John Kerry and Hanoi Jane!

[FN FAL]

Had to post this picture...http://www.newsmax.com/images/headlines/Fonda_Kerry_arrow.jpg

 

[chawbein]

I could care less about John Kerry, but that guy sure is the ugliest sonuva b!tch I've seen in a while.

 

[FN FAL]

Here's the article from where that picture was taken. Evidently Don Imus is ticked about the photo and is considering withdrawing support.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/2/10/85843.shtml

 

[FN FAL]

They also have the John Kerry arrest photo...

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2004/2/10/230326.shtml

 

[chawbein]

"It's time for an old-fashioned hippy @ss whompin!"

 

[FN FAL]

You mean like the one they got at the 1968 democratic convention in Chicago?

http://www.jofreeman.com/photos/Chicago68/68chicago04.jpg

 

[chawbein]

"Set your batons on WHOMP!"
"Mine's stuck on twirl, Chief."
"Ahhh, Jeaze!"

 

[GogglesPisano]

Nothing wrong with protesting that war. Sometimes, patriotism includes trying to point out the error of your country's ways.

Isn't it possible that the protestors brought about an earlier withdrawal of our troops than otherwise would have occured?

(Please be nice with your reponses, or it will prove my point that the angriest, most insulting posters on this forum are always the arch-conservatives.)

 

[rettofly]

Isn't it possible that the protestors brought about an earlier withdrawal of our troops than otherwise would have occured?

I think the protesters prolonged the agony by politicizing the effort and encouraging the enemy. If they had kept quiet, the military would not have been handcuffed, and the net result would have been fewer casualties on both sides.

 

[GogglesPisano]

I think the protesters prolonged the agony by politicizing the effort and encouraging the enemy. If they had kept quiet, the military would not have been handcuffed, and the net result would have been fewer casualties on both sides.

You're assuming we could have won the war either way. From what I've read, we didn't have popular support in South Vietnam. That, in itself, made the war unwinnable.

 

[EagleRJ]

Nothing wrong with protesting that war. Sometimes, patriotism includes trying to point out the error of your country's ways.

Isn't it possible that the protestors brought about an earlier withdrawal of our troops than otherwise would have occured?

(Please be nice with your reponses, or it will prove my point that the angriest, most insulting posters on this forum are always the arch-conservatives.)

So protesting that war was fine, but protesting this war is wrong? I think the goal of defending a democratic allied country from Communist invasion is just as noble a cause as targeting rouge nations that support terror. Where we went wrong in Vietnam is we didn't give our soldiers the ability to win. We ended up losing the war even though we won all the battles, and hopefully those lessons will forever be remembered by our military leaders.

There's nothing wrong with opposing a war, except when it hurts our military's morale or ability to win. That includes giving aid and comfort to the enemy (Jane Fonda) and wearing the uniform at a protest (John Kerry).

I think this country should always have a leader who emulates our national seal- desire peace but be ready for war. GWB is not a warmonger- he just isn't afraid to apply the necessary force to meet a threat to our country or our allies. We can't afford to return to the pacifism and isolationism like we had pre-WWII, and I'm afraid that's where the Democratic candidates would take us.

 

[FN FAL]

You're assuming we could have won the war either way. From what I've read, we didn't have popular support in South Vietnam. That, in itself, made the war unwinnable

I don't see no Viet Cong flag hanging over our capitol!

It wasn't a declared war, it was a police action. We just got bored and went home. End of police action. We lost 50,000+ American lives over there, compared to their losses of more than a million, if not millions.

We won most of the battles we fought in over there, we can't help it if the South Vietnamese didn't have the heart to win their own civil war. You can take a horse to water, but you can't make it drink.

If you mean we lost the police action because we were unsuccessful in our attempt at superimposing our western values on another culture...well then you might have me there.

We greased more of them, then they did of us. They didn't come out of this thing the boss of us either. I don't call that losing.

 

[GogglesPisano]

So protesting that war was fine, but protesting this war is wrong? I think the goal of defending a democratic allied country from Communist invasion is just as noble a cause as targeting rouge nations that support terror. Where we went wrong in Vietnam is we didn't give our soldiers the ability to win. We ended up losing the war even though we won all the battles, and hopefully those lessons will forever be remembered by our military leaders.

There's nothing wrong with opposing a war, except when it hurts our military's morale or ability to win. That includes giving aid and comfort to the enemy (Jane Fonda) and wearing the uniform at a protest (John Kerry).

