BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?

Subject: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 02 May 00 - 01:23 PM

Probably everyone has heard the story of returning Vietnam veterans being spat upon by antiwar protesters. Now there is a book by Jerry Lembcke called "The Spitting Image: Myth, Memory and the Legacy of Vietnam" whose thesis is that alleged spitting NEVER HAPPENED.

I found the following information at amazon.com:

"No, Holy Cross College sociology professor Lembcke can't prove a negative, but he makes a strong case that tales of antiwar activists spitting at returning vets are myth. Lembcke, a Nam vet who was active in Vietnam Veterans Against the War, opens with Persian Gulf War politicians' use of 'the spitting image' and then traces Nixon and Agnew's agitated response to antiwar activism by GIs and veterans. He notes that contemporary media, government, and polling data show no evidence of antiwar spitting incidents; the few events reported had supporters of the war targeting opponents. But later studies reported hostility toward veterans; 'the spitting image' epitomized that narrative. Similar images were common in post-World War I Germany and France after Indochina; Lembcke suggests the Nixon administration cultivated this notion of betrayal because it stigmatized both the antiwar movement and veterans against the war. With development of a new psychiatric diagnosis, post-traumatic stress disorder, a good vet/bad vet split was complete, and Hollywood films shifted attention from the war itself to its GI victims." --Mary Carroll Booklist August 19, 1998

"The image is ingrained: A Vietnam veteran, arriving home from the war, gets off a plane only to be greeted by an angry mob of antiwar protesters yelling, 'Murderer!' and 'Baby killer!' Then out of the crowd comes someone who spits in the veteran's face. The only problem, according to Jerry Lembcke, is that no such incident ever has been documented. It is instead, says Lembcke, a kind of urban myth that reflects our lingering national confusion over the war." --Los Angeles Times

"The myth of the spat-upon veteran is not only bad history, but it has been instrumental in selling the American public on bad policy." --Maurice Isserman, Chicago Tribune

"The best history I have seen on the impact of the war on Americans, both then and now." --David Dellinger

"Lembcke builds a compelling case against collective memory by demonstrating that remembrances of Vietnam were almost at direct odds with circumstantial evidence." --San Francisco Chronicle

One of the most resilient images of the Vietnam era is that of the anti-war protester - often a woman - spitting on the uniformed veteran just off the plane. The lingering potency of this icon was evident during the Gulf War, when war supporters invoked it to discredit their opposition.

In this startling book, Jerry Lembcke demonstrates that not a single incident of this sort has been convincingly documented. Rather, the anti-war Left saw in veterans a natural ally, and the relationship between anti-war forces and most veterans was defined by mutual support. Indeed one soldier wrote angrily to Vice President Spiro Agnew that the only Americans who seemed concerned about the soldier's welfare were the anti-war activists.

While the veterans were sometimes made to feel uncomfortable about their service, this sense of unease was, Lembcke argues, more often rooted in the political practices of the Right. Tracing a range of conflicts in the twentieth century, the book illustrates how regimes engaged in unpopular conflicts often vilify their domestic opponents for "stabbing the boys in the back."

Concluding with an account of the powerful role played by Hollywood in cementing the myth of the betrayed veteran through such films as Coming Home, Taxi Driver, and Rambo, Jerry Lembcke's book stands as one of the most important, original, and controversial works of cultural history in recent years.

About the Author

Jerry Lembcke is Associate Professor of Sociology at Holy Cross College. In 1969 he was a Chaplain's Assistant assigned to the 41st Artillery Group in Vietnam.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: MMario
Date: 02 May 00 - 01:30 PM

Having known several vets who claim they were spat on, I choose to believe the vets. the incidents I have heard about were usually semi-private, one under family circumstances, several in bars. This was a painful era for almost everyone involved, in one way or another.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 02 May 00 - 01:47 PM

I was working on a pacifist paper in England during the war, so my experience was second-hand, but in all the time I spent with anti-war people, including a lot of Americans, I never came across any antagonism to ordinary American servicemen.

Even the Nazi stuff, like My Lai, was generally seen as primarily the responsibility of the politicians and those who backed them, who put inadequate people into situations where they were twisted into something less than human. People who would otherwise have quite likely lead ordinary inoffensive lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,Okiemockbird
Date: 02 May 00 - 01:48 PM

Since the book very carefully confines itself to public incidents involving just returned veterans within a few minutes of getting off the airplanes that brought them home, MMario's examples (which I am inclined provisionally to accept) arent' strictly counterexamples to Lembke's thesis.

