Jack has been spreading erroneous facts on the Vietnam War and states that President Nixon ….”LIED THRU HIS TEETH so he could KILL MORE THAN HALF OF ALL AMERICANS IN VIETNAM.” (VM), Jack states in a further post:

“He disregarded LBJ's experience and moved ahead as if he was a newbie. The result was predestined - we more than doubled our casualties, and achieved nothing.”

Now to understand how we go in the future we need to learn from the past and dispel erroneous myths, so here are the facts per the US Army War College Library as it pertains to VM:

1. Peak troop strength in VM was 543,482, on 30 April 1969.
2. US Military hostile deaths were as follows:
-Prior to 1966     – 5,008
-1967   - 9,378
-1968     - 14,589
-1969     -              9,414
-1970     - 4,221
-1971  - 1,381
-1972    - 300

Total deaths under LBJ and Kennedy = 32,053
                  Nixon   = 15,316

Contrary to LBJ, President Nixon as commander-in-chief did have a plan and it was to “strengthen and hold”. From 1969- 1971, Cummunist “insurgency” was destroyed to where over 90 percent of towns and villages in South Vietnam were free from communist domination. By 1971, throughout the populous Mekong Delta, the communist insurgency action dropped to 3 incidents per 100,000 population.

Through this plan, Nixon was able to begin troop withdrawals in 1969 and nearly complete them by 1971.  Nixon’s plan included bombing North Vietnamese Army (NVA) supply lines and stations in Laos, Cambodia, and Hanoi. He also mined Hai Phong Harbor. Nixon was a tough nut and forced the NVA to the peace table and got our last POW out of Hanoi in early-1973.

The NVA were also forced to the table because the 327,000 Chinese troops and the Soviet Union’s 55,000 “advisors” (they were installing air defense systems etc) were being hammered. Fact is, if Nixon would have followed LBJ and McNamara, marine and soldier deaths would have increased and we still be in a VM war quagmire.

Things were going on course, but Hanoi Jane and the Democratic controlled- US Congress had other ideas. In 1972 or 1973, US Congress passed the “Case – Church Law” which forbade US Military forces from operating in SE Asia.  The US Military was not driven out from Vietnam. The US Congress voted them out.  So how do our lessons from the past, manifest themselves into policymaking for Iraq, well, I’ll let the Democratic US Congress and Jack have the floor.


-- Modified on 11/9/2006 8:42:49 AM

What was our strategic objective in Vietnam, and how much of that did we acheive?  And was it worth the price?

IMHO, those are pretty basic questions that anybody should know to ask, going into ANY task.

Now in hindsight, it looks like a pretty rhetorical question, doesn't it?  In fact, in hindsight, it looks as if we had simply let the commies do their thing, wreck their economy and flog their people, learn their lesson and get it over with, we would have done a much better job of spreading democracy, eh?

So we pretty much fucked it up, and the real question is, when should we have figured it out?

IMHO, it seems to me that McNamara and Johnson had the information in front of them to understand that this was not a problem where their WWII experience applied; it should have been clear by 65 or 66 that the situation allowed the VC/NVA to apply a Chinese model, not the conventional WW2 model; and that anybody who had ever heard of Mao could figure how this was going to go.

In fact, LBJ and McNamara did figure it out, a couple years late and a couple billion $$ short.   Theie greater failure may have been in failing to communicate to the American people that this was not going to work, for the simple reason that you cannot walk into a strange land, point a gun at a man, and tell him you're there to save him from his neighbor.  It doesn't work.  Those neighbors have to figure it out among themselves.

So, in retrospect, it seems to me that Kennedy's advisors should have realized that this was going to be a continuation of the Chinese campaigns of WW2, not the European ones; and McNamara and LBJ were stupid, but they finally learned.  That they didn't or couldn't pass their knowledge was the next problem.

Nixon, however, had their experience staring him in the face, and disregarded it.

In fact, Truman had been advised by the JCS not to go into Korea, and not to commit ground forces to the Asian mainland, because the JCS believed it was stupid to fight an enemy on his own ground, and that we should rely on our naval superiority.

Militarily, of course, that is a no-brainer, and we should have observed that - in fact, we should be observing it now.

But politically, it doesn't fly.  We have power, we feel the need to "do something", even if "something" is spelled "MASSIVE FUCKUP" or "hundreds of thousands of casualties".   It's not uniquely American, it's a common human disorder, ie leaping before you  look.

You can argue minutiae, but that information is never available when you are trying to predict the future.  When you are choosing a course of action, you need some appreciation for where you are going; and in that respect, Nixon was wilfully blind, eg in 2 major respects, Vietnam and Watergate alike.

So, do we model ourselves on Nixon?  Do we admire and imitate him?

Not me.  You might, but I'm not.

are deciding what to do with a fucking mess.


