Dec 22, 2006

Iraq is Viet Nam

Iraq is Vietnam and you'd better believe it - From A Liberal Dose

EXCERPT:

Sometime in 1969, the White House, faced with unrelenting facts on the ground and under siege from the public, had quietly made the decision that America couldn't win its war in Vietnam.

Nixon and Kissinger didn't put it that way, of course. America was a superpower, and it was inconceivable that it could lose a war to a third rate nation whose soldiers lived on rice and hid in holes in the ground. So the White House conceived an elaborate strategy that would mask the fact of an American defeat. The US would slowly withdraw its combat troops over a period of several years, while the mission of those who remained would change from fighting the North Vietnamese and Vietcong to training the South Vietnamese to carry on the fight on their own. At the same time, we would give the South Vietnamese a series of performance ultimatums which, if unmet, would trigger a total withdrawal and let us blame the South Vietnamese for the debacle that would follow. This strategy was called "Vietnamization." Implementing it cost at least 10,000 additional American and countless more Vietnamese lives, plus billions of dollars.

It was a rigged game from the start. All but the wildest zealots in Washington knew that the South Vietnamese would not and could not meet our ultimatums: an end to corrupt, revolving-door governments, an officer corps based on merit not cronyism, and the creation of a national state that enjoyed popular allegiance strong and broad enough to control the political and cultural rivalries that had ripped the country's fabric for a thousand years.

During the eighteen months I was in Vietnam, I met almost no Americans in the field who regarded Vietnamization as a serious military strategy with any chance of success. More years of American training could not possibly make a difference in the outcome of the war because what was lacking in the South Vietnamese Army was not just combat skills but belief in a cause worth fighting for.But none of that was the point. Vietnamization was not a military strategy. It was a public relations campaign.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey Fade..the head of Al-Queda in Iraq has a message for us...

THE head of an al-Qaeda-dominated group in Iraq offered to give US troops a month to pull out free of attack in an audiotape posted on the internet overnight and demanded an answer within two weeks.

...

"We are offering you the opportunity to withdraw your troops in complete safety and we are expecting your response within two weeks,'' said the voice purporting to be that of Baghdadi, leader of a self-proclaimed Islamic emirate in western and north-central Iraq that is dominated by al-Qaeda supporters.

"We appeal to President George W. Bush to seize this historic opportunity which should allow your troops to pull out in safety,'' it said.

Bush has faced intense political pressure to overhaul his Iraq policy, following the rout of his Republican party in mid-term elections, rock-bottom approval of his management of the Iraq war and mounting US combat deaths.

A policy review by the Iraq Study Group, a bi-partisan panel, recommended that all frontline US troops be withdrawn by early 2008.


Wow you and them sound the same..crazy huh?..we lost we lost Terrorist win..siggghhh

Anonymous said...

You got that right that it was NOT a military strategy, just PR. And IRAQ is just another VIETNAM. "Peace with honor" my ass!

Caveman said...

Woo hooo hill its a Vietnam..so you just waved the white flag...terrorist win....USA loses...wow..cant belive it

Anonymous said...

Fade, who is this "caveman"?

Anonymous said...

hmm a person that does not surrender to terrorist?..like you

Caveman said...

Merry Christmas to everyone..stay safe

Anonymous said...

Fade, hurry back. We miss you.

Faded said...

Caveman is my Arch-enemy, HCgal. ;)

navyswan said...

Caveman likes cheese:
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/wehlia/3300824398727202114/#4868

Faded said...

He's a special kind of Cheesehead. Can't you just see him at a Political Debate? Big Foam W on his finger and a wedge of Red white and blue cheese strapped to his head (lined with tinfoil, no doubt)...

Anonymous said...

Yes Fade that is me..better then a someone that ..runs from terrorist.. : )

Faded said...

I don't run and I don't hide. And I don't support killing people in their own homes so that some Halliburton employee can buy a third home in Aspen.

5 US soldiers died today in Iraq.

For what?