Posted on 05/29/2006 9:18:38 AM PDT by Kaslin
NEW YORK — A cameraman and soundman for CBS were killed and a CBS correspondent was seriously injured Monday after their convoy was struck by a roadside bomb in Iraq, the network said.
Veteran cameraman Paul Douglas, 48, and soundman James Brolan, 42, were killed, CBS reported on its Web site. Correspondent Kimberly Dozier, 39, was in critical condition at a U.S. military hospital in Baghdad after undergoing surgery.
The three were reporting on patrol with the 4th Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, when their convoy was hit by an improvised explosive device, CBS said.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
And China wasn't Communist before we entered WWII.
Not quite sure I follow your twisted logic. Are you saying AQ and us would have been pals if we hadn't "propped up" Saudi Arabia?
It was during Bush's term but it was a war that the 'media' demanded--what will all the whining & crying for weeks about the famine in Somalia, millions of people dying & something just had to be done.
Pals? No, we're not pals with plenty of folks on this planet, but that isn't the same as being at war.
Since you're piling in, and quoted the question, why not take a stab at it: "Do you think it is the duty of American soldiers to keep a Saudi or Kuwaiti King on his throne?"
Well, that question is not directly relevant to my post, which concerned what happened after American ground troops had already been removed from Vietnam, after those lives had already been spent.
But to answer your question nevertheless... In my armchair opinion it was advisable to have resisted the advance of communism in Indochina, but centering (and substantially limiting) that defense to South Vietnam was a massive strategic blunder.
Although Eisenhower was very cautious and reluctant about becoming engaged in the region, especially without the British and other allies involved (and, IIRC, Churchill wanted to let eastern Indochina go and hold the line at Thailand or Burma) he nevertheless had the correct strategic understanding: If it came down to making a stand Laos was the key to it.
The indigenous communist movement in Laos was far weaker than in South Vietnam or Cambodia, and was entirely dependent on North Vietnam. The Laotians had a great (well earned, over centuries) hatred of the Viet Minh. And Thailand would have presumably (I think, although I'm not that conversant with the circumstances) provided a secure base to project American power into Laos.
If you'd denied North Vietnam control of Laos, you deny them the Ho Chi Minh trail, and the ability to infiltrate men and supplies into the long Western border of South Vietnam almost at will. Then you only have to defend the narrow border between North and South Vietnam from attack and infiltration.
American forces would have been occupied with these tasks, and South Vietnam could have been given much more responsibility, and therefore more accountability, and therefore more Darwinian incentive, for dealing with it's internal resistance and politics. With this strategy I think there would have been far greater prospect of success with far lower cost.
Had Eisenhower been able to have third term, or had Nixon been elected for that term, I think the history of Vietnam would have been entirely different, and we would likely have North and South Vietnam today, with a contrast between the two along the lines of North and South Korea.
And as to your "so what"? Well, yeah, it might have been "so what" had Kennedy and Johnson not committed us to the defense of South Vietnam. Indochina was not that important in itself; if only because the Viet Minh were racist, regional hegemons first, and communists second, and would never have been entirely cooperative allies of either the Soviets or the Chinese, and would indeed have continued to play one off against the other...
But the commitment to South Vietnam having been made, the "so what" of abandoning that commitment, even doing so gratuitously when American lives were no longer at stake, was absolutely huge.
It embolden the communists, and stimulated their aggressive impulses. Although the trend was (thankfully!) soon reversed during the Reagan administration, the years immediately following the backstabbing and abandonment of South Vietnam and Cambodia saw a global advance of totalitarianism that was (and remains) unprecedented in world history since the Second World War, and was against every other historical trend. This was NOT coincidental.
Jean Kirkpatrick, speaking at the Republican National Convention in 1984, gave a list of some of those loses. (Full speech here. FR thread here.)
From the fall of Saigon in 1975 'til January 1981, Soviet influence expanded dramatically into Laos, Cambodia, Afghanistan, Angola, Ethiopia, Mozambique, South Yemen, Libya, Syria, Aden, Congo, Madagascar, Seychelles, Nicaragua, and Grenada.
If in the American interest, and in a legal military action as approved by the democratic and constitutional process in America, then YES, it damn sure is.
BTW, although there is CERTAINLY plenty to criticize Kuwait for, and even more with regard to Saudi Arabia, we did not only restore the Emir of Kuwait to the throne, we also reinstalled the Kuwaiti parliament, which was then (and I think maybe still is?) the only generally elected legislative body among the Gulf States.
