The President of the United States of America will once again insult the intelligence of all sentient beings and particularly of his hosts on Wednesday when he will tell the Veterans of Foreign Wars,
Three decades later, there is a legitimate debate about how we got into the Vietnam War and how we left.
A "legitimate debate."
Yes, he will actually say that. To a group of veterans. Many of whom - unlike George Bush - served in Vietnam.
A "legitimate debate."
Sure - just like there's a "legitimate debate" about the theory of evolution.
The president will also make the argument that withdrawing from Vietnam emboldened today's terrorists by compromising U.S. credibility, citing a quote from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden that the American people would rise against the Iraq war the same way they rose against the war in Vietnam . . .
"Here at home, some can argue our withdrawal from Vietnam carried no price to American credibility, but the terrorists see things differently," Bush will say.
Ahh, yes - "stabbed in the back" by the Dirty F**king Hippies, once again. Wow - guess those guys who wrote that op-ed piece in The New York Times the other day were misinformed, 'cause the Preznit sez our guys in Iraq are worried:
As they take the initiative from the enemy, they have a question: Will their elected leaders in Washington pull the rug out from under them just as they are gaining momentum and changing the dynamic on the ground in Iraq?
To no one's surprise, the Right Wing Noise Machine has already jumped on the Dolchstosslegende bandwagon with admirable Teutonic gusto. The neocon mouthpiece New York Sun had this to say:
President Bush, opening a new theme in support of sticking with the battle of Iraq, will today bluntly warn the Democrats against committing the errors of Vietnam — where America's withdrawal precipitated a communist-led bloodbath.
Cue the Hörst Wessel Song, Marlene. (Oooh, I love that: "The Battle of Iraq" - sorta like, "The Battle of Algiers," only without the stinking Frogs.)
After quoting one anti-war senator at the time who asked what difference it would make which side won the war for Vietnam, the president will conclude: "One unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like ‘boat people,' ‘re-education camps,' and ‘killing fields.' "
Say, are you going to the book burning Friday night? Bring a brick - I hear we're going to do some window shopping. (Y'know, all those people in Cambodia wouldn't've died if we had, like, y'know, really invaded Cambodia, like we should've.)
"Today the violent Islamic extremists who fight us in Iraq are as certain of their cause as the Nazis, Imperial Japanese, and Soviet Communists were of theirs"
I'm so excited to go the big rally next weekend in Nuremberg Crawford - me and my Young Defenders of the Homeland troop are going to be on a rally squad! (Never mind that we didn't actually fight the "Soviet Communists," but who's counting, right?)
A "legitimate debate."
The only "legitimate debate" about the President trying to compare Iraq favorably to Vietnam involves finding an answer to the question,
Just exactly how stupid does he think we are?
Same shit, different day. From a diary nearly a year ago:
Not surprisingly, Stanley Karnow, whose seminal work, Vietnam: A History, offers one of the best summaries of the country and its conflicts, takes issue with the crank-smoking wackos:
"They're clutching at some sort of way to justify hanging on in Iraq," said Karnow, whose "Vietnam: A History" is considered by many to be the definitive account of the conflict. "The war in Vietnam, in my estimation, was unwinnable for the simple, basic reason that we were up against an enemy that was prepared to take on unlimited losses. They would have gone on fighting endlessly."
Here - just in case you missed it, please check out this diary, based on Karnow's book: Iraq is not Vietnam. Iraq is not Vietnam. Iraq is not Vietnam. Iraq is not Vietnam. Iraq is not Vietnam. Iraq is not Vietnam.
[snip]
[I]t's sickening. These people just don't get it - and never did get it.
After Germany lost World War I and was humiliated by the Treaty of Versailles, certain elements within German society put forth the idea that the Kaiser's forces could've won the war if only they hadn't been "stabbed in the back" by certain other elements of German society - including, primarily, Jews, socialists and communists. In fact, the myth was so entrenched and widespread that it garnered its own name: Dolchstosslegende; literally, "dagger-stab legend."
Well, guess what: We've got our own revisionists now. But instead of Versailles, their shame is Vietnam. And that shame burns as fiercely for them as Versailles did for the revisionist Germans.
Y'know, it never ceases to amaze me how these morons continue to pick the wrong playbooks to read from. Uh, news flash for neocons: The Nazis lost.
And so did the United States in Vietnam. And not for lack of trying.
Let's quickly review:
We were in Vietnam for 16 years, from 1959 through 1975. We spent about $541 billion there (for the period 1964-72, in 2005 dollars); our defense budget represented 9.6 percent of GDP (compared to about 4 percent currently).
We dropped more than 7 million tons of bombs in Southeast Asia during the Vietnam War.
A total of 58,000 American soldiers were killed. No one knows how many Vietnamese were killed.
This is what we got for all that: