Walter Cronkite's Ridiculous Spin on the 1968 Tet Offensive in South Vietnam

[Soupnazi630]

I am still waiting for you to posts facts that prove that the War in Vietnam was justified.

I did

 

[whitehall]

Cronkite was America's favorite newscaster. He had plenty of chances to go to Vietnam. Why did he put on a helmet and pretend he was under fire while he pronounced the Tet victory to be a stalemate? Was it an attempt at drama or was there a more sinister motive not to give Nixon credit for winning the war?

 

[Tom Paine 1949]

Of course the U.S. went to Vietnam thinking, hoping, we could succeed in keeping South Vietnam on “our side” of the Cold War as we did South Korea in the Korean War. Unfortunately for the U.S the whole situation in Vietnam was very different than it was in Korea.

But of course few Americans understood or cared about the history, or even the recent history, of Vietnam, or the history of the Vietnamese Communist Party there, or even knew Ho Chi Minh had led a popular government in Hanoi at the end of WWII that had declared independence before British naval troops helped France overthrew it to reimpose French colonial rule. This return of French colonialism, not immediately but eventually won U.S. backing — despite Ho Chi Minh’s overtures to the U.S. at the time.

Of course Ho Chi Minh and his band of resistance fighters had already worked with the U.S. CIA (its predecessor anyway) in the fight against Japan. Though definitely a communist, Ho had traveled extensively in Europe and even in the U.S. and had a far more sophisticated understanding of the world than the Korean communists. With a different Western policy, he may very well have emerged as a fairly independent leader like Yugoslavia’s Tito.

 

[Hector12]

I did

Feelings are not facts.

 

[Hector12]

The north atttacked them and tortured and slaughtered them

We did it too. Why was that?

 

[Soupnazi630]

Feelings are not facts.

Thats why I post facts and you post feelings

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Cronkite was acknowledged as the most trusted man in the media at the time. The problem was that there was no other voice in the media. Just when Americans finally defeated the V.C. after Tet, Cronkite deemed the victory to be a stalemate and the crazy commie supported American left wing declared the American victory to be a defeat. The democrat majority in congress decided to pull the plug rather than giving Nixon a win and Cronkite and the liberal media decided to grasp defeat from the arms of victory.

Your Rosy-Eyed View Wilted

North Vietnam would have immediately replaced their Tet losses just by lowering the draft age by one year.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Tet was a propaganda victory for the Communists because Gen. Westmorland and President Johnson had not prepared the American people for an offensive of that magnitude. They kept talking about a "light at the end of the tunnel," as though the War in Vietnam was nearly won.

Instead the Communists fought on for another five years and eventually won total victory, handing the United States a humiliating defeat.

Until Tet most male college graduates thought the War would be over by graduation. Tet meant there was no end in sight. Tet gave energy to the anti war movement.

The Very Name Selective Service Indicates Elitist Capital Treason

Our GI-deploring hereditary ruling class was defeated, not real Americans. Yet its totalitarian thought-control allowed it to grow even stronger. The betrayed GIs couldn't overthrow it, even though they were the only ones in their generation who were trained to kill. All their will to fight was purposely taken out of them, just as it had been taken from the original patriots, which caused the failure of Shays's Rebellion.

College graduates were not "deferred"; in reality, though not officially, they were exempted. So they didn't protest the war out of fear of getting drafted and sent there; it was pure snobbery against the Whites who refused to run away to college because it is designed for teenagers who are afraid to grow up.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

We did it too. Why was that?

Winning Attitude to "Civilians": "Help Us Kill the Enemy or You Are the Enemy and We Will Kill You."

Nine months after I got out of combat, the Captain of my former company said, "We destroyed Hue in order to save it."

We lost when the race traitors made it a war to save the worthless Vietnamese in the South instead of invading the North, like MacArthur did in Korea before Truman took it away from him because of fear of the weak and primitive Chinese.

Eisenhower didn't land in Normandy to save the worthless French. His only objective was to get to Germany and force the Nazis to surrender.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

American involvement in that war was unjust for reasons I have already stated in this thread.

Preppies on Both the Left and the Right Owe Vietnam Veterans 60,000 Lives

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

INTERESTING COMPARISON BETWEEN THE PRESS COVERAGE OF
THE VIETNAM WAR AND THE ISRAELI-PALESTINIAN CONFLICT​

During the Vietnam War and the I-P conflict you had-have the same giant army of journalists, talking heads, "experts", politicians constantly bombarding the american people that victory is right around the corner in Vietnam and that the 2-state solution is possible.

The average american, time and again, as the years and decades go by, see the reality in Vietnam and Palestine consistently demolishing the lies spread by the american media, the politicians, the generals and the "experts".

