The New Vietnam

[greek302]

One of the biggest marches on washington in the last 5 years is happening right now.

These photos are of US and British Anti-war Rallies in the last 5 years

[removeduser_426582376423734]

Its not the new Vietnam, its still Vietnam. Going into a war for too long with no real victory will do this to any country. The west's been moving towards pacifism since the end of WW2.

[greek302]

[RusskiSoldat]

Yes, the war is unpopular, everyone gets that.
It being the new Vietnam in terms of any losses is an exaggeration.
The only issue at stake right now is how to keep some semblance of order in the country after we pull out.

[Tom Paine]

New Vietnam is a comparison now nigh-universally acknowledged and actually referred to directly by GWB himself, so... What's the purpose of this thread?

[RusskiSoldat]

Yes, because I put great faith into the words of GWB

[greek302]

lol

[darkseb]

They should have demonstrated a few years ago when bush came to power and decided to invade irak against international support, it would have spared america a lot of human losses, money and credibility. But i just remember self confident americans who supported a foolish president and were deaf to the rest of the world's call not to wage war. And once again you have to pay the price... Now on maybe America will listen to their allies a little more. You just have the president you vote for twice...

[Aristophanes]

Part of the reason this war is the 'new Vietnam' is that the mindstate of those people mediating it has been so substantially shaped by Vietnam, and there's been, without doubt, a juvenilist effort by the predictable crowd - the likes of Sean Penn, Susan Sarandon, et al... - to transform it thus.
The fact of the matter is there is a large part of the population that has never been engaged in any serious moral quandary, no essential struggle; and this preening neo-hippyism appeals to a certain part of the people as self-indulgent, solipsistic, vicarious catharsis in their 'selfless' attempts to salvage a moral high ground. It is recourse , an offering to the world to forgive the plenty and prosperity they grew up in. As much as much as I might find the self-flagellatory efforts of some religious sects to be barbaric and ignorant, I can't possibly characterize them as ignoble in the sense that this crowd, eager to evade personal responsibility, seeks to assume a moral and, ultimately, meretricious cloak.
Whatever my agreements or disagreements with American foreign policy, present or past, I can't help but think that this 'selfless' concern for the people in Iraq - which seems to demand the immediate withdrawal of American troops - is a vulgar display of the worst excesses of naivete and emotionality, or, simply, a tribalist, hypocritical and partisan attempt to undermine a regime which they claim does not represent them.

[Eric]

I do not believe that the Western nations should go completely pacifist. With no means to defend ourselves, a few wicked men could just walk right over us.

I believe our defence policy should be run on the philosophy of a quote I once heard. It goes like this: A Pacifist is someone who never takes up arms, even when people take up arms against him, a Warmonger is someone who takes up arms even when there is not threat to him. A true Warrior is he who arrays his arms around his home, but prays and tries to never, never use them. The western nations should act like the Warrior in that quote.

[removeduser_426582376423734]

I do not believe that the Western nations should go completely pacifist. With no means to defend ourselves, a few wicked men could just walk right over us.

I believe our defence policy should be run on the philosophy of a quote I once heard. It goes like this: A Pacifist is someone who never takes up arms, even when people take up arms against him, a Warmonger is someone who takes up arms even when there is not threat to him. A true Warrior is he who arrays his arms around his home, but prays and tries to never, never use them. The western nations should act like the Warrior in that quote.

Its rarely this easy. The Warrior must fuel his home, and a good old warrior across from him has some oil. He is also different.

[Tom Paine]

So Aristophanes, you deny the possibility of people thinking that the war was wrong on the basis of it being illegal and immoral? You deny the possibily of it being anything but self-serving, to say the war is wrong, even if one does not think the troops should be withdrawn with all haste? That's the implication.

[bdh]

So Aristophanes, you deny the possibility of people thinking that the war was wrong on the basis of it being illegal and immoral? You deny the possibily of it being anything but self-serving, to say the war is wrong, even if one does not think the troops should be withdrawn with all haste? That's the implication.

No, thats not what he is implying at all. He's implying these people aren't making real, personal sacrifices.

[Aristophanes]

So Aristophanes, you deny the possibility of people thinking that the war was wrong on the basis of it being illegal and immoral? You deny the possibily of it being anything but self-serving, to say the war is wrong, even if one does not think the troops should be withdrawn with all haste? That's the implication.

