Vietnam War Myths
Rudy Rummel
By word of mouth repetition, by slovenliness about checking facts, by fitting in with ideological propensities, erroneous "facts" may in time become furniture of the mind. Such are that Hitler was elected democratically (he lost both elections in which he ran and "was appointed Chancellor"), or that Stalin killed 20 million (he killed about 43 million). One such erroneous fact is that the Vietnam War was a Civil War.
This idea was very much promoted by the "anti-war" crowd and the Vietnam propagandists, for if true it meant the United States had no business interfering in an internal Vietnamese conflict, and it justified the North's total takeover of South Vietnam in 1975. However, that Vietnam was one country is not historically correct.
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Yours,
Wince
The hippies didn't seem to think of that.
Both would have been "civil wars".
What is the unique nature of a civil war that means "hands off"?
When I see people saying stuff like this, it is immediately clear that either they are just partisan shills or they have been taken in by partisan shills. The facts are that Republicans Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford were President of the United States and Commander in Chief from 1969 to 1976. It was Richard Nixon who negotiated the Paris Peace Accord. It was Gerald Ford who did not act to protect South Vietnam when the NVA invaded in 1975. In Ford’s Tulane speech in April 1975 with NVA forces advancing on Saigon, Ford proclaimed Vietnam “a war that is finished as far as America is concerned."
It is also claimed that by cutting funding for SVA in 1974 the Democrats in Congress broke a promise to South Vietnam to help defend it against a North. This promise was contained in a 1972 letter from Richard Nixon to President Thieu that was made public the day Thieu resigned, April 21, 1975, just before the fall of Saigon. Richard Nixon and presumably Gerald Ford were aware of this promise. Congress probably found out about this promise in January 1975 from Defense Secretary Schlesinger, but Gerald Ford made clear that the US was not going to re-enter Vietnam in January 1975.
I do not doubt that the anti-war movement had something to do with the loss of Vietnam, but only a partisan shill can claim the Democrats in Congress are to blame for losing Vietnam. In truth the North expected it to take two years for its army to defeat the South, but when the NVA invaded, more than hundred thousand SVA troops deserted or surrendered in the first week. The NVA realized the SVA army was near collapse, and started a quick offensive to take Saigon as soon as possible. (The SVA did regroup and put up some resistance around Saigon, but it was too late by then.) The SVA did not collapse in the first week of the invasion because they were running out of bullets. The truth is that the NVA had better leadership and its men were better motivated than the SVA. Too many South Vietnamese either actually wanted the North to win, or just didn’t care who won, until it was too late. Many of those people who didn’t care, quickly discovered their error after the North won.
Vietnam may have historically been divided into several countries, but the people spoke a common language, and many in the South looked to Ho Chi Minh as a hero for fighting both the Japanese and the French. The 1955 “referendum” in South Vietnam that removed the Emperor and made Diệm president was hardly a “free” election. Soldiers guarded the polling places and beat people who tried to vote to keep the Emperor. More votes were recorded for Diệm in Saigon than there were registered voters. The 1954 Geneva Accords called for a election to unify the North and South, and Diệm refused to hold the election with the backing of the US because it was clear that Ho Chi Minh would have won.
Ford's comment that we were not going back in is also irrelevant to the point that without funding, the RVN lost.
The need to paint the Hanoi forces as irresistible is designed for current use. If the left can paint something as "another Viet Nam", it means we can't possibly win it--after all, you can't win a Viet Nam--and so we shouldn't start. Because the left's fear is that, if we start, we might win. Which would never do.
Thus, the end of the war has to be redesigned to diminish the role of various factors in our control in order to increase the supposed irresistability of Hanoi--and by extension any other enemy of the US the left favors and doesn't want inconvenienced.
Forgot about the elections. The motivation behind refusing to participate is a matter of retroactive mindreading.
Herewith my contribution: This was less than a decade after the free elections in Eastern Europe promised by Stalin. Nobody, then or now, whatever they pretend for political purposes, ever believed the Czechs and Poles really voted for what ultimately happened to them. These elections were so dirty that Carter would have loved them.
Question: Do you accept the certainty of the same thing happening given the immediate lesson?
Rudy's one of the most influential political scientists of the last generation, a respected academic whose work has appeared in many peer reviewed journals and is discussed in many standard poli-sci textbooks. He is also one of the world's foremost authorities on mass murder.
Perhaps you should take off your own set of vary obvious partisan blinders and look at the information being presented.
In January 1975, a few months before the North invaded the South again, Gerald Ford indicated at a press conference that the US would not intervene again in South Vietnam. Only someone who is blinded by partisanship could come to the conclusion that only the democrats in Congress were to blame and Gerald Ford was just a helpless bystander. There is lots of blame to go around. Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Ford and the Democrats and Republican members of Congress all share the blame.
No funds. Keep in mind what the power of the purse means.
No. Really. If you can ask all those questions with a straight face, it is self-evident that you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
First we have "In truth the North expected it to take two years for its army to defeat the South, but when the NVA invaded, more than hundred thousand SVA troops deserted or surrendered in the first week."
Which invasion are we talking about, mikey? Tet '69, the '72 invasion, or the (finaly) '75 invasion? And while I'm at it, it isn't the "SVA," it's ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam), ok?
In order:
-no, because Ford knew Congress would say no.
-why ask for emergency funding when they're voting to cut off funding required by treaty?
