[onedoug]

As I said, I think this poll deserves a Freep.

[onedoug]

Sorry for the typos. I hit the "post" click-on prematurely.

[getgoing]

Done. We have a way to go to turn this one around.

[bybybill]

I have often wondered if Vietnam would be free today if Watergate didn`t happen.

[Texas_Jarhead]

short answer:

The communists slaughtered tens of millions and enslaved hundreds of million more. The U.S. did what was right and noble in opposing such an evil force.

[RLK]

It was justified. The communists brutally killed and tortured tens of thousands of villagers to destabilize rhe countr. It as an easy war to win. The reason we lost is because we had playboys, idiots, and subversives in government undercutting the military effort. Playboy Kennedy had Diem killed for no good reason. McNamara was a leftist subcersive who is described as a admiror of socialist presidential candidate Norman Thomas in his own book. By 68 the situation was nearly unrecoverable.

[Pompah]

Should the U.S. have become involved in the Vietnam conflict.?
What a truly stupid headline.
Who the hell would ask a question like that after all these years. Jesus. ! Fifty thousand plus aluminum caskets later and a question like that comes up.
I can't belive it. HELLO ?

[truth_seeker]

In the early years of the Cold War, Radio Free Europe beamed the message that World Communism was evil, leading to the 1956 Hungarian revolt.

Then the US proceeded to give the freedom seeking Hungarians ZERO support. We were all talk, and no action.

I expect when it came to Vietnam, we saw an opportunity to take the other position, and DEFEND against the spread of communism.

That it turned out as it did is for another discussion.

The past is history; nothing can change it. But today another threat is faced, namely the spread of World Islam, which is a diabolical, authoritan political march, which seeks nothing less than domination, by the sword--now terrorism.

Hopefully we will stand against it RIGHT NOW. President Bush was CORRECT on Sept. 20, 2001 when he likened it to Nazism and Communism.

Islam was political from the first days. Mohammed was a ruler, a general, he taxed, made civil laws and led wars. He simply wrapped up his political conquest as a religion.

We should stand against it no LESS firmly, just because it is claimed to be a religion. It is a power movement, no less than Nazism and Communism. Arafat studied terror in Cuba with communists, as did other muslim terror group leaders.

It may be true that all muslims are not terrorists; but surely today (almost) all terrorists are muslims.

[CARepubGal]

Ping

[CW_Conservative]

Should the US have become involved in the Vietnam conflict?

The real question they should be asking and answering is, "Why did we have to become involved in the Vietnam conflict?"

Then they could start tracing the miserable effects of one foreign policy failure after another, starting with our role in the treaty that ended WWI.

The middle of the program could show how the Vietnam War was fought by politicians, with devastating results for 50,000 Americans.

The ending could depict how George Bush I and his grand UN Alliance fought a half-ass war that left a dictator in power and then fast foward to today, when his son has to clean up daddy's mess.

[fire_eye]

JFK left a Communist regime 90 miles off our shore when he should have whacked it out out of existence, and it has been leaking Commie bacteria into the Western Hemisphere ever since.

Then he mired us in Nam, in an attempt to salvage his reputation, his re-election, and his ego.

Vietnam was every bit as unimportant to American strategic interests as Cuba was important to Communist strategic interests. The Russians were laughing at us the whole time, and rightly so, for giving a damn about Vietnam while they fomented revolution right under our noses.

But nobody, including some on this website, will stand up and damn this "martyred" scumbag for what he was - a clear candidate for the most destructive President to ever take office, vying for that title with Roosevelt and now Clinton.

[boris]

In retrospect, no. The outcome would have been the same: the North conquering the South. Only with fewer American casualties and trauma victims. No memorial wall in D.C.

And the Vietnam War gave the anti-American left a HUGE break, essentially allowing them to "take the moral high ground" and re-define society along the lines they wanted it to take.

The results are all around you.

