Posted on 05/16/2021 7:22:09 AM PDT by DIRTYSECRET
Hindsight's 20-20 right? As a young lefty I was for it. Was the South worth dying for? It wasn't. The people that went-were they chumps? Misguided perhaps. The seed may have been planted when JFK said we'd pay any price, bear any burden. Was that reckless just as he lived his life? We are much more mature nation as a result. It took Iraq/Afghanistan to open my eyes. Gulf of Tonkin didn't happen. Where were the WMD? After 911 we bomb Iran's infrastructure, put them in the stone age and threaten to do it again. It would not have cost a trillion. Happy Sunday.
Pardoning traitors is a traitorous act.
I disagree. They should not have been pardoned. As a practical matter, there would be less Democrats in the country if they were not pardoned. They and their kids would now be Canada’s problem.
Yep, Dad rode the rails to the West Coast from ND at the age of 17. He wanted to join, but wanted to be on the water. December 1941. EVERYBODY joined, but one uncle who was booted out of boot camp. The other relatives treated him very badly for life.
I agree, but as time goes on I find myself wondering about the 58K+ who gave up their future for this sh$t-sandwich of a federal government we have now. Makes me sad. Not to mention how we were able to mess destroy the lives of many of those who returned.
. So, having a heavily armed and trained force of communists, supported fully by the Soviets, the Chinese, and their Warsaw Pact buddies invading an ally and the key to controlling the Southeast Pacific and the paths to support our other allies - the Japanese, the South Koreans, the Philippines, and Australia weren’t reason enough to risk your precious skin?
Reminds me of those who say we didn’t have to do Iwo Jima.
Vietnam was a rough war but I really remember the friendships and crazy stuff we did together over there as 18 - 21 year olds. Wouldn’t trade that experience, those memories for anything in the world.
I have to work on forgiving those people who didn’t go with us. Doesn’t help it when they gloat about “how smart they were” to avoid fighting.
Iwo is a harder question.
Vietnam was where the Soviets chose to initiate their "National Liberation War" strategy and it was just the latest hot spot in the Cold War. Ever think of what the consequences would have been if we hadn't fought? Can you guess how many allies would have believed in us after that?
No, you were "smarter than we were" by avoiding service in Vietnam. You're spouting the propaganda of the Left, the same traitors who carried the enemy's flag in the streets and chanted that Ho Chi Minh was going to win.
Those of us who went and fought learned who we were. We learned that we had the courage to face a relentless and vicious enemy. We learned that we could endure stunning heat and humidity, bugs, snakes, leeches and crappy diseases. We learned what it was to see people die around us and many of us suffered wounds and long-term or permanent loss of parts of our bodies and we were the ones that could take it.
You, on the other hand, will never know what you're actually capable of enduring for your country, because you didn't.
Like I said earlier, I have worked hard for the last 54 years trying to forgive the jerks that stayed home and watched us take the burden - but it's really much harder to forgive people who keep spouting about how "smart they were" to hide from their responsibilities to our country.
?
I suppose so, but the ones who returned don't seem to have become leaders, more like just foot soldiers for the left. Some of those who remained in Canada may have had more of an influence there.
A pardon was going to happen the next time a Democrat was elected president. It's not well known now, but Gerald Ford had worked out an amnesty plan for returning draft evaders. It required them to perform community service before receiving a pardon.
The greatest accomplishment of the Left was to turn Vietnam into “Nixon’s War”, although JFK and LBJ started it and Nixon got us out.
I was going to mention that but thought I was the only one remembered the long convoy[s] from Iraq to Syria. When ever the Iraq debate comes up, no one ever mentions it even with clear substantive photos. Saddam sent that convoy as the US was flying in early military people and shipping our war machine. The war was going to happen and he knew it.
Personally, I don't think Bush II made a mistake by invading Iraq. THE ENTIRE WORLD KNEW HE HAD WMD's FROM HIS HISTORY. The intel agencies over-thought they were nukes.
Beside Bush I reneging on his no new taxes, his biggest mistake after securing Kuwait oil was not to go in and finishing off Saddam and his so-called invincible Guard. I still have mental pictures of the devastation along a highway of his Mother Of All Wars military. I laughed my ass off.
IIRC, Iraq and the Allies were in a truce, but no peace agreement. Saddam was even limited in fly zones, which he broke often and was just cause for more war against him. I was so pleased that our military (SEAL? DELTA? RANGER?) found him in a spider hole and he got hung. I could have some of this wrong - it's been so long. Please correct me if so.
Never ever for any reason burn your HONORABLE DISCHARGE. Never throw you medals away, like John Kerry did. You earned that HD and any medals. I have 3 HD's myself. They have a special position of standing in my garage with all my other Navy accomplishments. Thank you for serving in that micro-managed clusterfuck war, Sir.
I agree and thank you for your service in VN clusterfuck. Hope the VA is taking care of you.
I couldn't agree more. That was when men were men and believed in American values and would fight against communism which is now over-taking our country. I'm so glad I'm in the last stretch of life. Still, anyone needs a point man in real life, I'd be there, as long as I don't have to fly...haha.
Ford backed off and we ended up only rescuing 20,000 before the NVA closed the door. I was planned to lead an antitank team Northwest of the Saigon Sports Stadium but ended up staying aboard ship with my troops and watched the country fall.
Ford failed the Vietnamese after our Congress betrayed them. Those we couldn't get out, suffered through decades of "reeducation camps" or escaped by sea to suffer attacks by pirates, starvation, and exile to refugee camps.
BS. They were cowards, stupid idealists, nihilists that bought into every word their professors said. Sex, Drugs, and Rock n Roll. That was the Hippie mantra.
I've been wondering that, also. It hasn't happened since I've been alive and I'm 71.
Apples and Oranges. A draft I can accept, in fact wish it existed today. Risking their lives in an undeclared war for nation building is another.
I'm not sure who "you people" are. The Vietnam War ended before I was in kindergarten.
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