The 38th parallel is in Korea and not Vietnam. I think your refusals to see the parallels between vietnam and iraq are based on your lack of knowlege of US military interventions in that part of the world.

The only things korea and vietnam had in common was that they were both cases where the US, Russia and China interfered in the internal affairs of asian nations.

While the other side has its propaganda for empire buiding, US citizens were led to believe it was supposedly for the purpose of saving the world from the evils that spread forth from communist revolution.

Now the bogey man of communism has been replaced with the bogey man of religious extremists. The one thing that remains the same is that powerful forces benefit from wars the wars they promote while humanity in general suffers.

Pete, thank you for responding. I may not agree with your vision of what our leaders should be doing, but at least your opinions seem well thought out and consistent, you have a core set of beliefs that I would call traditional conservative.

What I would like to see done differently in regards to terrorism is just intelligent security at our borders and airports, an INS that has the tools and support that it needs to enforce immigration policy, and much more "surgical" military operations around the globe against individuals who are a danger to us. Besides that, coalitions w/ our traditional allies and smart diplomacy to reduce hatred for us when it is possible, ( it's in our best interest), this is where we may diverge because I oppose some of the same policies that make people hate us, but I believe in killing terrorists. Hope that clarifies things with me.

Invading and occupying Iraq was a disasterous mistake IMO, god knows how expensive and destabilizing it really was. As an American sitting comfortably at home, I feel gut-wrenching pain for the troops that are on the ground there getting shot at because of inept policy makers in D.C. Do I support the troops? Yeah, and if one of my guys was in power they would all still be alive. It breaks my heart and makes me fighting mad, I'm not kidding. If you and I could go there and talk to them right now, I'm sure that plenty, including officers, would privately agree w/ me at this point.

I have many relatives and a surrogate big brother who was a Marine in Viet Nam during the Tet offensive, who are what I would call "mainstream Republicans", fiscally conservative but not religious zealots, realistic about the human condition and pragmatic. That is what I aim for, but I expect quite a bit from leaders. I have never seen someone do a worse job of leading than this president. He is truly pathetic, IMO, and in the eyes of the world.

About the tanks: yes, I wondered about their absence. In fact, when I first saw a tank in the movie, I thought that that was what the troops needed in the first place, and funny as this is, once I saw "UN" painted on the tank's front (hood?) I said to myself, "Well that's a losing cause."

Goes to show what the UN represents in wartime scenarios, at least for me.

As for what you say about the high hopes for the U.S. and Iraq, there still and most obviously has not been enough study on the Iraqi infrastructure that existed before the war to bring the country back to a working entity. Almost all of the leaders in the country who have risen out of the sand to help rebuild Iraq, have been implicated in some scandal or the other, and rendered inadequate. Again, there just seems to be a lack of planning going on there.

In fact, I have to disagree about this NOT being similar to Vietnam: Iraq has all the makings of another Vietnam in as much as this IS a war of attrition and re-establishment. It simply occurs on a different timeline than in Vietnam. In Vietnam, the idea was to stop the influx of Communism from the north, while in Iraq, the influx of a bad nature (terrorist state, whatever that is) has already occurred.

And with the term "exit strategy," I can't think of any major war where we have employed a successful exit strategy. In Vietnam, we evacuated. As for Germany, Japan, and Korea, we have yet to exit.

I can compare Iraq to Somalia based on Hollywood effects and the hot, dusty terrain; a broken-down city teeming with snipers and guerrilla fighters - maybe not as many as in "Blackhawk Down," but a sizeable amount to kill more U.S. soldiers than were killed before the end of hostilities was declared by Bush in San Diego.

But the bigger picture is a Vietnam of sorts: all the markings are there: 1) Lack of intelligence as to the indigenous people; 2) Lack of planning once warfare has started and completed; and 3) Lack of understanding by the media, coupled with the Administration's thwarting of the media's quest for answers. What does a liberal media then do? They take their own hostilities to the public, state over and over the rising death count, the lack of information coming from the Administration, the lack of resolution to the problems, and finally, the fact our soldiers aren't home yet.

It takes the American public to listen to these points, however by way of Bush's approval rating, they don't seem to be listening. Either that, or they simply don't care...

