Bush in Vietnam warning over Iraq

[joedirt 0]

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Right. Just as we're supplying arms to the Iranian insurgents right now, we supplied arms to the islamic terrorists during the 1980's, we supplied intelligence to Saddam when he was fighting Iran, and we supplied the Iraqi insurgents during the 1990's. It's quite the popular thing to do, and we would be hypocrites to claim that it's wrong.

Holy Shit! I guess theres nothing we can do then about the Iranian military training and supplying insurgents in Iraq. Insurgents who are killing lots of people including U.S. soldiers. Wouldn't want to look like a hypocrite.

Damn man...when you don't want to take a side you sure don't.

[billvon 3,090]

>I guess theres nothing we can do then about the Iranian military
>training and supplying insurgents in Iraq.

There is something we can do - train and equip insurgents in Iran. Which we're doing. A better option would be to put down the gun and talk to them directly. We started doing that back in March, although at the first meeting we did little other than yell at each other. Hopefully that will improve.

>Insurgents who are killing lots of people including U.S. soldiers.

Right - just as our insurgents have killed russians, iranians, and iraqis. If you want to change these wars-by-proxy, get your own house in order - _then_ you can start telling other people what to do with theirs.

[piper17 1]

Largely peaceful after we left??? There are a few million corpses in Vietnam as well as Laos and Cambodia that would seem to indicate otherwise.

The Vietnames government continues to kill parts of its population to this very day...in very significant numbers. Remember "yellow rain"? Not what I would call "largely peaceful".

Pick up the Wall Street Journal today and read the essay entitled "Another Vietnam" by Max Boot. Read about the "unintended consequences" of pulling out of Vietnam prematurely.

In regard to Saudia Arabia, there are major problems with that country and our relationship with them. It is another muslim country with a significant portion of their polulation being muslim extremists. Look at who made up the majority of the 9/11 hijackers. In regard to other muslim counties being the source of insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, look beyond the so-called mainstream media to find out where they are from. Somalia, Chechnya, various "-stans", the Philippines and China to name a few. We are fighting these same muslim insurgents in Afghanistan as well.

Like it or not, this is a global war and we need to take it to the enemy on their home ground. We don't need more 9/11s or London bombings, or Madrid bombings, or Thailand bombings, or Bali bombings etc, etc, etc!

"A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition"...Rudyard Kipling

[billvon 3,090]

>There are a few million corpses in Vietnam as well as Laos and
>Cambodia that would seem to indicate otherwise.

Please indicate where in South Vietnam such a slaughter (millions of people!) took place after 1975, the year we left.

>In regard to Saudia Arabia, there are major problems with that country
>and our relationship with them.

I agree. But they supply us with oil, so we will always be good friends with them.

>Like it or not, this is a global war . . .

No, it's not. We (the coalition that is) are the only ones sending troops overseas.

>and we need to take it to the enemy on their home ground.

Then why are we in Iraq instead of Pakistan? That's where both the Taliban and Al Qaeda have a sanctuary.

>We don't need more 9/11s or London bombings, or Madrid bombings,
>or Thailand bombings, or Bali bombings etc, etc, etc!

Yet the war is causing more and more of these bombings. So the answer is obviously . . . more war? If so, we can look forward to a future of ever-increasing terrorism as more and more people take up arms against our aggression.

---------
Report: Global terrorism up more than 25 percent

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Iraq's sectarian warfare fueled a sharp increase in global terrorism in 2006, the U.S. State Department reported Monday.

The total number of terrorist attacks was up more than 25 percent from the previous year, according to the State Department's annual report on global terrorism.
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[NCclimber 0]

Well, there's this:

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An estimated 1 million people were imprisoned without formal charges or trials.
165,000 people died in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam's re-education camps, according to published academic studies in the United States and Europe.
Thousands were abused or tortured: their hands and legs shackled in painful positions for months, their skin slashed by bamboo canes studded with thorns, their veins injected with poisonous chemicals, their spirits broken with stories about relatives being killed.
Prisoners were incarcerated for as long as 17 years, according to the U.S. Department of State, with most terms ranging from three to 10 years.
At least 150 re-education prisons were built after Saigon fell 26 years ago.
One in three South Vietnamese families had a relative in a re-education camp.

http://www.dartcenter.org/dartaward/2002/hm3/01.html

Excluding all those who fled Vietnam after we left seems a bit disingenuous.

