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Member |
Makes sense when you keep in mind that most of the turds doing these types of documentaries were likely out there protesting and spitting on returning soldiers in that era. | |||
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Member |
I've noticed this, too, and it's starting to annoy me. There were many victories and effective endeavors in the war. MACV-SOG, and the LARPs, among others. It looks like Tet will be the next episode, and that was essentially victory for us. I want to see how Burns et.al. treats that. FYI - For those of you who have missed episodes or haven't watched the series, but now want to. Local PBS in Denver is airing the first five episodes Sunday afternoon, before broadcasting the sixth episode. Your local stations might be doing that, as well. Loyalty Above All Else, Except Honor ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ | |||
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Peace through superior firepower |
I expect to hear these phrases: "Overwhelmed" "Taken completely by surprise" "Underestimated the resolve of the North" "Facing a whole new war" "Demoralized American troops" | |||
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Member |
Should be interesting with Tet next. Until then, we had tried to eliminate more of them than could be replaced. Conventional wisdom is that NV damn near shot its wad with Tet and were close to defeat. More importantly, Walter Cronkite declared our war lost. LBJ said something to the effect "If we've lost Cronkite, we've lost the country". Following episodes should be a circle jerk for the filmmakers, LBJ gone, Nixon in, the Boomers' ascendancy and our ultimate "humiliation". I have a feeling we ain't seen nothing yet with this show. Set the controls for the heart of the Sun. | |||
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Just because you can, doesn't mean you should |
The battles-We won almost all of the battles and killed a lot more of them than they did us. The war-We (our leadership) didn't play to win and we didn't. I don't recall that they ever defined what a win would be, like they did in WW2. If you don't know where you're going, it's hard to find the way there. ___________________________ Avoid buying ChiCom/CCP products whenever possible. | |||
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Member |
"...Coyote and all their leftist ilk..." That's putting it mildly. This is him, back in the early 70s: __________________________ | |||
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Member |
I was confused about the war when I was 7-17, and now I know why , I am still very confused. a lot of very very special human beings fought and came back, a lot did not. I can not imagine going through what those soldiers went through. and then coming home to what they are going through now Safety, Situational Awareness and proficiency. Neck Ties, Hats and ammo brass, Never ,ever touch'em w/o asking first | |||
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Freethinker |
“It was obviously in the interest of those who opposed the [Vietnam] war, and those who evaded it, to portray those who served in the worst possible light.” — Lewis Sorley, A Better War (New York: A Harvest Book, Harcourt, 2000). Like so many things in history, it’s not necessary to limit oneself to watching agenda-filled polemics produced to satisfy people who don’t have the attention span or literacy for anything else to learn about the Vietnam War. Many books have been written that make it clear that the US and RVN and our other allies won all the major battles and by any rational standard were winning the war when we decided to pick up our ball and go home, leaving the South to its fate. And if anyone believes that Vietnam was somehow unique in the history of American warfare by any measure, I urge them to read the “Liberation Trilogy” by Rick Atkinson about the war in North Africa and Western Europe. The “last good war” and the “Greatest Generation” exhibited all of the same horrors: incompetent leadership from the top to the bottom; interference from national leaders; feckless allies who nevertheless demanded their shares of goods and glory; high rates of desertion and malingering; and on and on. ► 6.4/93.6 | |||
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Member |
Our departure has always been portrayed as a humiliating loss and I guess it was. Nixon campaigned on getting us out and it happened. I was prime draft age during the worst years and avoided it through deferment and the lottery. We all knew guys that went and guys that died but the prevailing attitude seemed to be don't go if you can avoid it. The humiliation of seeing material pushed into the sea and people hanging off helicopters was not as meaningful as the national relief. There was a great emptiness to that relief that may never have been filled. Set the controls for the heart of the Sun. | |||
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Freethinker |
“Humiliating”? I’m not sure. Humiliation is something the actor feels; it’s not an objective standard that the rest of us can assign. On the other hand, disgraceful is something that I have no hesitation in applying to the final outcome of the war. I have long been ambivalent in my feelings about Nixon and the war. As you say, he campaigned to end our involvement, so he was obviously carrying out the will of the electorate. Much more in his favor was the fact that he was willing to use military action to force the Communists to the negotiating table. He was roundly criticized for doing that despite its effectiveness because the leftist sympathizers of the Communist aggression wanted us to just unilaterally cease military action and support for the South without any concessions from the North. The resulting agreement to end US military action was, however, highly favorable to the North and relied on their agreements that anyone with half a brain would have recognized as being almost certain to be broken. The most disgraceful element of the end was the US’s failure of will and failure to honor its promises to the South when the North (inevitably) broke their promises. And something we should not forget is that 20 to 30 years after the end of World War II our national leadership and most of the middle-aged electorate who wanted us out of Viet Nam were members of the “Greatest Generation.” Some of the reasons why they viewed our obligations and the dangers posed to world peace by naked military aggression differently then are easy to understand, but others are not (at least for me). As with any such event in history, the details of what happened during the war and why are extremely complex. Anyone who hopes to begin to understand them must do more than watch a few hours of entertainment interspersed among the commercial advertisements. ► 6.4/93.6 | |||
