Pentagon Whitewashing of the Vietnam Era
Pentagon Accused of Whitewashing History of Vietnam War Era
The Common Dreams report below follows last Friday's New York Times
article about the Pentagon's commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the
Vietnam War, announced by Pres. Obama two years ago. Both articles
highlight the concerns of many veterans and other Americans that this
campaign should deal with some of the harsh truths of the war, and the
lessons that we, as a nation, should have learned -- and maybe did not.
No one disagrees that it is proper to recognize and respect the sacrifices
of American military personnel. As a Vietnam veteran, however, I and most
of my fellow vets do not need superficial statements like "thank you for
your service." We are not looking for balloons and parades. Veterans,
like most Americans, are hungry for some truth, honest disclosure, a
reality check about what we did in Vietnam and the consequences, and a
clear-eyed look at what we continue to do today with military actions
around the world that seem to be unceasing and uninterrupted.
For anyone who has not seen the letter to Gen. Kicklighter that is referred
to in the New York Times article, or signed it, the petition website is Vietnam
Peace Commemoration Committee
A website organized by Veterans For Peace is called "Full Disclosure: Toward
an Honest Commemoration of the American War in Vietnam" and can be found
here: http://www.vietnamfulldisclosure.org/.
The Department of Defense's official website, called "The United States of
America Vietnam War Commemoration" is at this link:
http://www.vietnamwar50th.com/ <http://www.vietnamwar50th.com/contact_us/>.
And finally, attached is a response I sent to the group that organized the
letter to Gen. Kicklighter, urging that we use this opportunity to bring
about some true *closure *to the legacies of the war in Vietnam, unexploded
ordnance and Agent Orange.
CHUCK SEARCY
Everyone,
This has been a very impressive effort with a tremendous response, more than I expected -- to be quite honest. More than 500 comments in a relatively short period following publication of the article in the Times confirms what I have believed for a long time: mixed in with the sorrow, and anger, and confusion that still may be evoked among some when Vietnam is brought up, also present are memory and emotion that pour into a very deep reservoir of goodwill among countless thousands of Americans toward the people of Vietnam as well as our own Vietnam vets. Among Americans there exists a broad sense of failure to come to grips with the enormity of what happened during the war, and we are burdened by a nagging feeling of abandonment of so many who suffered on all sides.
And now, coming more sharply into focus than I would have dreamed a few months ago, there is emerging a broad commitment to get things right -- not just to set the record straight and tell the truth, but also to bring closure to the legacies that still remain in Vietnam. America has a responsibility to clean up the bombs and mines, the enduring threat of unexploded ordnance we left behind, and to find some way to help the Vietnamese ease the burden of Agent Orange / dioxin which is still causing such suffering to millions. Americans truly feel, deep down, that we have treated the Vietnamese people unfairly and unjustly, for five decades. While we finally are recognizing and dealing with the pain and suffering of our own veterans, we have not yet fully extended that same compassion and justice to the people of Vietnam.
The 50th Anniversary commemoration may be the opportunity to do just that. It may be the opening to finally address the consequences of the war, to put the funds and resources and selfless commitments in place to make Vietnam safe from the scourge of unexploded ordnance that has killed or maimed more than 100,000 children and adults since the war ended in 1975; to provide some level of comfort and relief to families with two, three or more terribly disabled children presumed to be affected by Agent Orange, to ease their burden and make their lives more bearable.
I believe the American people are ready for that. When I was in the U.S. in August and September, I discussed those themes on several occasions, and without exception audiences responded favorably and positively, with relief, sometimes, in the knowledge that there is still time, and there are ways, to contribute to true healing in Vietnam, after all these decades.
Thanks mainly to the unflagging moral commitment of Sen. Patrick Leahy and the funding that he and a few other key members of Congress have managed to push through the appropriations process, the U.S. government is now significantly increasing funding over the next five years to deal with both of those issues: unexploded ordnance, and Agent Orange. More than $50 million will be provided for UXO mitigation, and $22 million for assistance to AO / dioxin families. That’s not a lot in the big scheme of things, but it’s much more than the $3 to $4 million provided by the U.S. each year for the past decade.
