General Westmoreland

[whitehall]

LBJ basked in the afterglow of Camelot and he could do no wrong according to the media. Nobody thought to question the "Tonkin Gulf crisis" at the time and he was able to send Troops to Vietnam based on fraud. By the time the U.S. finally wore down the V.C. after the Tet victory LBJ had enough and quit, giving Giap a chance to regroup and recruit. True to form the media blamed everyone from Westmorland to Nixon when the democrat controlled congress forced the U.S. to abandon the war and leave Vietnamese allies to fend for themselves.

 

[there4eyeM]

France created the whole mess through their colonialism

I think that we can forgive France for colonising Indochina because that was the thing to do "way back when" and every nation with the inclination & the possibility did it either in Asia or the Middle East or Africa or the Americas or even Australia. What we cannot forgive France for is that they FIRST prioritized the Catholic, Vietnamese "converts" against the Buddhists, and SECOND they were not sympathetic to the Vietnamese who sought freedom from France in THE VERY SAME WAY that France fought for their own freedom from the Nazi occupation in Europe and from the Japanese occupation of French-held Indochina.

The US got involved to prop up a corrupt and inept S Vietnamese government

Not that there ever was a "S. Vietnamese government" to begin with. But that is another point to discuss.

Japan took over Vietnam in WWII and drove the French out who were being occupied by the Nazis
Happy to be rid of the French, the Vietnamese found that Japan brought its own oppression.
Vietnamese rebels fought against Japan and expected they would have their own country after Japan was defeated
They appealed to the US to intercede on the side of freedom. Instead we backed France regaining colonial control

At least the U.S. was consistent; it liberated France and handed it over to the French, then it liberated Vietnam and handed it over to the French. See how easy that is?

 

[Flash]

William Westmoreland


Despite a stellar career as a U.S. Army officer, General William Childs Westmoreland is, unfortunately, best remembered for prevaricating about the situations surrounding the Vietnam War.

Criticized for giving positive assessments of worsening conditions in Vietnam, he was ridiculed by the public and media for deliberately deceiving President Lyndon B. Johnson, to maintain support of the war.

https://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1864.html

LBJ was a terrible Commander in Chief just like he was a terrible President.

He thought he could fight the Vietnam War in the South on the terms of the Communists. All he did with that stupid plan was unnecessarily get tens of thousands American troops killed.

Nixon fixed all that. He withdrew American combat troops and took the war to the North. He kicked the shit out of them and they agreed to the Paris Peace Accords allowing the sovereignty of South Vietnam, the goal of the conflict all along.

Too bad the filthy ass Democrats, aided by a few weak Republicans, gave the victory away to the Communists by defunding military aid to South Vietnam. One of the most despicable acts ever done by the Democrats.

 

[GLASNOST]

At least the U.S. was consistent; it liberated France and handed it over to the French, then it liberated Vietnam and handed it over to the French.

I don't fault the U.S. on that point but it translates to an inadequate amount of brownie points that can never justify the treachery they committed upon the Vietnamese people once the U.S. occupied the country, plunging it into a devasting war. The blood accumulated on the hands of the U.S. government has yet to be rinsed.

 

[rightwinger]

LBJ basked in the afterglow of Camelot and he could do no wrong according to the media. Nobody thought to question the "Tonkin Gulf crisis" at the time and he was able to send Troops to Vietnam based on fraud. By the time the U.S. finally wore down the V.C. after the Tet victory LBJ had enough and quit, giving Giap a chance to regroup and recruit. True to form the media blamed everyone from Westmorland to Nixon when the democrat controlled congress forced the U.S. to abandon the war and leave Vietnamese allies to fend for themselves.

The US realized the war was unwinable as early as 1966
But we kept sending more soldiers into the meat grinder to keep from admitting we had made a mistake

McNamara sends Johnson memo critical of Vietnam, Oct. 14, 1966

McNamara told Johnson that he saw “no reasonable way to bring the war to an end soon.” He viewed the U.S.-led pacification drive, which held a high priority in the Johnson administration, as “a bad disappointment.” And he cited widespread agreement within the intelligence community that the bombing of North Vietnam, code-named Operation Rolling Thunder, had neither “significantly affected infiltration [of South Vietnam nor] cracked the morale of Hanoi.”