--Boris

[CatoRenasci]

Our first mistake in Vietnam was backing the French return to Indochina after WWII. Eisenhower was surely correct in refusing the French nuclear weapons after Dien Bien Phu fell, and in refusing to allow American troops to aid the French in Vietnam. Douglas MacArthur, probably the best Asia hand in the US military, opposed our involvement, and was widely quoted as having advised that the US should never become involved in a land war on the Asian continent. Our involvement only became inevitable once the Kennedys started messing about in Vietnamese politics, backing the coup against Diem. I lost many friends and several Brother Rats in Vietnam and always supported our troops, but that was a war in which the civilian political leadership was abysmal and the senior military leadership craven. I still get angry when I think about Vietnam.

[karlamayne]

No.

Brave Americans have always lost their lives needlessly.

[Ace the Biker]

I requested assignment to Viet Nam when I went in 67 and I would do it again.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Should the US have become involved in the Vietnam conflict?

Eisenhower didn't think so, and I agree with him. After Korea many Americans thought we should never become involved in another ground war in Asia. This is not to slight U.S. motives or actions, especially those of our service men and women.

On balance, the Vietnam involvement probably cost us more than it could ever have gained. It unloosed social disintegration and lead to unchecked third world immigration. Would the USSR have disintegrated anyway? Hard to say. Viewnam caused Carter who caused Reagan who caused the downfall of the USSR. (Prior to Carter, Democrats had successfully demonized Goldwater.)

[gabby hayes]

For openers, we never should have supported the French re-colonial conquest of Indo-China after WW11. Subverting the Geneva Accords of 1954 was myopic along the lines of ignoring the nationalistic impulse of the NLF. In not too many years the "Red monolith" would see the NVA in combat with their comrades from China and Cambodia. Respect for thoser who served, but not a pretty page in our nation's history. (In anticipation of rebuttals, I was honorably discharged in 1961.)

[bandleader]

Only If We Were In It For VICTORY!General Douglas A.MacArthur said that "In War,There Is No Sustitute For Victory"!!

[gcruse]

... because I refuse to believe that so many
brave Americans lost their lives their
needlesly.

"I refuse to believe" is the refuge
of the cornered.

[dfwgator]

The biggest mistake we ever made was to allow France to keep Indochina as a colony after WWII. France would not have joined NATO, if the US didn't allow them to have Indochina. In retrospect, this was bad for two reasons, 1 of course is that we let the French into NATO, and 2 it set us up to attempt to clean up the mess left after Dien Bien Phu.

[donozark]

Some here seem to discount the importance of Vietnam. Cam Ranh Bay has figured in our history for a long time, but far more in the history of SE Asia. We all know what happened as a result of the Japanese landing there. Cam Ranh is one of the best natural harbors in the world. One reason why it didn't take the USSR long before they began parking their subs there, after the fall of Saigon. And would it not be crucial now, in the War on Terror?

I always find the issuance of Ho Chi Minhs March,1946 Order to be very interesting. He actually authorized the French to come back in (the North) and assisted them in destroying the Nationalist Vietnamese. Thousands were butchered. "Uncle Ho" as the left loves to call him not only was a founder of the Vietnamese Communist Party, but the French Communist Party as well.

The USA entered Vietnam as a member of SEATO. As did other nations. All were duty-bound to do so (come to the assistance of a member state). The North has ALWAYS been covetous of the South. They invaded numerous times in previous centuries. So many in fact, the South construction a couple of walls on the 17th Parallel to keep them out.

This from UNHERALDED VICTORY by Mark Woodruff:

"America's victories on the battlefield up until 1973 were overwhelmed by later events, and the sad fact is that Communist North Vietnam did later invade and conquer it southern neighbor. Those who predicted that the surrounding countries would fall like dominoes were proven wrong, but the world will never know if they might have fallen if America had not acted when it did. In 1994, Singapore's President Lee Kwan Yew noted that America's actions in Vietnam had given his country ten years to strengthen itself against the Communists, ten years without which Singapore might well have fallen. One can only speculate on how many other then-vulnerable states could also be added to the list."