I hope that the very impressive public awareness effort created by this group, now with great momentum resulting from the NYT article, will go on to explain and present to the American people the options for healing these war wounds, and for bringing closure to the war legacies in Vietnam. The American people, the Pentagon, the White House can still turn this "official" commemoration into an historic achievement nurtured through American humility, compassion, understanding and generosity, so that we can truly bring an end to the war -- for the Vietnamese, and for the American people.
I'm not sure how we convey that to a broad base of Americans who I sense are waiting and eager for an opportunity to participate, to right past wrongs. America desperately needs a success; we desperately need something that we can point to with some modesty, and truthfulness, and say, “This is who we really are. This is what America is all about. We have finally done the right thing.†I believe we will never have a better time than now.
Based on the impact that has been achieved in just a short time by this core group in launching the Kicklighter letter, with the work of those involved with the Full Disclosure initiative, and boosted by the attention and discussions generated by Rory Kennedy's film and the upcoming Vietnam history series that Ken Burns is producing, America may now be ready to deal with Vietnam in a frank and honest way, for the first time.
This may be the historic opportunity some of us have waited for, and worked for, over the years. Now may be the time when Americans will step up and join with our Vietnamese friends and work together toward a tangible end that will mark the 50th Anniversary of the War in the most appropriate way imaginable.
What higher tribute could we choose to honor those who died on all sides than to finally clean up the debris of war as best we can, making Vietnam safe for future generations, and to reduce the pain for those who are still suffering the consequences of Agent Orange.
Then we can join together, Americans and Vietnamese alike, and truly celebrate the end of the war.
I hope this group will give some thought and consideration to this as a priority, as a tangible part of an achievable agenda.
CHUCK SEARCY
===============================================
""If you conduct a war, you shouldn’t be in charge of narrating it." - Tom
Hayden
I catalog books from Vietnam, many of them from publishers such as Quan Doi
Nhan Dan about the war. Certainly these books are useful to scholars and
others interested in the subject matters discussed in these books. But if
it is improper for the Pentagon to be in charge of narrating its version of
the Vietnam war, would the same apply to publications from Vietnam? In
America, at least we have the freedom to present and debate different views
on the subject. In Vietnam -- so far as I know -- very few deviations are
allowed from the standard view presented in the official publications of
Vietnam. Bao Ninh's novel, The Sorrow of War, is one of the exceptions of
which I am aware.
Steve Denney
library assistant
UC Berkeley
What I find interesting is that the anti-war crowd is complaining that they
aren't being fairly represented in a commemoration, the purpose of which is
to honor the people who served in Vietnam. If they want to commemorate the
anti-war movement, let them create their own commemoration and hold it
separately.
Every major argument they made has been proven wrong in the intervening
years, many of them by the release of North Vietnamese documents or the
statements of North Vietnamese authorities. Millions and millions of
people died needlessly because we abandoned Vietnam, and the anti-war crowd
played a major role in causing that to happen.
Tom Hayden (and Daniel Ellsberg and several others) all refused to debate
the war in a public forum that took place on August 5, 2014 and was covered
by CSPAN. <http://www.c-span.org/video/?320869-1/debate-vietnam-war>
Now they want to insert their beliefs into a commemoration meant to honor
the Vietnam veterans without debate or opposition. All this while
insisting they don't want the warriors to be dishonored, they just want
their truth to be told.
They spit on Vietnam veterans and called them baby killers. They called
them war criminals. Even today they celebrate books like Nick Turse's Kill
Everything That Moves, despite it's obvious flaws and slanted agenda. (See
"Misrepresenting Atrocities: Kill Anything that Moves and the Continuing
Distortions of the War in Vietnam" in Cross Currents, recently published.)
They say things like it's appropriate to recognize and respect the
sacrifices of American military personnel, but their truth must be told as
well.
Their truth isn't truth. It's propaganda, produced in North Vietnam and
regurgitated by an anti-war movement that was funded, in part, by the North
Vietnamese and took its marching orders from them. It has no place in a
celebration of those who served in the American military during that war.
If they really still believe that their arguments have validity, let them
debate them on a national stage with scholars whose knowledge will prove
the invalidity of their arguments.
Of course they will never do that. They'll take advantage of the fact that
the media supports them 100% and doesn't really care to hear the opposing
arguments. And so, rather than healing the wounds of that war or learning
its lessons, they will continue to insult and denigrate the honorable men
and women who served by insisting that their commemoration be stained by
the lies of the anti-war movement.
