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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (146010)	9/20/2004 5:12:59 PM
From: michael97123	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Tortured vets and tortured dissenters is the legacy of vietnam i am afraid. And that brings me to Kerry who is tortured both ways. I know how hard it is for me to support military solutions in general because of our experience in vietnam. It seems to me that you, Ed and me are saying different things regarding the common shared reality. There is no easy answer for iraq based on our vietnam assumptions. But for me, my prime concern is not the number of iraqis that die but the numbers of americans and if there are to be more casualties it must be with the intent of winning. Right now we have what amounts to a three or four month hiatus until after the election where every family who loses a son or daughter will ask, what for? And if Bush does try to win it after reelection it wont make these folks feel any better. And if it can be proven that our confusion over falujah, ramadi, and samara allowed the enemy to strengthen and the coming battles produce far higher casualties than necessary because of our politicking...... you know what i am saying. mike

To: Neocon who wrote (146010)	9/20/2004 6:50:54 PM
From: cnyndwllr	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Neocon, re: My reevaluation of our Vietnam policy came after the fall of Saigon; the mass executions; the re-education camps; the fall of Laos and Cambodia; the boat people; Pol Pot; etc. I did not become "for" the war in Vietnam, but I became a lot less sure that "against" was correct. So I am afraid your "lessons from the Vietnam War" are not so obvious or compelling as you seem to believe........ Yes, there was a terrible price to pay but were the alternatives worse? Two questions will never be answered, first, what course history would have taken if we had not destabilized the region and second, what course would history have taken if we'd stayed and kept killing millions of Vietnamese? One thing that we DO KNOW for sure, we were powerless to impose our will on Vietnam. Another thing WE KNOW for sure, the names on the Vietnam wall stopped adding up when we butted out. That's good enough for me but for those who thought the deaths were worth whatever we were getting out of it, we could form a foreign legion for enlistees who thought it was worth THEIR LIVES. I'd wish them all well, and after a while I suspect that we'd see a lot less of such activism. Just let them figure it out-Ed.