The war happened no less than 4 years ago. It's done, it's over. Today there are American forces in Iraq, and they are, most likely, the only thing holding the warring factions back from all-out conflict. We can all form a comfort circle and lazily smoke pot, handing out the blame and washing our hands of the whole thing. We can repeat ridiculous maxims about 'peace' or other airy-fairy, nebullous ideals, but that ignores the reality. The price the Iraqi people are paying right now is nothing compared to what the weak, the women, the children, the infirm, and the old will pay when the all-out civil war begins. The US now has are responsibility, a duty, to prevent that. If the US soldiers leave tomorrow it will not simply be the dishonour and despondence of defeat and failure that they suffer, but the anguish of the massacres and mass graves that follow. Those demonstrators in Washington will never suffer that: they will only have the smug confidence of being 'right', no matter how many people died so they could feel that.

So yes, I find the demonstrations childish, naive, and worse.

[RusskiSoldat]

This thread is disappointing.
I was expecting a discussion of the economic and political growth of Vietnam in the recent years.

[JP226]

I heard a little about this earlier. It was some blurb and did not care really. Not that I so much as poltically disagree with them, which I do, but rather I had better things to do, like sports. FSU has to win this basketball game right now and as far as i'm concerned it's more important.

The point i'm getting at is, i'm one of the more informed individuals. WHether or not you agree with me, I do know more than the average person as to what is going on in the world. As most if not all of you do. Why else would we be here in the political mudpit? But as myself, someone "in the know" did not know, how much, honestly, does the vast majority care or even know of what's going on?

[Kretchfoop]

Depends on how we define "Vietnam". If we are talking strictly military matters then yes there are some similarities. But the entire Vietnam experience is absolutely nothing like that of Iraq. I don't think many people understand the effect the Vietnam War had on American society, both Americans and Non-Americans. Most people just know about the military aspect of it.

Today the US is very stable, very little internal strife. No one likes to admit it but the the number of US casualties are very low. Contrast this to the Vietnam era with the ongoing civil rights movement, Watergate scandal, conscription and the semi-"class" tensions it caused (rich kids could go to college to avoid the draft, poor kids couldn't). Really, the only thing happening now is most people hate Bush and company and responded as such at the midterm elections. No one bring up any red state, blue state nonsense please. One state voting 54% in favor of Bush and another 55% in favor of Kerry is not indicative of any sort of real divide.

Only the strictly military comparisons have any sort of weight. In Vietnam, the US was trying to stop a North Vietnam and therefore, communist, take over of South Vietnam. In Iraq the US toppled an autocratic regime and is now attempting to install a "friendlier" government. Not very similar at all.

I really don't understand the need to compare Iraq with Vietnam. Does Iraq being the new Vietnam make it worse or something? I don't know why it can't just be called "Iraq" and left at that. In my opinion it is clearly a very distinct experience from the one suffered in Vietnam and comparing it to Vietnam confuses the actual matters at hand.

EDIT: Brainfart. I forgot to mention the obvious similarity that in both conflicts the US had no real long term plan or goal. But I think that would largely qualify as a military matter so I'll just say I covered it.

[green tea]

I think about where its comparable: The US came to a war they cant win. Not even with those (25.000?) more soldiers. The US army isnt strong enough anymore, its exhausted. It simply cant win this war. Or in other words: This war is lost now. Sending in more troops doesnt change anything. And this is a catastrophy, not only for the image of the US, but for the whole western world. The instability caused by this will change the whole middle-east-picture. The "reason" for this war was to fight "terrorism". But what was before in irak? We had Saddam. He had a severe image-problem, or in other words: he was a lunatic killer, a dictator, someone I would not like to have as a neighbour. But he controlled his country, with those three ethnic groups. Now we have Saddam hanged, and surely he deserved this. But now we have a civil war between the sunnites and the shiites. And whoever wins will not have as main goal to make this a better world for the US and their friends. We all have a big problem now.

[carl-the-conqueror]

ah, but iraq has oil, and as you can see that makes all the difference !

[LoZz]

i think in the UK we had 1 million people on that rally against the iraq war, thats the largest protest in this countrys history and means that 1 in every 60 people attended it.