Paul Schmehl
Dear Paul and others:
Your message contains numerous questionable claims and ad hominem remarks,
which latter tend to inflame debate rather than clarifying issues of
collective concern. Such inflammatory language does not contribute merit to
your claims, which lack substantiation. It would be a shame if a message
composed in this tenor were to derail an otherwise fruitful exchange
regarding the Pentagon's commemorative website and the concerns it has
raised among scholars and others. If others choose to respond, they are
likely to do a better-informed and more thorough job of addressing your
email point by point, but some items that jumped out to me in your email
include the following:
Re: your remarks on the 'anti-war crowd,' as Chuck Searcy's thoughtfully
written message at the beginning of this thread, indicates, includes many
former veterans of the war. I believe that you are incorrect in stating "Now
they want to insert their beliefs into a commemoration meant to honor the
Vietnam veterans without debate or opposition." However, where you write,
"All this while insisting they don't want the warriors to be dishonored,
they just want their truth to be told." Re: this latter, shouldn't the
diversity of political opinions among Vietnam-era veterans be, at minimum,
related represented in national fora that claim to be historically
accurate? Further, why do you lump Hayden, Searcy, Turse, and other
distinct individuals in with unnamed others in an amorphous and indistinct
"crowd"?
Historical counterfactuals, the US peace movement's funding and "marching
orders" from North Vietnam: Despite your attributions of "propaganda," this
itself is rhetoric. Where is your evidence?
Re: spitting on Vietnam veterans, this topic has been debated on this very
listserv and appears to be only poorly substantiated, if at all. Link below
FYI.
Finally re: your closing claim: "And so, rather than healing the wounds of
that war or learning its lessons, they will continue to insult and
denigrate the honorable men and women who served by insisting that their
commemoration be stained by the lies of the anti-war movement." Given what
is widely understood, documented, and accepted by the international
community regarding the conduct of the war, I do not understand what can be
construed as insulting in Chuck's statement.
Sincerely,
Martha Lincoln
Martha Lincoln, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow
UC Berkeley School of Public Health
Paul, how many years was it you were in South Vietnam during the war, I forget. Remind me. You do seem to have a real interest in the Vietnam/American situation though, and you’ve apparently read quite a bit. Were you in Vietnam since ’75 for a while? Vietnam gets interesting when you have some experience with the place, it’s people, culture and history. The war’s over so I can’t send you there on military operations to experience the real thing. But I have a sense that you were born knowing everything already and whatever life brought along felt like illusion. For wisdom’s sake, I suggest a long trip to Vietnam, even without a war, and when you get there, keep walking, right in to the villages. Don’t stop. After two years, tell me what you’ve learned.
Andrew Pearson
NBC and ABC news and documentaries in South Vietnam, ’63-‘72
Dear Paul,
I'm not going to comment on all of your claims, as Martha Lincoln has aptly
done some of that. I will just remind you that this is an academic
listserv, not a propaganda listserv where wild claims can be circulated.
You complain that "What I find interesting is that the anti-war crowd is
complaining that they aren't being fairly represented in a commemoration,
the purpose of which is to honor the people who served in Vietnam." You
yourself have complained about a Texas Tech conference that you thought was
linked to the DOD commemorations where you thought the participants were
too "far left" -- *and you protested their speaking at the conferenc*e.
See: http://www.texaschlforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=83&t=65435
(If you know anything about Texas Tech and the Vietnam Center, this makes
little sense.) The fact is, from your written statements, you don't want a
range of opinions, from left to right, at any of these conferences or
commemorations. You don't like anything on what you call the "left,"
period. Ironically, this means that you don't want the views of a range of
veterans represented. To put it another way, by your logic, you want some
veterans shut out of such commemorations. Their voices censored.
That's a sad way to think about the Vietnam War.
The original meaning of "commemorate" means "to bring to remembrance," with
the implication that this is a communal act. It should, hopefully, be an
act of inclusion, although most nations commemorate their own.
In contrast to the European commemorations of the beginning of World War
One, I personally find the DOD website linked to the commemorations to be
terrible. It is poor quality, and looks as if it was contracted out to
someone who did the minimum necessary.
