Could We Have Won Vietnam?

[The Truth]

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Wow. I'm amazed.

The Chinese fought the Vietnamese for hundreds of years and never prevailed. The French fought with them for ten years before we arrived and never prevailed. We fought them for years and never prevailed.

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lol wrong, wrong, wrong....

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You gotta elaborate.

[ikestoys]

meh i guess the last one is right, but vietnam was run by chinese and french for a long time and the idea that they were this unbeatable people is just wrong.

[lehighguy]

Well Vietnam was independent from China from the 11th century to the 18th century. France controlled Vietnam in the same way we did, they controlled all the major cities but the countriside was full of guerillas that attack them every day. If guerillas are attacking you everyday how in control are you?

[ikestoys]

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Chinese fought the Vietnamese for hundreds of years and never prevailed

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just wrong, you are exaggerating

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France controlled Vietnam in the same way we did, they controlled all the major cities but the countriside was full of guerillas that attack them every day

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this was not true until the 20th century.

[canis582]

Prussia never lost a battle against poland and the pols still won. None of the presidential candidates understand history...to do so would disqualify them from the position they seek.

[Money2Burn]

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"Insanity" is not the right word to use for McCain's viewpoint. He is simply wrong.

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McCain's position is intellectually indefensible. Yes, this should disqualify him as a candidate for president. A fundamental grasp on our own history is prerequisite for this position.

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That would probably eliminate half the field

[PLOlover]

chomsky says saigon was "jewel of the orient" or pearl or sometihng, well that part is history not his opinion, his opinion was that US wanted the good stuff in VN, the resouces and other stuff, and so US either wanted to control said resources, or deny them to others.

since US achieved goal 2 of denying them to others (ie, blew the hell out of the whole country), US won the war and achieved their objective.

[adios]

The United States couldn't win the war with the strategy they had. They were committed to not ever, for any reason taking the war to the North Vietnameese by sending troops north of the DMZ. The goal was to make the South Vietnameese strong enough to defend themselves. We started to pull the rug out from under the South Vietnameese when we left in 1973 and in 1975 Congress finished the job by cutting off funds.

[Copernicus]

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I have 3 American employees, I know their character very well. I also know that they are grateful for the British intervention that made it possible for their families to emigrate to the UK and held off the North from taking over. Sovereignty indeed.

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Huh?

[Copernicus]

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Clearly, the war was unwinnable. Because the government we were supporting was not supported by the people. The revolt against Diem started in the south.

Clearly the American public supported the war. As late as February 1968 23% of Americans defined themselves as "doves" and 61% "hawks."

Clearly it was the lies of our government, as revealed in the Pentagon Papers, and its brutality, that turned public opinion. We dropped more bombs than were dropped in the history of the world on South Vietnam, the "country" we were supposed to be defending. I suppose had we taken General LeMay's advice, and bombed the Vienamese back to the stone age, we could have killed every man, woman and child in the country and thus "won" the war." Short of that, victory was impossible.

"Insanity" is not the right word to use for McCain's viewpoint. He is simply wrong.

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and so are you. <font color="white"> and you like baseball! what a maroon </font>