Vietnam in HD

[uscitizen]

Why don't we have the same kind of films from Iraq and Afganistan? With dead and dying boys lying around?
Damn liberal media?

 

[uscitizen]

"Yes we could have won. We could have strategically fought them in Cambodia and North Viet Nam on the ground. But that would have cost 200,000 KIA American treasure."

Actually we did ideed fight them on the ground in Cambodia May and June '70. I took part in the operation. I'd say we kicked some serious ass. We lost aprox. 250 GI KIA's, 1200 ARVN KIA's while the NVA lost aprox. 11,000 KIA's + quite a few POW's. We also captured a tremendous amt. of weapons, ammo, food, and assorted supplies.

Some of us were in Cambodia long after it was banned too.

 

[whitehall]

Harry Truman sent Americans to Korea without Congressional permission. For the sake of argument we will forget MacArthur's insane invasion and consider that in a hard fought conventional war we beat back the NK invaders in less than a year and re-established SK's borders. We could have done the same thing In South VietNam but for some reason democrats were playing politics. It was a pretend war at first. If we committed to a conventional war to establish the South Vietnam borders and rescue the people from the NV invaders it would have been clean and over. We are doing the same thing in Afghanistan today. Democrats refuse to fight a conventional war in Afghanistan even though NATO bombed the snot out of Libya to pave the way for the muslem brotherhood.

 

[Gadawg73]

"Yes we could have won. We could have strategically fought them in Cambodia and North Viet Nam on the ground. But that would have cost 200,000 KIA American treasure."

Actually we did ideed fight them on the ground in Cambodia May and June '70. I took part in the operation. I'd say we kicked some serious ass. We lost aprox. 250 GI KIA's, 1200 ARVN KIA's while the NVA lost aprox. 11,000 KIA's + quite a few POW's. We also captured a tremendous amt. of weapons, ammo, food, and assorted supplies.

I thank you sir for your service to our country, me and my family. I thank you for that information as I already knew that. We should have let you go and take out more there instead of ending your operation.
My brother was in country Nam 66-68. Mom almost had a nervous breakdown and Dad, a WWII Marine Captain war vet was opposed to the war after some of his comrades that were still in advised him of the political nature of this war. I turned 18 in 1972 and was never drafted.
God Bless you for your dedication to country and a job WELL DONE. You guys kicked ass over there and did your job.

 

[Gadawg73]

Harry Truman sent Americans to Korea without Congressional permission. For the sake of argument we will forget MacArthur's insane invasion and consider that in a hard fought conventional war we beat back the NK invaders in less than a year and re-established SK's borders. We could have done the same thing In South VietNam but for some reason democrats were playing politics. It was a pretend war at first. If we committed to a conventional war to establish the South Vietnam borders and rescue the people from the NV invaders it would have been clean and over. We are doing the same thing in Afghanistan today. Democrats refuse to fight a conventional war in Afghanistan even though NATO bombed the snot out of Libya to pave the way for the muslem brotherhood.

Democrats?
Nixon had his hand in it also.
Secure the borders? Ever heard of the Ho Chi Minh trail? We dropped more bombs on that than all the bombs dropped in WWII and still could not make a dent on the rice eaters' highway. They had 150,000 divilians maintaining that road the entire length of it. And most of it was in other countries other than Nam.
Democrats in Afghainistan policy???
We are using the exact same policy that Bush initiated.

 

[The Gadfly]

Why don't we have the same kind of films from Iraq and Afganistan? With dead and dying boys lying around?
Damn liberal media?

U.S.,
I'm surprised at you for saying that! Tell me, what good do you think that would do, and more to the point, do you REALLY want the families of those who have given their lives over there to see those images? You want to add that to the grief they already have to deal with? Why?

 

[JakeStarkey]

That should be up to the families, in part, but when American blood and treasure is being spent in the name of We the People then a volunteer force cannot be isolated from the rest of We the People's feelings, too.

 

[JakeStarkey]

I have to ask, what on earth does this mean, exactly?

It's quite clear to those who know history of the war, our American history, and our Constitution.