Although Kuwait is only partially free, with an unelected executive, it was (and I think still is) far and away the most free of the Gulf States. Parliamentary elections are held every two years since the liberation, and unlike many a moderate Arab state (e.g. Jordan) the Kuwaiti parliament has to my knowledge never been arbitrarily disbanded by the executive. (It was disbanded in 1999, IIRC, due to a constitutional dispute, but the Emir called for new elections within the three months required by the constitution.)
The Kuwaite parliament has real power, even if that is not in all cases for the good. They must approve all decrees by the Emir. For instance in 1999 the Emir issued decrees that greatly opened and liberalized the economy of Kuwait, and called for women to get the vote. The Parliament approved the former, but narrowly rejected the later. As far as I know at present women in Kuwait still do not have the vote (although I believe they are generally allowed to protest).
Bio of the surviving, but wounded, correspondent:
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/09/19/broadcasts/main574141.shtml
Must have been quite a shock for her to get hit by her own side like this. CBS is still not mentioning any US military casualties, and patently trying to find a way to blame Dozier's misfortune on the US military.
The camera and sound men were the first US journalists killed in the war (one died in 2003 from a pre-existing but undetected medical condition). There's been a lot of brag from journos about how brave they are, but in fact most US print journalists hunker down in their hotel bars and wait for stringers -- recruited in some cases from the insurgency -- to bring them stories.
Visual journalists have less opportunity to do that than some of the print hacks, like Dexter Filkins of the NYT (to name one particularly fabrication-prone example).
This woman appears to have been the sort of expendable journeyman that is used for stories the high-flying darlings can't be risked on. While she no doubt was in sympathy with the insurgents who attacked her and killed her crew -- otherwise, she would not have been welcome in the CBS family -- it's terrible that she's wounded like this, and I hope that you will join me in prayer for her survival and recovery.
After all, we'd pray for a foot soldier of the insurgency, why not for one of its public affairs officers?
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
" Never EVER forget what Walter Cronkite and the media did to us in Vietnam!!"
I could vomit every time I see that POS elevated to an American icon.
Cronkite was a hybrid of Cindy Sheehan and John Kerry anchoring one of the three nightly news broadcasts- in an age without the internet, cable tv or talk radio.
Just CBS, NBC and ABC - each vying to " hate America and the baby killing military " more than the other.
Unfortunately, the WOT is Groundhog Day for the same old media-Brian Williams, Dan Rather, Bob Schieffer,Chris Matthews, MSNBC, CNN, the NYT, et al.
Well, that's what the mohammedan terrorists say. Does it make sense to believe them?
You are making a post hoc ergo propter hoc logical fallacy. It is true that the US was in Saudi before AQ existed? Yes, it was. However Osama was a jihadi long before, and jihadis had identified the US as "the great Satan."
Long before the US war in Kuwait and Iraq in 1991-2, the faithful of Islam mounted numerous attacks on the US and its interests at home and abroad.
Maybe you missed it when Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan murdered a politician in 1968, when terrorists took US airliners to Jordan and blew them up in 1970, or when people awash in the love of Allah overran the US Embassy in Iran in 1979, abusing and even torturing scores of hostages; or when Mohammed Rashid put a bomb on a Pan Am plane in Honolulu in 1982.
You must not remember when the US Embassy in Beirut was blown up by Iranian- and Saudi-sponsored islamic jihad terrorists in April 1983 (oh, those provocative embassies!), when the hotel with the Marines was dynamited in October 1983, when the embassy in Kuwait City was blown up in December 83 (provocation again!), and then the embassy in Beirut (again) in 1984.
Perhaps you don't remember when a Kuwait Airways plane was hijacked to Iran in 1984. The gunmen (Shi'a terrorists) started shooting Americans and the Iranians let them do it, intervening only when a Muslim was next up.
Does the name "Robert Stethem" ring a bell with you. Of course not; your boy Pat Buchanan has forgotten him too. He was selected for murder on TWA Flight 847 in Beirut by Party of Allah terrorists, because he was an American.
Then there was Achille Lauro. That was a new twist -- hijack a ship, instead of a plane, for allah. They thought it was funny to shoot a cripple in a wheelchair and throw him off the deck of the ship... partly because he was an American, and partly because of a reason that Pat Buchanan could certainly support, he was a Jew. That guy's name, not that you'd care, was Leon Klinghoffer, and the terrorists that shot him praised allah as they did. With his wife watching.
In 1985 and 1987 the jihadis used loaner terrorists from the Japanese Red Army Faction for attackes in Rome and Vienna -- because the Europeans were profiling.
In 1986 jihadis helped themselves to a Pan Am plane and flew it to Pakistan (the "pure land" that was created by mohammedans who don't want to be tainted by having any other faith around. 22 died.