Shawn McHale
George Washington University
P.S. The text of the law on the Vietnam commemorations is as follows:
"To thank and honor veterans of the Vietnam War, including personnel who
were held as prisoners of war or listed as missing in action, for their
service and sacrifice on behalf of the United States and to thank and honor
the families of these veterans.
(2) To highlight the service of the Armed Forces during the Vietnam War and
the contributions of Federal agencies and governmental and non-governmental
organizations that served with, or in support of, the Armed Forces.
(3) To pay tribute to the contributions made on the home front by the
people of the United States during the Vietnam War.
(4) To highlight the advances in technology, science, and medicine related
to military research conducted during the Vietnam War.
(5) To recognize the contributions and sacrifices made by the allies of the
United States during the Vietnam War."
Paul,
You wrote, a propos of the Texas Tech conference, that:
"All 30 of the scholars invited to speak and serve on panels are far left
scholars or "moderates" who have consistently denigrated the war and its
participants. These scholars unanimously hold the so-called "orthodox"
historical view that the war was illegal, its participants were criminals
and the war had nothing to do with communism or the domino theory." You
went on to write: "Contact your Senators and Congressman regarding the
conference and express your displeasure that an event purporting to honor
and respect you will instead portray you as a war criminal and is being
funded with your tax dollars."
Sorry, Paul, but you wanted to censor voices. It doesn't matter what you
say, Paul, your words undo you. To you, an event SHOULD NOT OCCUR *unless*
it has what you consider to be "balance." In other words, you want to
censor such events, stop them from happening. If you don't like presenters,
you write things like the following: "Contact your Senators and Congressman
regarding the conference and express your displeasure that an event
purporting to honor and respect you will instead portray you as a war
criminal and is being funded with your tax dollars."
Unlike you, I believe that if a group of conservative veterans want to hold
a conference on the Vietnam War, it is their right, and I am not about to
force them to have leftists presenting in a conference. The same principle
should apply to commemorations of the VIetnam War. The only point I would
underline, and it is an important point, is that the US Department of
Defense should not be adjudicating the political leanings of presenters in
Vietnam commemorations. There are many veterans who are proud of their
service in Vietnam, and there are some who are not. There are many who
supported the war, there are some who turned against it. One should be able
to honor the service of Vietnam veteran David Cortright, author of Soldiers
in Revolt, as well as of my dissertation advisor, Vietnam veteran Keith
Taylor, who believes that the war was justified.
Shawn McHale
George Washington University
Help me to understand your position. My demand that there be balance in an
academic discussion of Vietnam is a demand for censorship, but the anti-war
movement's demands to be included in the commemoration, which is NOT an
academic discussion of the war is...what?
Paul Schmel
Paul,
My main beef with your post is your extreme and singleminded comments about
the “lies†of the antiwar movement and your accusations that it was directed
from Hanoi, etc.
I spent some time in the antiwar movement as a high school student, mainly
because I believed (after reading such diverse sources as Ellen Hammer,
Hoang Van Chi, Douglas Pike, and Thich Nhat Hanh) that the American
intervention in Vietnam was not in our strategic interest and was being
conducted in a way that killed too many innocents and in fact undermined the
Saigon regime.
I didn’t agree with many of the factions in the movement. Some of the people
in the antiwar movement seemed to be influenced by pacifist beliefs—there’s
nothing wrong with that, but I’m not a pacifist. There were some who
romanticized the Hanoi regime, I think because it helped them resolve some
of the cognitive dissonance. And, of course, there were some radicals who
saw the movement as part of a larger global struggle against imperialism and
racism. I wouldn’t be surprised if some of the latter had communications
with Hanoi, but most of the movement was not inspired or manipulated in any
way by Hanoi propaganda.
Lies? Sure, many in the movement said things that they later regretted.
Steve Denny’s post about the antiwar movement’s reaction to the reeducation
camps is pertinent:
> http://jimandnancyforest.com/2011/08/fighting-among-the-doves/
No one commented on it because I think it also inspires cognitive
dissonance. It makes some people uncomfortable, now as much as then. But
Forest and Joan Baez and the others who signed the petition against the
SRV’s repressive policies deserve our respect.