I am sorry my friend, you are correct, I goofed. I am going to blame it on the fact that I have been up since 4am est and I am a little tired. I don't want to make more mistakes tonight, so I will be back after some sleep. I will attempt to defend myself tomorrow and try to keep my errors one step behind my ignorance.

Pete

Get some sleep there, Captain. ;)

"As for what you say about the high hopes for the U.S. and Iraq, there still and most obviously has not been enough study on the Iraqi infrastructure that existed before the war to bring the country back to a working entity."

I, as well as most people here I would imagine, receive their information from various published sources. I've read that, before the war, the state dept. had informed the administration of the repercussions of starting and ending a war. That includes studying and preparing for various scenarios including the protection of infrastructure, the level of destruction, degree of mayhem/anarchy, etc.

The administration apparently decided to discount or minimize this part of the equation and (obviously) concentrated only on actual battle plans. Invading a country is seldom without complications. To not have addressed these issues before beginning battle is short-sighted ..... to say the least. Case in point - how much of Iraq has electricity, potable water and sanitation as of this date? How many happy Iraqi civilians are there? Have we won their hearts and minds in our quest to "free" them?

JMHO,
Sherwood Lee

Iraq is NOT Vietnam....

A. N Vietnam had the backing and Supplyof a Super Power the USSR..and the threat of mutual anhilation was the over riding determinate of policy in S Vietnam

B. Ho Chi Mihn was a Nationalist who wanted to unify his country and thus had the bulk of the people behind him. There is no situation like that in Iraq.

C. The USA only supported the French in IndoChina because we needed them as allies against the USSR in Europe....the US knew that it was a losing cause all long....until LBJ and Kennedies Best and Brightest came along.

D. Iraq isn't even like Afganistan...when the USSR invaded the USA was suppling the Mohadjin arms and supplies.

Iraq is more like Yugoslavia....an artifically created nation with disparate population...Sunies, Shieties, and Kurds

All heir apparent to the political process in Iraq were eliminated by Sodamn.... infrastructure was left to decay by him etc

Sodamns regime was more along the lines of being a Gangster than a Government...to have left him in place was to keep US forces in Saudi, and Kuwait to keep him in check. which were underlying causes for radicalization in Saudi


Now here is a flaw in American thinking... Americans have watched 2 much TV where at the end of an hour the bad guy is caught and the problem is resolved. We want to resolved our conflicts nice and neatly in an hour...and if that doesn't occur we begin to think something is wrong, that maybe it is undoable...maybe we shouldn't be doing this...

Also don't forget that there is a Political Party that is out of power and is stirring the pot as much as it can so that in 2004 they can get in power again...so things may not be as bad as the Nay says want you to believe.

Also take a look at the Stock Market as a Bell Weather of economic, and war related reality .it has rallied strongly since March...and shows no sign of underlying weakness...

What do you expect in Iraq... a country that for 30 years has been run by a Gangster, has fallen apart and never really should have been a country in the first place to be put back together again and running smoothly? In what 3 months???

Is America that Gun Shy and begin to think when the going isn't smooth that this could be another Vietnam? Since we have embarked upon this course of action we need to keep plodding along fixing one problem at a time, and keeping the lid on those who want to destabilize the situation. Until some kind of Stable government can be put into place. I do think that the more pockets that money comes from to fix the place the better though.

No, you and I aren't reaping the rewards, but I am sure that GW and Chaney "slush fund" account balances are looking pretty nice these days. Those kick-backs from the NON-BID Halibuton contracts totalling close to 2 BILLION couldn't have hurt. No, we didn't "go there for the oil", but the spoils of war are not fictional, they just only make it to a select few.

Don't U boyz get it....The SPOILS OF WAR is what has made this country as rich as it is.....

America has enriched itself on 2 World Wars by selling arms to everyone in sight....In the 58 years since the end of WW2, the USA has continued to sell arms throughout the world...The USA marKet share of the arms trade is probably around 75% since the collapse of the USSR.

Whining Liberals should get with the program and realize their nest is being feathered by whats going on....in other words our dear Liberals are biting the hand that feeds them... One if Liberals are so morally outraged why don't they put their living standard where their mouthes are...out in a shack in Idaho like Ted Kozinski did, then maybe their words would truly have meaning. Two Liberals should realize that by biting the hand that feeds them that they are undermining their own security...and one bite too many may cause them to become Dumpster Divers like me.

