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Topic: How soon we forget!

topic by Dick Dettrey 12/1/2001 (24:17)

reply top I am a honorably discharged and DRAFTED Vietnam veteran who served in that tiny and misunderstood country in 1965 and 1966. It was just like this terrorist attack of today. It was the battle cry of the Vietnam war which is: 'Remember the Maddox,' which was used by our 'peace president,LBJ, to fully involve us in a land war in Asia-Vietnam, to be exact. (Very few Americans remember that, but I, sure, do!) In WW 11, the battle cry was 'Remember Pearl Harbor.' However, there's a huge difference since Pearl Harbor actually occurred! Since, all the evidence uncovered about the infamous Tonkin Gulf incident of 4 Aug 64, states that it NEVER occurred and was used as a rallying point for the trusting American people. I was one of them for I was stuck in the army at the time of our full invasion of that tiny and once-beautiful country that we destroyed in order to save! (The logic behind that statement, completely, escapes me)! LBJ, apparently, remembered the words of Robert C. Winthrop, legislator and historian, who said to Congress in 1864: 'Professed patriotism may be made the cover for a multitude of sins.' It was used in 1964, and I wonder if is it being used, now? Dick Dettrey, a somehow honorably discharged Vietnam veteran

reply by John Shaplin 12/2/2001 (20:19)

reply top Dick, my memory of those times serves up a different dish: The Tonkin Gulf Incident wasn't really 'used as a rallying point for the trusting American people' but as something that Johnson presented to members of Congress more or less privately in chambers, exposed by Elsburg in 'The Pentagon Papers' and used as a rallying cry by the opponents of war. Of course the same sort of idiots fill the Congress today and willingly gag themselves with respect to all the so-called 'reliable intelligence' booted over from the C.I.A. by the National Security Council. But this is only for the select few who sit on the right committees, the rest just read 'The New York (Zionist) Times'! At any rate, both lessons not learned. 'John Calvin', Vietnan refusnik.

reply by John Calvin 12/3/2001 (16:16)

reply top I'd like to correct my statement which was a bit awkward. I meant to say that there wasn't much 'rallying' at the 'start' of the Vietnam war such as occurred in WWII after Pearl Harbor or at the beginning of Desert Storm and the Infinite Justice/Enduring Freedom Crusade. The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution wasn't much in the public focus until later, when protestsd mounted. I might as well add here that, having lived through the Vietnam War- mostly with a 'Leftist' orientation- I'm not convinced that those arguments had much effect in bringing it to an end. Rather, it was the 'old patriotism' of George Washington in his Farewell Address, Ike's warning about a 'military-Industrial Complex' and the record of American Letters ( e.g. the quote from Mark Twain presented by Sandra) that proved the most persuasive to the people with the power to end it. Today, I think the case is similiar and complicated by the fact that many of the justifications being used to support the war like 'liberating' the women of Afghanistan and establishing secular governments which are indifferent or even hostile to religion are also arguments habitually used by the Left, thus undercutting the credibility of their protests. Of course, mounting U.S. casualties, lack of real and lasting success on the battlefield, the ominous presence of China and the USSR and deterioration of the social fabric at home were probably the most important factors. Such factors are bound to arise to a much greater extent in the present conflict as time goes on and the tedious, difficult and conflict-producing debate that is bound to arise starts to drive ordinary citizens ( who today imagine they can get by 'united' forever)crazy.