel? No hope. Churchill did not have to surrender…why would you? You’d fight to the end. Appeasers like Mosely were not taken seriously, actually wasn’t an appeaser he was On the german side.
Also I’m afraid that many have to acknowledge that without Russia/USSR WW2 would not have been won, not in the way we know it. Without Britain Russia would have been overrun…probably.
Loki as in the god of mischief…and maybe a troll? Get it? Im not a liar, however, nor will I lie to myself, so I don’t lie to others to make a point….what’s the point? Im discussing and clarifying that’s all.
PS Im part Finnish. Not Canadian or French.
Looking at all the posts, especially but not limited to DonkeyKong’s, reminds me how incivil the Internet can be. I guess its the anonymity that allows the worst to come out. No offense, but its false bravery.
I am not claiming innocence either.
Looking at all the posts, especially but not limited to DonkeyKong’s, reminds me how incivil the Internet can be. I guess its the anonymity that allows the worst to come out. No offense, but its false bravery.
I am not claiming innocence either.
Thanks Ariel.
Stalin was a monster, an unmitigated monster. The system he presided over was a horrific joke, joke is actually not a word to be used. I dont buy into America bashing. One can critisize any system in the
Charlie what are you grading?
Also Im part Greek, but ppl called me what you would say a ‘white spik’ maybe? lol.
My unlce on that part of family is Greek, he was talking about Turkey. I have strugeeld hard to overcome my family predjudices. Against USSR and Turkey.
Too many enemies hey? Doctors say its unhealthy…
Yes Donkey should argue a point not simply denigrade and I think neo should not have to fight Dnkey’s wars for him.
Gourney:
One of my best friends – Roger H – is an American descended Finn. Tried to teach me some Finnish (Soumi??) but gave me up as hopeless.
I don’t think the appeasers were as hopeless as Mosely and the BloodyFools. My own suspicion is that Halifax would have continued to appease – to the extent of agreeing to a truce – Hitler was already talking about the Continent for Germany, Colonies for England.
And the choice was between Halifax and Churchill: only the threat of the Labour Party not supporting Halifax was enough for George VI for send for Winston.
History – she is strange woman, eh?
Advanced Chemistry: we had a major test on Group Theory as applied to Quantum Mechanical orbitals.
No one got the question about the platinum chemotherapy drug and how it might work…rats…
Ten papers and grades due at the end of this week.
Such a life.
Actually yes history is mybe a working girl, but yes again I have glossed over the fact that Labor may have been too eager to aquiese (?)
They were wrong. You see in eagerness to make a point I gloss over history, it was FAR more complex than that, as was Vietnam as is Iraq. These are not simplicities.
Iraq must succeed in some way. Even if it increasingly seems like partition. It is true as Powell said ‘you break you buy’…(I must sound like Powells press officer…)
I think that Democrats realize this, and anyway if they dont the brifings they will recieve from state department will sober them up. But Dems are not getting into power, real power, (if they gain anything…by the way)
Democrats are playing politics…as is the other side, one thing we may all be rst assured, Iraq will still be there tomorrow and there is no clear room to maneuvre. What the US needs now is real leadership, not this man, sorry if you disagree but I disagree with him and i think he (Bush) has hijakced the conservative movement. Have you read the latest American COnservative Editorial? I agree with it. But I am not an appeaser. I just think there are better ways to go about things.
You see Charlie many many Hard scientists are conservative…why?
And many Soft scientists and co are liberals?
Objectivity? Have you cornered the market? maybe, one for the Soft scientists to work out…lol.
I guess its the anonymity that allows the worst to come out. No offense, but its false bravery.
Strangely enough, I’m much nicer to weirdo leftists on the internet than I am in person. 🙂
Don:
I don’t have the answer to Iraq; my personal opinion is that the U.S. invaded the wrong country, perhaps as the result of a spelling mistake. (These things do happen.)
Utterly specious–makes the rest of your dopey post not worth reading.
Once again: I wish the baby boomers would get over Vietnam so we can fight the Musselman!
One of the reasons why I don’t read your comments section, Neo, except for a couple of people’s comments, is because you have a lot of crazy people here.
Either it is manic bipolar, with a bit of schizophrenia, meaning someone is giddy at one point and then slowly morphs into serious hostility, or it is anti-social behavior. Not exactly manic bipolar, but close.
Since you are the psychologists, I suppose they come hoping for help of one kind or another, but I never did like psychology as a profession. Useful as a weapon, can’t tolerate it as a profession. Technically I could, if it is you and the Saniy Squad, but I won’t for these uh people.