I have been thinking about this for the last few days and I can't find one correlation between Iraq and Vietnam with one exception. The Iraqis and the VC both use guerilla tactics againt our troops. If I am missing something here please let me know. I will list the differences as I see them.

1. As tabs said, the VC were very well funded by the Soviets, the Iraqis have no outside support at all. They may have some assistance sneaking across the border from Iran, but they are not being resupplied by them.
2. The VC had Cambodia and the north to take refuge in, we didn't even bomb Hanoi until the very end.
3. We were in Vietnam to help repel an invading force and to help the south retain her "independence". We are trying to give the people of Iraq their independence back.
4. The action in vietnam was a "police action" and not a war. That was a huge mistake, without the declaration of war and no clear cut objectives in sight we were doomed to failure. We have an objective in Iraq. I don't know what the strategies are over there right now, as I am not given daily updates by Rumsfeld, but they are breaking new ground here, it is not going to be easy.
5. We had a very different fighting force in vietnam. It was made up of men who were drafted and a lot of them didn't really want to be there and the "green" guys had a life expectancy of days, not exactly great morale boosters. Our guys in Iraq are 100% volunteer, they know why they are there and they are getting the job done.

I think there were some mistakes made in this campaign, but I believe that we were justified in our action. I am tired of the way that we (I use that term figuratively) keep trying to put a "happy face" on war. It's dirty, it's nasty, it's bloody and at times absolutely necessary. Would we have the stomach today to have another D-Day? Would our commanders be able to send our troops into battle knowing that the casualties would be 75%? I don't know, but I hope so. We cannot "appease" the enemy any longer, we must fight him and win. Clinton did not have the heart for this, but Bush is at least trying. The media would have you believe that Iraq is now in shambles. This is simply put not the case. It isn't quite California yet, but it never will be. For those of you out there who still believe that we were wrong to do this, consider this: You and I live under the blanket we call freedom. We can openly debate this issue and any issue we choose without fear of recrimination or death. Blood was spilled for this right. I am eternally grateful to those who have come before me and paid the price for our freedom. Many suffered and died so that we can carry on the torch of freedom. Thanks to this, I do not know what it was like to live in Saddams Iraq. I don't understand the terrror that must be felt in never knowing If what I say or do will lead me to imprisonment, torture or death. I don't know what it's like to not be able to pursue an education. Or to not be able to worship the god of my choice in the way that I choose. I don't know what it's like to live in utter abject poverty while the madman who runs my country steals from me to make a point to the west. I am glad that I have never had to live in those conditions, and now with our help neither will the Iraqis. Those who fled in fear for their lives will be free to return to their families and their homeland. This is not a "pipe-dream" this is something that we have the power to do. Someone on this board once said that some countries are destined to live under totalitarian rule. I say, that's easy for you to say from the comfort of your chair and very wrong in my opinion. You may not like Bush, you may not vote for him next year. That is fine you have that right, but what he did, and what he is doing is good, although we may disagree on the strategy. This is not the reason we went to Iraq in the first place, but I think it's a damned good result. Teddy Roosevelt once said "given the choice between righteousness and peace, I will choose righteousness". I couldn't agree more. If we were to leave now, before we have finished, what we have done would be wasted and that would be a shame. That would be like Vietnam.

Pete

OK, here are other similiarities you fail to see or dismiss.

Misleading intelligence and false information was used to justify waging war against both nations.

Nationalism and disgust at foriegn colonialism and occupation fuels a great deal of the resentment to our military occupation of both of these countries.

The guerillas and peaceful natives are usually indistinguishable from each other so our pacification of the country is sure to involve a lot of the nasty police state tactics like the ones behind operation phoenix in vietnam and the ones we so criticized Saddam for using so the resentment of the US occupation by the natives is certain to grow.

Just like in vietnam iraq's border is porous and there are a lot of surrounding countries who are certain to supply munitions and support to the iraqi guerilla cause.

How were our 'police actions' in Vietnam any different than our current feable attempts at policing and keeping order in Iraq? The goals in both countries were identical; set up a US friendly government that would maintain the colonial order preferred by western nations despite the fact that the majority of the people in the nation do not want us there or calling the shots for their country.

