Posted on 11/25/2011 10:06:51 PM PST by neverdem
I haven’t been to North Vietnam, but have travelled to the Southern Provinces many times over the last 5 years. I have found only goodwill towards Americans.
GO NORTH, you will love it more. Hanoi is beautiful, the food is outstanding.
Halong Bay is gorgeous and worth the trip.
No Thanks
So glad to know that over 55,000 young American men lost their lives and tens of thousands more were maimed or injured fighting a meaningless war there 40 years ago so that a unified communist Vietnam could buy its way to prosperity with America!!!
Truly a heartwarming story.
Note.
Exactly how I feel about Hawaii. After touring a few of the Islands, never need to go back.
With the exception of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii sucks.
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Hanoi is noted for its beautiful French colonial architecture and influence. Vietnam joined the Frencophonie. Like China, its still a Communist one-party state but the economy is now mostly in private hands and it has one of the fastest-growing economies in the world.
They've declared victory but I'm not so sure. I'll happily shake the hand of the representatives of the Vietnamese government - the new, freely-elected, non-Communist government - at which point the war truly will be over. Until then if their thugs have a problem with the Chinese thugs both sets can kiss this pissed-off veteran's ass.
Truly a heartwarming story.
I have no affection for any commie government. My friends were killed and wounded in action in Vietnam. I was there over twenty months between two tours, 70 - 71, and later 71 - 72. Both tours were shortened by Nixon's timetablss to withdraw.
It's just the enemy of my enemy is my friend. The Chicoms want to control the western Pacific to just shy of Hawaii. I'll be surprised if we don't have Navy and Air force combat over the freedom of the South China Sea.
This is NOT new. This was the way it was in 1967. When I remembered this "spirit" I always doubted that the Commies would be able to repress it. And, I believe the non-colonial based effort of the US and interaction with the American GI only served to reinforce that spirit. I'm still not absolutely sure we "lost" that war. Give it another 25 years.
BJ Clinton should never have normalized relations with them, until South Vietnam was allowed to elect its own government. Too many veterans from this war are still around to just pretend it didn’t happen.
If they want to know why the urban crime is lower than in other countries, they should point out that the other countries are democracies being compared to a communist slave state. Vietnam is only friendly because they are afraid that after China armed them to the teeth for their war against the US, they’ll be absorbed into China’s “sphere of influence”, or whatever phrase is used now when “free” countries are just a larger neighbor’s b!tch. China invaded in 1979, and certainly could do so again.
> I’m still not absolutely sure we “lost” that war. Give it another 25 years.
I gotta agree with you.
The commies marched South, occupied Saigon and the war was over. They put their puppets in place and the local poulation basically ignored them and continued with their own special Vietnamese version of free enterprise. The individual commies watched all this happening, wanted the prosperity that it brought and that they’d never had before and joined the system. Vietnam is commie on paper and free enterprise in practice. In another 25 years, it will be interesting to see how this plays out.
We fought to protect South Vietnam, and it fell 2 years after we left; I don’t see a win or a tie in that. The fact that our country is now led by communists indicates to me that they won.
“It’s just the enemy of my enemy is my friend.”
A lot of American jobs are being shipped to Vietnam; they may be friends to business, but certainly not to “real” Americans. We’ve propped up a failed communist system by sending them the fruits of capitalism - jobs & wealth. Before that they were a toilet like Cuba.
They may be free enterprise in terms of an economic system but they are all communist in terms of a political system. There is little freedom in Vietnam; certainly no pubic dissent or voting (South Vietnam at least had the former, if not the latter).
> They may be free enterprise in terms of an economic system but they are all communist in terms of a political system. There is little freedom in Vietnam; certainly no pubic dissent or voting (South Vietnam at least had the former, if not the latter).
Yes they are, but I think that more of the North bacame free enterprise that the South became communist. And you are correct. They have no free speech or movement, but that’ll come with time.
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