Loki:
It is true as Powell said ‘you break you buy’…(I must sound like Powells press officer…)
I served in the Army under Powell as Chairman of the JCS. In his career, he held one leadership position in Vietnam and otherwise served entirely as a staff officer. He was an affirmative-action baby and everyone knew it.
I was utterly disgusted and offended when his wife said: “He can’t run for president, the white people will kill him.”
He subjected the poor Army to every loopy politically correct nonsense the Clinton admin could come up with.
His darkest moment was when he ended the Drive to Baghdad in Gulf War I after he quailed at the sight of the Highway of Death.
The Highway of Death was a great thing and probably the high-water mark of American lethality.
His ‘you break it, you fix it’ policy is utter nonsense: pure 60’s ‘kumbaya’ crap.
How about: “We break it, YOU fix it and if you don’t fix it the way we like it we’ll break it again!”
The envious, small-minded world has always hated the US, at least they could fear us….
Y’know the reason for ‘the international goodwill’ toward America after 9/11?
‘Cuz we were getting killed.
The world only loves America when we are dying….
You see Charlie many many Hard scientists are conservative…why?
Intresting point: I’m an electrical engineer.
No, really….
The Highway of Death was a great thing and probably the high-water mark of American lethality.
Great psychological weapon, video tape it and send it to everyone. OIF 1 planners thought the Iraqis were still shocked and awed by the Highway, except that was the last war. Oops.
How about: “We break it, YOU fix it and if you don’t fix it the way we like it we’ll break it again!”
Too aggressive for Neo, but I like it.
‘Cuz we were getting killed.
I think it was cause all the chickenhawks were being humiliated, and the Left kind of liked that sense of moral righteousness and superiority.
Gray correct me If Im wrong but didnt you say you were born in 1968?????
Grow up: snarky cynicism only works until about 25, then people actually expect you to know things and not just poke fun at stuff…..
Gray | 11.06.06 – 3:10 pm | #
Hypocrite of the Month is going to be a tough race.
“The Highway of Death was a great thing and probably the high-water mark of American lethality.”
That sums up the American spirit nicely. Shoot defenceless people in the back after they’ve surrendered. Brave brave yanks.
No wonder Bin Laden is popular in the m/e. He has more scruples than racist scum like you.
Gray – Maybe we should organize a poll here on Neoneo –
Your name (pseudonym whatever but just not Anonymous)
Your vocation
Your political leanings
(Maybe Naitonality too)
eg. Randy, Brain surgeon, Communist…(Nth Dakota)
everytime one posts, then we could calibrate the data and find out if this theory of hard/soft holds?
Welcome Back Spotter…
How’s Arnold Horshak, Barbarino and Wassshington?
Ymasakar – are you advocating ‘cuttin and runnin?’
What’s wrong has a Frenchman finally caught up with you?
‘let us fight the musselman’
Serious question Gray, If you are a military man as you say
What do you advocate for next 5 years of US foreign policy.
You’re President elect, RIGHT NOW (Bush choked on an other peanut, and Cheney’s ego was inoperable)
Say that the Dems have failed to make any inroads to congress today (hypothetically) so you’re in charge..
What is your plan?
Spooty! You ol’ Mullah-sniffer! I kinda missed you….
The Highway of Death was a great thing and probably the high-water mark of American lethality.”
That sums up the American spirit nicely. Shoot defenceless people in the back after they’ve surrendered. Brave brave yanks.
You’re actually calling the Iraqi Army fleeing in combat vehicles and stolen Mercedes with their loot from Kuwait “defenceless (sic) people”!?
The poor defenceless (sic) Iraqi Army that was going to deliver the Mother of all Battles?
Actually, we didn’t shoot them in the back–we shot them in the front, the sides, the back, the top….
You are right about one thing:
Righteously catching the 4th largest army in the world, running with looted treasure over open desert, and destroying them with combined arms fire and maneuver is The American Spirit.
Loki: I was born in 1968. I’m no hippy–I only suffered under their stupid, stupid ideas….
“The real problem with South Vietnam was not that the U.S. “sold it out” – it was that South Vietnam was an imaginary country led by an unelected clique of people who had toadied to the French, then collaborated with the Japanese occupiers, then sucked up to the French again, and finally to the Americans – hardly great Vietnamese nationalists!”
There you have it, the left laid bare. The right side won Vietnam, and the wrong side won the Cold War.
