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Banned
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Originally Posted by roachboy
.....right now, most of what i see in american politics is avoidance.
that can go on--and the shit will hit the fan--and then we'll all be boo hoo something bad happened where we you daddy why didnt you think for us so that we could be safe. or we could collectively grow the fuck up, stop pretending that we are the world and start thinking about how to make things otherwise.
take money out of the ridiculous military-industrial contractor-orld and spend it on rebuilding infrastructure, set up microcredit systems that enable new types of economic and social diversity to unfold, invest state funds in supporting civilian oriented economic possibilities--provide universal health care, change the way public education is funded away from local property taxes to flat funding across states. rebuild infrastructure, change the transportation model away from our near-exclusive reliance on automobiles.
why the hell not? the united states spends more on "defense" against imaginary enemies than the rest of the world put together. and that's just one sector....
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Originally Posted by powerclown
Out of many things, he gave millions of Americans reason to be optimistic again. Like what Kennedy did for America in the 60s. Would you consider that improvement?
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powerclown, is it "improvement"....the result of Reagan persuading so many to engage in "politics of avoidance"? His message was that a disasterous war was a "noble cause", and that "free markets" should be permitted to feed us "cheap oil", until we abandoned all of Carter's alternative energy initiatives and investment, and until the entire fledgling solar energy industry was bought up and curtailed by big oil, itself. The lesson that could have been learned from the war in Vietnam, was "avoided", and here we are today, trapped in Iraq and in Afghanistan, all of our ground forces, and even our National Guard.
The US is totally dependent on foreign oil and "enjoys" twin $700 billion plus annual debt increases in trade and national debt. Oil hit $103 per bbl, just this week.
Yeah, "Ronnie" made us "feel good", because he told us not to worry about oil or imperialistic foreign poilicy, and we listened. The rich ole boy WASP oligarchy that paid to produce "Ronnie" and to persuade you to think politically and socially, in lockstep with the way they think, must be awfully proud of the way their plan has worked out. They are wealthier than ever before, but we're ?????
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Ten Years After -- Vietnam's Legacy: A Decade After War, U.S. Leaders Still Feel Effects of the Defeat --- For Politicians and Military, Avoiding Next 'Vietnam' Guides Policy Decisions --- No Consensus About Lessons
By David Ignatius. Wall Street Journal. (Eastern edition). New York, N.Y.: Jan 14, 1985. pg. 1
By David Ignatius
Wall Street Journal. (Eastern edition). New York, N.Y.: Jan 14, 1985. pg. 1
{First of a Series}
....The soul-searching over Vietnam extends even to the Reagan cabinet. Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger argues that the nation should avoid future Vietnams by fighting only popular, winnable wars; Secretary of State George Shultz counters that the U.S. must be ready to use force, even in ambiguous situations, to support its interests.
Vietnam frightened America. It was the nation's first defeat in war, and it made Americans more cautious and less certain about the world. Indeed, in the decade after Vietnam, the U.S. has been wary of military commitments and uncharacteristically worried about the future. The perceived hesitation and drift in foreign policy came to be known as "the post-Vietnam syndrome."
The after-effects of the war can be seen clearly in the two groups that were most involved in running it: the military and the foreign-policy establishment. Both groups waged war in the mid-1960s with bravado and conviction but suffered crises of confidence after the defeat, attacked as they were by the left as warmongers and by the right as losers.
Vietnam set America wobbling. Television brought the killing and the seeming futility of the conflict into every home and sparked public protest, and some old values and institutions were weakened. Much of the public came to distrust the country's leaders, especially those who had involved America in Vietnam. Congress distrusted the executive branch. And press reports fostered an atmosphere of suspicion. The tradition of bipartisan foreign policy disintegrated.
Harold Brown, who was Air Force secretary during President Johnson's buildup in Vietnam and later was President Carter's secretary of defense, explains: "There was more than a loss of confidence among the foreign-policy elite, there was a loss of legitimacy. And it wasn't just the defeat in Vietnam that did it, it was the backbiting that followed."
The acrimony continues. Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter's national security adviser, says the old establishment lost its will to rule, and that it now wants the U.S. to be loved rather than feared and respected.
"The Vietnam War contributed to a loss of self-confidence and moral self-righteousness with which any elite has to be imbued. Today, the members of the old elite are self-searching, agonizing, apologizing," Mr. Brzezinski says.
"Baloney," responds McGeorge Bundy, who was national security adviser to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. He says of the Brzezinski critique of the establishment: "The people I know who fit into that category -- including me -- don't strike me as demoralized." Former Secretary of State Dean Rusk dismisses the Brzezinski argument as "manure."