In 1988 those lovely mohammed worshippers seized two accredited diplomats from the US Embassy (oh, those provocative embassies!) in Lebanon and tortured and murdered them.
Which brings us to the 1990s, more or less. Not that my list is complete. But this list certainly doesn't indicate that jihadis were attacking Americans and American interests...oh, no!
No, obviously these people were just brimming over with the milk of human kindness until the bad ol' US responded to a Saudi request in 8/91 and began to build up forces in the Arabian Peninsula.
We need to take Pat Buchanan's approach of hunkering down within our borders, abandoning world trade and returning to subsistence farming, and electing a real strongman like Francisco Franco or... dare I say it... Pat Buchanan.
Yeah, riiiiight. They never attacked us before. We made 'em do it. They were just primitive agrarian reformers, wroth with idealism. Yes, Officer Krupke, I'm depraved on account of I'm deprived...
d.o.l.
Criminal Number 18F
I noticed how you gloss over the fact they weren't attacking us until after we stationed American troops to defend the Saudi Arabian King. I don't care if they don't like us. The French don't like us. But they had bigger fish to fry than us until we parked in their living room. You keep dodging the question, "do you think it is the duty of American soldiers to keep a Saudi or Kuwaiti King on his throne?"
Those nutbars are no different from the SS, and in fact have pretty much the same aspirations. Do you NOT believe OBL when he declares that he wants Islam to rule the world, and by extension himself as the anointed leader? If you cannot see that for yourself, you do not have a full grasp of current events.
If you think that is remotely possible you do not have a full grasp of reality.
Yes, thanks to colonial policies in centuries now past, we have issues that MUST be dealt with in the present, by us, the U.S.A., and anyone else willing to help, which unfortunately is not many since the majority of the world has a selfish and cowardly mindset that you so specifically display on this forum.
The White Man's Burden isn't the American Dream. Have you clued into the fact that it is a very narrow segment of Americans who want to play Globocop?
If in the American interest, and in a legal military action as approved by the democratic and constitutional process in America, then YES, it damn sure is.
You view keeping a king on a foreign throne as 'in the American interest' and thereby worth the blood of her sons and daughters. That's a sentiment fit for an empire, not a republic. Our differences in opinion stem from our seperate views of America's place and purpose. I see that you will forever be tilting at bogeymen, for the world is full of them when you go looking.
I agree and I'm greatly puzzled why we haven't been able to stop them. Maybe our pilotless drone aircraft are ineffective at night when the bombs are likely put into place. But it seems we ought to have some means of surveillance to put those s.o.b.'s out of business. I'm just venting and might see things very differently if I was on the ground there.
Actually I believe that raid occured October 3-4, 1993, during the Klinton administration.
Actually that raid occured October 3-4, 1993, during the Klinton administration.
Thanks for posting the background that I couldn't bring myself to type, as my own response was long winded enough! :)
Prayers for all, even CBS staffers.
And the Gulf region's only elected parliament. (I know you're not just a shallow and bilious anti-American, anti-military propagandist, and must have only forgotten that part...)
as 'in the American interest'
As opposed to having Kuwait and, in the range of reasonable prediction, Saudi Arabia, and thereby over half the world's oil supply, in the hands of, not a constitutional monarch, but a megalomaniac, totalitarian dictator?
Yeah. I'd say that was in the American interest. I'd think anybody remotely sane would grant that to be in the American interest.
and thereby worth the blood of her sons and daughters.
Yes. Worth the blood of her sons and daughters. Without question. Especially since with one, or two, nations in the world's most volatile region under the occupation of a brutal tyrant, and the stated desire of said tyrant to reestablish the empire of Nebuchadnezzar, and his repeatedly vows to attack and destroy Israel, and thereby the panic (and arms buildups) that would be inspired in neighboring nations; a FAR MORE deadly war or wars, in which the United States could not avoid becoming involved, would have been the reasonably predictable result of not confronting Saddam over his unprovoked invasion of Kuwait.
Our differences in opinion stem from our seperate views of America's place and purpose.
No they don't.
I see that you will forever be tilting at bogeymen
See? Our differences stem from your delusion. To describe Saddam Hussein in control of Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia, and thereby half the world's oil supply, and with further territorial ambitions, and with further aggressive, warmaking intent, and with weapons of mass destruction (which he DID have back then) as a "boogeyman"... I.e. something feared as a threat, but in fact only an imaginary threat... To not at least be able to see, but instead to hyperbolically dismiss, the sense of such an analysis...
Sorry, bud. That's not just a difference of "opinion". That's deep delusion. That's outright alteration of reality, sufficiently extreme as to most probably (if I may be premitted to speculate) related to some sick and twisted ideological motive.
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