How about looking at it this way - How many Vietnamese died as a result of our departure?

[billvon 3,090]

>Thousands were abused or tortured: their hands and legs shackled
>in painful positions for months, their skin slashed by bamboo canes
>studded with thorns, their veins injected with poisonous chemicals, their
>spirits broken with stories about relatives being killed.

One wonders if there was a Vietnamese Rush Limbaugh saying that that was just some guards blowing off steam. But I don't doubt there were abuses.

>Excluding all those who fled Vietnam after we left seems a bit disingenuous.

Why? People are fleeing several countries by the hundreds of thousands now, including Somalia, the Congo and Burundi. So clearly war isn't the only cause for mass exoduses. Likewise, millions have fled Iraq due to the war - so clearly occupying a country can result in as many refugees as leaving it.

However, if you want to include them, fine with me. By that measure we have ALREADY caused what you might have prevented by staying.

>How about looking at it this way - How many Vietnamese died as a
>result of our departure?

By your numbers, about 165,000 of the South Vietnamese left in Vietnam. Now, how many Vietnamese would have died as a result of our staying? While we were there approximately 4 million civilians died (about half and half north and south.) So the question becomes - is it better to have two million South Koreans die during a war we kept going, or 165,000 die during peacetime?

To translate that question to today's terms - is it better to see another 70,000 Iraqi civilians killed and another 4000 US troops die, over the next 4 years, or is it better to get out and see 6000 Iraqis die after the war? (Assuming the ratios are the same as the Vietnam war, that is.)

[NCclimber 0]

Wow. It's interesting how you seem to intentionally miss the point.

Pointing out that other countries have mass exoduses for various reasons doesn't change the fact that the overwhelming majority of South Vietnamese who left the country after the fall of Saigon, did so to get away from the North Vietnamese.

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>How about looking at it this way - How many Vietnamese died as a
>result of our departure?

By your numbers, about 165,000 of the South Vietnamese left in Vietnam.

Again - it's like talking to a box of rocks. How many of the fleeing Vietnamese were part of the 2 million who died in the Killing Fields. How many of the "boat people" died?

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is it better to get out and see 6000 Iraqis die after the war?

Where did you get such a low number? Do you really think a free-for-all would result in only 6000 deaths?

[billvon 3,090]

>Pointing out that other countries have mass exoduses for various
>reasons doesn't change the fact that the overwhelming majority of South
>Vietnamese who left the country after the fall of Saigon, did so to get away
>from the North Vietnamese.

Yes. And none of that changes the fact that the Iraqis who are leaving NOW are doing so to get away from us and the war we began.

>Again - it's like talking to a box of rocks.

When you revert to the schoolyard insults, it's time to say have a good weekend. Make some jumps or something; get that blood pressure down.

[kallend 2,117]

"He's saying, essentially, that 58,000 dead in Vietnam weren't quite enough, that maybe we should have twice as big a tragic memorial on the Mall. And who's saying it? A man who chose not to serve."
CNN political analyst Paul Begala


"Year-by-year, month-by-month, now even day-to-day, we're treated to a different rationale for the Iraq war."
Joseph Galloway, the only civilian awarded the Bronze Star by the U.S. Army during the Vietnam war, in an military affairs analysis piece for McClatchy newspapers.

"Bush's speech contained rhetoric that would stir any patriot but logic that should persuade few. ... The real lesson of Vietnam is that its civil war was a nationalist struggle that toppled no communist 'dominoes' across Asia. Bush's rhetoric implying an Al Qaeda 'domino effect' in the Middle East has the same false ring."
Editorial, LA Times.

"You're not going to be able to sell the lessons of Vietnam being we should have stayed a decade longer." Douglas Brinckley (Historian).

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[joedirt 0]

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There is something we can do - train and equip insurgents in Iran. Which we're doing. A better option would be to put down the gun and talk to them directly.

So would president Billvon send in another coup organizer to Iran if the talking didn't work, and become one of the hypocrites himself?

[kallend 2,117]

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There is something we can do - train and equip insurgents in Iran. Which we're doing. A better option would be to put down the gun and talk to them directly.

