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Vietnam, 35 years later
- Thread starter namvet
- Start date
Gabriel Kolko's 35 Years Since the Fall of Saigon takes only a few minutes to read, but it reveals how the "War is a Racket" mentality makes the same "mistakes" in Iraq and Afghanistan today as it did in Korea and Vietnam.
"It (the US) still wishes to be the 'indispensable power' to quote former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, but it can not win the victories it covets.
"Like a drunken person, it no longer controls itself, its environments, or makes its actions conform to its perceptions.
"It is therefore a danger both to itself and the world."
"It (the US) still wishes to be the 'indispensable power' to quote former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, but it can not win the victories it covets.
"Like a drunken person, it no longer controls itself, its environments, or makes its actions conform to its perceptions.
"It is therefore a danger both to itself and the world."
look at those photos (16 + 17) of all those 'dangerous' 60's radical...peaceful protests were the norm. LOL
Madeline
Rookie
- Banned
- #7
Hardly any Vietnam vet will discuss the war, even now. Suicides, homelessness, disgrace, broken promises, Agent Orange, Hanoi Jane...that was what they had to look forward to when they came home. Most were lucky if they were greeted by vacant airports. The rest, who we can never apologize to enough, were insulted.
Dante, you just do not come across to me as a 60-something guy. If I'm mistaken, my apologies...but namvet DOES, so I am choosing to reply to him rather than shutting up about this as you have asked -- and as we've all been doing since 1975. If we don't begin to talk about Vietnam soon, we're all going to die never having said our piece or made amends.
I was a protestor, and I smuggled draft dodgers into Canada. And NO, I am not comparing my experience to any vet's. But it was not all sunshine and roses for us either. I was beaten, gassed, followed, and spied on. What I did, I did because I thought it was right. I thought then -- and I still do -- that it was an insane war made up by rich old men to engorge themselves on money while people died.
I have a friend who was a Contientious Objector. He lived in Florida, on the Atlantic Coast and when he was drafted he appeared before the board, said "no, I'm not going" and waited to be arrested. Draft dodging was a crime, and he felt he should be treated like a criminal. It took him three months of going from county to county before he found a DA in Jacksonville who agreed to prosecute him...and he did two years in the Federal Pen. Believe me, he could easily have enrolled in college and gotten a waiver -- but he felt he needed to be where Nixon thought men like him belonged in order to make a point. CO's were couragous -- so were vets. So was damned near an entire generation.
Some of the people who stayed on US soil were acting out of conscience, and some of what we did helped to end that miserable war...saving at least some lives. For all the Hanoi Janes, and there weren't many, there are hundreds thousands of people like my friend. And like me...I wore a POW bracelet until like 1995.
It is time to we forgave one another, if you ask me. If we wait much longer there'll be nobody left alive TO forgive. We can all go on hating on **** Fonda. I hated her them and I still do -- she's NEVER made dime one off me. But we have got to stop blaming each other for the pain we suffered. Even My Lai appears now to have been more sick shit from Nixon, to discredit Vietnam Veterans Against The War. It was NOT our fault -- it was Nixon's.
Yes My Lai shocked me, but I was a child-woman, and had never been in combat. (Still haven't.) All I knew was about Vietnam I learned in a few minutes with Walter Chronkite every night. I know NOW I should have been more compassionate (and far more suspicious of the Army brass), but I was swept up in the horror story like every one else I knew. Kids my age, from where I lived, had done such a thing? It hardly seemed possible.
BTW, I was never anything less than respectful, even awed, by the returning vets who began showing up on our college campus on the GI Bill. It was obvious to me they were in terrible pain, but I didn't know how to reach out to them then.
It's been 40 years. Can I try again now?
Dante, you just do not come across to me as a 60-something guy. If I'm mistaken, my apologies...but namvet DOES, so I am choosing to reply to him rather than shutting up about this as you have asked -- and as we've all been doing since 1975. If we don't begin to talk about Vietnam soon, we're all going to die never having said our piece or made amends.
I was a protestor, and I smuggled draft dodgers into Canada. And NO, I am not comparing my experience to any vet's. But it was not all sunshine and roses for us either. I was beaten, gassed, followed, and spied on. What I did, I did because I thought it was right. I thought then -- and I still do -- that it was an insane war made up by rich old men to engorge themselves on money while people died.
