Without going into the arcane intricacies of Vietnam, the fertile genesis of the calamity was an American ethos of both our nascent fear and our historic arrogance, the fundamental truth was it was no one's fault. The tragedy was born an ugly child on November 22, 1963, when the 35th president of the United States was murdered. In the spring of '63, Kennedy had sent Marine Commandant, General David M. Shoup to Vietnam, to review the situation, and to report his findings to his Commander in Chief. Shoup told Kennedy, ??Unless we are prepared to use a million men in a major drive, we should pull out before the war expands beyond our control. ?
However he had authorized an additional few thousand advisors, they were sent primarily to learn whether any level of American logistical assistance could provide the sort of support to the South Vietnamese that would encourage them to better, less corrupt governance and an ability to defend themselves. The order authorizing additional forces and logistical support were accompanied by an authorization that, should the effort prove fruitless, American forces would begin their withdrawal, a withdrawal that was to be completed in 1965. In volume 3 of U.S. Department of Defense' US ?? Vietnam Relations, Kennedy makes his position clear, ??to introduce U.S. forces in large numbers there today, while it might have an initially favorable military impact, would almost certainly lead to adverse political and, in the long run, adverse military consequences. ?
The Greek tragedy that was Vietnam was that, beyond the chance he might bring Texas into the electoral vote column for the Democratic ticket, the Kennedy's had no further use for Johnson, and kept him as far out of the loop as they could. As vice-president Johnson knew nothing of Kennedy's skepticism about Vietnam, or the plans for withdrawal. As president he knew everything of the Republican's intentions to savage him ferociously should he not do all he could to win in Vietnam. And so the horrific acts unfolded.
To suggest it was no one's fault isn't completely accurate, however. Many of the generals knew. And they either misunderstood the limits of their branch's real power, or they deliberately lied to Johnson, and to the American public. Curtis LeMay knew. So did Maxwell Taylor. Except for bombing the North ??back to the stone age, ? Johnson gave the generals "on the ground" and in the air everything they requested
In the end it wasn't enough, because no matter what this country might have provided it would never have been enough. We did not have ??enough ? more that we could have given, unless 59,000 US dead was insufficient, unless 250,000 dead South Vietnamese soldiers was insufficient, unless killing 1,100,000 NLF was insufficient, unless killing 2,000,000 South and North Vietnamese civilians was insufficient.
And yet, in some ways the dead are the lucky ones. Their battles are over. Last month, Four-star General Eric Shinseki, now head of the VA, reported that 300,000 American veterans, most from the Vietnam War, are, and have been for years, homeless. Unshaven, in dirty, tattered clothes, they beg on our street corners and freeway on-ramps. They scavenge dumpsters behind our fine restaurants for scraps, the scraps the finer citizens of this land demurred. From one place to another, they push the rickety stolen shopping carts that contain all that is theirs in this world, in this life.
I've heard some folks, those with homes and families and food in the fridge, say, ??That's what they want; ? referring to the homeless. Yeah . . .. A kid just out of high school either enlists or gets drafted, and what he wants most of all is to be a wigged-out, homeless, 60-year-old whose body shakes and whose head rolls from side to side as if he has Parkinson's. Yeah . . .. If you can believe that . . ..
But Shinseki didn't stop there. He said our veterans from Desert Storm and the more recent batch from Iraq and from Afghanistan are rapidly adding to the population. Suicide is higher than at any time since the military began keeping track. So are the rates for violent crime: murder, aggravated assault, domestic violence, robbery, theft . . .. And the spikes all occur within a few weeks or months of returning stateside from combat tours, prevalent especially in those who have served repeated tours.
Tonight, the first day of December, Barack Obama will tell the nation of his plans to send some multiple of 10,000 more US soldiers and marines to Afghanistan. And he will have his supporters to those plans.
Other than for perhaps purely political reasons, political reasons that by definition are never pure, why?
Afghanistan is not a country, at least in the sense that we think. It is a loose aggregation of feuding tribes only 15% of whom can even read or write. Whatever governance there is within the geographic bounds that delimit the territory is corrupt to the core. The ambitions of those who claim leadership are to seize as much wealth from the already destitute peasantry as it can, not build a nation. Whatever al Qaeda there once was in Afghanistan is gone; gone to the western mountains in Pakistan, gone to Somalia, gone to Yemen, gone to the Sudan, gone to the Philippines, gone to central Africa and even to Paris and to London and to many, many other places around the globe.
Any chance of success, with ??success ? never having yet been even vaguely defined, will first require educating a population to read to some minimum serviceable level. That is going to demand building schools in areas where the mullahs and tribal chieftains don't want schools; unless madrassas where only the most radical of Islam is tolerated can be twisted as a "school."
So . . . how many years? Really . . . how many years? At what probable rate of success? And for how many American taxpayer dollars? And, en route to the securing of the mission (Whatever the hell that is), how many Americans will be killed or horribly mutilated to the point they and their families will be getting lifelong medical and financial support?
Just Iraq and Afghanistan to date: GAO now estimates we're headed to $3 TRILLION. Who out there will posit with a straight face that an Afghanistan will be less?
How much? How many? How long? Why?!!! Reread Shoup a few paragraphs up . NOW! And keep this fact tucked beneath the pillow: Add 30,000 forces to the mix and the total will then sum to more than what the Soviets had when they were seized in the ongoing nightmare.