So would president Billvon send in another coup organizer to Iran if the talking didn't work, and become one of the hypocrites himself?

"Better jaw-jaw than war-war", Winston Churchill.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[piper17 1]

http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/vietnam-people-america-1821074-times-new

"A man can never have too much red wine, too many books, or too much ammunition"...Rudyard Kipling

[billvon 3,090]

>So would president Billvon send in another coup organizer to Iran if
>the talking didn't work, and become one of the hypocrites himself?

Nope. President Billvon would tend towards having the US deal with the US, and Iran deal with Iran. I'm funny that way. (Not that I'd ever be elected - I'd always be pissing someone off!)

[kallend 2,117]

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http://www.ocregister.com/opinion/vietnam-people-america-1821074-times-new

Another revisionist historian. Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge only got their opportunity because of the Nixon/Kissinger meddling.

Iraq is not an oyster - our unwanted presence will not produce pearls.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[joedirt 0]

Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge only got their opportunity because of the Nixon/Kissinger meddling.



That's funny how you blame Nixon for "creating the opportunity" for Pol Pot to come to power instead of the ones who actually funded and trained him.

[ErricoMalatesta 0]

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President George W Bush has warned a US withdrawal from Iraq could trigger the kind of upheaval seen in South East Asia after US forces quit Vietnam.

"The price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens," he told war veterans in Missouri.

Mr Bush said the Vietnam War had taught the need for US patience over Iraq.

How the fuck would HE know?

I wonder if anyone considered this argument justifiable when Russia invaded Afghanistan...oh right, no body fucking did... but now the US are doing it to Iraq (and Afghanistan) it is sound reasoning. Double think...

[sv3n 0]

this was the first thing that popped up on the news segment of my homepage..........


Biden Says Bush Wants to Delay Chaos
2007-08-28 18:59:59
The Associated Press
By MIKE GLOVER Associated Press Writer


DAVENPORT, Iowa (AP) — Democrat Joe Biden charged Tuesday that President Bush's policies in Iraq are designed to confuse voters and ensure that a chaotic end to the war is delayed until after he leaves office.

Biden pointed to the turmoil that accompanied the end of the Vietnam War, with Americans plucked from the roof of the U.S. Embassy as enemy troops poured into Saigon. He said Bush wants to avoid such a stain on the end of his presidency.

"They would not be the ones who would have to deal with the reality of picking people up off the roofs of the embassy," said Biden, a Delaware senator and presidential candidate.

Biden, who heads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Congress will launch hearings on the Iraq war the first week it's back in session. He rejected Bush's assertion that an increase in the number of troops has improved the situation in Iraq.

Speaking at a news conference, Biden called for a diplomatic offensive that would reach out to major industrial nations as well as Iraq's neighbors.

"It's long past the time we make Iraq the world's problem, not our own," he said.

Earlier in the day, Bush defended his war strategy in a speech to veterans and warned that a withdrawal of troops would threaten the United States. But Biden said Democrats and Republicans have concluded that the president's Iraq policy is doomed — he compared it to the Bush administration's response to Hurricane Katrina.

"The president continues to suffer from what I refer to as the Katrina complex," he said. "The Katrina complex is, ignore all the warnings, bad things happen, continue to follow the same bad, failed policy and things get worse and worse. That's exactly what this policy is doing to us."

Biden said a series of reports have refuted the claim that Iraq was somehow related to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

"That should put to rest once and for all the false refrain that President Bush keeps repeating and repeated today," he said.

...and you're in violation of your face!

[kallend 2,117]

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Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge only got their opportunity because of the Nixon/Kissinger meddling.



That's funny how you blame Nixon for "creating the opportunity" for Pol Pot to come to power instead of the ones who actually funded and trained him.

Problems have causes, and problems have symptoms. You are focussed on symptoms and ignoring the causes.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[joedirt 0]

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Problems have causes, and problems have symptoms. You are focussed on symptoms and ignoring the causes.

O.K., I'll use your logic and focus on causes.

Gavrilo Princip was responsible for Pol Pot's "utopia".

Gavrilo Princip murdered Archduke Ferdinand...which led to WWI... which led to the treaty of Versailles... which gave Hitler his opportunity for conquest... which started WWII... which started the cold war... that led to the U.S. involvement in Indochina.

It's as much Gavrilo Princip's fault then.