I have a friend who was a Contientious Objector. He lived in Florida, on the Atlantic Coast and when he was drafted he appeared before the board, said "no, I'm not going" and waited to be arrested. Draft dodging was a crime, and he felt he should be treated like a criminal. It took him three months of going from county to county before he found a DA in Jacksonville who agreed to prosecute him...and he did two years in the Federal Pen. Believe me, he could easily have enrolled in college and gotten a waiver -- but he felt he needed to be where Nixon thought men like him belonged in order to make a point. CO's were couragous -- so were vets. So was damned near an entire generation.
Some of the people who stayed on US soil were acting out of conscience, and some of what we did helped to end that miserable war...saving at least some lives. For all the Hanoi Janes, and there weren't many, there are hundreds thousands of people like my friend. And like me...I wore a POW bracelet until like 1995.
It is time to we forgave one another, if you ask me. If we wait much longer there'll be nobody left alive TO forgive. We can all go on hating on **** Fonda. I hated her them and I still do -- she's NEVER made dime one off me. But we have got to stop blaming each other for the pain we suffered. Even My Lai appears now to have been more sick shit from Nixon, to discredit Vietnam Veterans Against The War. It was NOT our fault -- it was Nixon's.
Yes My Lai shocked me, but I was a child-woman, and had never been in combat. (Still haven't.) All I knew was about Vietnam I learned in a few minutes with Walter Chronkite every night. I know NOW I should have been more compassionate (and far more suspicious of the Army brass), but I was swept up in the horror story like every one else I knew. Kids my age, from where I lived, had done such a thing? It hardly seemed possible.
BTW, I was never anything less than respectful, even awed, by the returning vets who began showing up on our college campus on the GI Bill. It was obvious to me they were in terrible pain, but I didn't know how to reach out to them then.
It's been 40 years. Can I try again now?
Madeline:
Those who made millions of dollars from killing 58,000 Americans and millions of Vietnamese never engage in the kind of soul searching that you do.
If Ron Paul is correct about our credit crisis morphing into a currency crisis, it's possible the Pentagon won't have enough money to kill innocent Muslims on the other side of the globe.
Innocent Mexicans will be much more cost effective victims.
I don't think it's too late for any of us from the Vietnam era to make amends.
If we get ahead of the greed curve and tax war into extinction before it destroys our specie.
Those who made millions of dollars from killing 58,000 Americans and millions of Vietnamese never engage in the kind of soul searching that you do.
If Ron Paul is correct about our credit crisis morphing into a currency crisis, it's possible the Pentagon won't have enough money to kill innocent Muslims on the other side of the globe.
Innocent Mexicans will be much more cost effective victims.
I don't think it's too late for any of us from the Vietnam era to make amends.
If we get ahead of the greed curve and tax war into extinction before it destroys our specie.
Madeline
Rookie
- Banned
- #9
Madeline:
Those who made millions of dollars from killing 58,000 Americans and millions of Vietnamese never engage in the kind of soul searching that you do.
If Ron Paul is correct about our credit crisis morphing into a currency crisis, it's possible the Pentagon won't have enough money to kill innocent Muslims on the other side of the globe.
Innocent Mexicans will be much more cost effective victims.
I don't think it's too late for any of us from the Vietnam era to make amends.
If we get ahead of the greed curve and tax war into extinction before it destroys our specie.
What a kind, brave thing to say, georgephillip. Thank you...it really has eased my heart.
Madeline
Rookie
- Banned
- #10
Gabriel Kolko's 35 Years Since the Fall of Saigon takes only a few minutes to read, but it reveals how the "War is a Racket" mentality makes the same "mistakes" in Iraq and Afghanistan today as it did in Korea and Vietnam.
"It (the US) still wishes to be the 'indispensable power' to quote former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, but it can not win the victories it covets.
"Like a drunken person, it no longer controls itself, its environments, or makes its actions conform to its perceptions.
"It is therefore a danger both to itself and the world."
All too true, except that Hillary Clinton has the morals of a rattlesnake. Nothing distressed me more about Obama than him appointing her as Secretary of State. The woman is a craven power-monger and a closet lesbian who hates both men and women.
Kinda hard to imagine anyone worse for that job.
All too true, except that Hillary Clinton has the morals of a rattlesnake.
Don't toss stones from a glass house, your morals are nothing to brag about!
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