-Ford couldn't send troops to aid South Vietnam because we didn't have the logistic structure get the forces back into theatre quickly enough, not to mention the question whether he could do so, politically
-I'll finish the last two together: Ford did not take these steps because Congress had already made its will apparent: NO aid to South Vietnam
Period. And despite mikey's contortions to the contrary, soldiers have a great deal of trouble when they have no bullets, artillery shells, bandages (or any other medical supplies), or anything else. ARVN was washing and reusing bandages by the end of the invasion.
But now, the Congressional vote to cut off all had had nothing to do with that. And the fact that those voting "aye" were overwhelmingly Democrat is just an inconvenient bit of useless trivia.
Face it, mikey; your boys fucked up. They stabbed a country which trusted us in the back, and to this day refuse to take responsibility.
Now, if you want to prove I'm wrong, dig up the voting numbers and show me that the GOP voted for that cut-off to the same proportion the Democrats did.
I am, BTW, no mindless GOP "partisan." The Republicans got a lot of mileage out of painting the Dems "soft on communism" for many years, and have "Tailgunner Joe" McCarthy on their hands. In fact, you could reasonably claim that Kennedy and Johnson let themselves get wrapped up in Vietnam in order to avoid those same charges. Gotta do something about them godless Reds, don'tcha know.
On top of that you are seem unable to read simple English paragraphs and understand what they mean, so perhaps that explains your problem understanding what I wrote, and why you are so easily taken in by rightwing propaganda. It should have been obvious to any English speaker that I was talking about the ’75 invasion.
Lets review a little history:
It was Republican President Eisenhower that negotiated the cease-fire that ended the stalemated Korean War without victory.
It was Republican President Nixon that negotiated the Paris accord to end the Vietnam War without victory.
It was Republican President Ford that failed to take or call for any action when North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in 1975.
It was Republican President Regan that withdrew the US Marines out of Lebanon a few months after the 1983 Berirut barracks bombing, giving terrorist the first clear signal that the US would run away in the face of terrorism.
It was Republican President Regan that followed up by trading arms sales to Iran for the release of US hostages in Lebanon, further confirming that the US would fold in the face of terrorists.
It was Democratic President Clinton that withdrew troops from Somalia after the Battle of Mogadishu, further enforcing the idea that the US could not stand casualties.
It was Republican members of Congress that severely criticized Democratic Presidents Clinton’s August 1998 cruise missile attack on al-Qaida camps and believed assets as an unnecessary attempt to divert attention away from the Lewinsky scandal, further convincing terrorists that the US did not take terrorism seriously.
These are the facts, rather than the myth, of Republicans toughness on security issues. Republicans try to talk tough, but their actual record is pretty mixed.
I find your style of mindless accusation and slander irritating. It does not fit the forum. Every time you post you call someone a "partisan hack" or a "shill". Please clean up your act.
Which party ran a "peace at any price" candidate? Not the Republicans. Which party is still plagued by peace activists? Not the Republicans.
What was the Repulican mistake that handed Vietnam to the communists? It was the Watergate coverup, followed inevitably by Ford's pardon of Nixon. This bankrupted the President of all political capital. He could no more oppose the will of the Democrats in Congress than I could have.
Yours,
Wince
My, my, you are thin skinned. You guys can dish it out, but you don’t like someone pointing out that the historical ‘facts’ you keep talking about are actually inaccurate, one sided, highly partisan opinions. It is perfectly ok for Casey Tompkins to call me “stupid”, but god forbid I call someone a partisan shill for repeating the one-sided, partisan versions of the history of the Vietnam war being promoted by right wing talking heads and bloggers.
“Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God,” Matthew 5:9.
Your statement is a bunch of partisan nonsense. The Democrats are no more the peace at any price party than the Republicans are the war at any price party.
So in your mind poor Gerald Ford was just road kill after Watergate? He let the Democrats in Congress lead him around by the nose on foreign policy and national security. Now there is a sterling example of strong Republican presidential leadership on national security.
This claim would be a lot more credible if Ford had at least tried to do something to help South Vietnam in 1975 rather than sitting on his hands.
I'm not a big fan of Casey calling you stupid either. OTOH, Casey has a sense of humor when he writes. You don't. I can take teasing, and I can take insults with a smile, but I don't like insulting rants. I don't like it when Dean does it, and I've said so. He doesn't do it all the time. You do. You consistently strike me as insulting. Casey and Dean don't. If Casey and Dean were to stop posting I would miss them. If you were to stop posting I wouldn't. Since your viewpoint is actually valuable around here, and your comments are otherwise well thought out, I'd prefer not to just skip your comments. But your style invites me to ignore you. I can't get what I don't ask for. If I thought you were hopeless, I wouldn't complain, I'd just ignore you. Please clean up your act. Find a way to act as if you like the people here. Crack a joke. Something.
As far as dishing it out, well, generally, I don't. Sometimes I do get sarcastic.
Hey, I didn't say that the Democrats were a peace at any price party. They ran a peace at any price candidate in 1972, and judging by the returns, a lot of Democrats defected to Nixon.
And, point to your side, if you want to make it, is the paleocon neutralists on the Republican side that invoke the shade of Washington. Not quite so vocal as the peace activists in your tent, and certainly not positioned to force a normal Republican candidate towards neutrality to get their votes in the primary. OTOH, the peace activists in your party constantly threaten more vigorous national security types like Liebermann.
And yes, Gerald Ford was just road kill after Watergate. He, and the Republican Party were in utter disarray. His mishandling of Vietnam was one reason why Reagan was able to mount such a strong primary challenge against a sitting President.
Reagan helped the Republican party recover from Vietnam. When will the Democratic party recover? They aren't showing any signs of it.
Yours,
Wince