I am going to skip over most of your arguments. Its not that I think they are meaningless, its just that we clearly disagree...why beat the dead horse. I will say though that the have nots are not as important in global politics as the established countries, thus their turn to communism would have little effect and did not warrant the extreme number of casualties.
Hindsight is 20/20. Vietnam became an issue right after WWII and stayed on the front burner until the mid-70s. It began with France attempting to reassert colonial control and at some point along the line they began selling it as standing up to Communism.
Ho Chi Minh was a commie. The Vietminh was a communist organization. The logical conclusion is that He/they would have, and eventually did, install a commie government.
What did not warrant even one casualty was the disgraceful way US politicians gave away fighting and winning a war for votes.
oh, and regarding the M-16, I saw a documentary on its origins on the history channel. The gun has a very interesting and turbulent history.
Look at the history of the M-1 Garand. None of the traditionalists wanted to give up their "tried and true" Springfields for it either.
The biggest problem with the M-16 was bureaucratic rather than mechanical. The weapon originally used lubricated ammunition. The Army bought their usual overkill amount. Then, one of their demands to Stoner was that it be capable of firing unlubricated ammo.
The modification was made, but some beancounters in their infinite wisdom decided to use up the "perfectly good" stockpile of ammo before acquiring more. The lubricated ammo created unacceptable chamber pressure on combustion, and cause the weapon to jam. The gun got blame because the bureacracy was hardly going to come out and admit they screwed up.
The runner-up most notable reason for jams amidst cries that the weapon was unrealiable was people not cleaning their weapons. All I can say to that is pack the engine compartment of your vehicle with mud and turn the engine on.
The biggest reason, IMO, for most of the controversy is that the weapon was field tested in a real war. Not really the brightest idea I've heard.
Here is where the stance that the U.S. 'lost' the Vietnam war comes from. It was not a war of survival, it was a war of containment in a country far far away. So what is victory? The containment of the communsim? Defeating the communist North?
Either way, we were going to run into problems. Pacifying villages failed miserably and unlike the U.S., body counts were not a factor for the Vietminh. If we wanted to root out communism for good, we would probably still be there today. It would be a never ending guerrila war. The North was constantly growing in size, and communism had infultrated the South as well. Operation Phoenix was meant to root out the communist recruiters and leaders in the South, and while it was somewhat successful (though very illegal) it also demonstrated the extent to which the communsists were breeding their ranks from within the South itself.
My point here is that you have stated/implied the US military lost the Vietnam War. The US military did NOT lose the Vietnam War, for the very reasons you yourself state. When the US military was employed as a fighting force it had no equal. It did an exceptional job of attempting to adapt to the situational reality while following an arbitrary set of rules the enemy did not adhere to.
The "illegal" ops were the ones that had the highest success rate. Then, as now, the outcries of the clueless hamstring the military and take away its advantage.
I also disagree with your numbers. Ho was NOT overwhelmingly popular as you keep stating. When they first defined the DMZ at the 17th parallel, a grace period was given for those who wished to move either north or south. It was expected that those who succeeded under colonial law woul dmigrate south -- an estimated 30K. Refugees were promised a ride.
Over a million refugees fled the North, overwhelming the logistics that had been based on the 30K estimate.
The NLF in the south was made up of anything anti-Diem. That does not necessarily mean they were pro-Ho. While the core group were card-carrying commies, the rank and file were likely as not to just be disgruntled S Vietnamese.
On the other hand, a war that is not fough for survival must have its limits. There is a point that you must ask yourself "is this worth it"? Vietnam had certainly reached its limits. 56,000 casualties, the POW's and MIA's and the demoralized troops. There were a lot of guys who simply did not want to be there.
Your whole line of thinking here is flawed, IMO. There should be NO war fought wiht arbitrary limitations placed on the value of the objective.
Leaving Vietnam without closure disgraced EVERY servicemember that bled, sweated, cried or died. It disgraced us as a Nation. And as a Nation, every treaty we had with any foreign nation suddenly became a worthless piece of paper.
Where a troop wants to be is irrelevant. They go where they're sent. They don't get to pick and choose which wars they wish to fight and which ones they don't.
You criticize the left a lot and student protestors a lot. But society relies upon disagreement. Just as our government was based on checks and balances, society is as well. That is the role of the media, to inform the people of daily happenings. I could agree with the argument that protestors took it too far. And I don't agree with Jane Fonda going to Hanoi. But there needs to be a group that carries public sentiment into the limelight.
If you look, my criticism is of those that "took it too far." I have zero problem with voicing dissent in a proper forum like an educated person with manners. When it's all over-the-top extremism, chants based on nothing but lies, and my all-time favorite: committing violence to protest violence, I've got no use for those people.
I am sure that LBJ and Nixon both would have loved to carry this thing on as long as they could for the simple reason of pride. But there were too many angry parents, too many disgruntled veterans, and too many casualties to carry on a war that's sole purpose is to contain an ideology that really can't harm us outside of the Soviet Union and Cuba. By invading the convention, by going wild on college campuses, the protestors were able to do their part in ending a war that was beginning to border on lunacy.
Here again, you are using arbitrary and inflated "too many _____'s". All wars are based on ideology in one way or another, and I can only assume you did not live through the Cold War as you have made several statements alluding to it not being able to hurt us. At the time, it was perceived as a real threat.
As far as the extremist, dirty, hippy idealogue protestors go, they were and are a disgrace to this Nation. The very second they turned violent they should have been squashed, period.
There was an article in the New York Times about how reporters in the past protected the Presidents. It brought up somet interesting stories, some funny, some sad, others just sick, that the newspapers did not print in order to give the President privacy, or to save his reputation. One sick story that was not printed because of the craziness was a meeting with a few reporters during which LBJ whipped 'it' out and said 'This is why we are in Vietnam'.
Sometimes you just have to say, the means does not equal the reward.