I think this country should always have a leader who emulates our national seal- desire peace but be ready for war. GWB is not a warmonger- he just isn't afraid to apply the necessary force to meet a threat to our country or our allies. We can't afford to return to the pacifism and isolationism like we had pre-WWII, and I'm afraid that's where the Democratic candidates would take us.

Democratic? Therein lies the rub. Elections were never held during the war. Diem was a corrupt, unpopular leader (being a Catholic in an overwhelmingly Buddhist nation.) I think the vast majority of rice farmers spending 18 hours a day couldn't have cared less who was in charge, hence the lack of popular support.

As far as opposing the war and the impact on our troops, you can take that to an extreme. Let's say, hypothetically, we decided to invade Sweden tomorrow for no good reason. Would you protest, even if it hurt morale? Don't yout think the Nazis made this argument as the Wermacht rolled through Poland?

 

[Dave Benjamin]

What an interesting choice we face.

A presidential candidate who was arrested for demonstrating his beliefs versus a sitting president who was arrested for DUI and can't even raise his own daughters very well. Of course it's hard to fault the daughters for emulating their old man.

 

[chawbein]

What an interesting choice we face.

A presidential candidate who was arrested for demonstrating his beliefs versus a sitting president who was arrested for DUI and can't even raise his own daughters very well. Of course it's hard to fault the daughters for emulating their old man.

Don't be a douche-tard.

 

[AceCrackshot]

FN FAL,
While I usually agree your choice of weapon, I would have to disagree with "analysis" of the situation in S. Vietnam, especially after 1972.

The historical facts speak for themselves...
After Tet 1968, the indiginous (sp!) Communist insurgency in RVN was essentially dead. I have spoken with main force VC commanders who were in essence the sole survivors of BATTALIONS, the casualties were of that magitude. Combined with the essential indifference to communist idealogy in the South in the 69-70 timeframe, outright hostility in certain circles (esp. Catholics and Cao Dai) the VC intellectuals wrote off class struggle and even large scale guerilla activities in favor of conventional combat.

RVN military forces were gaining in strength and capability during Vietnamization. Army and CIA analyists (though not entirely objective) claimed the ARVN the most combat effective Free World Army in the world outside the US, and including the Israeli.

Which is my highly truncated argument leading my thesis. South Vietnam fell, not due the lack of fighting spirit of the South Vietnamese, or political corruption (though both were present, in some degree) but due almost entirely the evaporation of support, morally, but most telling, materially, in 74-75 on the part of the US. This abandonment of the Vietnamese was one of the most craven and cowardly acts in modern history, and can be laid, almost entirely, the feet of the anti-war movement and its adherants in Democratic Party. The Democratic Party, somewhat like the former Communist parties in Eastern Europe, has never been called to task.

My only question to Senator Kerry, would be "Do you continue to believe the abandonment of peoples to barbarism, either clerical or atheist, represents a moral, ethical, or even a self-interested wise choice?"

 

[EagleRJ]

As far as opposing the war and the impact on our troops, you can take that to an extreme. Let's say, hypothetically, we decided to invade Sweden tomorrow for no good reason. Would you protest, even if it hurt morale?

I suppose I would protest, since King Gustav XVI isn't corrupt, and isn't threatening Scandanavia with WMDs.

Don't yout think the Nazis made this argument as the Wermacht rolled through Poland? [/B]

Every army carries the banner of just cause before it. I'm sure the German people were in full support of the annexation of the Rhineland and Austria, and of the invasion of Poland. Of course, if they voiced any opposition, the Geheime Staats Polizei would come and arrest them and they wouldn't be seen again.

The rest of the world didn't think Hitler was just in his actions, and they did something about it. I'll bet that then, as today, someone was protesting the escalation here, as they have every right to do under our Constitution.

 

[chawbein]

Joseph P. Kennedy was one who opposed escalation with the Nazis. He was also a well-known Hitler appeaser, and a big fan of Hitler for that matter. That's another ball of worms though....

Read it here.

 

[GogglesPisano]

Nice thread so far. Interesting discussion. I'm glad it has't devolved into the usual name-calling

 

[bart]

Isn't it possible that the protestors brought about an earlier withdrawal of our troops than otherwise would have occured?

An invasion of North Vietnam in 1965 would have had them home by 1970.

You take the fight to the enemy, not wait for them to find you.

Which exactly why we should be fighting in Afghanistan and Iraq.

and Iran and Syria and Pakistan and Uzbekistan.

I am sure there are others, but those are the real hot spots.

Or we could all hold hands and march for peace and let the Islamic Terrorists choose the battlefield.

I know what my choice is, what is yours?