Iraq Through the Prism of Vietnam

[AGENDA21]

The Vietnam War experience can’t tell us anything about the war in Iraq – or so it is said. If you believe that, trying looking through this lens, and you may change your mind.

The Vietnam War had three phases. The War in Iraq has already completed an analogous first phase, is approaching the end of the second phase, and shows signs of entering the third.

Phase One in Vietnam lasted from 1961 until the Congress passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution in March 1965, authorizing deployment of large U.S. combat forces in South Vietnam. It began with hesitation and a gross misreading of American strategic interests. It concluded with the U.S. use of phony intelligence that made it seem that North Vietnamese patrol boats had attacked U.S. ships in the Tonkin Gulf without provocation.

President Kennedy was ambivalent about deeper involvement, but some of his aides believed that a North Vietnamese takeover of the south would bring Sino-Soviet dominion over all of Southeast Asia. They paid little attention to the emerging Sino-Soviet split, which the Intelligence Community was reporting in the early 1960s. Accordingly, the “containment of China” became their goal, their rationale for U.S. strategic purpose – that is, not allowing the Soviet Bloc to expand in this region.

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0309-20.htm

[MADem]

1. Turning the corner!!!

Light at the end of the tunnel!!!

We had to destroy that village in order to save it!!!

Peace with honor!!!

AGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

When will we ever learn???

[AbsoluteArmorer]

2. It is IraqNam!

Good thread... good awareness about the close comparisons between Iraq and Vietnam. In my own opinion, both were set up by similar GOP and NeoCon operators in our govt. To understand how Vietnam evolved, allows us the same track Iraq is on. It will take the American ppl and the troops to, once again, divert the NeoCon's goals.

This thread is a keeper!

[AGENDA21]

4. I agree with ya...

[PsN2Wind]

3. More confirmation

check my sig line

[KharmaTrain]

5. This Is A Different Book In Many Ways

Being one who lived through the Viet Nam era, I'm as guilty as anyone in making comparisons between the two quagmires, but I see big difference in where we stand now and how it relates to the endgame in Vietnam.

For the most part, our Nam involvement was rural...the major cities were not the urban hellholes Baghdad and Fallujah are. Our troops had a buffer...bases and other environs that were relatively safe havens (except during Tet) where they could escape the war...be it temporarily, but it was not as relentless than what our forces confront today. I don't think any American military force has been put in such a tenible position...not only standing between two factions that want to kill each other (the South Vietnamese were never so willing as Iraqi "allies" are in that matter) but we're also the occupying army that is the ultimate target of all sides. There is no concept of "peace with honor" being discussed here...no face saving that leaves the door open for some sort of organized withdrawl.

The overall damage this incursion and its mismangement and fraud can't even be calculated at this point as its still ongoing. This regime's distorted foreign policy masks not only how we can deal with a situation, but in how others can or will work with us. At one point I had hoped a future Democratic leader could appeal to the Arab league to assist in finding a way for us to get out of this mess and begin restoring some face in that part of the world...but now I think we've crossed several bridges too far where no one wants to help or trust us.

[MADem]

6. Every point you made is valid

Certainly, they are not precisely the same at all, from a tactical aspect, especially. And certainly given that Vietnam was a proxy war, where we fucked up a third party country rather than going after the Big Commies head-on.

The similarity is that we got in over our heads, where we were not wanted, with a stated agenda that talked about bullshit like freedom and self-determination, but in actual fact was all about gaining strategic advantage and resources.

We weren't unprepared for the city fighting aspect, as military training has incorporated the idea of street fighting in earnest since the Somalia debacle. The thing that threw these clowns for a loop back in DC was that they thought Saddam had sufficiently pacified and COWED the Iraqi population so that, even if they didn't greet us as liberators, they'd be too beaten down through years of hardship, deprivation, and the odd bombings, that they would not muster any resistance. And then, we could give them treats, and make them sit up and beg like good dogs.

The idiots just did not count on NATIONALISM...and not nationalism in the 'greater Iraqi' sense, but those regional and cultural loyalties which were the only things that kept the beaten down majority of shi'ites and the culturally-distinct Kurds from going mad when they had to eat shit from the Sunni-Takriti bosses. Once they let those genies out of their bottles, they weren't going back in. And of course, there are plenty of "support groups" from outside the country coming in to fan the flames...either because of boredom, an attitude of "just war" against imperialist westerners, or some crazyass religious fervor.

It's sort of like a cheesy remake of a Disney movie twenty or thirty years on...the essential plot features are the same, but the situations are different. Do you want your Jerry Lewis as the Nutty Professor, or your Eddie Murphy rendition? How about your Fred MacMurray Shaggy Dog, or your Tim Allen edition?

Never mind the details, the story always ends on the same note....only in the case of Iraq-Nam, it ain't funny.

[WilliamPitt]

7. Il Dupe

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=614820&mesg_id=614820

My thread didn't get a lot of traction yesterday. Here's a kick hoping yours will. This is an important story.