Forget the purge of Saigon, the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge, the cannibalism Great Leader Mao forced people into. The people slain were on the wrong side, wanting gross liberty and horrible capitalism. And now those stupid Iraqis dare, DARE to reach for the same gifts of freedom and prosperity? They must be taught the same lesson.
spotty:
When you surrender, you stop everything you are doing and wait for the victor to tell you what happens next. You do not grab as much loot as you can get your mitts on high-tail it back home. The Iraqis on the so-called Highway of Death weren’t surrendering – they were escaping. Sorry, delicate one – they were fair game.
Despite press reports to the contrary, most of the Iraqi soldiers in the convoy were smart enough to get out of their vehicles before being obliterated. The ones who didn’t got one minute of intense pain followed by fifteen minutes of fame. C’est la guerre…
“Strangely enough, I’m much nicer to weirdo leftists on the internet than I am in person.”
Gray, I am going to send you a bill for a coke soaked laptop if you keep this up. My training is Chemical Engineering, but should have gone into History & PoliSci, find it more interesting.
Bugs, don’t forget that Sputum is a sharia-loving antitheist, someone The Bunny would have called a maroon for that silliness. And, yes the Iraqis on the Highway of Death were escaping after looting, not surrendering. Stupid move.
What is your plan?
Employ the ‘Oil Spot’ theory of unconventional warfare that the British performed successfully in Malaysia, Aden, and recently Basra.
No one is/was better at pacifying and holding an area than the British. We gotta swallow our egos and adopt their unconventional tactics.
Expand and hold pacified areas while playing the different sides off of each other for favor and money.
Stop being so damned nice and start disappearing some bad guys (we’re accused of that already).
Get out of the ‘mud fort’ mentality that the French had in Vietnam and get into the countryside and villages.
Less armor, less driving, more walking and more talking.
Less Paul Bremers and more T.E. Lawrence’s.
Less big civic projects and more individual interaction–with the Old Way the British used to do it: 10 of you dead and displayed for any 1 man injured.
If we paint a school and build a playground, that school is going to teach english, you’re going to say the f’in pledge of allegiance and read the f’in bible in that school.
We’d suffer more casualties initially, which is why this option is politically unpalatable….
The Brits did it right in Basra in this war. We are still dicking around because we are afraid people will claim we are an Imperial Occupation.
Honestly, look at how well all of the old British colonies turned out?
“Actually, we didn’t shoot them in the back–we shot them in the front, the sides, the back, the top….”
Flippant but funny…but should’t be.
Loki, Archaeologist, Liberal Centrist, (Finland – working holiday)
See here about the death toll on that highway of death. It apparently wasn’t all that high, although it initially appeared that way because of all the burned vehicles.
And to Don Radlauer–somewhere along the line I think I wrote a post (or at least a draft; can’t find it at the moment) about the differences between the South Vietnamese government and the type of system we’re trying to encourage the development of in Iraq. Basically, it’s the difference between the realpolitik point of view and the neocon agenda. So in that sense I agree with you. But in another sense it’s possible that the South Vietnamese government would have grown into more democracy and legitimacy if it had been allowed to survive. But I agree that one reason the Vietnam War was unsuccessful was that the government in place was far from ideal. That said, it was better than what initially replaced it when the South fell.
And all of that is tangential to the fact that, at the time Congress pulled out, it wouldn’t have been a big deal to have continued our support to at least give them a fighting chance of remaining non-Communist, like Korea. There were no more American combat troops there, and the South Vietnamese forces had been doing not that badly. It was the least we owed the South Vietnamese people, the soldiers and civilians who had died there, and our own reputation for keeping our word.
I’ve got a soft spot in my heart for Finland after watching “The Dudesons” movie with my stepdaughter.
Damn funny movie–Jarpi was my hero.
I’ll always remember the way my military history professor described the Finno-Russian war:
“The Finnish winter was simply too cold for the average anthropoid from Odessa; and when the muzhiks froze in their trenches, the Finns walked over and shot them.”
(Sorry Sergey :))
I’m like Gray, I’m for cutting up Al Sadr and mailing the pieces, special US air drop, to his buddies in Iran and Iraq.
The British didn’t do any of that stuff you mentioned, Gray, in Basrah. That is why Basrah is going to the Badr Brigades, i.e. Iran.
But all in all, Gray’s got it right. Now, if 5 Grays were advising Bush, things would get a lot better. And not just because of the esp stuff.
Ymar,
The British did all of these things in Basra:
Expand and hold pacified areas while playing the different sides off of each other for favor and money.
Stop being so damned nice and start disappearing some bad guys (You’d be surprised….).
Get out of the ‘mud fort’ mentality that the French had in Vietnam and get into the countryside and villages.
Less armor, less driving, more walking and more talking.
Less Paul Bremers and more T.E. Lawrence’s.