"Those who forget the past" is a nice glib cliche for people who don't realize that it's not at all about memory, but rather, what part of the past applies to the present?   Remember, your slogan was also Jim Jones'.

So the Republicans have gone into Iraq on the theory that Saddam might have WMDs, and now that since nuke plans are on the web, we HAD to go in, because he would have built weapons with the plans we gave him.

So here we are with a new coach in the 3rd quarter, down 20,000 casualties, just in time for the Republicans to blame the loss on the Democrats.  

It's less about whether Saddam may or may not have had WMDs, but rather, is our presence in Iraq going to make things better, or worse?  and will it be worthe the price?

Now, the answer is clearer, BUT ANYBODY should have been able to make some rough calculations in 2001.

What exactly were we going to do in Iraq?  Would it make things better, or worse?  Would it be worth the price?

The ONLY way you can get to an affirmative answer in that situation is if you are totally ignorant of the Iraqi nation, history, and think that a simple invasion and withdrawal is better than Saddam.  Nothing else is predictable in any detail; but it does not seem smart to me to create a situation where our military (and our GDP) is committed to a quagmire with no likely end or positive result.

The appalling technical issue in Iraq is the almost total lack of foresight.  The appalling moral issue is that a President could be so reckless.

We can get around to counting numbers later on.  If you want to argue that it was the Democratic congress who defeated the US with legislation in Vietnam, not the NVA, suit yourself.  My suggestion would be that we defeated ourselves when we jumped into something without thinking WTF we were doing 1st; and we've already done the same thing in Iraq.

(1) exactly what do we expect to accomplish, (2) what are the likely results, and (3) is it worth the price?

Do you EVER go thru that analysis, or do you just knee-jerk react?  Don't feel bad here, because the entire nation often just knee-jerk reacts.   OTOH, you gotta admit, it's rarely clear and smart.

As for numbers, we'll see about the Wall later on.    I recall checking a while ago and finding that about 28K of the 58K dead were on Nixon's watch; I don't have that research handy.  I notice that your numbers are about 11K lower than the conventional 58K.

If you are arguing that no, Nixon only killed a third of them, you don't seem to see that even if you are technically correct, you're still admitting that Nixon didn't get much peace, and I don't see the honor in it.  Like Nixon, you seem to have lost sight of where you're going and what you're doing.

IMHO:  War is not to convince us or others that we're bad, or honorable.  It's to defend us, only.    Any other reason to go to war is not so much immoral, as stupid, because it will cost us more than it will benefit us.

Yes, driving a delivery truck on the same fucking route every damn day is better than sleeping in the same fucking rice paddy, even twice.

Americans often seem to misunderstand the limits of military force.  I think Mahan had it right when he said that "military force can only provide an anchor for civil authority."

We have an incredible military force.   But the only thing it can do is "kill people and break things".   It is not good at sales and marketing, which is most of what politics is about.

If you want to sell to a person, the very last thing you do is send a rifle company into his backyard.   They're foreign, they're armed, they're unpredictable, they make a mess and piss off the women.

They are not police.  Policing has to be local, and has to be a local consensus.  Exactly WTF made us think we could ever force a local consensus in Vietnam, or Iraq?  Sheer, pure unmitigated ignorance?

So now we've run out Saddam.   Eventually (I hope to God) we will leave Iraq.  Will the situation there be better for our interests?  Eh?   I mean, before you even consider whether it's worth the cost, WTF do you think could possibly be created there that would be better for US interests than a blowhard tyrant who knows we could kill him if we wanted?

try to stick to using facts. Quit making shit up.

Your total figures are about 20% lower than most estimates, including those on the Wall (slightly over 58K dead.)

Using your figures, Nixon was responsible for only a third of the KIAs, and was not responsible for over half, only a third.  

Your argument is that Nixon inherited a Democratic fuckup, and he made it better by managing it better; and your conclusion is that we should therefore imitate Nixon in Iraq, ie., bomb the motherfuckers to the peace table.

Not necessary.  If you bomb the motherfuckers right, they CAN'T come to the peace table, because they are FUCKING DEAD.  If you don't, then what?  Do you think they are gonna go home and stay home when you stop bombing, because they promised they would?  When you go home, and are busy doing momma, are you gonna go run and bomb somebody every goddamn time a couple of dinks get in some argument?

How about backing up and asking some REAL BASIC questions, like WTF do we expect to accomplish, how do we expect to accomplish it, does it pass the laugh test, are there fallback positions, is the cure any better than the disease, is it worth the price?

Now, as I have pointed out, it is generally not smart to engage an enemy on his terms unless you absolutely have to.  If you find yourself in that position, that you must, you risk defeat because you already fucked up.  

If you willingly walk onto the enemy's battlefield, there's only one possible reason, it's because you're a fucking idiot and unfit for command.