McNamara foresaw a bleak future for the struggle against the communist foe, which had generated a rising tide of domestic anti-war protests. As he put it: “The prognosis is bad that the war can be brought to a satisfactory conclusion within the next two years. The large-unit operations probably will not do it; negotiations probably will not do it.”

 

[GLASNOST]

Nixon ..... He withdrew American combat troops and took the war to the North. He kicked the shit out of them and they agreed to the Paris Peace Accords allowing the sovereignty of South Vietnam, the goal of the conflict all along......

This is untrue as a statement and as a contradiction unto itself. You make it sound as if ONE he forced Vietnam to a joint Paris Peace Talks and TWO that in doing so he had accomplished the goal that the U.S. had had from the very start.

ONE. It was actually the tenacity of the Vietnamese people who forced the U.S. to agree to what culminated in the Paris Peace Talks ... not the other way around. And TWO the U.S NEVER intended to witness any Democratic freedom in Vietnam. It was, after all, the U.S. that thwarted Democratic elections in Vietnam in the first place.

 

[GLASNOST]

The US realized the war was unwinable as early as 1966
But we kept sending more soldiers into the meat grinder to keep from admitting we had made a mistake.

I do not agree with that. The situation Vietnam found itself in (once France had been defeated) was an opportunity of exploitation that the American, capitalist, Military-Industrial Complex was quick to recognise.

American endeavours in Vietnam (and every other American war since) was one that Eisenhower had warned of. We can prove this by realizing the U.S. never had any "game plan" in Vietnam. There was no "winning strategy" mapped out. This is because winning (read 'ending') was in total contrary to the Military-Industrial Complex goals. Let's talk turkey here. The longer the war carried on the richer the big goats became. "WAR" - that was the goal. So willing to admit this or unwilling to admit that was just a 'slight-of-hand' shell-game devised to keep the American tax-payers befuddled ... made even easier thanks to the "Red Hoard" paranoia that Joseph McCarthy had injected into the homes of the American population.

 

[Flash]

Nixon ..... He withdrew American combat troops and took the war to the North. He kicked the shit out of them and they agreed to the Paris Peace Accords allowing the sovereignty of South Vietnam, the goal of the conflict all along......

This is untrue as a statement and as a contradiction unto itself. You make it sound as if ONE he forced Vietnam to a joint Paris Peace Talks and TWO that in doing so he had accomplished the goal that the U.S. had had from the very start.

ONE. It was actually the tenacity of the Vietnamese people who forced the U.S. to agree to what culminated in the Paris Peace Talks ... not the other way around. And TWO the U.S NEVER intended to witness any Democratic freedom in Vietnam. It was, after all, the U.S. that thwarted Democratic elections in Vietnam in the first place.

You are confused.

It was the bombing of the North. The Soviets and the Chinese were ready to give up support.

Nixon was a much better Commander in Chief than that asshole LBJ. He knew how to defeat the North without getting tens of thousands of American troops killed.

The objective of the war was met when the Commies signed the Paris Peace Acoords. Until Nixon kicked their asses they felt they could win the ground war in the South with the help of the Soviets and the Chinese.

I was over there from November of 1967 until March of 1970. I saw what a disaster LBJ was as a Commander in Chief.

I saw how the morale dropped when the sonofabitch announced the curtailment of bombing of the North. That told the troops they were wasting their time fighting the Commies. Nixon corrected that.

I saw a lot of things first hand but that doesn't make me an expert on the war. If you are confused about the war may I suggest that you read "Why We Were In Vietnam" by Norman Podhoretz?

 

[GLASNOST]

France was a Catholic country and installed the minority Vietnamese catholics in leadership positions to rule Vietnam for them.

More or less, yes.

Kennedy was the U.S. president when the French army was defeated in Vietnam and France lost its colony. President Kennedy was a Catholic, and many people believe he was pressured by the Pope/Vatican to send American advisors (troops) to help keep the Vietnamese catholics in power.

I can see no indication of that and no logic either.

 

[GLASNOST]

You are confused.
It was the bombing of the North. The Soviets and the Chinese were ready to give up support.
Nixon was a much better Commander in Chief than that asshole LBJ. He knew how to defeat the North without getting tens of thousands of American troops killed.