Less big civic projects and more individual interaction.
Right now they are rewarding the Badr Brigade which, honestly, I think will be useful to play off of Sadr and the Mahdi army.
Y’know–I’ve got my own ideas, but it’s not far off from what we are doing–with a few notable exceptions…. We’re getting there…
“The Finnish winter was simply too cold for the average anthropoid from Odessa; and when the muzhiks froze in their trenches, the Finns walked over and shot them.”
LOL!
It should be – “One day the Finns found themselves less drunk than their adversarys the Russians and strolled over to ask for an amnesty for a liquor run only to find the Russians sleeping one off, and then shot them for their vodka…’
Ymar and Gray
You should look up ‘EU referendum’ blog they ahve the same idea(s) and they’re ‘limeys’.
Ok your plan might have worked – but the EU Ref boys say that the Brits should be doing what the Americans are doing…
Also you have all left out something, Basra is homogenous ethnically, Baghdad (area)is anything but. Not to cast aspersions on Brits, they are good guys (soldiers) and have met many in Cyprus (they bad).
But Basra not Iraq all.
Also EU Ref guys agree on your Malaysia example, though I dont cause Malaysia not complex like Iraq.
“One day the Finns found themselves less drunk than their adversarys the Russians and strolled over to ask for an amnesty for a liquor run only to find the Russians sleeping one off, and then shot them for their vodka…’
LOL! Sounds like The Dudesons movie!
Thick Finnish accent:
“Hitting the golf balls at the windows sounded like it would be pretty fun…. But now? Fixing it myself? It sucks….”
/ thick finnish accent
Me? I prefer scotch to the clear liquors and anise seed flavored liquor in Scandinavia…. Aquavit? Eeeesh….
You should look up ‘EU referendum’ blog they ahve the same idea(s) and they’re ‘limeys’.
Huh…. I’ll give it a read…
You make a good point about the non-sectarian nature of Basra–but that is still intrinsic to the ‘oil slick’ idea:
Start with a neighborhood in Baghdad–of either sect and hold it; pacify it; reward it; and use it as a base to secure the next street; the next corner….
Make the other sects envious while cutting the others’ water; electricity; and raiding them mercilessly until they fold; then reward them and start in on the next neighborhood…..
“A hand out and a kick up the arse if they won’t take it.”
Not the US! We’re like Santa Claus on crack dispensing gifts to good little boys and bad little boys alike….
Damn we want people to like us!
Yeah, brave brave yanks.
‘Duudsonit elokuva’ Yes they are my stupid cousins….not
But have you ever see Leningrad Cowboys go America? Long tme ago?
Also like Lars Von Trier I think, ‘The idiots’ which is good. (Danish)
Lapin Coulter…(joke) Lapin Kulta is good drink but it doesn’t look so good, (joke)
Also ‘Passing Clouds’ movie. The drunk chef acts like my other uncle…
“we were just cursing in Finnish” lol
A Finnish Borat would be funny, he could make endless jokes about his Saami wife, (laplander)
Start with a neighborhood in Baghdad–of either sect and hold it; pacify it; reward it; and use it as a base to secure the next street; the next corner….
So where are the rewards, where are the people loyal to those who are our allies in Iraq, for Basrah? In essence, where is the proof that this is working?
If the militias are still running around controlling Basrah, and Sadr is still alive, what exactly has the Brits accomplished in the South except to get up more sectarian killings?
“And all of that is tangential to the fact that, at the time Congress pulled out, it wouldn’t have been a big deal to have continued our support to at least give them a fighting chance of remaining non-Communist, like Korea. There were no more American combat troops there, and the South Vietnamese forces had been doing not that badly.”-Neo
By late 1974, the Politburo in Hanoi gave its permission for a limited VPA offensive out of Cambodia into Phuoc Long Province that would solve a local logistical problem, determine how Saigon forces would react, and determine if the US would indeed return to the fray. In December and January the offensive took place, Phuoc Long Province fell to the VPA, and the American air power did not return. The speed of this success forced the Politburo to reasses the situation. It was decided that operations in the Central highlands would be turned over to General Van Tien Dung and that Pleiku should be siezed, if possible. Before he left for the south, General Van was addressed by First Party Secretary Le Duan: “Never have we had military and political conditions so perfect or a strategic advantage so great as we have now.”-Wikipedia
Neo, the communists launched an offensive in 1975 that they thought would reach Saigon by 1977, Saigon fell in 4 months!