The rest of your post appears to me nothing more than jingoistic statements that have little do with the facts concerning the US occupation of iraq.

For example, from your statements you seem to be unaware that Iraq was one of the few secular arab countries where people had religious freedom and anyone including women could seek a higher education if they had the money or scholarships to do so (like here in the ol USA).

Yes, soldiers have died in the past to protect our freedoms, but that does not give our government cart blank to wage war with the rest of the planet when our current corrupt regime can't even run this country right.

There are places in the US that are just as bad as in iraq. Drug lords and religious fanatics kill and extort people and control territory here in our own country, but these facts do not bode well when people are trying to use these facts about other parts of the world to justify wars that promote US hegemony.

If you need a good case in point as to whether the US can win this war any time soon just look to how well the several decade occupation of the palestinian territories is working out for the Zionist state of Israel.

To think 9/11 was used to justify this attrocity in the making when Iraq had nothing to do with it just goes to show how low people in the Bush administration are willing to go to promote a war that their hawks have been promoting for over a decade.

I can't help but notice that you quote Teddy concerning righteousness and peace when his regime was rife with neither.

While you state it would be a shame to leave Iraq before we finish putting another puppet police state in to replace the last one we put in place there, vietnam has turned out pretty well despite our exit if we don't count all of the birth defects from the tons of dioxin we left behind in the form of agent orange and the unexploded munitions that still kill and maim a few viliagers every now and then.

Some assistance? It's a lot of assistance. That's why we put the call out for help in Iraq.

When's the last time you visited Vietnam?

My dog eats better than many Vietnamese citizens. That's all I have to say. Those people would love to have a free economy and society. Fortunately, we can invade Vietnam with Western culture. It just takes a lot longer.

Jürgen

Maybe I should have just stuck with my discussion on turbochargers.

I wasn't going to reply to this because it is quite obvious that we see things so completely different that this an exercise in futility. But.....if I don't respond it would appear that I can't. So here goes:

Misleading and false information.......that is a great soundbyte and a wonderful statement if you can get away with it. Did he mislead congress when he got an overwhelmingly affirmative vote to use force in Iraq? Or was congress just stupid enough to not do any research prior to their vote? Whatever. But I will agree that Kennedy was way out of his depth when he sent troops to Vietnam.

Nationalism and a disgust of foreign colonialism.........Huh? This made me think of Monty Python's Holy Grail, when King Arthur was trucking through the fields and got into a serious political debate with a peasant farmer. I think they hated the fact that we were running over their rice paddys with our tanks, doing something they couldn't understand. But you're right they weren't too happy we were there, Iraqis are learning the difference.

Which of Saddam's police state tactics are we using? I mean exactly, did we fire up the woodchipper that Uday and his brother used to use? Or maybe we just started our own mass graves in between the ones Saddam had. Right. Oh, I forgot, are we using the seek and destroy techniques we used in Vietnam?

The goals in both countries were identical........similar maybe, we were supporting the standing government in Vietnam in fact using their military. We were initially "advisors" remeber? In Iraq, we are trying to help them to become self governing. Oh yeah and we declared war in Iraq.

Jingoistic......I bet you could kick my ass in scrabble.

Iraq is like "the good old USA"????????? Are you kidding me? I guess you think the berlin wall was built to keep the capitalists OUT of the wonderful agrarian community in east germany. Right. I'm speechless, really this is the most amazing thing I have ever heard.

To compare Iraqs border to vietnam, there would have to be NO border on Iran (for example) and make it illegal for the US to enter there. There is no comparison here. And this is NOT why we are asking the UN if they would like to help us.

Current corrupt regime.......a regime implies an authoritarian government. You may not like him, but Bush was ELECTED in case you missed it. Now please don't start whining about how the election was "stolen" by the supreme court. Thats another thread altogether. And our status gives us not only the right to protect ourselves but the obligation to help others.

There are places in the US that are as bad as Iraq.....name one. Name me one place in this country where you are not protected by the rights afforded you in the constitution. Give me one example of this. I guess this is the reason we have uncontrollable immigratio TO this country right? This is such a miserable place to live, oh won't someone please come and rescue us from our oppressors. This has left the boundries of good judgement.