As a general rule, American military superiority is purely technological.  We do not have a lot of knowledge about 3rd world cultures, nor do we have a lot of bodies for mass infantry actions.  But we excel at the technical thing, and especially in the air force/navy theaters.   And we're also damn good at commerce and marketing.

So it would make all the sense in the world to engage adversaries in those theaters, with those weapons.  

And that's the reason the Republicans don't do it.   They are ignorant as fucking rocks, and as amoral as reptiles.  The ONLY useful skills they have are political, ie, fucking other people for the fun of it.

So, do you want to argue how many casualties we can stuff in a body bag?

Holy crap, Jack, do you even read what you type??  Your "Bomb them 'till they're dead" concept loses a bit of cred when you are answering to the poster's comments on the Chinese and Russians involved in VN.  Nixon was a fool because he didn't Bomb the Soviet Union & China??  "Walk on to an enemy's battlefield" was done by idiots in say........Normandy???.....Gettysburg???....Mt. Suribachi??  Your hate for Bush has contaminated your brain.  You deem it necessary to involve yourself in nearly every post on the board because you obviously have nothing else to do.  You are not satifsfied if nobody argues back, so you continue to post with your endless mantra.

Have you ever had to think about the consequences of your actions?    I guess not.

Nixon was a fool because he didn't think about where he was going and how he was going to get there, let alone the cost.  I will give Bush credit - he doesn't think AT ALL.

I will explain, slowly:  when you get in a fight with somebody, you have to think about the possible and probable consequences first.   Of course, if all your enemies are dead, you have no worries.  That's always a possibility.

But if you're going to leave any alive (and that happens too) you have to think if you can control them, and if you will need to.  People are very rarely happy when they have the shit kicked right out of them, and they will usually pay you back if they can.  

Now, if their army is the only thing you are worried about (as in WW2) it's pretty easy.  You just wreck the army.

BUT, if you are there to CONVERT them to democracy, to save their society from commies or terrorists, you have a much harder problem.  It's ultimately a sales problem, and it's not going to be finished  with bayonets, UNLESS you are willing to put down every man, woman, child, dogs & goats.

You do NOT pick a fight with an enemy on a battlefield of his choosing.  That's elementary.  You've obviously never actually thought about using a weapon.   You DON'T come where he expects, or put yourself in a position that he can use his most effective weapons on you.   Why engage in endless guerrilla war if there's a fucking ocean between you?   Only if you expect to enforce your will on his land, or are afraid of his navy.

For a single example only: it's stupid for a most women to pick a physical fight with most men.  If she has to, she gets a gun and shoots him in the back.   BUT it works much better if she can TALK him out of what she wants, and damn if we don't all know how that works.  And what's more, they often make us like it.

Let me dismiss your examples:  Normandy worked because the time and location were unexpected.  The North won at Gettysburg because Lee could not control the battlefield the Union had chosen.  Suribachi was a good example of the cost of necessity:  the Japanese knew they were coming, and made them take 35 odd days for a task they thought would take 3 days.  Unavoidably heroic.   The most effective leaders do not need their troops to be heroes.  Life ain't a movie.

You shouldn't be complaining until you can keep up.

About 10% of the way into it, they stopped briefly to have a very short celebration after raising the National Ensign. Gosh, now where does that sound familiar from?

we made our mistake in VN when LBJ landed units in 1965.

Advisors is one thing.  We're "teaching" them.   The watershed comes when we have to prop them up with our own forces.   If they can't learn, they're history.   You gotta learn not to throw good money after bad.

There are distinctions between Iraq & Vietnam.  Technology is one, the absence of 3rd STATE support is another.   I doubt that technology can be decisive in a political action, and the absence of state allies may not make a lot of difference where there's no clear alternate target, and the neighbors stand by like vultures.

The critical issue is identical to Vietnam - Do the people want you there, do they want to buy your product, or are they going to stab you in the back as soon as you turn around?

We had a short predictable honeymoon, but nobody should have ever thought that was going to create any sort of political stability or govt that would be better FOR US than Saddam.   Now we've spent GOd knows how many lives and bucks, and we're in a worse position than the day we secured Baghdad.

No, I don't know how we'll get out.  Yes, I blame BUsh.  Yes, it will be a fucking mess.  No, it won't get better if we just kill enough people, or get the right promises from the right camel jockey.  

Mistakes are understandable.  This wasn't a mistake.  This was giving the Dubya child a shotgun and being surprised when he shoots the neighbor kids.

Very good question.   The answer is in politics.   Rising to an office doesn't automatically improve your judgment; you still have to decide who to listen to, and what questions to ask.   If you are a neophyte or noob, you may have a clue what's going on.  Why should an aviator think about how villagers react to a platoon patrol?  He never interrogated them.

So you have the basic issue of judgment.  You can have fucking brilliant people working for you, but if they are buried where you can't understand what they are trying to tell you (and many nerds are) you are still fucked.

