Bush Rewrites History of Vietnam War
You can tell Bush is really getting desperate because now he himself is bringing up the Vietnam War.
But instead of recognizing it for what it was-a reckless imperial overreach, just like his own Iraq War-Bush twists the history of the Vietnam War to try to buttress the one he’s got us in now.
Check this out: He says we should have stayed in Vietnam longer.
“The price of America’s withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens,” he told the Veterans of Foreign Wars. By the way, he’s counting the victims of the Khmer Rouge, who came to power only after the U.S. ruined Cambodia.
And he’s not counting the three million people the U.S. killed in Southeast Asia during that war.
Just as he’s not counting the 70,000 to 700,000 civilian Iraqis his war has killed, or the one in ten who have been forced to leave their homes.
As Kissinger and Nixon did in Vietnam, so Bush is doing in Iraq: arguing that withdrawal will damage the credibility of the United States and embolden our enemies. To back up that point, Bush wheels out bin Laden, who has become useful again (rather than a total embarrassment) for the Administration. Since bin Laden cites Vietnam as a signal of American weakness, Bush concludes that America can never withdraw again from a war.
But what Bush doesn’t yet grasp-though the CIA has admitted-is that the U.S. occupation of Iraq is, today, serving as a recruiting device for Al Qaeda.
So at best, the Al Qaeda argument is a wash: Withdrawing from Iraq helps Al Qaeda; staying in Iraq helps Al Qaeda.
It is, of course, amazing that Bush is even bringing up Vietnam.
Back on April 13, 2004 he was asked about the Vietnam analogy at a press conference.
But Bush did not want to hear anything about it. “The analogy is false,” he said, without explaining why.
He did, however, suggest that it was almost treasonous to raise the specter of Vietnam. “That analogy sends the wrong message to our troops and to the enemy,” he said.
Now he sends the message himself.
And what, by the way, does Bush suggest we should have done in Vietnam?
The North Vietnamese and the Viet Cong were overrunning Saigon; the U.S. embassy personnel barely got away in helicopters off the roof.
And despite more bombs tossed on the Vietnamese than all the bombs during World War II, the U.S couldn’t prevail there.
Short of committing wholesale genocide.
Bush has previously implied that the United States didn’t kill enough people in Vietnam.
Here are his words from his acceptance speech at the Republican National Convention in 2000: “A generation shaped by Vietnam must remember the lessons of Vietnam: When America uses force in the world . . . the victory must be overwhelming.”
The prospect of overwhelming victory never existed in Vietnam. Nor does it exist in Iraq today.
Bush is rewriting history-never his best subject.
Matthew Rothschild is the editor of The Progressive magazine.
© 2007 The Progressive
How does Bush know anything about Viet Nam? He wasn’t there!
Who controls the past - controls the future!
Bushslut yesterday quoted Graham Greene’s “Quiet American,” wherein the innocent and naive American character is discovered to actually be a CIA agent engaged in paying thugs to create FALSE FLAG OPERATIONS…thereby terrorizing the locals and blaming both sides (insurgents and occupying military) for these manufactured/synthetic “terror” events. Sound familiar, anyone?
So here we have our serial-killer prezdint pretending to be acquainted with a novel in which the USA is clearly exposed as a terrorist force. Beautiful. Talk about exposing this naked emperor and the horse he road in on…
The whole thing, bushslut’s speech and his literary reference, is so sublimely, so perfectly calibrated that I am beginning to suspect his “handlers” may have finally decided to help bush betray himself for the sociopathic madman we all know him to be! Really, did they do it on purpose?? Cause if they didn’t, this is one helluva collective Freudian slip…
Junior “Ner’do’well” Bush never withdrew from Vietnam, because he never went.
He was tasked by his Daddy to defend the officers mess in Alabama from unsalted peanuts
If the Chimp cares so much about millions of innocent citizens, is that why he has them slaughtered? What an ignoramus.
Before you rewrite history, you need to be able to write.
