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Whenever I have read or heard about the way anti-war protesters acted and especially treated vets it makes me sick to think people can be so horrible. Sure they may not have to like it, but they seemed like they were spineless cowards who's only real value would be to have been used as meat shields. It's a shame an anti-war protester could not have taken a bullet or two rather than a soldier.
To me they didn't even deserve to call themselves Americans. Just a bunch of selfish scum bags as far as I'm concerned.
Do you understand why they were protesting? They thought the war was pointless, and they turned out to be right. The US lost after tremendous loss of life on both sides, not to mention the bombing of Cambodia.
Can anyone explain why the US took over the defense of South Vietnam from the French in the first place? I don't buy the idea that the only reason was to prevent the spread of communism. Were there resources in the area the US wanted?
Do you understand why they were protesting? They thought the war was pointless, and they turned out to be right. The US lost after tremendous loss of life on both sides, not to mention the bombing of Cambodia.
Can anyone explain why the US took over the defense of South Vietnam from the French in the first place? I don't buy the idea that the only reason was to prevent the spread of communism. Were there resources in the area the US wanted?
initially it was to prevent the spread of communism. The soviets were backing the North Vietnamese. Later I believe it was Johnson's and Nixon's ego -- neither wanted to be the first president to lose a war.
The militias also were mostly volunteer to protect their area too. That's basically how it worked until about 1861 with the Civil War (especially for the North). The South was actually was rather militia led. After the Civil War, it switched to the draft rather than the militia. As I mentioned, similar but different.
As for your assertion with we were the draft we saw Indian Wars of the 1870's, the Spanish-American War, World War 1, World War 2, Korean War and Vietnam War. Since switching to a voulenteer army, we have only seen two Iraq wars and Afghanistan.
But they have been going on for nearly 15 years, and if you really want to find any news you have to seek it because it isn't headline news. It's like people forget we are fighting a war at all. If it weren't for the volunteer military, I think the wars would have ended a long time ago. I do not want a new draft, but it is sad that we have been fighting for so long it has just become background noise, or a bit on the news crawl at the bottom of the screen.
But they have been going on for nearly 15 years, and if you really want to find any news you have to seek it because it isn't headline news. It's like people forget we are fighting a war at all. If it weren't for the volunteer military, I think the wars would have ended a long time ago. I do not want a new draft, but it is sad that we have been fighting for so long it has just become background noise, or a bit on the news crawl at the bottom of the screen.
I'm so sure a drafted army would have been cause to withdraw troops too early. We could have seen a Viet Kong type take over similar to some of the radical groups including ISIS/ISLS that we see popping up in Iraq.
I'm not sure what the answer for the armed forces should be whether draft, volunteer, militia based or private because none are a perfect situation. With the draft, we have too much of a smartened youth who while not necessarily liberal, aren't as gullible as they were in the early days of the Cold War to the evils of US involvement elsewhere and why the US is getting involved. Volunteer armed forces is far too reliant on supply and demand and is often seen as more racist than the draft ever was as it goes after the poor (which is typically minorities), more so than the rich (which typically is whites.) Militias are OK but they are better guerrilla fighters on homeland rather than foreign soil (part of the reason we lost Nam and won the Revolution.) A privatized army is no answer, just look at Africa with Sierra Leone with their corrupt soldier for hire set up. Regardless of the method, I'd argue that men and women both need to sign up for Selective Service or just abolish it because it is sexist to have young men need to sign up for it to get federal loans or grants while young women don't have to.
The bit about the war is just a news scrawl mainly because of how long it has been drawn out and honestly how it isn't a war anymore. It's nation building yet we can't leave because the governments aren't stable with the various terrorist and radicalized Islamic groups angling for control in both nations. Honestly, I'd argue we should have never left Iraq the first time.
It's nation building yet we can't leave because the governments aren't stable with the various terrorist and radicalized Islamic groups angling for control in both nations. Honestly, I'd argue we should have never left Iraq the first time.