(No, you can't hire brains.  You still need to know how to use them.)

Next, you have the bureaucratic effect.  When faced with uncertainty, groups of people focus on details; and the corollary is, they lose sight of the forest for the trees.  What's worse, they becomes invested in their work - they become EMOTIONALLY reluctant to abandon all the details they've put so much effort into.  The Tuchman book Guns of August is a good example of how this this gets countries into very deep shit.

And that's even before you consider that people don't get hired for a job they tell you is impossible.  But you know, they could be right, and it's up to the buyer to be sure.

But the Repubs aren't complete fools.  Sure, there's lots who really think you can sell a product by threatening your customer, and that's because they have no experience.

But the RNC brains had to realize that Iraq was a tar baby, and it was all rationalization to keep the GOP out of trouble.   It's NOT ABOUT controlling IRAQ; it's about controlling Washington DC.  Who the fuck wants all that sand, when you can push the entire USA around?

I can believe Dubya is a fucking moron.  But I think Cheney knows goddamn well what he's doing.

Your only possible point would have to be, that the only necessary justification for military action is the possibility of making a movie.

I already told you, my life ain't a movie.  If you want to do that shit for laughs, knock yourself out.  My guess is your POV would change the minute that you faced an opponent who shot back.

More likely, you just aren't following any sort of logic.

There are over 58,000 names on the Wall.   That's about 11,000 more than your friend cites.

Ya got any better facts?   Or are you just blowing shit because you have no answers?

The basic argument here is that Nixon was a good man.  You care to defend that?


-- Modified on 11/9/2006 5:21:17 PM

If you were in fact the realdeal, you wouldn't even comment on the underlying point - that you should never attack in the way/time/place expected.   If at all possible, you should pick a way and place to fight that your enemy cannot possibly defend.   You should never let your enemy pick the battlefield.   You ONLY attack a Suribachi where there is no cheaper alternative.  The mere existence of a fortified position is not a reason to attack it.  You probably don't realize that for every island we attacked in WW2, we bypassed many others.

All of that is saying the same thing that is so fucking elementary I shouldn't have to say it.

But you seem to be a special sort, with serious comprehension problems.

During the Vietnam War:

Hostile deaths = 47,359
Non-hostile deaths = 10,797

I don't have a breakdown on the non-hostile deaths. Non-hostile could be anything from a soldier dying in a vehicle accident or STD. Of course, having served in a combat hospital, we cannot forget the 75,000 VM vets who were severely disabled and the over 150,000 who were hospitalized.  I think Kerry, added to the statistic, nah! I wouldn't go there. Kerry served.

after 3 & a half years of the same old shit, it's a LIFESTYLE.

It's OK.  Congress can't do much of anything about it.  Like the man said, Congress tried to cut Nixon off, and he STILL kept going, what, 2 more years?

Same thing will happen here.  Congress will try to cut Bush off, and he'll keep on going, and then blame it on the Democrats.  If they had just given him another 8 years, million men and a blank check, he coulda won!   Wrecked the USA, but killed all the Iraqis.

This is why I say, look, you have to decide what you want, and go for it.  If you want to kill them all, just gas them and get it over with, and go home.

If you think you're gonna convert them to some POV with a bayonet, you have to stick it a couple inches into them, and sorta keep it there.

Jack,

Sorry buddy, but the numbers do not show LBJ knew what he was doing in Vietnam. He escalated the war, and up until he left office, troops were being sent in ever increasing numbers to 'Nam with military orders to fight the NVA.  You talk about strategy, well like you said; we don’t have access to the inside information.

My gut says LBJ was sincere in fighting communism and believed in the domino theory of communist expansion. The cynic in me, notices an historical demographic which occurred in the 1960’s and see, the biggest wave of young people i.e. baby boomers entering the workforce, who would need jobs, a piece of ass, education, etc.  I wonder if LBJ said to himself….hmm what do I do with these millions of horny, (Can’t get no satisfaction), undisciplined youth full of angst? Why, send them to 'Nam. From August 5, 1964 to March 1973 over 8,744,000 personnel were on active duty during the war. Over two and half million served within the borders of South Vietnam.  Average age = 19yrs.

It would not be the first time in history; leaders have sent young men to war, in order to relieve socio-economic pressures at home. In 1095 AD, Pope Urban II at the Council of Clement, proclaimed a crusade to take back the Holy Lands for Christianity. The crowd responded to his proclamation like a scene form a Bush campaign rally, "Dieu le veut"!, "Dieu le veut"!, "God wills it!" What a farce! The crusades were about a land acquisition project for a feudal economic system that ran out of terra firma to give away to young noble lords. When that strategy did not work, colonialism was born.

You want Nixon’s stratagem well here it is. To succeed in modern warfare or the New World Order as senior Bush calls it; war has to succeed on three elements. The do-it-yourself gunboat diplomacy of yore, is out of style, and impractical, unless your talking about Grenada. The essential elements for success are 1) militarily, 2) economically and 3) politically.