What George learned from the Vietnam war were political lessons, since it was a political war. One of the lessons learned from the Vietnam War included keeping the media in control of the government. TV was a scapegoat for a failed policy, but a lesson learned.
But it’s what Bush didn’t learn that is the problem. He didn’t learn that you can’t force your will inside a foreign country. America has even had much better success at changing people and countries with dollars than with bombs.
He could also have learned that you can’t fight and win a war without the full knowledge and support of the American people. After WW2 the American people were taken out of the war effort. America wars no longer have rationing, war bonds, weekly theater newsreels, a draft, no Rosy the riveter, we don’t even have to pull our drapes. Korean vets went and came home practically unknown and unnoticed. The Vietnam War was already going on for nearly five years before Americans even knew what their troops were doing. And they got to know because of the media, not from the government.
Of course when you prosecute a political war it’s not a good idea to tell the American people the truth. And to Bush it doesn’t really matter if you win or lose because it’s all political for him. He just wants to hold on to his chair.
Hoa binh
Can’t wait to see the footage of the last US diplomatic personnel leaving Baghdad in Apache helicopters from the embassy roof, there’s an analogy for ya Georgie, and the result will be the same. Hundreds of thousands if not millions dead at the hands of whatever band of US trained thugs gains ascendancy over the remains of ‘the cradle of civilisation’.
Each and every one of us, democrat, repubican, liberal or conservative should be hanging our heads in shame, for each and every one of us did NOT do enough to stop this stinking, rotten, bloody carnage. In the end we can bitch all we like but WE let it happen. We ultimately control what these trained monkeys do, they are OUR chosen governers. They tell us lies, or tell us nothing and we let them. They control our media and use them to misinform us, and we let them. The media, as well as congress, the Senate, and the UN fail to ask the questions we know should be asked, and we LET them.
How much longer will we dodge our responsibilities as free citizens?
How many more millions of violent, bloody, hideous deaths will occur before we start acting on that thing about ‘eternal vigilance’.
This war is not the result of a lunatic gone mad, it is the result of a hundred million people not bothering to vote, and another hundred million believing that voting is the sum total of our responsibility. Perhaps Jefferson should have been clearer about the ‘eternal vigilance’. We’ve allowed ourselves to believe he meant just watching…and most of us aren’t even doing that.
What will you, yes YOU do about this horrific situation in the next week?
I’ll tell you exactly what you’ll do, same as me…abso-bloody-lutely nothing. Thank god for American Idol.
D’ye think this was what the big guy was talking about with that line concerning ‘worshiping false idols’?
As vile, ignorant & ludicrous a figure as Bush is, let’s keep in mind that he’s just the front man for a whole class of powerful people who are every bit as vile & murderous as Bush himself. Some are even worse.
Interestingly, there’s not even a single decent person in the whole administration. There’s not even a single “pseudo-decent” person. Every last one is a monster, a liar & a criminal. In the first GW Bush admin, they had Colin Powell — who beneath the surface is actually just as bad as Rice, Cheney, Bolton, Gonzo, Rummy & all the rest. But at least Powell had a pleasant & skillfully telegenic personality, so he could get away with faking the role of “the voice of sanity.” In the current admin, none of the crew can even fake it! Atilla the Hun would be the most liberal member of this administration, if he was still around.
What we have had for the last seven years is precisely the kind of gangster-tyranny that several of the so-called “Founding Fathers” warned us about. If the American people had any self-respect & political consciousness, they would rise up and overthrow this illegitimate tyranny, which has already violated (and in fact, revoked) a large portion of the Constitution. I doubt there’s a single member of the admin who couldn’t be put behind bars for life, under the legal system which existed prior to the theft of the 2000 election.
Bush’s handlers seem to be positioning him, by giving him more and more preposterous speeches to read and outrageous policies to propose, so that the Democrats must declare Bush to be the enemy and then Impeach him and Cheney or they must acquiesce. And with “off the table” Pelosi in charge, it appears to be a winning strategy.
RichM,
A frightening thought is that Rove may have left because the rest of the criminal gang was too depraved and insane even for his tastes.
