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Politics : Actual left/right wing discussion -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (3202)	10/20/2006 12:25:48 AM
From: Richnorth	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 10087

You wrote: The Vietcong was smashed at Tet!!! Correction: No, they suffered huge losses. But they were not "smashed". "Smashed" is typical American BS in a war they lost. As a matter of fact, Tet was the beginning of the end of the US in Vietnam. Soon after Tet, the initiative for the war began to shift to the enemy!!! Many readers here don't know about this as they were not yet born during the early part of the Vietnam War which lasted from about 1963 to 1974. To understand it in perspective, read the following: Tet Offensive From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Vietnam War The Tet Offensive (January 30, 1968 - June 8, 1969) was a series of operational offensives during the Vietnam War, coordinated between battalion strength elements of the National Liberation Front's People's Liberation Armed Forces (PLAF or Viet Cong) and divisional strength elements of the North Vietnam's People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), against South Vietnam's Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN), and United States military and other ARVN-allied forces. The operations are called the Tet Offensive as they were timed to begin on the night of January 30–31, 1968, T?t Nguyên Ðán (the lunar new year day). The offensive began spectacularly during celebrations of the Lunar New Year, and sporadic operations associated with the offensive continued into 1969. The Tet Offensive can be considered a military defeat for the Communist forces, as neither the Viet Cong nor the North Vietnamese army achieved their tactical goals. Furthermore, the operational cost of the offensive was dangerously high, with the Viet Cong essentially crippled by the huge losses inflicted by South Vietnamese and other Allied forces. Nevertheless, the Offensive is widely considered a turning point of the war in Vietnam, with the NLF and PAVN winning an enormous psychological and propaganda victory. Although US public opinion polls continued to show a majority supporting involvement in the war, this support continued to deteriorate and the nation became increasingly polarized over the war.[1] President Lyndon Johnson saw his popularity fall sharply after the Offensive, and he withdrew as a candidate for re-election in March of 1968. The Tet Offensive is frequently seen as an example of the value of propaganda, media influence and popular opinion in the pursuit of military objectives.................. ------------------------------- Here's an excerpt from vietnam.vassar.edu The Tet Offensive By 1968, things had gone from bad to worse for the Johnson administration. In late January, the DRV and the NLF launched coordinated attacks against the major southern cities. These attacks, known in the west as the Tet Offensive, were designed to "break the aggressive will" of the Johnson administration and force Washington to the bargaining table. The Communist Party believed that the American people were growing war-weary and that Hanoi could humiliate Johnson and force a peace upon him. Most of Hanoi's predications about the Tet Offensive proved elusive. Communist forces suffered tremendous casualties in the South and the massacre of thousands of non-Communists in Hue during the Tet Offensive created ill-will among many of Hanoi's supporters. Furthermore, several leading southern Generals thought the plans for the Tet Offensive were too risky and this created a strain in relations between northern and southern Communists. In any event, in late March 1968, a disgraced Lyndon Johnson announced that he would not seek the Democratic Party's re-nomination for president and hinted that he would go to the bargaining table with the Communists to end the war.

To: TimF who wrote (3202)	10/20/2006 7:02:53 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 10087

"The Vietcong was smashed at Tet." 'Smashed' is a relative term but, yes, Vietcong's ability for set-piece battle was, undoubtedly, severely degraded. Par for the course --- the North often treated the southern rebels as disposable 'cannon fodder'.... "The war continued because North Vietnam continued to attack." Duh! That's a bit like belaboring the obvious! (As the war would have, no doubt, for further generations... if necessary. Nationalism [& anti-Colonialism] being perhaps the strongest motivating political forces of the 20th. Century....) "There really is no force like the NVA in this war." Correct: there are at least three major and differing sides among the locals... Sunnis, Shiites, and Kurds --- to name just the most populous 'factions'. (This is one clear difference.) "But I don't think the enemy forces in Iraq would try something like Tet." I agree. Because for any ONE faction to expose itself by going 'all out' against the foreigners, would weaken itself too much vs. it's local enemies. Never-the-less, it remains quite 'possible' for Sunni and Shiite factions to both take pot shots at occupying forces, as long as we remain interposed between them. (And they will CERTAINLY use our presence to blame all of their problems and their own short-comings on, as an EXCUSE.) A 'rope-a-dope' strategy makes more sense for the 'insurgents'.