Vietnam War: Top secret US papers published

[José]

Originally posted by whitehall
Here's the deal jose. You lefties jost love to make grand statements about international policy you might have learned in the third grade but you can never seem to pin the tail on the donkey. A true leftie might condemn Nixon or the Military or even capitalism but they can't seem to bring themselves to criticize LBJ even when it is right in front of them. Maybe it's the skewed pop-culture education in the last 40 years.

Jesus Christ, whitehall!!

Not everybody in this world are blind, virulent partisans like you who see contemporary human history exclusively through the paradigm of the two major american political parties!!

I don't care to know which party started or prolonged the Vietnam massacre or if the invading force was made up of american G.I's in Vietnam or soviet conscripts in Afghanistan!!

There is something called human decency that makes normal human beings puke at the disgusting, shameful sight of a first world country and its army meddling into the internal affairs of a small, impoverished nation of peasants to "send a message" to the "other side" totally destroying them in the process.

This is not about donkeys and elephants, you partisan hack : )

This is about maintaining a bare minimum of moral integrity and not losing your moral compass.

 

[Sallow]

The West created a totally discredited puppet government in a fictitious country named South Vietnam, turned a small conflict that would follow France's withdrawal into a bloodbath of biblical proportions, utterly destroyed Vietnam's infrastructure and we still have to put up with asshole posts by cretins like whitehall.

And people tell me I should honor all Vietnam vets... even those who don't regret their participation in the destruction of that small nation.

I'd love to honor an unrepentant Vietnam vet by delivering a load of hot, stinky piss in his mouth.

That's completely fucked up.

You may not have agreed that the war was right..or even thought it was criminal..but the Veterans of the war were doing what their nation directed them to do.

And many of them came back and protested the war. Many didn't. But either way..they served America. And they deserve respect.

 

[sparky]

respect? while all the major networks refused coverage of Winter Soldier's washington protest?

debatable that....

 

[editec]

What Admin lied? JFK's?
I can't imagine that. He was one cool dude.
We need someone like him today. Doubt if he lied to anyone.... He always looked out for what was BEST for America.

God help us when we ever let a president hire his own brother to be Attorney General. Bobby thought he was secretary of state and his crazy fixation on Cuba might have caused the death of JFK. At any rate the brothers were out of control. They authorized the CIA to raise, feed, train and equip a little army of Cuban exiles and abandoned them at the Bay of Pigs. It was LBJ who lied about the Tonkin Gulf crisis and he set the rules in VietNam so that America couldn't possibly win the war even though they won every battle. Just when the US was poised to finally wear out the V.C. after TET Walter Cronkite decided to enter the war and tell Americans that the hard won victory of TET wasn't a victory at all but a stalemate. LBJ quit in front of the whole world and the VC had a new lease on life.

Kennedy took office on JAN 20TH 1961

The Bay of Pigs happened about 90s days later... mid April 1961

There's no way in Hell that operation was something JFK had time to get together. He inherited that mess


Eisenhower authorized $13 million and Department of Defense ... Essentially, the operation called for the training and equipping of a the ex-patriot army of Cubans.

Kennedy's mistake was trusting the CIA's judgement.

Of course, Castro knew everything about the plan and slaughtered that invading force on beaches.

 

[The Gadfly]

The West created a totally discredited puppet government in a fictitious country named South Vietnam, turned a small conflict that would follow France's withdrawal into a bloodbath of biblical proportions, utterly destroyed Vietnam's infrastructure and we still have to put up with asshole posts by cretins like whitehall.

And people tell me I should honor all Vietnam vets... even those who don't regret their participation in the destruction of that small nation.

I'd love to honor an unrepentant Vietnam vet by delivering a load of hot, stinky piss in his mouth.

Well, well, if it isn't the People's Hero and chief VC cheerleader again; what's the matter, no war protest today? Or did the politburo give you a break from licking Uncle Ho's dead arse long enough for you to crawl out of his coffin and speak? Is that the best you can do for an insult? That's weak, even for a commie rat like you!

For those who missed it, this one actually said in our last discussion on the subject, that American troops were "responsible" for the VC's atrocities; he more or less implied we somehow "made them do it". Real devils incarnate, we were; now, he says, we were just a bunch of unmotivated slackers. Make up your mind, Jose, (if it can be called a mind)!

Just for the record, Jose, here's one VERY "unrepentant Vietnam vet" who would love to imbed his jump boots in your sorry, un-American arse, one at a time, and then shut your foul piehole with a GI fist; that way, I could have the pleasure of watching you explode from the pressure of all that intellectual flatus trapped inside. You'd be funny, if you weren't so disgusting. There are things I regret about Vietnam, but killing VC and NVA is NOT one of them. Repent? HELL NO! You, Hanoi Jane, and your VC/NVA pals can wait on that, until hell freezes over; it is NOT going to happen. I would like to know exactly how you think you became such a superior being, so imbued with a high moral sense, as to think yourself fit to pass judgment on men who have actually had to make moral decisions under extreme stress, and live or die with the results. Of course, it's easier to do that from your armchair, than it is humping a ruck and a rifle. We at least exercised responsibility, instead of running from it.