The objective of the war was met when the Commies signed the Paris Peace Acoords. Until Nixon kicked their asses they felt they could win the ground war in the South with the help of the Soviets and the Chinese.

I was over there from November of 1967 until March of 1970. I saw what a disaster LBJ was as a Commander in Chief.

I saw how the morale dropped when the sonofabitch announced the curtailment of bombing of the North. That told the troops they were wasting their time fighting the Commies. Nixon corrected that.

I saw a lot of things first hand but that doesn't make me an expert on the war. If you are confused about the war may I suggest that you read "Why We Were In Vietnam" by Norman Podhoretz?

This is all untrue. I am a Vietnam War Vet myself - Central Highlands 1966 - 67. "Why We Were in Vietnam" is an ad hoc concoction put together by the CIA and is mostly a Red Herring. It is so riddled with American propaganda - some obvious ... some sublime - that it makes me want to vomit.

 

[Sunni Man]

I have noticed the time frame when a person was in-country has a lot to do with their perception and opinions of the Vietnam War.

U.S. Army 1970-71 ....

 

[GLASNOST]

The end result was the U.S. lost the Vietnam war and gained zilch....

This is a conundrum because you have not (nor many others) defined your own notion of the two words "U.S." and "gain". Make no mistake, many powerful & influential Americans made gazillions on the War in Vietnam. Their "gain" was enormous. But what about the U.S.? If you are talking about the American population, American values, American credibility .... well, no ... no gain at all. But you don't really believe that those who "gained" give a shit about the nation ..... do you?

 

[Flash]

You are confused.
It was the bombing of the North. The Soviets and the Chinese were ready to give up support.
Nixon was a much better Commander in Chief than that asshole LBJ. He knew how to defeat the North without getting tens of thousands of American troops killed.

The objective of the war was met when the Commies signed the Paris Peace Acoords. Until Nixon kicked their asses they felt they could win the ground war in the South with the help of the Soviets and the Chinese.

I was over there from November of 1967 until March of 1970. I saw what a disaster LBJ was as a Commander in Chief.

I saw how the morale dropped when the sonofabitch announced the curtailment of bombing of the North. That told the troops they were wasting their time fighting the Commies. Nixon corrected that.

I saw a lot of things first hand but that doesn't make me an expert on the war. If you are confused about the war may I suggest that you read "Why We Were In Vietnam" by Norman Podhoretz?

This is all untrue. I am a Vietnam War Vet myself - Central Highlands 1966 - 67. "Why We Were in Vietnam" is an ad hoc concoction put together by the CIA and is mostly a Red Herring. It is so riddled with American propaganda - some obvious ... some sublime - that it makes me want to vomit.

You are really confused about this, aren't you? The CIA did not write that book.

Unfortunately most people only know about Vietnam from what they heard from Hollywood and the Liberal press.

What do I know?

I was sent over in LBJ's buildup and I was sent home with Nixon's draw down. I saw a lot of shit when I was there. I saw how LBJ wasted our troops with the wrong strategy. "Lets fight the commies on their turf on their schedule, what could possibly go wrong?". After I got home Nixon kicked the shit out of the North and soon after the North signed the Paris Peace Accords, which guaranteed that the South would remain sovereign. That was always the objective of the war. We had won.

All we had to do was continue the funding for the South like we did in Korea after the war there and everything would have been fine. But that is not what happened. What happened was the filthy ass Democrats (that hated the fact that the Commies didn't win) voted to defund South Vietnam. That led to the Commie takeover and the slaughter of untold numbers of South Vietnamese. The slaughter even spread to Laos and Cambodia.

Vietnam was a big shit sandwich for everybody. Kennedy and LBJ should have never got us involved in the first place. They were idiots, especially LBJ for escalating the war with his trumped up Gulf of Tonkin bullshit. LBJ was a first class idiot with his strategy that Nixon corrected. The Democrats (with a help of a few weak Republicans) were assholes by doing a cut and run after victory had been achieved.

 

[GLASNOST]

You are really confused about this, aren't you? The CIA did not write that book.

So it is your conviction that the info in that book was gathered on the author's "own unbiased steam" ... that the pseudo-facts within were not collected from official, CIA-spun pages?