<h3>Ronald Reagan, who called the war "a noble cause,"</h3> entered the White House in 1981 hoping to end the post-Vietnam syndrome. Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger argues that Mr. Reagan's election itself was part of the national reaction to Vietnam. "Vietnam put in motion such a weakening of America and created so many frustrations that a reaction to the right was inevitable," Mr. Kissinger says.
President Reagan may have eased the residual pain of Vietnam, with his patriotic talk about standing tall. But certain problems of the post-Vietnam era remain, especially the absence of bipartisan foreign policy. The bitter debates of the past four years over Lebanon, Central America and arms control suggest that the old consensus is dead.
"One of Mr. Reagan's achievements is that he has undone much of the damage we have suffered," says Mr. Kissinger. "But he can't undo the sequence of events -- Angola, Iran, Afghanistan, Nicaragua -- which were the indirect consequences of Vietnam. The fact that we have such difficulty today discussing Central America in strategic terms -- as opposed to abstract moral terms -- is a burden Reagan must carry."
Richard Holbrooke, a politically liberal former State Department official who spent three years in Vietnam in the mid-1960s, sums up how the war changed America's image of itself:
"I grew up in school believing that the United States had never lost a war. My children don't think that. I grew up thinking that the United States was the strongest country on earth. My kids think that maybe Russia is. Suddenly we became fallible."
Looking back at the war and the civilian strategists who haggled over every bombing target, Mr. Holbrooke concludes: "The basic, simpleminded American view was right: Win it or get out."
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From post #14 <a href="http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthread.php?t=108864">Vietnam:Reagan's "Noble War", The Left forced the US to fight with one hand tied,Or?</a> thread:
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Compared to the opinions of the US military leaders who served, and led...in Vietnam, your comments seem unpersuasive. If you have something to back what you claim, why not react to the points made in that informative piece:
http://www.vva.org/TheVeteran/2000_07/despmeas.htm
A publication of Vietnam Veterans of America, Inc. ®
An organization chartered by the U.S. Congress
June 2000/July 2000
Desperate Measures
Search And Destroy, Rolling Thunder, Agent Orange, Phoenix, And Taking The Night Away From Charlie......
...because, Marv....your posted points remind me more of Reagan's political rhetoric, than of any substantive debate.
....and Marv.... 4 years after the 3 year long, period of "Rolling Thunder" ended, with the '68 Tet Offensive......the US was still bombing, just the way you apparently thought they weren't...."hot n' heavy":
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...-07-NBC-4.html
NBC Evening News for Sunday, Nov 07, 1971
Headline: Vietnam / Fighting / Air War / Report
Abstract: (Studio) Battle occurred Sunday E. of Saigon between Americans and VC. Viet Cong casualties reported B-52 bombers hit Cambodia, Laos and South Vietnam. United States air support more important Center of International Studies at Cornell University releases report with regard to air war.
REPORTER: Garrick Utley
(DC) Study shows level of bombing greater under President Nixon than under Lyndon Baines Johnson: in 1965-68, 3,015,000 tons dropped; in 1969-71, 3,400,000 tons dropped. United States dropped 2 million tons of bombs in World War II; 1 million tons in Korea and 6 million tons in Indochina. 1,050,000 civilians killed since 1965: 6,000,000 refugees reported Defoliation since 1962 affected 14% total area: 5,200,000 acres forest land, and 560,000 acres crop land. Report's final remark read.
REPORTER: Robert Goralski
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...23-NBC-11.html
NBC Evening News for Tuesday, May 23, 1972
Headline: Vietnam / Bombing
Abstract: (Studio) United States pilots bombing North Vietnam may now attack almost anything contributing to North Vietnam's war effort, according to Defense Department, Ind. as well as military targets will now be hit. Electric power plant hit near Hanoi. Americans use new bombs guided by lasers to destroy 6 bridges on rail line leading from Hanoi to P.R. China.
REPORTER: Garrick Utley
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...20-CBS-12.html
CBS Evening News for Wednesday, Jun 20, 1973
Headline: Bombing Statistics / Cambodia-Laos
Abstract: (Studio) United States drops 50,000 tons of bombs on Cambodia in last 2 mos. Statistics from Senator Harold Hughes. More bombs dropped on Laos than all enemies in WW II.
REPORTER: Roger Mudd
Marv, IMO, the things about Vietnam, that you are convinced of, are absurd, "feelings based" opinions, not supported by the actual record. How many more tons of bombs should have been dropped, and how many more Vietnamese should have been killed of wounded, to "win it"?
With the record of "all that help" from the US.....directly from at least 1964 to the end of 1972, why was the US unsuccessful in it's goal of "Vietnamizing" that civil war? Could the comments in the second quote box on this thread's OP, possibly be the reason?