Last night, I talked about the first element, 1) Nixon’s military strategy. Jack you are right, the Vietnam conflict was fought using a World War II paradigm, but by LBJ not Nixon. Let me explain:

2) Economics

Of all the Presidents in the last half-century, Nixon understood the best, the world socio-economic structures affecting the process for peace. He realized the World War II model of large standing armies which worked for FDR in defeating Hitler and extended by LBJ into the VM conflict was an anachronism and unsuitable for a post-industrial market economy. He instituted the Volunteer Army and got rid of the FDR, LBJ era military draft model.

Nixon understood that the Bretton Woods system of international monetary management established during World War II, of fixed exchange rates pegged to gold was also an anachronism.  By 1968, gold outflows from the US accelerated to a point, the world economy had a “dollar” glut.  By 1969 and 1970, the Vietnam War had accelerated inflation that the US began running a trade deficit for the first time in the twentieth century.  Through the late 1960’s dollars were being printed, being pumped overseas, to pay for LBJ’s  military and domestic expenditures. LBJ’s economic scheme was to buy now and pay later. Printing money did not work then, and it doesn’t work now.  

1970 was a key year, US gold coverage deteriorated from 55 percent to 22 percent. The holders of dollars Europe and Japan had lost faith in the ability of the US to cut budget and trade deficits. In a nutshell, the US had lost economic creditability and we were losing it, literally. In 1970, 22 billion dollars in gold assets fled the US.

In 1971, to save the US from an economic collapse, Nixon decisively imposed wage and price controls, a 10 percent import surcharge, and made the dollar inconvertible to gold directly.  Yes, those are the facts a Republican did that, and thank God.  Nixon prevented an economic catastrophe that most assuredly would have led to social unrest or further armed conflict.

3) Political

On the foreign policy political front, Nixon was absolutely brilliant, he understood the days of World War II and conventional warfare, would most likely result in mutual destruction in the nuclear age. He began to normalize relations with the Soviet Union and China, and signed the SALT agreements to limit nuclear proliferation. He was the first President to go to both the Soviet Union (the Yalta Conference doesn’t count) and China and have bilateral talks. He also knew, he had to engage the USSR and China in diplomacy, to end the supply of weaponry to the NVA.

At that time, China considered the US, their most fearsome enemy. With China, the process of peace was begun with a game, ping pong. Enemies have to learn to build trust with each other, on some level, in order to achieve lasting peace. He sent Kissinger, to Israel and Egypt to resolve the Arab and Israeli conflict i.e. the Yom Kipper War and bring peace to that part of the world, and for all us. Carter, another good President, took Nixon’s game plan, and actually had Begin and Sadat developing a friendship during the Camp David Accords. Much later (belatedly), Carter deservedly was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

Where Nixon failed was with the Democratic US Congress, and it was their mess he was cleaning up. Spineless bunch. When I see an old news reel of the protesters and Hanoi Jane at an anti-aircraft gun battery, I cringe.

You ask what did Nixon achieve. He promised, “Peace with Honor” and he delivered. Over 600 POWs returned home to their families. 114 POW’s died in captivity, God Bless Them. He set the foundation, for Reagan and Gorbachev to begin peace and not have 1000 ICBM’s pointed at our families. My advice for the Democrats is to follow President Nixon’s template, do not make the same mistake twice.  

-- Modified on 11/10/2006 12:37:03 AM

-- Modified on 11/10/2006 12:38:15 AM

-- Modified on 11/10/2006 12:33:10 PM

ya gonna answer?  Are you real?

What is your beef?  Do you know?  Or is it a secret?

This whole fucking country is sick and fucking tired of Republican bullshit, lies and slime.  

If you have a complaint, SAY IT.  If you don't, then STFU!

Somme, hmm; Verdun, hmmm.

Leaders who walk their people into a FUCKING POINTLESS SLAUGHTER aren't idiots; they're just writing movie scripts for John Fucking Wayne.

Troops love the chance to be heros.  They all love to stand up whenever they hear an automatic weapon.  They LIVE for their chance to be shot.

Ya fucking moron.   Just like every other Republiscum, big hero with somebody else's life.

non-hostile deaths are still proximately caused by military operations.  I will bet there were no STD KIAs, zero, zip, nada.

But you are also right that 58,000 KIAs is an artificially low figure.  All the guys with permanent disabilities carry that war with them every day of their life.  Imagine being 19 and losing your legs.  I think I'd have rather died.

So arguing exact numbers is pretty much like arguing how many angels can dance on a pinhead, eh?  Depends on who the pinhead is, I guess.

