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Obama weighs selling U.S. arms to Hanoi in bitter irony for Vietnam veterans
Washington Times ^ | 5/22/16 | Dave Boyer

Posted on 05/22/2016 7:33:00 PM PDT by Nachum

In a move that is raising concerns among some Vietnam War veterans, President Obama will discuss selling more U.S. arms to Hanoi during his visit to Vietnam that began Sunday night.

Top White House advisers said Mr. Obama hasn’t made a decision whether to lift the partial U.S. embargo on sending military equipment to Vietnam, where more than 58,200 U.S. soldiers were killed before the fall of Saigon in 1975. But the administration sees advantages in easing the embargo, both as a warning to expansionist China and as leverage to compel the communist regime in Hanoi to improve its record on human rights.

“We are thinking through how our evolving security cooperation [is] going to look moving forward,” said White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes. “They regularly raise this issue with us. We are looking at, of course, how our broader relationship is evolving, including our continued commitment to support human rights in Vietnam.”

The notion of selling more lethal weaponry to Vietnam is a bitter irony to some veterans of the war and to some Vietnamese-Americans who fled the communists.

“They are still a communist country,” said retired Army Maj. Wulf Linden, a Georgia resident who served two tours in Vietnam. “If it’s the cream of our crop [of weapons systems], obviously that would be a bad mistake. It would be nice if we’re not selling to a regime that’s a documented communist regime. That’s my concern.”

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: arms; armstohanoi; armstovietnam; china; obamavietnam; veterans; vietnam; vietnamvets; vietnamwar
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To: Nachum

He is doing as much as he can to transform America into something that can’t be recovered. It will get much worse in his 200 odd days left.

Why haven’t we started shooting these un-American traitors to our county yet!?!?!?!?


21 posted on 05/22/2016 7:51:16 PM PDT by Delta 21 (Patiently waiting for the jack booted kick at my door.)
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To: Nachum

We already sold them Boeing 787 Dreamliners airliners.

Take a look at the pictures at this link:
https://www.planespotters.net/airframe/Boeing/787/35151/VN-A861-Vietnam-Airlines


22 posted on 05/22/2016 7:52:46 PM PDT by r_barton (GO TRUMP!!!)
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To: Nachum

23 posted on 05/22/2016 7:57:40 PM PDT by Byron_the_Aussie (It's them or us.)
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To: Nachum
Nations have no permanent friends or allies, they only have permanent interests.- Lord Palmerston

Back in the sixties, the USAs problem was the SovUn and it's clients. Today the problem is China

24 posted on 05/22/2016 7:59:19 PM PDT by Oztrich Boy (Rules are for the guidance of wise men and the blind obedience of fools - Solon, Lawmaker of Athens)
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To: Nachum

VC ought to buy German Leopard 2 tanks instead of crappy US Abrahms. Nato countries kicked US tank teams’ a$$e$ in recent tank competition at Grafenwohr.


25 posted on 05/22/2016 8:00:26 PM PDT by batterycommander (Keep calm and call for artillery.)
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To: Don Corleone

He obviously will get a big kick back to his “foundation” he makes me sick


26 posted on 05/22/2016 8:05:26 PM PDT by dandiegirl (BO)
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To: Nachum

What a traitor.


27 posted on 05/22/2016 8:06:11 PM PDT by Salvation ("With God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26)
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To: tumblindice
You rang?


28 posted on 05/22/2016 8:07:19 PM PDT by RightGeek (FUBO and the donkey you rode in on)
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To: r_barton

Anything I’m thinking about buying, if it has a ‘Made In Vietnam’ label, it goes back on the shelf.
That’s one of the first reasons (of more to come) I stopped shopping at Target many years ago: khaki trousers with my waist size but cut to fit a teenage girl, and ‘MIVN’.
Let them ‘network’ with their communist friends who armed them, China and Russia, so they could kill us.
It’s hard to believe anyone here is agreeing with Marxist Obama on getting cozy with the communist Vietnamese.


29 posted on 05/22/2016 8:10:52 PM PDT by tumblindice (America's founding fathers: all armed conservatives.)
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To: batterycommander

That’s a training problem, which, BTW, is Bush’s fault— when Rumsfeld went rummaging around for extra infantry, the mechanized units were a ready source of manpower and their training was cut even more as their budgets only got worse under Zero.


30 posted on 05/22/2016 8:16:44 PM PDT by pierrem15 ("Massacrez-les, car le seigneur connait les siens")
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To: RightGeek

Hillary without make-up?


31 posted on 05/22/2016 8:16:44 PM PDT by SandRat (Duty - Honor - Country! What else needs said?)
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To: Nachum

The Vietnam War ended 41 years ago. The Vietnam of today isn’t the same as it was. I was in Vietnam 1969-1971. Today Vietnam has internet and Skype and Nike and Reebok factories and they make the Lumia smart phones.
Also, for as many times as China has invaded Vietnam, the Vietnamese have always driven them out successfully. It would be nice to know how they do this.


32 posted on 05/22/2016 8:17:51 PM PDT by BuffaloJack (The reason for Gun Control has always been Government's Fear of Rebellion.)
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To: dfwgator

The Vietnamese did smell Chinese s*** for a thousand years, from 111 B.C. to 938 A.D. when Vietnam was occupied by China.

Look up “Trung sisters revolt”. FWIW I learned this in Vietnam many eons ago while speaking French with North Vietnamese refugees from Hanoi. They have very long memories.


33 posted on 05/22/2016 8:21:25 PM PDT by elcid1970 ("The Second Amendment is more important than Islam. Buy ammo.")
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To: Nachum

Send Bergdahl and Hanoi Jane.


34 posted on 05/22/2016 8:24:00 PM PDT by Georgia Girl 2 (The only purpose of a pistol is to fight your way back to the rifle you should never have dropped)
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To: DIRTYSECRET

China gave lip service to supporting the North, but they really wanted the Khmer Rouge to dominate Indochina.

It took the Vietnamese Army to rid the world of Pol Pot.


35 posted on 05/22/2016 8:24:07 PM PDT by dfwgator
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To: Nachum

This is a far superior method of containing China than committing US forces. There is no love between China and Vietnam. By selling them arms, we make money while achieving a geopolitical objective, and no US lives are put on the line, and no taxpayer money is spent to make it happen.

It’s such a sensible move I’m surprised it’s coming from Obama.


36 posted on 05/22/2016 8:24:56 PM PDT by thoughtomator
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To: pierrem15

Yeah, that happened in the artillery too. But the Leopard 2 is a better tank, in my opinion.


37 posted on 05/22/2016 8:27:11 PM PDT by batterycommander (Keep calm and call for artillery.)
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To: Don Corleone
Obama’s Jane Fonda moment!

One word...

"LEGACY"

.

38 posted on 05/22/2016 8:33:15 PM PDT by Seaplaner (Never give in. Never give in. Never...except for convictions of honour and good sense. W. Churchill)
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To: Byron_the_Aussie

Brilliant!


39 posted on 05/22/2016 8:34:08 PM PDT by rdl6989
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To: Ken H

Good post.


40 posted on 05/22/2016 8:39:18 PM PDT by cpdiii (DECKHAND, ROUGHNECK, MUDMAN GEOLOGIST PILOT PHARMACIST LIBERTARIAN, CONSTITUTION IS WORTH DYING FOR)
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