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CALIFORNIA’S VIETNAM WAR
Frontpagemag ^ | 09/22/2017 | Lloyd Billingsley

Posted on 09/22/2017 4:42:51 AM PDT by DFG

The Vietnam War, the ten-part, 18-hour documentary series by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, is running on PBS. Thursday’s episode 5 showed the conflict on the brink of the Tet Offensive in 1968. Future episodes will deal with the withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1973, which paved the way for the victory of the Soviet-backed North Vietnamese Communists in 1975. One California state senator has considerable experience on that front.

The Communists changed the name of Saigon to Ho Chi Minh City and Janet Nguyen was born there in 1976. Her father was a South Vietnamese soldier and imprisoned when the family tried to escape. The Communists assassinated her uncle, a South Vietnamese Army officer, in front of his village and family.

The Nguyen family became part of the “boat people” exodus and made their way to Thailand. California governor Jerry Brown spearheaded an effort by high-profile Democrats to keep the refugees – even orphans – out of the United States.

Brown tried to block flights of refugees into Travis Air Force Base and said it was “a little strange” to bring in refugees when one million Californians were out of work. Rep. Elizabeth Holtzman of New York likewise pitted the refugees against her constituents. Rep Don Riegle of Michigan sought to bar funds for the refugees. Rep. Joshua Eilberg of Pennsylvania, chairman of a subcommittee on immigration, accused the Ford administration of acting “with unnecessary haste” in evacuation of the orphans.

(Excerpt) Read more at frontpagemag.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: brown; hayden; nguyen; vietnam
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1 posted on 09/22/2017 4:42:51 AM PDT by DFG
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To: DFG

When are they going to show the “Hanoi Jane” episodes?


2 posted on 09/22/2017 4:44:46 AM PDT by DaveA37
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To: DFG
and Cornell's main plaza is still named Ho Chi Minn Plaza to this day...
3 posted on 09/22/2017 4:47:18 AM PDT by Chode (You have all of the resources you are going to have. Abandon your illusions and plan accordingly.)
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To: DFG

Kind of ironic that Jerry Brown, who does everything he can to protect and legitimize the Mexican invasion of his state, was so adamantly opposed to refugees fleeing communist persecution in Vietnam. Funny how these liberals love immigrants unless they happen to be Cubans, East Europeans or South Vietnamese who had fled communist persecution.


4 posted on 09/22/2017 4:54:37 AM PDT by BradtotheBone (When I die I want the GOP to be my Pallbearers, so they can let me down one last time.)
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To: BradtotheBone

Think it might have something to do with votes? Naw....


5 posted on 09/22/2017 5:07:51 AM PDT by Kozak (DIVERSITY+PROXIMITY=CONFLICT)
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To: BradtotheBone
The Vietnamese didn't take jobs hanging drywall or picking tomatoes, they went to college.
6 posted on 09/22/2017 5:13:27 AM PDT by LoveUSA (God employs Man's strength; Satan exploits Man's weakness.)
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To: DFG
I don't think many people realize the scope of the Vietnamese refugees who escaped to this country. One of my best friend's girlfriend managed to escape as did other family members who live out in California.

One of my nephew's best friend's (who is now a doctor) parents are physicians who landed in Nebraska. What's funny is that when I first met him, I knew nothing about him other than he was Vietnamese. I then found out he was from Nebraska and was an avid pheasant hunter until he went away to medical school........

I think the Vietnamese who were successful in their journey to the US more than made up for the hospitality extended to them in that they all went on to become hard working, productive members of our society......

7 posted on 09/22/2017 5:18:15 AM PDT by Hot Tabasco
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To: DFG

Been there. Done that. I don’t need Ken Burns to tell me how ugly it was over there or here at home. The “Wall” is reminder enough.


8 posted on 09/22/2017 5:27:07 AM PDT by Don Corleone (.leave the gun, take the canolis, take it to the mattress.)
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To: DFG

I’ve been watching the series. A lot of upper level politics, which is to be expected. After being rehashed for what?...42 years (yikes!), I’ve seen most of the photos and videos in other presentations.

A little concerned about the body count coverage. I can’t speak to the up the chain exaggeration, but at the direct contact level in a Marine infantry battalion, I can tell you we only reported what we had actually killed. And we killed plenty during the year I was there (1968-1969).

I hope Burns will emphasize how costly winning the war was for Vietnamese men of that generation.


9 posted on 09/22/2017 5:28:30 AM PDT by Captain Rhino (Determined effort today forges tomorrow.)
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To: LoveUSA
BINGO !


The war in Viet Nam was IMO, an effort to rid America of the middle class educated white guys that had emerged from the loins of Daddy's returning from a successful WW2.