THE BIG LIE
Repeated over and over in the face of objective reality…
THE BIG LIE
Fascism, NAZIism, propaganda, war…
THE BIG LIE
“We lost the good war in Vietnam because we quit, because of liberal defeatist pacifists we abandoned the poor souls of South East Asia, and after we betrayed and abandoned them they suffered so horribly…”
THE BIG LIE
Repeat repeat repeat repeat repeat repeat…
THE BIG LIE
RichM:
Your points, as usual, are eloquently and forcefully stated (especially the last paragraph). I continue to be baffled that there is so little momentum for impeachment, when, as you point out, impeachment is the least of what these thugs should suffer.
Slashpot has it exactly right.
Webwalk has it right.
Thik about it. The Big Lie manipulation lead to fearfulness freezing the electorate from action including voting and thinking. Talk about a deer in the headlights unable to properly assess the facts and act accordingly!
“We have met the enemy and he is us” - Pogo 1970 (Walt Kelly)
And the Spin goes on….and on……and…..
if you go backward and “correct” the mistakes made in vietnam, then everything will be all right, right? what planet are these people from?
Personally I believe this makes things easier for those who wish to truly understand the truth about the Vietnam conflict.
Because if Bush says it, it MUST be a lie.
“if you go backward and “correct” the mistakes made in vietnam, then everything will be all right, right? what planet are these people from?”
Actually, these people are from a cartoon. I remember an episode where Bart Simpson gets shocked by touching a live electrical wire, and he continues to do so thinking that the outcome on the next try will be different.
Even if Bart finally figures out that there are ways to insulate him from the shocks, the main point is to not try and touch a live electrical wire in the first place.
So there you have it folks, we have a bunch of cartoon characters running this country thinking that they can “remake the world in their image,” when the wise thing to do is not attempt such a foolish undertaking in the first place.
Sadly, many in this country believe in the utterly foolish notions of manifest destiny and moral superiority. If there is to be any lasting change, progressives ought to find ways to wean people away from such authoritarian notions.
“As Kissinger and Nixon did in Vietnam, so Bush is doing in Iraq: arguing that withdrawal will damage the credibility of the United States and embolden our enemies.”
Is it really Bush who is delusional or the people in this country who continue to swallow this shit……. hook, line and sinker?
Slapshot, I tend to agree with your withering analysis, but I have to ask, What could we have done to prevent all this? It’s not as if no one tried. Maybe we didn’t do enough, but what should we have done, or do now, that won’t be met with main force, in the streets or wherever we do it? They have the firepower, and begging Congress to kick the bastards out hasn’t worked. Imploring Congress to impeach hasn’t worked, though significant majorities favor impeachment. We have no representation, and that’s the core of our problem. If we resort to violence we’ll be throttled in no time. Hundreds of thousands protested in the streets in 2003 and have since, off and on, to no avail. I was among them, and it seemed as if most of us knew marching and protesting wouldn’t work but what else was there? Yelling at other progressives on blogs to get off their asses and DO something also doesn’t yield much. But if you know what we should do, please don’t hold back. Clue us in.
Because We Are THE REDCOATS!
You all have some very good and important material about Bush and his fiasco. But, you know we are going to have to stop worrying about this for a few months as the football season is just about here and we need to get ready for another big year.. Then American Idol comes on too, and it takes quite a little time to watch also. We can get back to these problems next spring–unless the Olympics… Gee I don`t know when.
“The prospect of overwhelming victory never existed in Vietnam. Nor does it exist in Iraq today.”
Whoever hasn’t read Daniel Ellsberg’s “Secrets” should do so. Ir’a surprising the Beast has taken this long to enunciate what has ALWAYS been the reactionary position — as Kevin Kline as the goonish CIA thug in “A Fish Called Wanda” shouts at John Cleese, “Shut up! Vietnam was a tie!!”
” If we resort to violence we’ll be throttled in no time.”
See Ward Churchill’s “Pacifism As Pathology” from AK Press, prefaced by Derrick Jensen and Ed Mead.