I'd like everyone who has served in one of the branches of this country's military ?? including the Coast Guard ?? to stand up, to be saluted. Your service was honorable, regardless that you may have, on occasion, done things while serving that were not the least honorable. All that acknowledged and said, serving at Point Barrow or aboard the Big E or at a missile silo in the Dakotas or Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado bear no relationship to jumping from a Huey in Pleiku, in Quy Nhon province, or in any of the combat operations in Iraq or Afghanistan. No relationship; suck it up! To my way of thinking, you have neither a legitimate affirmative vote nor valid affirming opinion on the issue: whether to send additional military forces to Afghanistan.
However he had authorized an additional few thousand advisors, they were sent primarily to learn whether any level of American logistical assistance could provide the sort of support to the South Vietnamese that would encourage them to better, less corrupt governance and an ability to defend themselves. The order authorizing additional forces and logistical support were accompanied by an authorization that, should the effort prove fruitless, American forces would begin their withdrawal, a withdrawal that was to be completed in 1965. In volume 3 of U.S. Department of Defense' US ?? Vietnam Relations, Kennedy makes his position clear, ??to introduce U.S. forces in large numbers there today, while it might have an initially favorable military impact, would almost certainly lead to adverse political and, in the long run, adverse military consequences. ?
The Greek tragedy that was Vietnam was that, beyond the chance he might bring Texas into the electoral vote column for the Democratic ticket, the Kennedy's had no further use for Johnson, and kept him as far out of the loop as they could. As vice-president Johnson knew nothing of Kennedy's skepticism about Vietnam, or the plans for withdrawal. As president he knew everything of the Republican's intentions to savage him ferociously should he not do all he could to win in Vietnam. And so the horrific acts unfolded.
To suggest it was no one's fault isn't completely accurate, however. Many of the generals knew. And they either misunderstood the limits of their branch's real power, or they deliberately lied to Johnson, and to the American public. Curtis LeMay knew. So did Maxwell Taylor. Except for bombing the North ??back to the stone age, ? Johnson gave the generals "on the ground" and in the air everything they requested
And yet, in some ways the dead are the lucky ones. Their battles are over. Last month, Four-star General Eric Shinseki, now head of the VA, reported that 300,000 American veterans, most from the Vietnam War, are, and have been for years, homeless. Unshaven, in dirty, tattered clothes, they beg on our street corners and freeway on-ramps. They scavenge dumpsters behind our fine restaurants for scraps, the scraps the finer citizens of this land demurred. From one place to another, they push the rickety stolen shopping carts that contain all that is theirs in this world, in this life.
I've heard some folks, those with homes and families and food in the fridge, say, ??That's what they want; ? referring to the homeless. Yeah . . .. A kid just out of high school either enlists or gets drafted, and what he wants most of all is to be a wigged-out, homeless, 60-year-old whose body shakes and whose head rolls from side to side as if he has Parkinson's. Yeah . . .. If you can believe that . . ..
But Shinseki didn't stop there. He said our veterans from Desert Storm and the more recent batch from Iraq and from Afghanistan are rapidly adding to the population. Suicide is higher than at any time since the military began keeping track. So are the rates for violent crime: murder, aggravated assault, domestic violence, robbery, theft . . .. And the spikes all occur within a few weeks or months of returning stateside from combat tours, prevalent especially in those who have served repeated tours.
Tonight, the first day of December, Barack Obama will tell the nation of his plans to send some multiple of 10,000 more US soldiers and marines to Afghanistan. And he will have his supporters to those plans.
Other than for perhaps purely political reasons, political reasons that by definition are never pure, why?
Afghanistan is not a country, at least in the sense that we think. It is a loose aggregation of feuding tribes only 15% of whom can even read or write. Whatever governance there is within the geographic bounds that delimit the territory is corrupt to the core. The ambitions of those who claim leadership are to seize as much wealth from the already destitute peasantry as it can, not build a nation. Whatever al Qaeda there once was in Afghanistan is gone; gone to the western mountains in Pakistan, gone to Somalia, gone to Yemen, gone to the Sudan, gone to the Philippines, gone to central Africa and even to Paris and to London and to many, many other places around the globe.
Any chance of success, with ??success ? never having yet been even vaguely defined, will first require educating a population to read to some minimum serviceable level. That is going to demand building schools in areas where the mullahs and tribal chieftains don't want schools; unless madrassas where only the most radical of Islam is tolerated can be twisted as a "school."
So . . . how many years? Really . . . how many years? At what probable rate of success? And for how many American taxpayer dollars? And, en route to the securing of the mission (Whatever the hell that is), how many Americans will be killed or horribly mutilated to the point they and their families will be getting lifelong medical and financial support?
Just Iraq and Afghanistan to date: GAO now estimates we're headed to $3 TRILLION. Who out there will posit with a straight face that an Afghanistan will be less?
How much? How many? How long? Why?!!! Reread Shoup a few paragraphs up . NOW! And keep this fact tucked beneath the pillow: Add 30,000 forces to the mix and the total will then sum to more than what the Soviets had when they were seized in the ongoing nightmare.
I'd like everyone who has served in one of the branches of this country's military ?? including the Coast Guard ?? to stand up, to be saluted. Your service was honorable, regardless that you may have, on occasion, done things while serving that were not the least honorable. All that acknowledged and said, serving at Point Barrow or aboard the Big E or at a missile silo in the Dakotas or Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado bear no relationship to jumping from a Huey in Pleiku, in Quy Nhon province, or in any of the combat operations in Iraq or Afghanistan. No relationship; suck it up! To my way of thinking, you have neither a legitimate affirmative vote nor valid affirming opinion on the issue: whether to send additional military forces to Afghanistan.
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