I agree with Gary Woods that
there are a lot of differences between Vietnam and Iraq, and
differences in the United States government's involvement in each.
In Vietnam we were supposedly fighting "Godless Communism," and
now we are supposedly fighting "Godawful Islam." But in both
cases that "supposedly" covers a lot of territory.
The population of Vietnam was 35
million in 1965, the land area is slightly larger than New Mexico
and they have a LOT of ocean coastline. They also have a varied
religious population-- Buddhists, Catholics, Hindus, Muslims and
other religions peacefully coexist. Iraq on the other hand has a
population of 26 million at present and a land area that is a bit
larger than California-- lots of desert, lots of oil, only one
ocean port, and as we know a predominantly Muslim population, with
serious problems in the sex and violence departments deriving from
that religion.
US warfare in Vietnam cost
roughly 58,000 American lives and 140 Billion dollars. Vietnamese
casualties, first reported accurately in 1995, were 1,100,000, or
a 1/19 ratio of Americans to Vietnamese killed. In Iraq, the
death tally as of 8-12-05 is 1846 Americans and about 25,000 Iraqi
civilians (exact figures are not available) or a ratio of about
1/14. Many more of the casualties in Iraq are civilian
bystanders-- men, women, children, babies.
We have spent $187 Billion in a
little over two years in Iraq, which works out to $1,190
1965-dollars per Iraqi, to bring them democracy (though destroying
much of their infrastructure in the process). We spent $4,000
1965-dollars per Vietnamese during our entire twenty years in
Vietnam. So our government is not squandering American lives in
Iraq the way it did in Vietnam, but it is spending our tax dollars
a lot faster.
This same money would have paid
for providing health insurance for poor children in America and
medicine, childhood immunization and clean water and sanitation
needs for the developing world, making us safer by making us
better liked by other nations.
Our government propped up a
series of unpopular dictators in South Vietnam, starting with Ngo
Dinh Diem, supporting his refusal to allow democratic elections to
take place. President Eisenhower noted, and President Kennedy
agreed that in a fairly run election North Vietnam's Ho Chi Minh
would win and unite the country under his form of nationalistic
communism.
Then we cooperated in getting
Diem and his brother assassinated. Now this is beginning to sound
similar to Iraq-- we decide we don't like the current ruler, we
get rid of him. But in Vietnam we continued to support dictators
and a repressive government. We are trying to avoid making that
mistake in Iraq.
We supported and then abandoned
Nguyen Van Thieu, who fled to the US in 1975 when Saigon fell.
The leader I remember, though, was a General Nguyen Cao Ky, who
became South Vietnam's premier in 1965. I read an article, in
Parade magazine I think, that quoted him as saying "My only idol
is Hitler." From that instant I opposed our support of the South
Vietnam government. Hitler was worse than the communists. (Did
you know the early Christians tried communism? The real problem
isn't communism, it is that humans are such nasty selfish
creatures...)
There are important similarities
between the two invasions, however. In both cases Americans were
committed to an expenditure of lives and money without being told
the whole story. We were not told that Ho Chi Minh had been an
ally of the United States, an ally who respected America enough to
model the Vietnamese Declaration of Independence upon that of the
USA.
Ho Chi Minh fought fiercely first
against the Japanese invasion in WWII, and then against the French
who wished to turn Vietnam back into a French colony (gee, a
colony fighting for freedom and independence against an oppressive
overseas government! Sound familiar??) Few Americans knew about
the Vietnamese struggles against the Japanese and French, or their
thousand-year struggle to keep from being absorbed by China. All
that Americans were told by our government was that Ho was a
GODLESS COMMUNIST!
Our twenty-year sacrifice of
lives and money did prevent Ho Chi Minh from becoming elected
president of a unified Vietnam. He died in 1969; Saigon fell in
1975. Vietnam is now a country with a one-party, communist
political system and a weirdly capitalist economic system.
Was Vietnam worth the lives lost
and ruined, the political nastiness, the money that could have
been spent to make our own country a better place to live? I
don't think so.
As far as the reasons for
invading Iraq, not only were we not told the whole story, but we
were deliberately given misinformation, which some people
obviously still believe. Fifteen of the nineteen 9-11 hijackers
came from Saudi Arabia, and still people believe that Saddam
Hussein organized and supported them. Most of the Taliban and, of
course, Osama bin Ladin, came to Afghanistan from Saudi Arabia.
Saddam Hussein did use chemical
weapons against his own people-who were (understandably!)
rebelling against him-- but Hussein's atrocities inside Iraq did
NOT threaten the United States. We supported this very nasty, but
effective tyrant for nine years while he fought Iran for us, and
few Americans cared what he did to Iraqis, Shiites or
Kurds.
Furthermore, the sickening
stories about American abuse of Iraqi prisoners-- the most recent
one about the 56-year-old who was beaten to death in November
2003, stuffed inside a sleeping bag after two weeks of torture,
certainly do not make Americans look like "liberators" in
comparison. Two years down the road, what sickening stories will
we hear about what is going on right now? Or will the coverups
have become more clever?
Then there's the whole garbage
dump of misinformation about nuclear weapons. In February 2002
Ambassador Joseph Wilson, who served for 23 years in the
diplomatic corps, visited Niger to look into the allegations that
Hussein was attempting to purchase uranium from them at the
request of the CIA (not Cheney; Wilson NEVER claimed this). He
found no evidence for this, AND the current Nigerian ambassador
informed him that she had sent reports to Washington stating
basically the same thing.
He returned and made his report
to the CIA, so that's two negatives on the uranium story by March
2002, but a year later, in his March 2003 "Meet the Press"
appearance, Vice-President Cheney was still saying that Saddam
Hussein was "trying once again to produce nuclear weapons."
By the way, I am really annoyed
by the letter I received from Representative Pearce's office which
tried to defend Karl Rove by defaming Joseph Wilson, referring to
him dismissively as a "former Clinton aide." Joseph Wilson,
unlike Bush, Cheney, and the rest of the 'chickenhawk gang,'
personally defied Saddam Hussein when he was acting ambassador of
Iraq in 1991 by sheltering hundreds of Americans in the Iraq
embassy in Baghdad while Hussein was threatening to execute anyone
caught "harboring foreigners."
And in case you still think there
is any doubt about the uranium stuff, please note that the very
day after Wilson's article ("What I Didn't Find in Africa")
appeared in the New York Times, Ari Fleischer, the White House
spokesman, was saying, "There is zero, nada, nothing new here,"
and "we've long acknowledged" that information on the attempted
purchases from Niger "did, indeed, turn out to be
incorrect."
As for the future of Iraq, a
Washington Post source said recently, "We set out to establish a
democracy, but we're slowly realizing we will have some form of
Islamic republic." Another official stated, "We've said we won't
leave a day before it's necessary. But necessary is the key word
-- necessary for them or for us? When we finally depart, it will
probably be for us." Sure sounds like Vietnam to me.
So again I ask, has Iraq been
worth the lives lost and ruined, the political nastiness, the
money that could have been spent to make our own country a better
place to live? And my answer still is, I don't think
so.
******
I found all the information for
this article on the Internet. I am not interested in hearing
about runaway brides or watching 'reality' shows on TV. As a
patriotic American, I believe it is my duty to learn the whole
truth if I can, and the corporate-owned American media are not a
reliable source.
General Vietnam Info:
http://www.studentsoftheworld.info/infopays/wfb.php3?CODEPAYS=VTN