What are you not understanding, Trajan.

dude, quote the quote correctly please, I pulled out this-

Quote:YOU You contradict your comments on hearts and minds. If we had concentrated more on the average Vietnamese and family, less on the wealthy, we could have turned them away from the VC and NV.

ME; I have to ask, what on earth does this mean, exactly?

and asked what does that mean exactly? see it ?
what are you not understanding?

It means exactly what I wrote. What is not clear to you?

 

[The Gadfly]

That should be up to the families, in part, but when American blood and treasure is being spent in the name of We the People then a volunteer force cannot be isolated from the rest of We the People's feelings, too.

There has to be a balance of some kind, Jake, and in this age of near-instant communication, I don't know if we've found it yet. There's a great difference between that, and the situation we had in WW II and Korea, where there was a delay between getting information from the battlefield to the folks back home. That gave more time to decide what to show, and not show; if it provided time for government censorship (and it did), it also provided time for some editorial discretion. Now there's an increasingly fine line between accurate reporting, and some modicum of sensitivity to the families of the troops involved, (and on occasion, for the best interest of the nation, too).

I know that many people feel showing casualties, even graphically, serves the interest of promoting opposition to war. That may be a double-edged sword, as well. I'm not sure that has the same shock value now it did in say, 1967, and it is possible that at some point, if you expose the general population to the sight of that kind of carnage to a more significant degree, a good many of them may eventually become desensitized to it, as so often happens with soldiers in battle. Whatever one may think of this war or that, I'm not so sure that is a good thing, either.

War, ANY war, whether justified or not, is a horrible thing; a beastly, brutal exercise in unspeakable horror that leaves an indelible mark in the hearts of all who have to fight it. It can take human souls from the heights of nobility to the darkest pit of depravity, and in the end, there is no glory in it, only tragedy. I think Norman Schwarzkopf may have summed it up best, "Any soldier worth his salt is antiwar, but we have to remember that some things are worth fighting for." That too, is a balance, one that I am not sure we as a people have found yet.

 

[JakeStarkey]

My step-dad waded across the lagoon at Tarawa. I have seen the pictures, stills, movie reels, and I don't watch now because my hands shake. He was 18! Like so many of the other kids. But I do think the American people's need to know has to be balanced as well as the families' feelings. Tough choices for sure.

 

[BlindBoo]

We lost the war here at home, not on the battlefield. The American soldier, was, is, and always will be, the best on the field. God bless 'em.
God not only endowed this country with fertile land, abundant natural resources, a productive and resourceful citizenry, but from the first, with a citizen soldier that was always watchful and ready to lay down his plow and go off to fight for what was right, his land, his rights, his family, and his country.

Now after THC went off and canceled their discussion website, I refuse to watch their programming.

We lost because the leaders had a feckless policy.

We should never deploy our forces unless we are committed to total victory. Search and Destroy (and then give it back) was the failure.

 

[JamesInFlorida]

Why don't we have the same kind of films from Iraq and Afganistan? With dead and dying boys lying around?
Damn liberal media?

U.S.,
I'm surprised at you for saying that! Tell me, what good do you think that would do, and more to the point, do you REALLY want the families of those who have given their lives over there to see those images? You want to add that to the grief they already have to deal with? Why?

First of all I think every family is different. Some families I think would be ok with it.

Not only that but I think the biggest thing about wars in the US is that most people haven't been touched by the war personally anymore. The average American is being desensitized to the brutal realities of war. They view is as another news story, or read it in the paper, or think they understand how brutal/hard war is on the troops and families.

 

[The Infidel]

"Yes we could have won. We could have strategically fought them in Cambodia and North Viet Nam on the ground. But that would have cost 200,000 KIA American treasure."

Actually we did ideed fight them on the ground in Cambodia May and June '70. I took part in the operation. I'd say we kicked some serious ass. We lost aprox. 250 GI KIA's, 1200 ARVN KIA's while the NVA lost aprox. 11,000 KIA's + quite a few POW's. We also captured a tremendous amt. of weapons, ammo, food, and assorted supplies.

I thank you sir for your service to our country, me and my family.

God Bless you for your dedication to country and a job WELL DONE. You guys kicked ass over there and did your job.