The more I read of your pompous, self-righteous moralizing, the more I realize what kind of simplistic thinking it derives from. You see the world in terms of First World bad, Third World good. You look at policies and events in isolation from the larger, longer-term conflicts of which they were a part, and the historical context in which they occurred. What's missing from that viewpoint, is the realization that with WW II (one could argue the process started some years earlier) the world shrunk, and as a result, America lost the luxury of waiting to be attacked before reacting; that was a bit dangerous before; now, it's potentially fatal. Defending America since has become a far more complex proposition, requiring that we be more proactive. Defending freedom in the world we inherited is actually a subject for discussion in its own thread, and I think I'll start one.

 

[The Gadfly]

Are you saying it is not a war because congress didn't declare it? or another reason?

They were UN backed conflicts and referred to as a Police Action not a war.

That's why there were soldiers from Greece, Australia, New Zealand, Turkey, and several other countries that participated in both conflicts.

Those weren't soldiers. Those were brainwashed sheep too fucking dumb to think and act on their own.

As for you, maggot, I am glad you are no longer polluting the air of America by breathing it, or dirtying her soil by treading upon it! God, what brought the vermin out of the woodwork today? Doesn't matter; go crawl back into your hole in the banana republic dung heap and go back to sleep.

 

[The Gadfly]

That is a bit much José.

Most Vietnam vet like me were drafted.

In those days it was prison for three years or two years in the army.

I did not want to go but I sure did want to spend three years in prison.

Believe me it wasn't about patriotism or defending America.

It was about surviving and having your brother's back.

Many vets like me are neutral about it.

We were 19 years old and not politically sophisticated.

So to blame us is pure nonsense.

The US government is who should bear the responsibility not the individual soldier

Sunni, we are all humans, we all make mistakes, specially when we're teenagers/young adults... so I won't be the first one casting stones...

But there has to be repentance, Sunni...

If you sincerely regret your participation it's like you'd never left America and didn't participate in the destruction of Vietnam.

But if you don't it's as if you were still in the jungles of Vietnam, killing young vietnamese who never did any harm to America and only wished to unify their homeland.

I know what I'm saying sounds like Christian theology (the emphasis on repentance) but as an agnostic I can assure you it's just common sense : )

I have nothing but respect for people who participated in that conflict and sincerely regret it... because we all know how difficult it is to recognise our own mistakes from a human point of view.

And yes, I know the weird, absurd tendency people have to give a free pass to the direct perpetrators of that unjustified war of aggression, the tendency to exonerate the ones who pulled the triggers and drop the bombs of any guilt and put all the blame on politicians.

This is pure, unadulterated bullshit. The direct perpetrators are as guilty as any politician.

No justice system in the world would allow a murderer to go unpunished just because he was not the intellectual author of the crime.

But I'll say it again, Sunni.

It's not the "I was just following orders" bullshit what really cleanses a Vietnam vet from the acts of unjustified violence he commited against that country.

REPENTANCE IS WHAT REALLY ABSOLVE YOU OF ANY WRONGDOING.

The way I see it, if you sincerely repent you're just like a newborn baby, immaculate, without any sin.

Jose, who the hell died and made you the High Priest of Whatever? It is one thing for you to hate what I was and am; I went to Vietnam as a professional soldier and an officer. I volunteered. Sunni and hundreds of thousands like him didn't have a say in the matter; they were drafted, and sent, whether they liked it or not, whether they understood it or not. Not a single one of them, not one, needs to "repent", or apologize to you or anyone else. You want to piss on them too, and that is both disgusting, and more than a little unfair! Who the hell are you to pass judgment on them? How do you know what they did or didn't do? YOU WEREN'T THERE! I get sick of seeing the implication they were un-motivated slackers; however they felt about it, and even though a lot of them were little more than boys, they fought, bled, and a lot of them died, with valor, and yes, with honor. I know, because I WAS THERE, and I saw what they did. They have NOTHING to be ashamed of, NOTHING! At least they know the meaning of the word, "honor", which you do not, as you slander the living and profane the memory of the fallen.

Incidentally, there's a song from back then called "The Universal Coward"; it should be your theme song. One verse in particular fits what you represent:

He's the Universal Coward, and he runs from everything;
From a giant, from a human, from an elf;
He runs from Uncle Sam, and he runs from Vietnam;
but most of all, he's running from himself.