Now we are comparing this to Israel? The last time I heard them referred to as "zionist" was a bald guy in a brown shirt and combat boots, not exactly who I'd like to align myself with if I were you.

This atrocity in the making..........so, we're committing atrocities but Saddam wanted freedom of religion and an education for all who can afford it. Unbelieveable.

How did I figure you wouldn't appreciate a president who opened the door to civil rights and started environment protections. Oh, because he was a republican, I forget sometimes that that's what determines good or bad.

To replace the last one we put in there? Saddam replaced the last government in a bloody coup. Explain this one for me.

As far a vietnam goes, you missed the slaughter in cambodia by Pol Pot or was that completely unrelated to our leaving the region?

Here's a couple more you probably buy:

Nixon resigned because he was directly involved in the Watergate affair, right?
McCarthy was wrong about there being communists in our government, right?
Truman was as responsible as Reagan for the demise of the Soviet Union, right?
Carter was a brilliant diplomat, right?
Castro was the best thing to happen to Cuba, right?
Arafat really wants peace in the middle east, right?
Clinton only lied about unimportant things, right?

Let me just say, I would love to sit down and have a beer with you sometime. That would be fun. :)

Pete

As long as there will be naives like Pete Pranger to pay their taxes and give carte blanche to the government to pursue any agressive policy of economical takeover it wishes, wars against terror will continue.
Maybe the world will be shown to us as a safer place, whatever the controlled media will show will be the truth, right ?
Seriously, if the US really wanted to help the Iraqui, should not it start to stop using depleted uranium during combat ? Then, would not it make sense to hire Iraqui people to rebuild their country, rather than giving the businesses to Bechtel and Halliburton for a much higher cost ? What the US is trying to do, without duping anyone, is to rebuild Iraq on its OWN WAYS, for its OWN INTEREST, and make it an economic colony that will have to repay its debt by providing cheap oil. Can you see where the Iraquis are being screwed ? One comes to destroy their country, then generously offers to rebuild it (and generously offers the UN to pay part of the tab) but the catch is that they have to hire those expensive american companies. Iraqui are educated people you know, they have engineers too...but they have oil too, and this is what the US economy needs more than anything. Just imagine paying your gas $4/gallon, with quotas, and having blackouts all the time. Just imagine how our comfortable little lifes would be disturbed, regardless of how much money we have.
It was more about oil than WMDs...Oil and business for the GW`s buddies. I`ll stick to that.

Aurel

count me in Pete. I've been itchin' for a good fight. it seems to me that you've also noticed the ignorance of our current political situation that appears to be running rampant these days. the left's one-line indictments fraught with simplistic hints at conspiracies are getting pretty tiring to say the least.

let's have some fun. I got your back.

and heck, after the dust settles, maybe we can go back to discussing turbo chargers.

I'd take your challenge, but what's that saying? "Never engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed person". :cool:

Okay speeder, if that's the way it is, we'll leave you alone then. :D

Very kind of you, but then I would expect nothing less. :)

Eric you should checkout this thread. Halibuton is still the only company up for the job (that never really happened this second time around.)

Also keep in mind, our government makes (by far) the most money from a healthy economy (read: easy taxes) By keeping the price of energy (gas, in this case) low, people have an easier time adding to the GNP. The more GNP, the more money to be controlled by politicians. . .the more money controlled by politicians, the more lips are kissing their collective ass. . . .and that's what its all about. . . .a win-win.. . we get lower gas prices, the politicians get high pucker factor.

To think that the Bush admin is playing such a simple quid-pro-quo with Halibuton, as you and Aurel describe, is ludicrous. Not a single other company has cried "foul . . .we wanted to be responsible for putting out massive amounts of oil fires in Iraq"

It's just leftist propoganda, mascarading as a "princple" argument.
Its like . . .what if the right got all PO'd about a 90's army cookie contract going to Nabisco. Sure, Nabisco is about the only company capable of handling the task. . .but sheesh, there's Al Gore, and all his tabacco affiliation. . .Nabisco is owned by Phillip Morris . . connect the dots, man . . .we're all gett'n shafted by the man. :rolleyes: