Michael,
If you don't want to discuss, AND LEARN, from history, for the purpose of applying it's lessons to current foreign policy, then don't get involved in the discussion..
Message 23543138
It's germane because so many people have tried, incorrectly, to draw lessons from the experience in Vietnam and apply them to Iraq. Certainly we've seen various media pundits and politicians tell us all about the Vietnam "quagmire" being repeated in Iraq.
There are, of course, similarities. But there are also many disparities. And it's important to understand what they are, lest we fail to understand history properly.
Vietnam was "state on state" aggression based upon ideology, cloaked in the banner of "unification". But hundreds of thousands of people fled the North because they did not want to live under a communist government. And when the North conquered the South, millions more found themselves fleeing their homes from the communists. And those who stayed found themselves incarcerated in "re-education" camps, to be indoctrinated in the ideology of Marxist-Leninism (which hardly applied to them since they were agrarian, not industrialized).
The mid-east, on the other hand, is involved in a politico-theological conflict with militant extremists on one side, and secular and religious moderates on the other.
But the result, if we're not willing to confront these Jihadists, will be the same.. Millions of people will suffer just as the Afghanis did under the Taliban. And the end result will be more attacks against the west.
Hawk |