Is there a difference between Nancy Pelosi’s “Impeachment is off the table” and our “revolution is off the table” position? I’m as reluctant to surrender my safety as the next person — but is there safety anywhere? Today Iraq, tomorrow Iran — and us, in the meantime.
Do you want to do something about this? This will be an eye-catcher. Go out and rent the movie, “Full metal jacket”. Do your computer magic and make a clip show for YOUTUBE. Make a montage with the indifferent, hateful, attitudes of the soldiers, toward the “gooks”; blend that with a few clips of idiot king Bush. But now here’s the kicker. In order for it to get seen by the millions of mind-numb zombies of americans, you need to title it in the bases of all terms. And that movie has it. Remember that classic scene, “Me so horny, me love you long time”. Who knows? You’re internet addicted teenager, might even ask you about the Vietnam war.
I usually agree with what Matthew Rothschild has to say (when he’s not implying that a vote for Kerry amounted to saying “no” to the Iraq war or smearing Norman Finkelstein, that is).
But his affectation of writing in single sentence paragraphs drives me up a wall.
He offers each sentence to us like a tiny, precious pearl, separate from all the rest.
Resonating in its own little echo chamber.
But sometimes with a partner. Just to mix things up.
It’s like political commentary presented as blank verse poetry.
Hmm.
Actually, it’s kind of fun.
Try it yourself some time.
You may like it!
Ok, that’s enough.
I’ll stop.
I promise.
As long as I’m here: it’s clear to me that Rothschild doesn’t understand the real lesson of Vietnam…for that bit of wisdom, you have to go to the New York Times or the Los Angeles Times.
Thank goodness we have them to instruct us!
Dichterfreund,
I tell you I have goosebumps! I logged on here, and had read a couple of the posts since I posted last night, when the idiot box caught my attention as a show about rich housewives was commencing. I had to reach for the remote as I couldn’t stomach it even as background noise. I flicked around until I found a great movie amongst the trash: The last half hour of “a fish called Wanda”. Again I laughed at Kline’s brilliant portrayal of Otto. The ‘Vietnam’ sequence killed me yet again with Cleese at his insulting best as Michael Palin’s steamroller wielding Ken bears down unmercifully on Otto. Of course Otto laughs hysterically until his own hubris sees him squished.
I thought a couple of minutes about what an amazing analogy it was for America in general, disdainful of the steamroller heading inexorably for them until its too late.
Then, when the movie ended to Otto’s plaintive cry of ‘AaaaashoIe!’, I turned back to the computer…I swear this is true, though it’s nothing more than sheer coincidence, it’s still quite bizarre.
Ephraim:
I admit, it isn’t a simple thing to do, though for each individual it actually is. Simple organisation, a loud enough voice, and the realisation and acceptance of the fact that no one, not anyone, is perfect.
Do that, and you take away the main weapon of the neocon, the fascist, the evil, the corrupt.
Divide and conquer.
Whenever one stands up and shouts for us, louder and clearer than the rest, providing a rallying point, they simply find a way to make him look like them. And it’s so damned easy! They simply point out the fact that he or she is human like the rest of us, and we turn. We forget what we wanted. We curse ourselves for believing in a Messiah and hurry to be the first to say “I knew it all along!”
There is no Messiah, the concept of a perfect being who is also mortal is a creation of the corrupt to prevent us from uniting. We cannot unite without a rallying point, and we won’t rally around anyone who can be shown to be simply a normal, flawed human.
Just pick someone! Anyone. As long as they are shouting the same basic messages you want shouted, don’t quibble over details, just shout along until the voices are too loud to ignore. Who is the loudest voice calling for impeachment right now? Decide, then shout with them, even if you don’t agree with them about anything else, even if you don’t like them. You can always dump them later.
If enough people do that, then what they want will be what happens. When it does, go after the next thing. The main thing is, don’t stop shouting, and stop being so damn picky.
Sorry that went on so long, its much simpler than all that.
Just about everyone here wants impeachment.