Per Army War College

BATTLE Deaths    = 47,359
Non-combat Deaths= 10,797
Total Deaths     = 58,156

Per the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (The Wall-USA)

- U.S. MILITARY CASUALTIES IN SOUTHEAST ASIA -
- DEATHS BY CASUALTY TYPE AND SERVICE -

CASUALTY
Type    USA   USN   USAF  USMC USCG TOTAL
HOSTILE
KILLED 25,358 1,115  537  11,491  4 38,505
HOSTILE
DIED OF 3,566 150    49 1,476  1 5,242
WOUNDS

HOSTILE
DIED WHILE
MISSING 1,960 325 1,130 108  0 3,523
HOSTILE
DIED WHILE
CAPTURED/
INTERNED  45 36 25 10   0 116

NONHOSTILE
DIED OF
OTHER    4,907 579 531  1,436   2 7,455
CAUSES

NONHOSTILE
DIED OF
ILLNESS/
INJURIES 1,437 69  170 314 0    1,990

NONHOSTILE
DIED WHILE
MISSING 928 281 141 3  0 1,353

TOTAL   38,196 2,555 2,583  14,837 7 58,178

Lay the FUCK OFF Kerry.

He's just like any other jg who went over there.  Well, let me qualify that - there were damn few Yalies who volunteered.  They sure as shit could find a way out if they wanted.  I can think of another one who sure did.

So he spends 4 months in country, and picks up 3 PHs.  DON'T GIVE ME THAT BS that he applied.  You CAN'T apply for a medal for yourself.  The corpsman makes the decision.  If you have evdience to the contrary (other than some book written 30 years after the fact by a political hack) then let's hear it.

Sure, the guy was damn lucky he didn't pick up a serious wound.  Yeah, I think the Navy, AF & Army hands out too much ribbon; but that's because I was a jarhead, and that's what they do.  Yeah, I think any man that doesn't know to keep his fucking head down is a little crazy.

3 PHs is completely consistent with his other decorations.  Maybe the Navy was easy; but that's not his doing.   Yeah, I've seen people like that, who have a knack for doing the right thing when they find themselves in the wrong place.  No, I've never heard of anybody getting a phoney medal, precisely because you CAN'T put yourself in.  Your command initiates that action.

What do I think is more credible, a Navy bureaucracy that made 5 consistent decisions 30 odd years ago, or a book written in the middle of a political campaign, 30 years after the fact, and financed by political opponents?   The bureaucracy is boring, and that's why I place my bet on it.   Fraud and cons are much more likely in politics.  NO contest there.  Not even close.

Kerry pissed A LOT of people off because he came back and showed the exact same cojones in the USA that he did in RVN.  He's a decorated fucking Yalie, and he could have written his ticket.  Instead, he criticizes the war very specifically, and throws his medals back.  I can't say what he saw, or if it was true.  I can say it was clearly against his personal interest, and that sort of courage was damned rare then, when most people were doing whatever they could to get deferred or into Canada.  Saying what you think is true is not a betrayal of anybody, ever.  If a person can't deal with information, that is a fucking personal problem.  I would much rather have a man who told me what he really believes next to me, than a man who shades his view according to what he thinks I want to hear.

So Kerry comes back and goes on about his life.  The majority party in his native state doesn't naturally and normally like people with military records.   It takes a while to convince these folks that military service is a valid form of self-expression, ya know?

So this never becomes an issue until the 2004 campaign, when Kerry comes on the scene, and is matched against Bush, a fellow who has gone on record saying he doesn't remember where he was for his ANG drills.

Ya know what?  I know a lot of resevre units are pretty loose, but nobody believes Bush here.  Not even a serious drug/alcohol abuser is that forgetful.   But assume for aminute that he is - his advisors can get his records released in 24 hours, and shut up all the talk, if they wanted to.  But they don't, and there is a reason for it.  My bet is that it's because there is soemthing damned embarrassing in there.  Maybe not what people expect, but probably something.

What beats the shit out of me is why people like yourself attack a man's record on behalf of Bush and Cheney, 2 of the most obvious draft dodgers in public life.   Kerry is of course visible now; but the Republiscum have done the EXACT SAME THING to
McCain, a Republican whose record is crystal clear, and Murtha.

Now what that tells me is that the Republiscum have no loyalty to anybody, and no respect for anything.  These are people who would insult their mother on her deathbed if she asked for a Democratic primary ballot, and then forge her siganture to take her last SS check.

So why do they do this?  Easy.   If your back is to the wall, there's only one choice - attack.  Put Kerry up against Bush, some reporter is going to compare ribbons.  The only thing the Republicans can do is go mad slinging mud.  Some people will believe the shit; more to the point, you throw your opponent off balance, and force him to talk about irrelevant issues.  Well, massive penis envy is also a Republican issue here.