Ike had paved America and we were the baddest asses on the planet.

And believe it or not, the public schools actuall TAUGHT real stuff we kids could use as adults.

So we went to the moon.


Sorry for the rant, but Viet Nam opened to the world the hatred the enemy has for education and intelligence and your remark about Vietnamese going to college triggered an old peeve of mine.

10 posted on 09/22/2017 5:35:45 AM PDT by knarf (I say things that are true, I have no proof, but they're true.)
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To: DFG

Hard to watch shows like that. Same as Blackhawk down. I turned 18 in November of ‘72. I missed serving but was old enough to see for years before how the Commies in our colleges were subversively using the idiots to sway public opinion. Same thing is happening now. Still pi$$es me off.


11 posted on 09/22/2017 5:40:15 AM PDT by HighSierra5
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To: Hot Tabasco

I grew up with many Vietnamese in Nebraska.

Big rednecks. Good hunters. Their parents would cook food that I couldn’t pronounce, and complain about football.

I will never forget that the father, though he loved the Fourth of July, couldn’t watch fireworks.


12 posted on 09/22/2017 5:56:55 AM PDT by redgolum
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To: DFG
Do you suppose that they will show the John Kerry museum in Saigon? Will they mention the Kerry visits to Paris to meet with the enemy which was treason. Will they show the Cronkite new feed that said they war was lost after the biggest victory of the military since WWII? Will they tell that the Demonicrats defended the military and blamed the veterans for losing the war.
13 posted on 09/22/2017 6:03:26 AM PDT by mountainlion (Live well for those that did not make it back.)
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To: mountainlion

no, no, no and no.


14 posted on 09/22/2017 6:07:33 AM PDT by satan (The tree of liberty is dying in the drought.)
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To: LoveUSA

That’s a fact.


15 posted on 09/22/2017 6:15:26 AM PDT by stillfree? (Don't let illegals turn your state into California.)
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To: DFG

Based on the article, the hypocrisy is stunning! Hanoi Jane should be dead!


16 posted on 09/22/2017 6:16:15 AM PDT by Road Warrior ‘04 (Molon Labe! (Oathkeeper))
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To: DFG

There is a small memorial outside of San Onofre on Camp Pendleton that is dedicated to the Vietnamese refugees. Many of them lived there on Pendleton in a tent city while being re-located across America. I was a teenager when Vietnam ended and remember quite well the refugees. We had a large Vietnamese family that our Church sponsored. People may not realize but because of that area being French for a long time, not all Vietnamese were Buddhist. Many were Catholics.

I’ve seen a little of the Ken Burns documentary and the part I watched was concentrating on the corruption of the South Vietnamese government. IMO, that was one of the problems with the war. In order to fight a counter insurgency, you have to have a credible partner. When Buddist monks were burning themselves in the streets of Saigon in protest to the government, we should have realized that we did not have a credible partner.

The goals of the war were laudable and it was a worthwhile cause. The left always lampoons the domino theory, but guess what? It actually happened, Cambodia and Laos did turn red and hundreds of thousands died in the Khmer Rouge killing fields of the late 70’s. Thank you for that Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden.

My experience has taught me that the best Americans are usually the ones that have fled Communist persecution and the Vietnamese in this country are no different. It’s funny how all of these type of groups end up being Republicans by and large. Guess that’s why the left doesn’t want them in America.


17 posted on 09/22/2017 6:18:01 AM PDT by Old Teufel Hunden
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To: DFG
The Democrat Media complex caused the loss of that war. By attacking Nixon with their made up phone baloney Scandal, they kept him from responding appropriately to the military situation in Vietnam. Democrats gained 49 seats in congress because of the constant media bashing Nixon was taking because of the Democrat/Media liars trying to gin up a fake scandal.

The blood of thousands is on the heads of those news manipulators that cost us that war. Obama has done far worse than Nixon ever did, yet these same media liars are refusing to so much as peep about the gross violations of the law perpetrated by that corrupt fool Obama.

This nation needs to destroy these media liars, and deprive them of the ability to force false narratives on the American people.

What is wrong with America is one party media liars controlling the news.

18 posted on 09/22/2017 6:49:50 AM PDT by DiogenesLamp ("of parents owing allegiance to no other sovereignty.")
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To: DFG

Disgusting. They interview only failed American soldiers, weeping about having gone to war. I watched part 1 and that was it for me.


19 posted on 09/22/2017 7:08:25 AM PDT by pabianice (LINE)
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To: Hot Tabasco

I’ve met quite a few Vietnamese refugees also and they were all hard working people. Everything good after they all learned that eating your neighbor’s pet dogs is not acceptable behavior here.:-)


20 posted on 09/22/2017 7:09:37 AM PDT by Rusty0604
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