This is one of the best known news/talk/blog sites on the planet.
Let’s agree that we want impeachment and that we’ll do what is in our power to do to achieve that end regardless of what other issues we don’t agree on.
I kinda like this blank verse thing… Thanks Distantocean!
The NeoCons, who were still vital in the days of Vietnam, but not yet a majority, had a very clear position on how to win in Vietnam. It was simply “Bomb Hanoi” and nuclear response was absolutely what they had in mind.
Thank God we didn’t. Had we done so (or more frightening to contemplate, had they been in power as they are now) we would not be here in the condition we are in today. We wouldn’t be watching “Survivor” we’d BE survivors.
The war was on the brink of igniting WW3 and a nuclear response in Vietnam would have triggered it. It was after all the “War for the Far East” as Iraq today constitutes a vital battle in the “War for the Middel East”. China would have not idly sat by and watched us “nuke” Hanoi, and the Soviets would not have watched them watch us.
I sometimes shudder at the mentality of the American Right. There was no way to win in Vietnam (thousands of miles away from our home base, no clear military objective in mind and therefore no conceivable conventional definition of victory possible, and day-by-day, less and less support at home). The only way to “WIN” was, as Ann Coulter might have said, anihilation of “those people”.
Oddly, the war was started to halt the advance of Communism yet our defeat hardly hastened this. In fact, had we bombed Hanoi, Vietnam wouldn’t be the capitalist, consumer country it is today.
These people (NeoCons) are not a joke. They are every bit as dangerous as Nazis were, because of their strategic view of human life. They either believe they will somehow all be spared the holocaust that would follow nuclear war (do all those gated communities have underground bunkers?) or they really do believe the “next life” will be better than this one?
I read this site everyday and see it largely as a space where people trash Democratic hopefuls, sure-things and longshots. It depresses me greatly to think the inherent evil resident in the NeoConservatives who have taken over the Republican party does not sufficiently terrify all of you. They must be defeated at any cost.
I for one will take no chances on their retaining the White House to finish the onerous job they have begun. I pledge here and now to vote for and work for ANY Democrat that can defeat Guliani, whose candidacy seems to be based upon his military [sic] posturing.
Republicans have put the rich, the really rich, in control. These people will not suffer the outcome of such horror. If the Democrats have become their unwiitting dupes then kick them in their asses and wake them up! But don’t take the risk of letting these demons retain power.
And don’t for a second think that somehow it won’t matter who gets elected because they are “all the same” - that is an illusion. Not that the Democrats aren’t as bad in many ways as Republicans, but that the power elite that has taken over the Republicn party is worse than anything we can imagine.
Fight for Peace
It’s now overwhelmingly clear that despite the huge cost in blood, treasure and moral standing in the world, neither the Vietnam nor Iraq military actions was in our national interest. Yet Junior argues our “credibility” would suffer if we withdraw prematurely.
So, if we continue on our present course of stupid, counter-productive violence we GAIN in credibility. But if we respond rationally and cut our losses we LOSE credibility.
Acting rationally causes one to lose credibility? I wonder if Junior picked this idea up from an undergraduate logic course at Yale, or if he didn’t learn it till he got to Harvard Business School?
Ephrain would rather bitch than act. That’s why he’ll always moan about the futility of it all.
Hey Jackass doughyden, I’m sure I’ve acted way more than your self-righteous ass ever has. But I’m not immune to noticing futility and not being forever stupid enough to continue repeating activity that only perpetuates it. Are you dumb enough to think I’m the only one around not absolutely certain what must be done, as you seem to be? Or does it make you feel good to single out someone and hold them up to ridicule for some fantasy you have that they’d “rather bitch than act”? Act away, world-changer, get Kucinich elected by throwing money at him. That’ll do the trick. Wear those t-shirts and display those bumper stickers (I’ve done all these things myself), and when they don’t lead to a President Kucinich be sure to hunt me down so you can blame me for your failure. Meanwhile, cram your self-righteous superiority up your Man of Action Ass.