The underlying factor in all this is that while there were people in South Vietnam who didn't like the Vietcong, there were very few people willing to die for the Saigon government. The Saigon government was corrupt and ineffective, and that was the bottom line......
The point of everything that I've posted, Marv...is that because the above "lesson" was and still is obscured....for you....by Ronald Reagan's rhetoric, and that of others, the US is grinding it's treasury, it's military forces, and the people of Iraq....to pieces,,,,relearning, the same lesson. So far....only US troops, in response to orders from civilian politcal leaders, show consistent willingness to reliably counter Iraqi insurgency and preserve the US installed and facilitated Iraqi government. Iraqis have not "stood up", so we can stand down....and they won't...to the point that our forces will ever withdraw without a collapse of the Iraqi security forces, after the US withdrawal,
That is why the Iraqi security forces won't be properly equipped or have full logistics support. The fear of US leaders is that the assets of US trained Iraqi forces will fall into the hands of the insurgents. That is already the case, in too many instances, just as ended up happening with the military assets of ARVN forces, in 1975.
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...10-ABC-12.html
ABC Evening News for Tuesday, Feb 10, 1970
Headline: VIETNAMIZATION
Abstract: (Studio) Melvin Laird arrives in Saigon; says Vietnamization irreversible.
REPORTER: Howard K. Smith
(DC) Laird expects to drive home facts to Nguyen Van Thieu. Laird will. make it plain United States cuts to go on; nothing will stop it.
REPORTER: Bill Gill
(Studio) Major part of Vietnamization is teaching South Vietnam to fight for themselves with United States weapons.
REPORTER: Howard K. Smith
(Fort Wolters, Texas) Fort Wolters, helicopter training for 300 South Vietnam; 19 weeks of training; more training in Alabama follows; may train thousands. <h3>Many trainees have reservations about their government, especially about its corruption. [South Vietnam SOLDIERS - can t talk about political]</h3>
REPORTER: Gregory Jackson
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...-04-ABC-3.html
ABC Evening News for Tuesday, Jul 04, 1972
Headline: Vietnam War / United States Training
Abstract: (Studio) Fall of Quang Tri city to South Vietnam seems near. South Vietnam paratroopers landed in city limits and set up own defense positions 1/2 mile from city center. South Vietnam helicopter pilots trained in US.
REPORTER: Harry Reasoner
(Savannah, Georgia) Over 1400 South Vietnam completed 5 month helicopter pilot course in past 2 years Training to be in South Vietnam by South Vietnam from now on, a loss for Savannah families who housed South Vietnam pilots in training.
REPORTER: David Snell
The record shows that the US gave it an earnest try....Marv.....for more than a decade.....with a half million US troops, all the bombing imaginable, 58,000 American dead....and an impressive Vietnamization of the war.....and it turned out not to be enough Marv. Wishing and indoctrination via political rhetoric and individual anecdotal references of lower echelon US veterans of the Vietnam conflict, cannot turn what happened into what you think happened.
Same shit....different day:
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...-17-NBC-7.html
NBC Evening News for Tuesday, Feb 17, 1970
Headline: Vietnamization
Abstract: (Studio) Defense Secretary Melvin Laird reports to Pres-. on Vietnamization; military part of schedule. Dep. United States Ambassador to Vietnam William Colby testifies to Senate committee [Senator Stuart SYMINGTON - asks Colby if South Vietnam could handle situation in Vietnam without Americans] <b>[William COLBY - believes Vietnamization a gradual thing; can give no set time for all Americans getting out.]</b>
REPORTER: David Brinkley
C'mon.....Marv !
http://openweb.tvnews.vanderbilt.edu...15-CBS-10.html
CBS Evening News for Friday, Oct 15, 1971
Headline: Reagan / South Vietnam Visit
Abstract: (Studio) California Governor Ronald West Reagan, on Asian tour, congratulates South Vietnam President Nguyen Van Thieu on unopposed election victory; notes George Washington unopposed.
REPORTER: Walter Cronkite
(Saigon, South Vietnam) Thieu puts in urgent request for Reagan's visit; fears appearance of snub if he didn't come. <b>[REAGAN - says doesn't know why such an uproar over uncontested election; feels purposes for Americans dying in South Vietnam still valid; notes United States fighting against totalitarianism.]</b>
REPORTER: Bruce Dunning
I thought it was Ronald "Wilson"....not "West".....the point is.....Reagan knew better....but he was a fucking actor..... it was all a performance, Marv. WINK
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Last edited by host; 03-01-2008 at 06:02 PM..
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