 

[Sunni Man]

Haven't you heard? Vietnam wasn't a war, it was a "Police Action" according to that clown ginscpy.

They never really called VietNam a "police action". That term was reserved for Korea. It wasn't a war either.

Generally, Vietnam was call a "Conflict"

 

[The Gadfly]

Haven't you heard? Vietnam wasn't a war, it was a "Police Action" according to that clown ginscpy.

They never really called VietNam a "police action". That term was reserved for Korea. It wasn't a war either.

Generally, Vietnam was call a "Conflict"

Quite correct, Sunni, although I have to say, it damn sure FELT like a war, from my perspective. "Conflict" and "police action" are terms favored by civilians and REMFs who are not on the receiving end of incoming. I still remember an officer (recently returned from a tour as an advisor in Vietnam), commenting to the effect that, "Vietnam is the sort of low-intensity "brushfire" conflict we are likely to be facing for the foreseeable future. However, there is no such thing as a low intensity firefight, when you happen to be in one!"

 

[Sunni Man]

They never really called VietNam a "police action". That term was reserved for Korea. It wasn't a war either.

Generally, Vietnam was call a "Conflict"

Quite correct, Sunni, although I have to say, it damn sure FELT like a war, from my perspective. "Conflict" and "police action" are terms favored by civilians and REMFs who are not on the receiving end of incoming. I still remember an officer (recently returned from a tour as an advisor in Vietnam), commenting to the effect that, "Vietnam is the sort of low-intensity "brushfire" conflict we are likely to be facing for the foreseeable future. However, there is no such thing as a low intensity firefight, when you happen to be in one!"

The government loves to use euphemisms to lessen the impact of military actions.

I remember the Cambodian "incursion" ala Nixon

And the technique still works today.

Obama's "kinetic" military action in Libya

The are some evil Machiavellian people in every administration.

Who do nothing but dream this stuff up to try and deceive the people.

 

[The Gadfly]

Generally, Vietnam was call a "Conflict"

Quite correct, Sunni, although I have to say, it damn sure FELT like a war, from my perspective. "Conflict" and "police action" are terms favored by civilians and REMFs who are not on the receiving end of incoming. I still remember an officer (recently returned from a tour as an advisor in Vietnam), commenting to the effect that, "Vietnam is the sort of low-intensity "brushfire" conflict we are likely to be facing for the foreseeable future. However, there is no such thing as a low intensity firefight, when you happen to be in one!"

The government loves to use euphemisms to lessen the impact of military actions.

I remember the Cambodian "incursion" ala Nixon

And the technique still works today.

Obama's "kinetic" military action in Libya

Yeah, and I wonder if a politician ever met a euphemism he didn't like. I can't understand the current fad of trying to somehow "sanitize" combat-it is what it is. It's like trying to polish a turd, and put it a pretty package-at the end of the day, it's still a turd, and still stinks.

 

[sparky]

Q here,
doesn't anyone see history repeating itself, sans a draft?

 

[editec]

Originally posted by whitehall
It was LBJ who lied about the Tonkin Gulf crisis and he set the rules in VietNam so that America couldn't possibly win the war even though they won every battle. Just when the US was poised to finally wear out the V.C. after TET Walter Cronkite decided to enter the war and tell Americans that the hard won victory of TET wasn't a victory at all but a stalemate.

IF WE DID THIS, IF WE DID THAT... BLAH, BLAH, BLAH...

America could have invaded North Vietnam, occupied Hanoi and it wouldn't make any difference.

The North Vietnamese would simply retreat into the jungle and continue to fight from there.

The conflict would even have survived the end of the Cold War, BECAUSE IT DIDN'T HAVE SHIT TO DO WITH COMUNISM, it was a national liberation struggle to expel foreign troops from vietnamese soil and unify the country under the command of Vietnam's greatest independence hero, Ho Chi Minh.

Here's the deal jose. You lefties jost love to make grand statements about international policy you might have learned in the third grade but you can never seem to pin the tail on the donkey. A true leftie might condemn Nixon or the Military or even capitalism but they can't seem to bring themselves to criticize LBJ even when it is right in front of them. Maybe it's the skewed pop-culture education in the last 40 years.

Oh what utter fucking bullshit.

Kid, you don't know doodlesquat about how much shit the anti-war movement gave LBJ.

So read a fucking book, you ignoramous.

 

[Sunni Man]

LBJ caught hell

Why do you think he did not want to run for a second term??

I grew up during that time.

So I know exactly what went on

 

[José]

Originally posted by The Gadfly
Jose, who the hell died and made you the High Priest of Whatever?

Originally posted by BulldozerI
Since when did you become Jesus Christ?

LOL, Gadfly/BulldozerI!!

I'm a "J" but definitely not a "JC".



