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| The Triumph of Intellectual Dishonesty by Sen. James Webb |
| 2007-01-29 |
| By James Webb Newly elected Sen. James Webb, D-VA, wrote this essay in the fall of 1995. The lessons about one lost war, and its instructive value for those who would force us into a second (including Sen. Webb), should prove obvious. -- The Editors. About a year ago I made a presentation to a group of high-powered account executives at one of the world's largest investment banks. My speech discussed Vietnam's current demographics, its economic future, and the desirability of doing business there. During the question-and-answer period I was challenged by a gentlemen of about my age who had never been to Vietnam and who in his youth had obviously been opposed to the war. Why, he asked rather snidely, would I want to do business with the communists when I had tried to kill them as a Marine? Where was my consistency of thought? And indeed why did we even fight a war if they were so keen to do business with us? I answered by pointing out that I have always believed in the strength of the culture and people of Vietnam, that the conditions now emerging in that country are approaching, however slowly, what I and others wanted to see twenty-five years ago; and that it was the communist government's actions, not American intransigence, which had held back the country during the last two decades. Before the next question was asked, I was interrupted by another million-dollar-a-year man, who it turned out was a Yale graduate and an Army veteran of the Vietnam War. He had become so angry from old memories that his face was on fire. "You're being too nice to this guy," he said. "I'll tell you why I have no problem doing business in Vietnam. I spent eighteen months there, and I never hated my enemy as much as I did the people who ... on me when I came home." |
| Posted by:anonymous5089 |
| #8 #7 - sounds just like iraq. We've won every tactical battle yet it's a "quagmire". F*cking stupid media - and more troubling is the ignorant average moron who has the privelege to vote some moonbat in to the WH but cannot connect the dots on iraq, UN resolutions from 1991, al q, muzzy fundies, and wmd's. Yeah, the $million question is why is Webb not saying the same of iraq? If we leave iraq early it will inevitably be a humanitarian crisis prolly surpassing 'nam/cambodia together - what an asshole. We've lost way less people in this conflict then in parallel to 'nam *and* prolly have more to gain from a stable democratic iraq in 2007 then we ever did from a stable democratic 'nam in 1975. |
| Posted by: Broadhead6 2007-01-29 21:15 |
| #7 About the victory of the South over the North in 1972, Pournelle also said "To any rational person destroying a 150,000 man invading force and capturing or destroying an armored corps looks like victory." Of course, this event was not reported that way & has been conveniently ignored by most ever since. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-01-29 20:46 |
| #6 I guess I'll say it again. The US did not lose the war in Viet Nam. It abandoned its ally when the ally was threatened with overwhelming conventional invasion in 1975, unlike the case in 1972 when a previous North Vietnamese conventional invasion was smashed using mostly South Vietnamese ground forces & US air support. By 1975 the North had rebuilt its forces with extensive (and expensive) support from the USSR. This next conventional invasion met with no support from the US government. Each ARVN soldier then had 20 cartridges & 2 grenades. To quote Jerry Pournelle "[South] Viet Nam accordingly and predictably fell. ... Since the United States did not participate in resisting this flat out invasion from the North, how is this a defeat for the United States armed forces? WE DID NOT FIGHT. That was a political decision. Had we fought and lost you could call that a military defeat, but it takes twisted thinking to say that the Army was defeated when it was not fighting...It is easier to blame the [US] army for failing in Viet Nam than it is to accept the fact that the American people and their Congress betrayed an ally and thereby condemned millions to death and torture...You can prove anything if you make up your data. You can draw any lessons you like from history if you ignore all the inconvenient historical facts. You may learn from good history but you learn little from bad history. And it is not good history to say that the US armed forces lost a war they were no longer fighting when their last engagement in that theater was an unalloyed victory. " Oddly enough, Noam Chomsky thinks the US won, in that the North had to abide by the rules of the World Bank. The Soviet Union bankrupted itself financing this war & its next one in Afghanistan, and is no more. |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-01-29 20:44 |
| #5 How many times do you get to stab your own military in the back before all the repeated lessons of history come to play? Consent of the governed is not about votes. It's about the willingness of the people to literally lay it on the line, to give that last full measure of devotion. Ever think that many are willing to die for the Donks or their lap children of the MSM? Well said. The contract is being eroded. I think the war will eventually come to a neighborhood near us. |
| Posted by: SR-71 2007-01-29 11:01 |
| #4 Mogadishu |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2007-01-29 10:18 |
| #3 MOG? |
| Posted by: Anguper Hupomosing9418 2007-01-29 10:11 |
| #2 The American military was not defeated upon the field of battle in Vietnam. It was not defeat at the MOG. It is not defeated upon the field in Iraq. The enemy won the first two because their allies stabbed their own military in the back for political gain and posturing. One and only one party has engaged in and has defeated the American military. What party could that be? What party is that of Sen. Webb? How many times do you get to stab your own military in the back before all the repeated lessons of history come to play? Consent of the governed is not about votes. Dictators often get that 99% vote on their 'elections'. It's about the willingness of the people to literally lay it on the line, to give that last full measure of devotion. Ever think that many are willing to die for the Donks or their lap children of the MSM? |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2007-01-29 09:46 |
| #1 The question then becomes, "Why did he recognize that we won the war (due to a superior military)and lost the peace (due to the Gramscian left in our midst) in Vietnam, yet fails to do so now?" Was he promised something by the left? Is that why he changed? Or perhaps he fears that his generation's sacrifices and deprivations (which he obviously values tremendously) will be eclipsed by another, making his own appear less by comparison? At any rate, the opening anecdote defines well the constant need to distinguish between hot wars with hot enemies and the cold war that we still fight with Marxism, albeit cultural in this era rather than economic. |
| Posted by: no mo uro 2007-01-29 07:32 |