Lies? What about the lies that got us into the war? See James McMasters, a
graduate of West Point who is a credentialed member of the military
establishment, writing in Dereliction of Duty: Johnson, McNamara, the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, and the Lies That Led to Vietnam:
> "The war in Vietnam was not lost in the field, nor was it lost on the front
> pages of the New York Times or the college campuses. It was lost in
> Washington, D.C."
>
Lies? What would you say about the analysis of other U.S. military
historians who have critiqued the Vietnam War? I posted a summary of a
symposium at the Reserve Officers Association (VSG, Feb. 21, 2013) on the
problems of counterinsurgency in Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan:
> The thrust of Daddis’ and Gentile’s argument was that the idea of a
> “savior-general†is a myth, both in Vietnam and Iraq, and we shouldn’t be
> misled into thinking that we (the U.S.) have developed foolproof
> counterinsurgency strategies. As a corollary, we shouldn’t be scapegoating
> generals like Westmoreland for the failure of our grand strategy.....
>
> Considering that both Daddis and Gentile teach at West Point, it was
> interesting to hear their thoughts on the difficulty of trying to do
> “nationbuilding at the point of a gun.†(I think that was Col. Gentile’s
> phrase, but Daddis said something similar.)
>
> In fact, from the discussion, I gathered that three of the four
> panelists—everyone but Sorley—would argue that the U.S. military intervention
> in Vietnam was misguided and unlikely to succeed under any circumstances. As
> far as today’s counterinsurgency efforts, those three seemed in agreement that
> we haven’t come up with a magic bullet, and, that being so, we should not
> overestimate the military’s ability to transform other societies. (For
> instance, Col. Gentile suggested that our involvement in Afghanistan goes far
> what we need to do to neutralize Al Queda.)
Every major argument that they [members of the “antiwar movement�] made has
been proven wrong?
I would say quite the contrary. The documentation that has come to light
shows that the the Communist powers were not on a monolithic expansionist
program in the 1960s, and, except for a brief period when China was urging
Hanoi to be more aggressive, both the Soviets and the Chinese were far more
interested in compromise and détente than conflict in Southeast Asia. No
less a cold warrior than Nixon chose to abandon the Vietnam adventure AND
the domino theory when he decided it would be a grander thing to establish
relations with China.
We can continue debate all of these particular points ad infinitum. But
don’t try to claim that criticism of the war all came from leftists or was
motivated by a lack of patriotism, etc, etc. Dissent is a time-honored
tradition in American history, from the Whigs’ spirited criticism of the the
Mexican War, to Andrew Carnegie’s opposition to the Spanish-American War and
the public’s horror at the indiscriminate killing of civilians in the
conquest of the Philippines.
:: Mike High
葩旗文仕
Khuê văn các
Independent Research Facility
Great Falls, VA
USA
" Sure, many in the movement said things that they later regretted. Steve
Denny’s post about the antiwar movement’s reaction to the reeducation camps
is pertinent:
http://jimandnancyforest.com/2011/08/fighting-among-the-doves/ "
Thank you Mike, but the post was not by me, but by Jim Forest, who was
involved with the Fellowship of Reconciliation and the Catholic Peace
Fellowship during the war, and was imprisoned for burning draft records. In
1976 he circulated an open letter among peace activists protesting
repression in Vietnam, which was published in the New York Times in
December 1976. His comments in this post introduce an article by Jim Finn
about the ensuing controversy.
Steve Denney
library assistant
UC Berkeley
Just trying to give credit where credit where credit is due, Steve. I only
knew about the Jim Forest page because you included the link in your message
of 2/26/2013.
I guess I should also have included this link to Jim Forest’s own account,
highlighted by his rather disturbing phone conversation with a member of the
national staff of the American Friends Service Committee:
> http://jimandnancyforest.com/2011/10/after-the-war/
>
:: Mike
Mike, anti-war movements have always included people with wide-ranging view
of what anti-war means. Pacifists such as Quakers, people opposed to the
current conflict only, people who hate capitalism, people who don't like
the party in power, etc., etc. But, as a movement, the Vietnam anti-war
movement was funded and energized from Hanoi and Moscow. Of course there
were other factors, such as the draft, that energized the movement as well
and swelled its numbers. But, at its core, it was a communist-led and
communist-driven effort to win the war politically in America. And it was
successful.