I had a tumultous adolescence in which I brought great sadness to my parents and they forgave me (of course they did, they're my parents...). So I believe everybody, even Vietnam veterans, must be given every chance and opportunity to express sincere remorse for what they did to Vietnam...

And if they do repent it's as if they never left America. But if they don't I'm not afraid to say they deserve a giant, spiky dildo up their asses while they're still alive and all the fire of Hell after they die.

 

[José]

Originally posted by Sallow
but the Veterans of the war were doing what their nation directed them to do.

And by doing so they commited a crime, Sallow, they became as criminal as the government that ordered them to do it.

People, get this into your skulls:

America didn't have any CASUS BELLI (reason for war) to interfere with Vietnam's internal affairs. No vietnamese aggression against the US, no nothing... NADA, ZERO, ZILCH. Therefore american soldiers didn't have any right to stomp an ant in Vietnam let alone kill the vietnamese people (combatants or non-combatansts, the distinction is irrelevant when there's no casus belli to speak of)!!

A vietnamese stray dog killed by an american G.I. in an remote, obscure vietnamese village in March, 21, 1965 was a crime!!

Due to the absolute absence of anything remotely resembling a legitimate casus belli, each and every act of violence perpetrated by american soldiers in Vietnam was a crime!!

Imbeciles who "thank Vietnam vets for their service" are actually thanking criminals for the crimes they committed!!

I'll never understand this obsession that exists in America and that seems to be the country's favorite national pastime to give a free pass to the very same people who actually killed hundreds of thousands of vietnamese.

Take a good look at the scandalous double standards with which you judge criminals in civilian and military clothes, Sallow:

When people are paid by a civilian to kill someone else you don't even think about putting all the blame on the person who hired them.

But when they are paid to kill innocent people on behalf of the United States in an unjustified war of aggression you do just that!!

It stands to reason that everybody involved in the Vietnam war is guilty of waging an unjustified war against that country (from the US president who gave the orders to the lowest of grunts who carried them out).

Super-patriotic american clowns build an absurd, mentally insane protective shield around US soldiers to deflect criticism from the individuals who actually carried out that war of aggression!!

You blame 19 arabs who demolished two skyscrappers in America without provocation on behalf of Al-Qaeda but thank thousands of Americans who destroyed the entire country of Vietnam on behalf of the US government in an equally unjust war.

How depraved is that, Sallow?

 

[José]

Originally posted by Sallow
That's completely fucked up.

What is realy fucked up, sick and morally depraved is people who thank and respect someone for this kind of "service", Sallow:

Each and every one of those young men had families and a whole life ahead of them, Sallow. Neither them nor their country did anything to America to deserve this.

You cannot separate their deaths and suffering from the people who ACTUALLY killed and hurt them. You cannot extricate the "service" of Vietnam veterans from all the criminal suffering they imposed on the people of Vietnam. They are one and the same.

Everytime you thank an unrepentant Vietnam vet you're thanking a criminal who impose decades of excrutianting pain on hundreds of vietnamese, maimed or severely burned by Napalm and other explosives/chemical agents and still don't feel bad about it.

Everytime you thank them you're spitting on the suffering of hundreds of thousands of vietnamese mothers, fathers, widows, orphans who waited for them to return and many still suffer to this day.

You're thanking those unrepentant criminals for all the innocent lives they cut short.

From the kind of pornographic patriotism that leads you to say "thank you for your service" to people whose "service" was to destroy a nation that never hurt the US I just want one thing: distance.

I have seen many road whores in my life, offering themselves to truck drivers, that had more compassion and moral stature than the sick, morally depraved kind of patriotism you're defending here, Sallow.

 

[José]

Sallow, I don't want you to get the wrong impression I'm being "hostile" to you when in reality I'm the biggest fan of your posts. I'll never forget the calm, dispassionate manner in which you summed up the Afghanistan war:

"The conflict was justified now America should pull out its troops and leave a strong warning that we'll be back if necessary."

What a wonderful, thoughtful, dispassionate answer!! While insane people are littering Message Boards with genocidal dreams about nuking a whole country because of the actions of a handful of islamic terrorists here you are presenting a reasonable, proportional response!!

As far as Afghanistan is concerned I'd go a step further and say that if America decides to leave it must make clear to the Afghan government (either Karzai or even a future Taliban government) that Afghanistan will be closely watched and if they are unwilling or unable to prevent the infiltration of Al Quaeda the country reserves the right to conduct air strikes and special forces operations without any warning.

So I want to make clear I'm an admirer of your posts who just happen to disagree with you on this particular issue, ok?

 

[Sunni Man]

You better get going José

Or you will be late for your La Raza meeting.

And miss the opening "I hate America anthem"

 

[sparky]

geez loouizzeee

bad enough to have had lived thru the history

but having to live with the revisionists of it too...