The American people were lied to for 10 years about the war (and our governments bankrolling of much of the French effort in the 50’s). The draft was slanted to send the working class at the expense of college age middle class (those with other priorities.) Our economy was doing contortions due to run away welfare state spending, the war, and the Saudi’s had us by the (cover your eyes fellow posters if you faint at the sight of uncivil language.) balls due to our support of israel during the Yom Kipper War.
If you think the North was bled dry and we could just hang in there a little longer. Try reading accounts of the Chinese invasion into the North to punish Vietnam for driving the Khmer Rouge out of Phnom Penh.
The lesson that YOU seem to want to avoid is DON’T LIE TO THE AMERICAN PEOPLE.
We abandoned South Vietnam because we could not trust our government to be honest.
That is the heart of any solid relationship with government, corporation, church or individual.
Trust.
Do you in your heart trust this administation, if so why?
Can’t we just leave the Vietnam analogies behind. No one ever agrees about anything from that era, the history is so tarnished with agenda, it’s been such a political weapon mishandled by both sides that it’s pointless. Isn’t it enough to say that once we tell people we’re here, we’ll help you, and we won’t leave till you’re ready, that we should keep our word? Isn’t that clear enough for everyone?
The main weapon of British Empire were not its gunboats or cavalry units; it was its reputation. If US had not betrayed their allies repeatedly, they would have now much more allies and less enemies who dare to challenge them. The whole global project “Jihad” would not have been even conceived. 9/11 was a pay for Veitnam betrayal.
Sergey…No.
911 was US trained bin Laden who fought Russia, then he got bored so invented other bullshit.
I have to say im disappointed in some of my fellow citizens who see the horrible Iraq coverage on cnn while eating lunch at the mall food court, and decide they just cant take it anymore. This war is just too stressful and probably spoils their shopping experience.
My hat is off to the people in the actual war zone that want to finish the damn job. Maybe we’ll look back and appreciate them more when the suicide bombers make it to our malls.
Cutting off funding to the S.Vietnamese in 1974 just hastened the inevitable. We bet on the wrong side in a CIVIL WAR.
“Do you in your heart trust this administation, if so why?”
DonkeyKong
DonkeyKong, although I sympathize with your statements on Vietnam, Iraq is not Vietnam. Please make every effort to advance your mental life beyond thirty years ago.
Iraq is the Military front of the wot, which the terrorsists themselves say. The Iraq war is concretely based upon the Bush Doctrine, which itself has compiled a perfect record thus far, and especially as compared to the previous strategy, and as compared to *no* strategy, other than surrender, which your deranged leaders continuously champion as some kind of death-wishing panacea.
Yes, I trust the Bush adm.. It is instead you who are so paranoid and “lost in the sixties again” that you cannot trust anyone. Your neurosis is defineable and easily recognized.
Indeed, why would I trust a bunch of anti-free thought Faux Liberal Chicken Dhimmi Cultist Controllists who show exactly zero ability to confront reality with fact, logic, and creativity – and who offer as an alternative only an inveterate, obsessive complaining which makes two year olds look statesmanlike?
Ask yourself if and why you would have the complete lack of rationality to trust people like Kerry, Mothra, Pelosi, Durbin, Clinton, Dean, Shumer, Kennedy, McClure, Waters, Conyers, Gore, Berger, Albright, Murray, Rangel, Rather, Olberman, Cole, Keller, Fox, Baldwin, Sheen, Streisand, and so on, ad nauseum.
In the rational world there is simply no contest. But you are not in the rational world. That’s your problem.
“Ask yourself if and why you would have the complete lack of rationality to trust people like Kerry, Mothra, Pelosi, Durbin, Clinton, Dean, Shumer, Kennedy, McClure, Waters, Conyers, Gore, Berger, Albright, Murray, Rangel, Rather, Olberman, Cole, Keller, Fox, Baldwin, Sheen, Streisand, and so on, ad nauseum.
In the rational world there is simply no contest. But you are not in the rational world. That’s your problem.”
J. Peden
Mr or Mrs. Peden, Neo’s post IS about Vietnam. Please read it first or have some one read it to you.
Oh, and I did’nt know Barbara Streisand was in the senate.
PS-You’re also supposed to say Micheal Moore is Fat. I’m disappointed.
More like tragedy
Cutting off funding to the S.Vietnamese in 1974 just hastened the inevitable. We bet on the wrong side in a CIVIL WAR.
Greg Daniels | 11.07.06 – 12:49 pm | #
Agreed, you guys bet on the wrong side.
A straight up war crime unrivalved by anything save for the Nazi genocide.
But that’s all over now–we elected leftists to Congress.
You can love us again.
But can they still hate Bush, gray? Pretty please?
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