There are two relatively recent immigrant groups that have been very beneficial to America in spite of the welfare overload, the Cubans and the Vietnamese. I have long believed that we should have taken all the Viet refugees who made it to anywhere else on the boats. I have always thought the wet-foot,dry-foot policy with the Cuban refugees has deprived the country of some potential entrepreneurial ability and wealth by sending back so many. Both groups have largely shunned the welfare blanket and built businesses and added to the culture and the economy. An earlier era group we shunned for far too long was the Jews escaping from Europe in the thirties.American efforts in Viet Nam are respected even by old Communists there. I have talked to some and they say things like they know the Americans were not there to rule the country as were the Chinese and the French and the Japanese. They never expected the Americans to stay. Vietnamese are practical people, even the Communists.
Our plans were to evacuate every single Vietnamese who ever helped us, approximately 2 million people and as I heard, ships were being sent from the States to make this happen.
Very shortly, those plans were abandoned by the Ford administration and only something like 20,000 were rescued and many brought to the Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton to begin resettlement.
I was deeply ashamed that we abandoned our allies and it was something I never forgot. It told me that the government I had believed in so deeply was a whole lot less honorable than I thought.
The Vietnamese-Americans have been a real success story for our country.