Confusion over the Vietnam War [Veterans Please Bring Input]

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

My mom is really upset with a certain pundit who I'll keep nameless. It's not my intention to be negative on this. She heard someone say recently that the reason we lost the Vietnam War was because because of 'will to win' or something to that extent.

She and I both believe that the Vietnam War was winnable until we were hamstrung by the UN. When we started off, we helped the populace learn how to defend themselves. We equipped them and trained them. They learned enough that they could fight off anyone who wanted to mess them over, to draft their young men, loot their harvest, etc.

Also, we were forbidden by the UN from crossing borders. Thus, we were sitting ducks while the enemy could hit-and-run and cherry-pick their fights.

But neither my mom nor I were there. So perhaps a lot of people need educating?

To all vets who fought in that and any other war, Thank You from both of us!

FReegards....

[joesnuffy]

I was there for "Vietnamization" which sucked big time..turning the war over to the ARVN VC Patrolling the famous named French Rubber Plantation where you couldnt use an M-60 or an M-79 because of possible tree damage...

[cksharks]

AAAAannnnnkkkkkk Wrong answer.Check out who owned 51% of Brown and Root. At the time the largest Const co in the world.It was LBJ's bitch ass wife. Kennedy was going to get out of Nam. OOPS guess what happened? Check out a certain contract for a certain harbour. Billions of USA loot.

[Doe Eyes]

Nixon made mistakes, but Vietnam wasn't one of them. The Vietnam War is all Lyndon Johnson, Bill Moyers, and Robt. S. McNamara, to name a few.

Wasn't Nixon President for half of the war? Why does he escape all blame?

[Mark17]

The war was fought, and won or lost from Washington. The codes used to transmit the highly detailed orders to us were broken by the Russkis with the help of the Walker Family Spy Ring, so the enemy knew my orders before I did, and the back-up orders.

I was at Bien Hoa Air Base, and talked with an Air Force Major once. He was an A-37 pilot, and he told me that the Vietnamese always seemed to know when and where their air strikes were going to be. I just thought they had a good grapevine, but years later, I became convinced it could have been the result of the Walker spy ring. Those bas-----.

[Mark17]

One of his accomplishments was 'regime change' in the assassination of Thiem (sp?)

Ngo Dinh Diem.

[cynicom]

Arthur....

You need to read how LBJ got his "silver star" during WW2. That will tell you what the man was.

[Billthedrill]

I think of Vietnam as two wars, one running from our initial advisor role in 1962 through Tet '68 when the Vietcong were utterly mangled, to a bloody stalemate wherein the rules of engagement favored the other side prohibitively, thence to 1973 and the Paris peace treaty, when we withdrew and "declared victory." The ARVNs were, of course, somewhat taken aback, and we left them trained and capable of fighting a low-level surrogate conflict, or so we thought. We'll never really know, because in 1975 the North Vietnamese began the second Vietnam War, completely different tactically from its predecessor. It was essentially an armored blitzkrieg down the central North/South highway. The ARVNs had little artillery, virtually no air support, and had lost the will to fight due to political incompetence, theirs and especially ours, and as a result of a feeling of abandonment after a decade of worldwide propaganda. It didn't take long for the last helicopters to leave Saigon. That part I saw.

About a year later the Vietnamese invaded Cambodia, thinking it would be an easy task to take a country whose government under Sihanouk - he ain't no FReepin' Prince - had attempted to maintain "neutrality" while its neighbor was being raped from his territory. That fellow had been ousted in '70 and his successor, Pol Pot, had been working the country over ever since, and he managed to make life hell for both his own people and the invaders.

The upshot of the was was too big to go into here, but some interesting items include Laos and Cambodia, which fell to the communists, validating the much-derided Domino Theory, China, who ended up in an artillery duel with the NVA over some territorial violations, Thailand, whose stubborn failure to fall marked the high-water mark of communism in the Far East, and of course, the Vietnamese people themselves who risked their lives to escape to freedom as Boat People. The latter provided us with a highly-educated, technically-competent and fiercely loyal population that helped fuel the high-tech boom of the 80s.

You can return to Saigon today, a good friend of mine told me - I haven't - because that's what the locals still call it. He related to me the conversation he'd had with a guy in a cafe who had supported the VC during the war - that guy was spouting about how the revolution had betrayed them and that they'd throw the communists back out, just wait and see. That was 1992. I wish him luck.

For many of us, myself included, the Vietnam war isn't over yet. It will end when the entire rotten facade of communist government finally falls. And that will happen.