Evidence? When the draft ended and America announced a planned withdrawal
from Vietnam, so did the anti-war movement.
Both Al Hubbard and John Kerry traveled to Paris and negotiated with Madame
Binh. Hubbard also made trips to Hanoi where he obtained advice and
information to use in America. Numerous other anti-war activists traveled
to Hanoi and took up Hanoi's political line (most notably Jane Fonda, who
is vehemently hated by many veterans.)
Both Russia and Hanoi have admitted providing funding for anti-war groups
and providing them with messaging assistance.
A number of anti-war groups were communist fronts, funded by Russia and/or
Hanoi, most notably the Vietnam Moratorium Committee, the People’s
Coalition for Peace and Justice, Veterans for Peace and VVAW.
<http://www.wintersoldier.com/staticpages/index.php?page=vcdirective>
While certainly the activities of many individuals were rooted in personal
belief and conviction, the driving force behind the movement was based in
communism, just as the "protests" under Bush (which have curiously
completely disappeared under Obama) were strongly supported by
A.N.S.W.E.R., another communist front group. The political aspect of
Hanoi's war effort has been downplayed and ignored for far too long,
perhaps because it strikes far too close to home for many. No one wants to
admit they were duped.
You ask about the lies that got us into the war. Have those not been
thoroughly and repeatedly discussed, dissected and reexamined? Yet the
lies the communists told, and the anti-war movement repeated, seem to have
been ignored. The fact that many of the scholars of the war were activist
anti-war protestors has been swept under the rug and ignored. Yet their
influence still drives the narrative. (Marilyn Young, John Prados and D.
Gareth Porter being obvious proponents of that view. Porter still insists
that Hue never happened, even though he was finally forced to admit the
Cambodian massacre.)
Where are the books exploring the communist connections to the anti-war
movement? The political warfare of Hanoi in all its dimensions? The
distortions of American policies and actions that became received knowledge
due to communist propaganda?
Even after Hanoi admitted that it attacked the Maddox, many still insist
the Tonkin Gulf incident was a myth made up by the administration to
motivate Congress to approve military action.
The imbalance is obvious. There are numerous books on My Lai. There are
none on Hue. What happened in My Lai was horrendous. Some of the
participants should have been executed for murder. What happened in Hue
has been the subject of no scholarly analysis that I'm aware of. Yet at
least 3000 people were murdered by the communist troops. (And some will
argue with that number, even though that is the approximate number of
bodies that were uncovered. There are 2000 others that were never
accounted for.)
If we're going to have a debate about the war, let's have it. But lets
discuss ALL the evidence, not just the evidence that supports the
conventional orthodox view. For far too long the academic focus of the
Vietnam war has been on what the US did wrong. (And there is much to write
about!) Only recently have the views of the Vietnamese even come to the
fore. Books like Veith's Black April, demonstrating that the story of the
ARVN is much more complex than the simplistic narrative (they were awful)
have come from outside academia. Why is that?
Might I humbly suggest that if we're going to discuss these issues we break
them into bite-sized chunks? And might I further suggest that, rather than
ridiculing my views by calling them "wild claims" or suggesting that I
ought to spend some time in Vietnam, we actually address the substance of
those claims?
--On October 14, 2014 at 2:38:14 PM -0400 Mike High
<mike.high at earthlink.net> wrote:
> Paul,
Paul,
Thank you for your efforts to enlighten me on the nature of anti-war
movements in general, and this one in particular.
Your evidence about the antiwar movement in America seems to boil down to
one captured document from South Vietnam that purportedly “urges addressees
to motivate discussions among the people [in Vietnam] about antiwar
demonstrations in the United States.†That hardly amounts to controlling
the antiwar movement in distant America.
I’m baffled by your interpretation of the downturn in the antiwar movement
after Nixon completed the troop withdrawals in 1972. That was exactly
Nixon’s intention—to defuse the antiwar movement. Smaller protests continued
re: continuing U.S. aid to fund the war, but it became a back issue for an
American public that was more concerned with the oil embargo and an economic
downturn.
All of your other statements lack any citations or context that would
indicate that numerous anti-war groups were “communist fronts†or that
certain individuals were stooges for Hanoi. (Visiting Hanoi does not mean
that someone is their stooge—Susan Sontag’s account of her visit, for
instance, gives absolutely no indication that she was falling under the
spell of anyone’s propaganda.)