So instead of talking about political issues, where Bush might look bad, or Bush's record, where he WOULD look bad, they pay for a book and PAC.  It's easy to find people who resent Kerry's anti-war activism.  Jim Webb is one.  I personally don't resent it in the least, because I think he was doing waht he thought was right, and that is one hell of a lot better than most people - most people were blowing one kind of shit or another, getting dubious deferments, running off to Canada, or telling us that body counts would solve our problems.

And the sort of fellow who would disregard his personal interest at home is pretty much the same sort of fellow who would be too fucking stupid to keep his head down under fire.

Now I'm gonna tell you what I think here.  A man who volunteers and gets sent to the motor pool (or  Hawaiian baseball team like Joe diMaggio) serves just like Gy John Basilone, whose duty put him in the way of trading his life for a bunch of ribbons.  You go where you're told, and you do what you have to.  Nobody should be faulting any man who served honorably, AND LEAST OF ALL a couple of assholes who don't remember where they were, or had other priorities.  We all had other priorities, and we all remember where we were.  I remember where I was, even if I didn't always know WTF was going on.

When you or anybody smears Kerry's record, you smear the record of everybody who stepped up to the plate when they were needed.  The only people who need to hang their heads in shame are the ones who deflect attention from their own records by smearing somebody else.

So lay the fuck off Kerry.  Talk about issues.   Every fucking time I hear somebody diss Kerry's record, for Bush, I remember one thing only - these are people with a fucking 2x4 in their head, complaining about somebody with a toothpick.  Fundamentally dishonest; and that really pisses me when I think that people I know are relying on these SHITHEADS to keep them out of trouble.
 
Do I make myself clear?!

1)  I didn't say LBJ knew what he was doing.  I said he should have known, and may have.  By 1968, he did.  He should have known 3 years earlier.  

His failure was in not telling Americans that they couldn't have what they wanted.  He may not have understood that, but he should have.

2) Yeah, we don't have access to "inside information".  But I think you overrate that.  The persistent problem in mgmt is not HAVING information; it's JUDGING information.  It's understanding that the bigger the  operation is, the more it takes on a life of its own, the less it can be controlled, and the more important judgment becomes.

3)  You make good arguments for Nixon's abilities; which I won't contest  - if for no other reason than limit post length.   More to the point, there's room for reasonable difference of opinion.  

What you miss is that his abilities did not include a moral compass that would have kept him out of Watergate; that would have kept him from whining about the unfair press; and most particularly, would have helped him understand that the Americans were telling him loud and clear that they had no interest in Vietnam that was worth the division of dead that you count; and in a democracy, you must respect that.

As it turns out, and as I pointed out, we would have been much better off if we had never landed in 1965.  The NVA would have taken over the next year, the purges wouldn't have been as bad, they would have fucked up the economy much earlier, gotten over their infatuation with communism, and be much farther down the road to democracy and capitalism today; and we would have another 58K men in our population.  

Yes, I'm cynical here too, that wars are often just population control.

STEPHEN DONALD BARTELS  
 
CPL - E4 - Marine Corps - Regular

Length of service 1 years
His tour began on Oct 10, 1967
Casualty was on Nov 9, 1967
In QUANG NAM, SOUTH VIETNAM
HOSTILE, GROUND CASUALTY
GUN, SMALL ARMS FIRE
Body was recovered

Panel 29E - Line 56


Your right about Kerry. I rather salute the guys who made the ultimate sacrifice. Cpl. Bartels died 39 years ago, today.

11,000.  Iwo Jima.  

So the fuck what?

do us both a favor and lose that dumbass mantra.

It's never about remembering; it's always about WHAT you remember, what lessons you take, and what you think applies.

It's INCREDIBLY common to fuck things up PRECISELY because you think that today's problem is like yesterday's, when it ain't.

Do you need examples?  Or can we just forget it?

On your points:

1) LBJ was no FDR. FDR believed in giving the people the bad news first, then his plan. I listened on NPR to a fireside chat, FDR had  after the American Army in the Phillipines had surrendered to the Japanese Imperial Army. One of the greatest defeats and darkest days in American Military History. He laid it on the line, we are beaten, the Nazi's are takening over Europe, we are losing. FDR spoke straight, no slogans, no bashing political opponents and he outlined a plan for winning. It was inspiring.

2)I agree about your point about "insider information", it is overrated. No one ever talks to us boots on the ground. Jack Welch a CEO, no less, said it best, "the most dangerous place to be, is sitting behind my desk".

3) Nixon was sharp. Yes, he was paranoid. Watergate was a fiasco. We all have our dark sides, Nixon's was his pride. He was too proud to admit his mistake. Instead he lied, and he went down like a errant SCUD missile.

4) Yes, we should have never ever have gone into Vietnam based on politicalized intelligence. Doesn't that sound familiar? But the problem with Iraq or as I perfer to call it, Mesopotamia is that unlike Vietnam there would be a domino effect in the Middle East, if we pull out of Baghdad. The Jihad movement is a different paradigm, a fight to the death, that requires a different tactic.