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Just because you can, doesn't mean you should |
The Paris Peace Accords of 1973 were just a way out for the US so we could save face and leave. They were really a short term truce and prisoner exchange. The leaders of North Vietnam knew the real plan and I suspect our's did too. In any case, it was better than continuing the same path for many more years and having the same or a worse end result. I would like to think we learned something, got something out of this, but I'm not sure we did. Insurgencies are really civil wars and they aren't settled by outsiders. ___________________________ Avoid buying ChiCom/CCP products whenever possible. | |||
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Member |
The media certainly learned something. The concepts of "quagmires" and "our boys coming home in body bags", both of which surfaced very quickly as we pondered our post-9/11 response. Set the controls for the heart of the Sun. | |||
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Junior Member |
Retired high school teacher in my hometown took a recent vacation to Vietnam. She asked a neighbor of mine, a Vietnam veteran, if he would like to go back for a visit. He replied he received an all expense paid 13 month "vacation" there in 1968-69 and once was enough for him. He has been watching the episodes so far and not found too much to argue about. | |||
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Member |
the entities that placed us here decided that humans are incapable of using where and when to use what we learn. they stopped their bi-monthy updates to their home planet in 1954. earth is not on the back burner ( in their minds) earth is out on the back porch sitting on two cases of pop bottles that were supposed to be returned in the early 60's Safety, Situational Awareness and proficiency. Neck Ties, Hats and ammo brass, Never ,ever touch'em w/o asking first | |||
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Member |
Back from a vacation in Europe and have had the episodes recorded. Interesting to see the members comments, as we've all known Burns' leftist leanings, we just want to know how far; what a surprise Peter Coyote narrating I did a paper on the war back in college, I came up with a handful of major points to which the professor, was all tied up because none of them were what she would've used: - The CIA's elimination of Diem and his brother, while both were idiots and responsible for the cynicism of the South Vietnamese people and their government, was ham-fisted and resulted in continued political instability. - Kennedy's signatory to the Laotian Neutrality Agreement should never have happened, when the Ho Chi Minh trail was being constructed and arms flowed in to support their own communist insurgency, instead of publicly exposing the NV and Laos, American political leadership failed to expose this and use it as leverage to justify military action. - Westmoreland and McNamara did more to screw up American military policy than anyone else. Not until Creighton Abrams and CIA's William Colby arrival, was there finally leadership who understood guerrilla warfare and how to deal with insurgencies. Unfortunately, their appointments were too late, as the South had lost the political support of it's citizens and the North had it's hooks set into American media. At that point, the war was a money pit. - While the draft was unpopular, drug usage was not as wide-spread as the media would've led many to believe nor was the fragging of officers. - Nixon did more to bring about the end than anybody is will to credit him with. He allowed his military leaders to do what was necessary and ultimately, bring the North to the peace table. He knew the South was lost as it's political leaders were all corrupt and many of it's citizen's were all exhausted, thus giving-in to the North. | |||
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Member |
I noticed the same thing immediately. Coyote must say those phrases 50 times throughout the series. Jeebus... | |||
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Peace through superior firepower |
Oh, and Richard Nixon was a BAD MAN!!!!!! Pushing fifty freaking years of this shit. The leftists just can't get past Nixon, who was a choirboy compared to the corruption from the likes of Obama and Hillary Clinton. Watergate? Big Goddamned deal. Benghazi, assholes. Benghazi. Wiretapping of political opponents? Again, Dick Nixon was an amateur compared to Barack Obama. Get the fuck past it, children. Open your eyes. Nixon was actually a very effective POTUS, not that the children could ever see it, or admit to it in the one in a million chance that they could see it. You know what it's like? It's like a chick who has daddy issues. Just can't get past it, not even in an entire lifetime. | |||
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Member |
We didn't learn anything. Look at Afghanistan. | |||
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Staring back from the abyss |
Boy, they mostly disemboweled Hanoi Jane. Kind of surprising coming from lefties. I would have expected them to gloss over her treasonous activities and statements. ________________________________________________________ "Great danger lies in the notion that we can reason with evil." Doug Patton. | |||
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Member |
Have they interviewed any of the North Vietnamese who tortured our POW pilots? I'm curious as to how they will be portrayed. Have not watched any episodes, I don't have the patience to sit through 10-12 hours. Maybe in the winter. | |||
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