If you have any actual information that individuals such as Al Hubbard and
John Kerry were receiving support from Hanoi or Russia or China, and/or that
foreign powers were the primary source of support for the antiwar movement,
please share it. Or put it in a book with footnotes—I’m sure you’re aware
that there is no shortage of publishing houses that are eager to publish
books accusing liberals of all sorts of misdeeds.
As for me, a large part of my criticism of the Vietnam war stems from a
fundamentally conservative position—that U.S. Intervention and the very glut
of U.S. aid undermined the leadership’s ability to develop a self-sufficient
government.
I heartily agree that all of the related and unrelated allegations that you
are now raising deserve separate discussion. But the thing that you were
talking about in your first message—foreign sponsorship as the primary
source of support for the antiwar movement—we can address in this thread.
But the burden of proof is upon you to provide evidence that would back up
your dramatic assertions.
:: Mike High
VSGers may note that a 46 page report by the CIA found no foreign control of the anti-war movement. It was noted that the groups were too diverse and factionalized to be vulnerable to such influence in any event.
See Charles DeBenedetti, “CIA Analysis of the Anti-Vietnam War Movement: October 1967,†in Peace and Change 9, no. 1 (Spring, 1983, 31-41) cited in Why the North Won the Vietnam War, Chapter 8, p. 230, fn. 8.
Also, if anyone wishes to listen to William Colby’s responses to my questions at panels taped at the Vietnam Center at Texas Tech, you will twice hear him say that if thereafter the war was lost because of the home front, it was because the war managers had failed to demonstrate progress in the war and that no public should continue in the loss of lives and treasure under such conditions. This suggests that the war was not lost by its critics, at least to the author of the “Lost Victory†of earlier vintage. View change; even Colby’s.
Also, the fact of the matter about Nixon’s ending of the draft was that it fuelled the reasonable assumption that it meant U.S. withdrawal and an end to the war. I would argue that it was that perception more than anything else that would account for any supposed diminution of the ant-war fever. Nixon made ending the war an election issue, why not believe that this was a part of his plan to do so?
My own view as to the end of the war is as expressed by Tran Van Tra, that the Vietnamese had something to with it, to which I would add, citizens of both the DRV and RVN.
Which is a VSG-specific concern.
Right now, I am working on Vietnamese public support for the RVN after the Tet Offensive. Suggestions, insights, and resources as to that are most welcome!
Marc J. Gilbert
The end of military conscription did not end the anti-war movement. But the
emphasis changed from large demonstrations such as the moratoriums to
lobbying Congress and holding events around the country, particularly on
college campuses. To say the anti-war movement was communist-led and
communist-driven is a disservice to millions of Americans who opposed the
war and had no such pro-communist orientation. Among those who were most
active, however, there were some who held a romanticized view of the
Vietnamese communists, and who believed their victory would lead to the
liberation of Vietnam. Other activists held a different perspective. Hence,
after the war ended in 1975, sharp divisions took place among these
activists over how to address disturbing reports of heavy repression in
Vietnam.
I believe the anti-war movement deserves some credit (or blame if you
prefer) for the cut-off of U.S.aid to South Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos in
1975. But I am only speaking from observation at the time, not expertise.
Steve Denney
I wasn’t going to mention it, but one of the enduring “prowar†myths is that
the antiwar movement succeeded in cutting off funding for the RVN. This is a
fallacy that we discussed in a previous thread (see March 28-April 5, 2014).
Congress did refuse to approve a supplemental appropriation for FY 1975, but
the U.S. was still providing the RVN with roughly four times the military
aid that the DRV was receiving from Communist countries. (Estimate from
William Turley’s Second Indochina War, pages 209-212, based on a 1979 U.S.
government study; also see Turley’s post to the list on March 31, 2014.)
The debate in the spring of 1975 was whether to gradually reduce U.S.
assistance to the approximate levels of assistance being received by the
DRV. (See Sam Nunn report of Feb. 1975, and his op-ed piece of March 9,
1975.) As a part of our earlier discussion, we confirmed that the DRVs
communist supporters had been ratcheting down their aid after the Geneva
Agreements, just as we were. (See the post by Balazs Szalontai, March 30,
2014)
:: Mike High
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