The 58K men killed was from our side, no telling how many Vietnamese died.

a bug-fuck, paranoid insane war criminal with delusions who shredded the Constitution. But why quibble?

Some of what you say is true.  Nixon did pull us out of Vietnam.  However, he also extended the war into Cambodia and Laos-- with catastrophic results for those countries.  

He managed to wring a peace treaty out of North Vietnam in time to use it as an "October Surprise" for the '72 election.  He did this by massive bombing of Hanoi.  "Peace is at hand," is what he said.  Whew!  Just in time to be re-elected, too.  It's clear from the records that this is exactly the way Nixon calculated it.  

You could argue that we were at war and that Hanoi had it coming, but it's clear that Nixon's main concern was to get re-elected.  Like with Watergate, he couldn't consider the fact that he had McGovern beaten anyway.  I could argue that if he got a peace treaty that way, why didn't he bomb the hell out of Hanoi in 1969.

The reason: he knew any treaty made on that basis wouldn't last till 1972.  It doesn't take a psychopathic communist to consider a treaty signed under those conditions to be dead before the ink is dry.

I'm surprised that you blame a Congress elected to get us out of Vietnam for passing a law doing exactly that.  Like it or not, the war was perceived as being a matter of abuse of executive power.  For someone plainly inclined to abuse power, such as bombing Cambodia, Nixon certainly ran for president at an inauspicious time.  You say Nixon had a plan.  He ran in '68 saying that he had a secret "plan."  I don't think he had a plan.  I think the plan was always to bomb Hanoi.  

A dirty little secret of the way that war ended: conservatives were just as relieved to be out of Vietnam as the liberals.  Conservatives talk about how anti-war protestors were only about 5 percent of the population.  If so, conservatives rolled over dead.  That's one thing conservatives have buried.  They were pretty mute while South Vietnam clearly limped along up until the time  Saigon fell, and they didn't start complaining till a few years after that. The Republicans could have filibustered the Senate, you know, and keep that evil law from being passed.  

It was about 1976 that the draft dodgers such as Cheney and Rumsfeld began to blame and advanced their careers with it.  

No, the US military didn't lose Vietnam, but like Iraq, the only way to have won would have been to do what King Leopold did in the Congo: Kill them all.  We could have obviously turned Vietnam into a parking lot and opened it up for colonization. Maybe you'd be prouder of our military right now, but personally I'm happy we had an act of Congress keeping us out.  

The thing is, the retreat from Vietnam was the best thing we did since the Marshall Plan.  Vietnam had no strategic significance.  It freed us up, and communism was dead 17 years later. It was not of any importance to our national or strategic interests.    

As for Hanoi Jane-- she was obnoxious, but her actions didn't matter one iota to the war.  We didn't leave one day earlier because of her.  I'm surprised it's ever still brought up as though it was significant.  At this point, you shouldn't care even if she was banging Ho Chi Minh.  Let it go!    

My guess here is that these fellows will turn out to be pretty much like all the rest - some small percentage - and god knows which ones they are - are fight to the death fanatics, for different reasons.

But the vast majority are people who go along with most of what they are presented.  If they are presented with a better idea, then it's not going to matter a lot if that is "don't fuck with Americans because they'll explode your heads" or "don't fuck with Americans because they have the only TV remote".  Excepting the partisan fanatics, people tend to recognize and respect superiority, and they'll get with the program quick enough.

Another problem entirely is that if you make these people productive, they will in fact control their areas, and eventually start displacing us, and that's not going to make us happy.  IOW, I think that any foreign policy should be circumspect.  We don't need to be the big dog bouncing around the living room here.

And a corporal with only a year of service.   A young hot dog, probably a 19 or 20 year old fire team leader.  Didn't make the birthday ball that year.  1 day short.

-- Modified on 11/10/2006 2:36:43 PM

If you go to the Vietnam Veteran Memorial (wall-usa) website and honorarium is placed for every soldier, marine, sailor, airman that died.  I do not like going to it, because it is so well done, I get teary-eyed. Hell, I've been to the DC and and the two times I was able to visit the VVM and I cried like a blubbering idiot. There are a couple of guys with the same surname as mine, and I wonder.

Anyway I got to go to work.

Your right CPL BARTELS, was a hot shot Marine. One-year to make E-4.

"women can't fight" the other day, where he describes his own reaction to losing I think his 51st KIA.

What Webb should have said is, as a cultural issue, we don't want and can't let women fight.   It's bad enough that men have to be involved.  We appreciate their offer, and thanks, but no thanks.

And I happen to agree with him.  I don't see military service as a career opportunity, but a duty, and I'm not anxious for a nation that regards it as routinely as just another career opportunity.  Killing people is not just another career opportunity.  It's something you only do when you have no other choice to protect yourself.