X2... well said Gadawg

 

[whitehall]

Harry Truman sent Americans to Korea without Congressional permission. For the sake of argument we will forget MacArthur's insane invasion and consider that in a hard fought conventional war we beat back the NK invaders in less than a year and re-established SK's borders. We could have done the same thing In South VietNam but for some reason democrats were playing politics. It was a pretend war at first. If we committed to a conventional war to establish the South Vietnam borders and rescue the people from the NV invaders it would have been clean and over. We are doing the same thing in Afghanistan today. Democrats refuse to fight a conventional war in Afghanistan even though NATO bombed the snot out of Libya to pave the way for the muslem brotherhood.

Democrats?
Nixon had his hand in it also.
Secure the borders? Ever heard of the Ho Chi Minh trail? We dropped more bombs on that than all the bombs dropped in WWII and still could not make a dent on the rice eaters' highway. They had 150,000 divilians maintaining that road the entire length of it. And most of it was in other countries other than Nam.
Democrats in Afghainistan policy???
We are using the exact same policy that Bush initiated.

Nixon had "a hand in it"? It was LBJ's war and he handed it to Nixon to clean up the mess with a hostile congress and riots in the streets. Congress finally withheld funding and Nixon was forced to withdraw. We bombed a jungle trail and finally dropped cancer causing defoliants and somehow it seemed like the way to run a war at the time. What do you think would happen if we opened up a conventional war in Afghanistan and ran over the God forsaken terrain with tanks and strafed every village that harbored Taliban and Alqueda? Which party would go crazy? That's right, the jack asses.

 

[The Infidel]

Why don't we have the same kind of films from Iraq and Afganistan? With dead and dying boys lying around?
Damn liberal media?

Do you have Netflix?

They are all over it.

Believe it or not, I have a hard time watching them bc they are usually written by liberal assholes who only want to make GW look bad. The liberal lean is so obvious!

But yes, they are out there.

 

[Gadawg73]

Harry Truman sent Americans to Korea without Congressional permission. For the sake of argument we will forget MacArthur's insane invasion and consider that in a hard fought conventional war we beat back the NK invaders in less than a year and re-established SK's borders. We could have done the same thing In South VietNam but for some reason democrats were playing politics. It was a pretend war at first. If we committed to a conventional war to establish the South Vietnam borders and rescue the people from the NV invaders it would have been clean and over. We are doing the same thing in Afghanistan today. Democrats refuse to fight a conventional war in Afghanistan even though NATO bombed the snot out of Libya to pave the way for the muslem brotherhood.

Democrats?
Nixon had his hand in it also.
Secure the borders? Ever heard of the Ho Chi Minh trail? We dropped more bombs on that than all the bombs dropped in WWII and still could not make a dent on the rice eaters' highway. They had 150,000 divilians maintaining that road the entire length of it. And most of it was in other countries other than Nam.
Democrats in Afghainistan policy???
We are using the exact same policy that Bush initiated.

Nixon had "a hand in it"? It was LBJ's war and he handed it to Nixon to clean up the mess with a hostile congress and riots in the streets. Congress finally withheld funding and Nixon was forced to withdraw. We bombed a jungle trail and finally dropped cancer causing defoliants and somehow it seemed like the way to run a war at the time. What do you think would happen if we opened up a conventional war in Afghanistan and ran over the God forsaken terrain with tanks and strafed every village that harbored Taliban and Alqueda? Which party would go crazy? That's right, the jack asses.

Conventional war in Afghanistan?
Tell us oh wise military strategist: how do we tell who is Taliban and who is not?
By the "T" on the baseball caps?
News flash there for you: 22,000 KIA under Nixon. And that would be a DEMOCRAT Congress that withheld funding.
"Hostile Congress"?? Now that is rich. The anti war movement started in Congress as soon as the war started and that came from Democrats. LBJ's largest war supporters were Republicans.
The current MILITARY strategy in Afgnhanistan is to win the villages with aid and that is working. Al Qaeda and Taliban are in them thar hills my boy.
I know this stuff. I grew up in it.

 

[High_Gravity]

I watched this the last 3 nights and I think it will be on H2 tonight as well, but wow what a good show. It was amazing to me that we didnt win a decisive victory.
Had we have fought it like previous wars we would have been out of there in a couple years, but it was the 1st war fought from afar in DC by politicians.
We used a body count to gauge our winnings rather than planting a flag and keeping the high ground.