The problem with taking on the task of nation-building is that the US would prefer to build a nation like itself--without realizing that it took a hundred years to stabilize the US...and that was from a firm foundation already established by the British.
In the early 90s, I had seen at three "Iraq After Saddam" intelligence analyses that predicted precisely what has happened in Iraq. A good bit of that understanding came from what happened to Yugoslavia after the death of Josip Tito. We--at least the Iraq experts--thoroughly knew that Iraq would spin apart without Saddam or someone very much like him.
The problem with taking on the task of nation-building is that the US would prefer to build a nation like itself--without realizing that it took a hundred years to stabilize the US...and that was from a firm foundation already established by the British.
In the early 90s, I had seen at three "Iraq After Saddam" intelligence analyses that predicted precisely what has happened in Iraq. A good bit of that understanding came from what happened to Yugoslavia after the death of Josip Tito. We--at least the Iraq experts--thoroughly knew that Iraq would spin apart without Saddam or someone very much like him.
And the nation would be in far worse shape with insurgency than it would ever be should the U.S. not gotten involved in establishing a stable government.
Do you understand why they were protesting? They thought the war was pointless, and they turned out to be right. The US lost after tremendous loss of life on both sides, not to mention the bombing of Cambodia.
Can anyone explain why the US took over the defense of South Vietnam from the French in the first place? I don't buy the idea that the only reason was to prevent the spread of communism. Were there resources in the area the US wanted?
I'd like to ask your age. Young people truly do not comprehend the hysteria that fear of communism provoked in this country during the Cold War. In this era, when people built a home, they often built a bomb or "fall out" shelter with it. "Better Dead than Red" was a common bumper sticker that you saw on cars. The defense budget assumed a huge proportion of the actual federal budget (and our GDP). People began speaking of a military industrial complex. In any event, I will repeat that in terms of historical analysis, you can't really comprehend what the war was about until you understand that fear of communism.
Vietnam did not have much in the way of resources and that was known. The situation in Vietnam, at first, seemed similar to what had occurred in Korea. We perceived a pro-Chinese, pro-Russian, communist government attempting to overrun a group of people in South Vietnam who were pro-western. Ultimately, the President had to act simply because of the political pressure to do so.
I once took an economics class from Kay Hunt who was a radical economist. If anyone would have believed the Vietnam War took place because of resources in Southeast Asia it would have been Kay Hunt. He didn't believe that and said so in a text book he wrote. He believed the orthodox view that the war occurred because of a general desire to halt the spread of communism.
I could elaborate on causation just a bit more. There were people in the State Department at that time that saw Mao Zedong and the Chinese communists in a particularly bad light. They felt that China because of its high population had "expansionist tendencies" and they saw putting troops in South Vietnam as a way to contain the country's desire for expansion into the rest of Southeast Asia. However, that is simply a corollary to the general idea that the was necessary to prevent the spread of communism.
Only years later, did we begin to see the actions of the North Vietnamese more as nationalists than communists.
There were also cowards committing the atrocities of My Lai and the like within the US armed forces. Not that anyone was ever seriously prosecuted or not quickly pardoned for it.
Do you understand why they were protesting? They thought the war was pointless, and they turned out to be right. The US lost after tremendous loss of life on both sides, not to mention the bombing of Cambodia.
Can anyone explain why the US took over the defense of South Vietnam from the French in the first place? I don't buy the idea that the only reason was to prevent the spread of communism. Were there resources in the area the US wanted?
Cam Ranh Bay is an excellent potential naval anchorage. USN always concerned about the Soviets achieving bases outside of their continental containment perimeter. Plus airfields in South Vietnam could reach out and dominate the China Sea and down to Singapore, Philippines. etc.
It was understood the next World War if conventional would require sea lanes to be used as in WW2 to ferry supplies and troops and raw materials.
Can't use mama's boys as conscripts, pampered kids during the 50's.
That's why you need a professional army with people that used to skin squirrels and critters when young and led a tough life.
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