Unfortunately most people only know about Vietnam from what they heard from Hollywood and the Liberal press.

I am not one of them.

What do I know?

Well? Let's find out ...... > > >

I was sent over in LBJ's buildup and I was sent home with Nixon's draw down. I saw a lot of shit when I was there. I saw how LBJ wasted our troops with the wrong strategy. "Lets fight the commies on their turf on their schedule, what could possibly go wrong?". After I got home Nixon kicked the shit out of the North and soon after the North signed the Paris Peace Accords, which guaranteed that the South would remain sovereign. That was always the objective of the war. We had won.

All we had to do was continue the funding for the South like we did in Korea after the war there and everything would have been fine. But that is not what happened. What happened was the filthy ass Democrats (that hated the fact that the Commies didn't win) voted to defund South Vietnam. That led to the Commie takeover and the slaughter of untold numbers of South Vietnamese. The slaughter even spread to Laos and Cambodia.

> > > .... ah, not very much.

All you've done was take the standard & fundamental, American propaganda and tried to weasel through the cracks. Really pathetic.

 

[Flash]

You are really confused about this, aren't you? The CIA did not write that book.

So it is your conviction that the info in that book was gathered on the author's "own unbiased steam" ... that the pseudo-facts within were not collected from official, CIA-spun pages?

Unfortunately most people only know about Vietnam from what they heard from Hollywood and the Liberal press.

I am not one of them.

What do I know?

Well? Let's find out ...... > > >

I was sent over in LBJ's buildup and I was sent home with Nixon's draw down. I saw a lot of shit when I was there. I saw how LBJ wasted our troops with the wrong strategy. "Lets fight the commies on their turf on their schedule, what could possibly go wrong?". After I got home Nixon kicked the shit out of the North and soon after the North signed the Paris Peace Accords, which guaranteed that the South would remain sovereign. That was always the objective of the war. We had won.

All we had to do was continue the funding for the South like we did in Korea after the war there and everything would have been fine. But that is not what happened. What happened was the filthy ass Democrats (that hated the fact that the Commies didn't win) voted to defund South Vietnam. That led to the Commie takeover and the slaughter of untold numbers of South Vietnamese. The slaughter even spread to Laos and Cambodia.

> > > .... ah, not very much.

All you've done was take the standard & fundamental, American propaganda and tried to weasel through the cracks. Really pathetic.

It is too bad that both of us that served (if you really did) have different outlooks on that shitshow.

It is obvious to me that you are very confused. Did you take mind altering drugs while over there? Maybe when you came back? That would explain your confusion.

 

[GLASNOST]

All you've done was take the standard & fundamental, American propaganda and tried to weasel through the cracks. Really pathetic.

[It is too bad that both of us that served (if you really did) have different outlooks on that shitshow.

No, it is not "too bad" because it has NOTHING to do with anything. This is just a child's logic you are trying to pass off as something it isn't. Only a child's mind would think being in Vietnam makes someone an expert, someone with inside information, someone who knows what politicians and generals said and thought. THAT sort of information can only be got by education and a keen & earnest will to seek out truth ....as much of it as possible. You, however, have displayed no intelligent understanding or personal knowledge on the subject. Yours is only the official American spun version of a filthy war similar to saying "it was a mistake" or "a miscalculation" or "out of our hands". The American occupation of Vietnam was none of those things. It was a lucrative con job specifically implemented with the goal of continuing it as long as they didn't get caught. But the government did get caught during the international Peace Movement.

[It is obvious to me that you are very confused. Did you take mind altering drugs while over there? Maybe when you came back? That would explain your confusion.

You poor idiot.

 

[Picaro]

....the US could NEVER win in Nam, but USMC Gen. Walt wanted to do it differently--small USMC/SV units--getting to know the people/etc
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/usmc/williamson.pdf
Lewis William Walt - Wikipedia
etc

Being barred from the northern part kind of put a damper on that idea, though it did have much to recommend it. Viet Nam is quickly becoming an American satellite these days.

we could've even went into the North and nothing would change--they would've just:
waited us out
moved their troops

A US “Victory” would have led to Viet Cong led insurgency supported by Russia and China

We would have had to remain to support the Saigon Government and would still be taking casualties

Rubbish. What do you think the VC were? They were crushed by Tet, and their own leadership says this; it was the U.S. press and left wingers that kept them at war, with bullshit stories about how we were 'losing n stuff'. And we all know who won the Cold War, and Johnson's escalation in Viet Nam went a long way in bankrupting the Khrushchev Doctrine. It had to shut down its global insurrection campaign in 1973, and the West took it to a soft landing after that. It's more than stupid to keep babbling how ' we lost n stuff', when it's immediately obvious we didn't lose a thing.