I was just a baby during that war, but it made an impression on me bc many of my uncles and dads friends served over threre, and they were never the same after it.
Luckily for me, my dad didnt have to go due to a birth defect... but he as labelled for life as a medical risk for the rest of his life and it was hard for him to get a job bc of it.

I know my ex girlfriends dad never spoke of it, except for one day when he and I spent it together working on his 4x4. He told me things he just couldnt tell his wife and daughter. His stories were some of the saddest things I have ever heard. He told me how he had to watch out for kids when in busy cities bc they (like Islamo facists of today) strapped their babies with bombs. He had to kill one and he never got over that. May he rest in peace... he lived a rough life after returning. It was hard for him to handle how he and his friends were treated upon returning stateside.
While watching the night before last, I cried like a baby when one of the soldiers described how they were treated at the airport upon arrival back from the tour. Frankly, so did he.. it was hard for him to speak. I felt so ashamed of my fellow Americans for that.
It was just so wrong, and it is a scar on our history that we should never forget.

To ALL of you veterans, I just want to say thanks for your service.

Please dont rep me for this thread... thats not why it is being posted.
I just have been wanting to post this and thought what better day to do it, than today.

I truly believe if DC let the Generals on the ground run the war we would have won in Vietnam, and we would have finished in Iraq and Afghanistan years ago.

 

[The Infidel]

I watched this the last 3 nights and I think it will be on H2 tonight as well, but wow what a good show. It was amazing to me that we didnt win a decisive victory.
Had we have fought it like previous wars we would have been out of there in a couple years, but it was the 1st war fought from afar in DC by politicians.
We used a body count to gauge our winnings rather than planting a flag and keeping the high ground.

I was just a baby during that war, but it made an impression on me bc many of my uncles and dads friends served over threre, and they were never the same after it.
Luckily for me, my dad didnt have to go due to a birth defect... but he as labelled for life as a medical risk for the rest of his life and it was hard for him to get a job bc of it.

I know my ex girlfriends dad never spoke of it, except for one day when he and I spent it together working on his 4x4. He told me things he just couldnt tell his wife and daughter. His stories were some of the saddest things I have ever heard. He told me how he had to watch out for kids when in busy cities bc they (like Islamo facists of today) strapped their babies with bombs. He had to kill one and he never got over that. May he rest in peace... he lived a rough life after returning. It was hard for him to handle how he and his friends were treated upon returning stateside.
While watching the night before last, I cried like a baby when one of the soldiers described how they were treated at the airport upon arrival back from the tour. Frankly, so did he.. it was hard for him to speak. I felt so ashamed of my fellow Americans for that.
It was just so wrong, and it is a scar on our history that we should never forget.

To ALL of you veterans, I just want to say thanks for your service.

Please dont rep me for this thread... thats not why it is being posted.
I just have been wanting to post this and thought what better day to do it, than today.

I truly believe if DC let the Generals on the ground run the war we would have won in Vietnam, and we would have finished in Iraq and Afghanistan years ago.

According to the "body count" standards, we did win.

We just continued to hand gained territory right back to the enemy.

 

[whitehall]

Americans won every major battle in VietNam but LBJ experts thought liberalism could re-invent warfare. We are doing it again in Afghanistan and stupid liberal concepts ain't working there either. You can't fight a war without taking and holding real estate. LBJ actually quit on National TV after the US finally won the greatest battle of the VietNam war after Tet. You can't make up these things. Democrats kill Americans for votes.

 

[JakeStarkey]

whitehall talks about warfare from the past for places in which it won't work.

A classic war in Iraq followed by half a million boots on the ground would have created the ally and republic we wanted. Cheney and Rumsfeld and the Republicans tried to do it on the cheap, wasted all those lives, wrecked our treasury, and created an Iraq that is drifting toward Iran.

Afghanistan is not about "holding real estate" because that is not the key for the nature of the culture and land. This war required from the beginning spec op troops and helicopter units and drones in the field, and a "win the hearts of the natives' in the villages. We are too late to win this one either.