I am not old enough to really remember the endgame of VietNam

[dsc]

but I have to wonder how much worse it honestly could have been than the endgame we are seeing in Iraq. If reports are accurate we have literally turned Iraq into a religious state. Not only is this creating a second Iran, and a wealthier Iran, but it also is exactly what our enemies in the war on Terror wanted. It is nothing short of amazing that this ends up being the final result.

By the time we withdraw we will have lost over 2000 troops in Iraq. This is assuming that a withdrawl comes in spring of next year which is the time table being floated. Founding a second Islamic state in the Persian Gulf wasn't worth one life let alone 2000. This is the democracy we want places like Egypt and Syria to become? This is the grand plan?

We entered VietNam due to a now discredited domino theory. Today VietNam, tomorrow the Phillipeans. The only rationale we had left for this war was a sort of reverse domino theory. First we democratize Iraq and then the rest of the Middle East. One can only hope that this domino theory was as wrong as its predecessor or we may well have nothing but Islamic republics from the Mediterranian to the Indian Oceans.

The aftermath of VietNam was a country which may have been too unwilling to go to war, even when it may have been a good idea. One can hope that this will be the aftermath of this disaster as well. I would rather us be too unwilling to go to war than too willing to do so. This is a disaster of the first order. It is a defeat that is tantamont to that we suffered in VietNam. Let's hope we learn from it.

[MichiganVote]

1. Iraw is Nam' w/o the jungle. The rhetoric is all the same

[silverlib]

2. Just got home from "Hearts and Minds"

A 1974 Viet Nam documentary that got little to no play, but won many awards. It was compelling how the talking points were so similar and one pilot who didn't realize the harm he had done until he returned home was asked "Have we learned anything?" His reply went something like this.

"I don't think anyone wants to learn anything from this. All I see is people refusing to learn and sometimes I see myself refusing to learn."

If this is showing anywhere close to where you live, I highly recommend it.

[blondeatlast]

5. Could you mean "Hearts and Minds," by any chance?

If you are talking about another movie, I must check it out (I've seen "Hearts and Minds," excellent, terribly disturbing film).

[silverlib]

8. Yes, that's exactly what I meant...

too past my bed time, but it's hard to go to sleep after seeing this documentary. I see a big correlation between how the info was presented in this film and 9-11.

I'll try to edit if not too much time has elapsed.

[lectrobyte]

3. I'm hoping the outcome isn't a bankrupt U.S., but we'll see

[Gildor Inglorion]

4. Actually, the domino theory was partly right...

it went, "Today Vietnam, tomorrow Laos and Cambodia, day after tomorrow Thailand, the Philippines, and Malaysia (Indonesia already had a Communist dictatorship in place)." Laos and Cambodia fell to the Communists, and Laos remains in Communist hands to this day. I certainly am no apologist for the Vietnam war - I didn't want to go, but the other choice was never going home again - but at least it bought some time for other southeast Asian nations. Our involvement in Vietnam was misguided and wrong; our involvement in Iraq is nothing short of criminal. I'd love to see an American government take charge that would try the B*sh cartel for high crimes and misdemeanors.

[proud2BlibKansan]

6. The endgame in Vietnam was horrible

We barely got out of there alive. I hope it isn't that bad when we leave Iraq.

[FloridaPat]

7. Twenty some years of killling in Vietnam. 4 million Vietnamese civilians

killed. Almost 60,000 American soldiers dead. I seem to remember that the French had Vietnam as a colony and the Vietnamese decided they wanted them out. So The French left and we went in to "advise". And it grew from there.

OK, so why were we there? I have yet to hear anyone say why. The year after Vietnam "fell" there was a big article in the NYT about how there was a lot of oil off the coast of Vietnam. Also, BP and two other oil companies asked the new Vietnamese government to honor the contracts they had with the old government. Vietnam declined.

Iraq is even worse than Vietnam. We have lost all credibility with the rest of the world. We have united almost the entire world against us. We have ticked off the entire Muslim world population. And we have showed the rest of the world we are a paper tiger. And we have basically destroyed our military might. We have also bankrupted the country. And in only 2 years.