Re: i take back some of my praise for fire in the lake
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As the first socialist state in Southeast Asia, Vietnam was seen as a huge test of the US resolve to not allow the dominoes to fall easily into Russian and Red Chinese hands. Negotiation with Ho Chih Minh and the DRVN was impossible with the amount of aid and influence the communists already had, and pretty much free reign they gave the totalitarian regime.
Google "domino theory indochina" if the book doesnt do justice to the topic. It has its obvious parallels with our policy in the ME.
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See Robert McNamara's "In Retrospect".
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