The average Joe:

"For 30 years I have seen battle after battle in Vietnam and attack after attack in Israel-Palestine.

What I see in front of me are two peoples (the Vietnamese and Palestinians) who will never accept the partition of their homeland and this is the exact opposite of what the journalists and "experts" say everyday.

But who am I to disagree with all those american journalists, political comentators and politicians, not to mention US generals and "experts" on the history of Vietnam and Palestine, who spent their whole lives studying the art of war and those parts of the world respectively.

My personal opinion is that the defeat of NVA and the Vietcong and the 2-state solution for Palestine are pipe dreams, miserable failures with zero chance to succeed in the future but I will continue to defer to the knowledge of the experts who know much more than I do about these two subjects."

Anyone Who Says, "At Least Bush Served" Deserves to Have a Son Die Taking a Richkid's Place

As Deserter Dubya said before 9/11, "Terrorism is just a Jew problem." That's why he canceled all operations Clinton had carried out to attack terrorist bases. WASPs never want to do anything to help Jews, even if not just the Jews are being threatened, whether against Nazis before Pearl Harbor or Muzzies before 9/11.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Yes they were invaded'

Your historic spin is an out right lie like the claim you served

After an HeirHead Meets His Guillotine, There Will Only Be Air Where His Head Used to Be

I was there when the North Vietnamese Army openly invaded in September of 1966. I had to listen to a Marine scream himself to death after three AK-47 bullets blew out his stomach. I wish that kind of death for everyone who used his Daddy's influence to get out of even having to go on Active Duty.

 

[Deadstick]

I think you got your dates mixed up there.

Assuming you meant the offensive of 1975, the US was well out according to the Paris Peace Accords. Ford had no intention of intervening again.

The thing was, Nixon knew he was selling the South out at the Paris Conference. He just wanted enough time to pull American Troops out to save face.

I believe the phrase was peace with honour

 

[Deadstick]

What don't I know about the War in Vietnam that would cause me to agree with you if I learned?

What I do know is that President Eisenhower wrote in his memoirs that his advisers told him that as many as 80% of the Vietnamese supported Ho Chi Minh,

Selection from Eisenhower's Memoires

and that the Geneva Geneva Agreement of 1954 scheduled an election to be held in July 1956 to unify Vietnam, that the division of Vietnam into North and South was to be temporary, and that foreign troops were forbidden to be introduced to Vietnam.

Internet History Sourcebooks: Modern History

What you did get right was the 1954 Geneva meeting, the election never happened because Ho Chi Minh would have won, the Americans and their puppets in the South didn't want that, so Minh was left with no choice but to liberate the Country by force.

 

[Deadstick]

Yes

The war was legal

About as legal as Hitlers attack on France.

 

[Deadstick]

Your problem is you are simple and ignorant, study some Vietnamese history before you say anything instead of looking at Hollywood for history.

Sorry Hector that post was not meant for you, apologies.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Vietnam is one nation, not two. Vietnam veterans I have talked to told me that the Communists had considerable support in South Vietnam.

Blood Money for Bluebloods

So did the Nazis have support in France; that's why the French lost. The Nazis also won a reasonably fair election in Germany, so whom the insignificant natives supported is a meaningless consideration. Most of all— because totalitarian thought-control makes us think otherwise—Hitler had majority support as a tool against Communism from the American and European ruling classes, which was the real reason for "appeasement," despite the pro-war draft-dodging heirs of weapons sales hypocritically preaching that appeasement was "cowardice," (Munich meme) and the justification for sending those born in the White working-class off to get slaughtered in Vietnam.

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

Do you believe that history books are unbiased sources of truth written by dispassionate reporters of facts?

Not the Histwhorians You Use to Justify Your Preppylove

I heard your slimey class-treason from a friend of sissyboy Dan Quayle, the Kokomo Commando. He said that Quayle had his Daddy get him in the Gutless Guard, pretending to believe that the Democrats weren't trying to win the war.

 

[Seymour Flops]

Not the Histwhorians You Use to Justify Your Preppylove

I heard your slimey class-treason from a friend of sissyboy Dan Quayle, the Kokomo Commando. He said that Quayle had his Daddy get him in the Gutless Guard, pretending to believe that the Democrats weren't trying to win the war.

Well, that was just weird…

 

[The Sage of Main Street]

You lost get over it.

Before They Could Stab Us in the Back, They Had to Take Away Our Backbone

The purpose of the Vietnam War was to kill off or take the fight out of the bravest sons of the White working class. Mission Accomplished.

This is not a Right or Left issue; those are two branches of the self-appointed ruling class. We need a Tet Offensive against the Big Top, this time run by Populists instead of deceptive Communists. We will suffer very few casualties, and the Privileged will be wiped out.