[Skywalk]

One of the books you HAVE To read about the latter stages of the war, when Creighton Abrams took command of American forces in the area, is A Better War Darn, now I can't remember the author's name. Interestingly enough, former conservative(so he says) turned liberal Michael Lind, wrote a good book called Vietnam: The Necessary War He punctures the myths about the war, mostly propagated by the left. He also describes the demographics of the US as related to voting, war and political allegiances. Very interesting stuff, overall.

[rockfish59]

My brother (on the right) at Cu-Chi, 1966!
I hope LBJ is burning in hell!

[Billthedrill]

A BETTER WAR

Some of the other links in this reference are good, too, including STOLEN VALOR.

[Misplaced Texan]

I don't know the numbers on how many of us were in Viet Nam and I surely don't know the number of us that chose to be over there, but I as everyone else have my own first hand opinion as to why we did not decisively defeat the enemy.

Let's look at the beginning when Kennedy sent in Special Forces which may have been the answer if only the Viet Cong had been involved in the war. However, the North Viet Namese Army soon became the major fighting force. I don't know what Kennedy would have done if he had lived, but it wouldn't have been any worse than what Johnson did.

Johnson moved into the White House and that changed the whole ballgame. Johnson was the ultimate politician. A true RAT. He cheated his way into his first political office with dead people's votes and he fought the Viet Nam war on the backs of soldiers so he could pay off the cronies that financed him for those many years he served the "public".

I went to OCS at Fort benning, GA and I will never forget that we wre taught in military history that one of the mistakes that the French made was to build bases and work from there. This of course gave the VC a point to attack and the end for the French came at Dien Bin Phu.

What did Johnson do? He had his construction cronies at Brown and Root start building bases all over the place. That was payback.

It was also stupid. Anytime any country does something the French did before, it is absolutely stupid.

Johnson had his Great Society plan going to save all the poor Americans and then he decided to save the poor North Viet Namese by not bombing them anymore. I was there when he quit bombing, but the NVA must not have gotten the word, because I was still getting shot at. Piss poor military decision. Unfortunately, most of the civilian decisions of the war were piss poor.

IF, IF, IF the American public had only elected Goldwater, there would have been an entirely different outcome. Republicans know how to fight wars. Massive and decisive action.

That's my two cents.

[rockfish59]

And the Viet commies are still methodically killing the Montagnards.

[Mark17]

And the Viet commies are still methodically killing the Montagnards.

I have no doubt about that, and I also work with some Vietnamese, who assure me that there are many former VC who live and work in America, especially California. What a country.

[rockfish59]

Former VC in California!

Doesn't Jane Fonda live there?

[Mark17]

Doesn't Jane Fonda live there?

LOL, I don't know where she lives right now, but I was referring to Vietnamese VC, not American born VC.

[fightu4it]

Maybe some day an economic scholar will produce a work showing us what the effect of millions of babyboomers entering the work force of a non-wartime US economy would be. Absent that information I reserve a final judgement. I was there 67-68.

[leadhead]

We should all get together when this guy finally dies and make sure we attend his funeral - two reasons - one to make sure they put a stake through his heart - two to give him an appropriate sendoff. Clintoon will never be able to approach the evil of RSMcN. May he burn in all the everlasting hells there are.

[tet68]

Dear Arthur,
I was there as a Marine Attack Squadron mechanic on A-4 sky hawk fighter bombers. I served from the middle of 66 to april of 68 at Chu Lai which is south of Da Nang.
Kennedy got us into vietnam but was in my view about to extricate us when he was assasinated, Johnson trumped up
the Tonkin Gulf incident to ramp up the war for his election. Once the communist infiltrators in this country began to turn the people, Johnson bailed and left Nixon holding the bag.
Nixon, whatever his faults, DID mine Haipong harbor and DID
get the North to the negociating table.
I think Johnson kept us in Vietnam just to keep the American
people from realizing what a disaster his "Great Society" scheme was, and to allow him enough time to foist it on the country.

I hope his gallbladder hurts him every day in hell.

There's my 2cents, as we used to say," It don't mean a thing, not a goddamned thing."

[Swede Girl]

Well-said. You are right that Goldwater would have taken care of the situation in the right way. Also, it has always been my personal belief that if Nixon had won the election instead of Kennedy we would never have gotten into that mess in the first place. Nixon was more of a chess player and wise to the ways of the world. But, this country was forced to endure a Democrat regime (won only by Joe Kennedy's influence on vote fraud) and the topping on that cake was LBJ.

And, the next two Democrat presidents, Carter and Clinton, made sure that the legacy of Democrat ineptness and corruption continues to live on.

Never, ever, ever vote for a Democrat.