 

[Picaro]

Ah no; we would have been in it a lot sooner if that were case, having committed up front to keeping it free from Soviet attempts to collapse it.

Johnson did what anybody else would have done in the same situation, i.e. where his entire JCS and his own Secretaries were ally lying about the facts, and trusted none of them, so he took control of some facets of the war himself. He wasn't going to be led into criminal acts in violation of the UN mandates by his political enemies, either. IT was the press who made TET, a major and final defeat of the Viet Cong, look like a major victory, and it was also the press who never complained about the North's constant violations of UN restrictions ignoring the DMZ and their use of the trails in Laos and Cambodia. You can blame the press and the pseudo-intellectual commie in American academia for selling the public bullshit about the 'war' that continues to this day. It was right for the U.S. to get involved, same as it was to get involved in Korea, the ME, Africa, and South America. The difference between Johnson's escalations and Eisenhower's wimpiness and conservative approach to the Cold War is like night and day; Eisenhower rescued no one from Soviet and Red Chinese mass murders and slavery, Johnson's polices bankrupted the Soviets' imperialist dreams and kept Red China and the Soviets divided, and pretty much ended the Cold War. Nixon merely reaped the benefits of a bankrupt Soviet Union.

After WWII, Vietnam would have united under Ho Chi Minh and formed its own country......just like today
They would avoided millions of deaths

I agree any politician would have followed the path of LBJ. In Cold War USA, allowing Vietnam to turn communist was political suicide

Ho would have turned it into another North Korea, and more millions would have died. LBJ's polices crushed the Viet Cong, and yet the media kept claiming it was a 'loss', and also ignored the North's blatantly illegal invasions of the south, while all the commie sympathizers were running around calling Johnson and company 'war criminals', and of most dope addled idiots liked the sound of that, so the repeat it to this day. They would have kept on going, first Laos, then Cambodia, then Thailand, then Malaysia. Fortunately Viet Nam bankrupted the Soviets, the 1973 war ended their influence in the ME, and they collapsed in 1973, unable to exploit their victory.

Not necessarily
Ho had made repeated overtures to the West to support a free Vietnam. Colonialism was hated and oppressive. When the West supported a return to Colonial rule, Communism offered a tempting alternative

Ho was a Red; his 'overtures' were rightly rejected as bullshit, and his word meant nothing.

lol @ communism offering 'an alternative' to oppression. IT would merely become a Russian colony, which is exactly what it did for a few years.

No, at the time, Ho was not a red

Eventually, the Communists offered Ho a better option than the Colonial Capitalists

Ho was a Red from the beginning. That's why the Red Chinese and Soviets supported him. He was recruited in France.

 

[Picaro]

#1 lesson learned from the Vietnam War.

"You can't bomb people back to the stone age when they still live in the stone ago."

30 years later America forgot lesson #1 and bombed the stone age people of Afghanistan, and achieved the same results as we did in Vietnam. ...

Afghanistan wasn't always the Stone Age.

The U.S. built Afghanistan's first paved highway ... in 1934. We've had diplomatic relations with them since 1934.

 

[Picaro]

....Afghanistan was much different in that we targeted the bad guys and NOT the Afghan airfields/industry/etc as much
..North Vietnam DID agree to terms after the massive Linebacker bombings--it did not win the war, but it did cause the NVs to relent

The end result was the U.S. lost the Vietnam war and gained zilch.

Afghanistan is basically the same story. No win, no prize. ...

also we disrupted the bad guys--A LOT --this is good

....fighting terrorism is MUCH DIFFERENT

The larger picture is we SEATO allies, and abandoning VN would leave them vulnerable. As it was they went into panic mode when Nixon began offering 'peace' overtures and agreeing to Red Chinese hegemony in the region. It wasn't just about Viet Nam, it was about a much bigger picture.