The Vietnam veterans I have known seemed mostly well-adjusted and easy-going. The only explicit complaint I ever heard relating to someone's tour of duty was a gripe about the M-16's tendency to jam. Nevertheless my guess is that there is some truth to the image of the let-down vet. Was every returning GI made to feel welcome at the local American Legion post or other Veterans' clubs ? Was every GI who subsequently went to college made to feel welcome by the students and faculty at the college of his choice ? But the people who did the letting-down weren't necessarily those who had opposed the war. War supporters, sore at the GI's for "losing" might just as easily have been deliberately or thoughtlessly unkind. (Query: did some veterans of Korea feel as though they were not welcomed home as warmly as their older brothers had been from WWII ? If so, was it partly because the home-front was sore at them because they didn't achieve a clear-cut victory ?)

T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Dave (the ancient mariner)
Date: 02 May 00 - 01:53 PM

I witnessed people spitting in front of, or in sight of returning Vietnam Veterans; and generally calling out some pretty nasty epithets. Yours,(got in trouble for smacking a few who did it to my friends) Aye. Dave

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: SDShad
Date: 02 May 00 - 02:19 PM

Well, I've no knowledge of the spitting issue, but I do know that there was, into the 1980s, a deep-seated hostility to anyone in a military uniform among at least some people in "the movement." I know it'd be hard to believe of me now, with my beard and braid down to *here*, but in my callow days of youth I was, for 2 years, an Air Force ROTC cadet at the University of Minnesota. We would wear our uniforms one day a week, and one particular Thursday, as I was walking into a classroom building, someone whose look certainly fit the lefty/antiwar profile glared at me angrily through his John Lennon specs and shouted, and I mean SHOUTED, "Down with war! Down with militarism! Down with wasting our people's money!"

I was too stunned to react, and wished later that I had tried to engage him in conversation, and let him know that my politics weren't all that far away from his, and explain my reasons for rejecting warmongering, but not the entire idea of the military. An opportunity forever lost.

The point of my rambling post being: foaming-at-the-mouth or spitting rage at anyone in a US military uniform may have possessed only a tiny minority of antiwar folks, but it did exist, even 9 years after the war ended.

Chris

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 02 May 00 - 02:24 PM

For a year I lived and worked in a house in Toronto that became a "safe" or "halfway" house for draft resistors. We worked in conjunction with an anti-war group in Buffalo (a border town) who would let us know when someone was "crossing". A lot of the kids who stayed with us on Admiral Rd. were terribly scared and definitely filled with emotional conflicts. Many had grown up in the "my country right or wrong" environment, and although they knew the "war" had more to do with commercial interests than "saving anybody" they still felt that being American meant you were "expected to die for your country" even if your leaders appeared to be insane.

One night we had an amazing incident happen. A full fledged Marine showed up at our door.(dress uniform and everything). You can imagine the chaos, and panic! Some thought that Canada had signed an extradition treaty with the US, and were madly writing letters to their folks..some were even praying.

What had happened was that the "Marine" in question (Kelly) had been to Nam, was promoted to Corporal, had killed (he said) and was returning to the States on a troop ship. An officer (apparently drunk) made some insulting remark, and Kelly slugged him. The officer hit his head on something and almost died. Kelly was imprisoned immediately on returning to the States (Camp Lejeune...I think..this is a long time ago) and was told that he would be serving 7 years in prison when found guilty. Now here's the odd part (to me anyway) Everyday they'd let him out of the stockade to drive a certain kind of large truck (he was the only one who had the proper licence on the base) and everynight he'd return and go back into his cell.

One day he just drove the truck out of the base and kept driving. He must have gotten some information from the extensive "underground railroad" at the time, 'cause he drove across the border at a secret place, and 5 hours later ended up at our door.

In the 3 or 4 months that Kelly spent with us, it was fascinating to watch the interaction between the resistors and the guy who joined up Gung Ho. Sitting around at night, everyone telling their stories was an amazing part of my education. Especialy knowing that by an accident of birth (50 miles north of the American border) I would never have to make that awful decision that so many Americans made. I didn't feel righteous...just very lucky.

Over the years I've heard stories from both vets and resistors about being "spat on". I've never witnessed anything in which each side's passions were so high.

Rick

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Mudjack
Date: 02 May 00 - 02:36 PM

I never seen or heard anyone say that they personally got spat upon, they always had heard about it and thought it to be true. I can guarantee you that most American GI's got crapped on pretty heavely. LBJ, Robert McNamara signed the orders and put our young warriors at risk, not the Peace demonstrators. My God that was an ugly time in our history.
Mudjack

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Irish Rover
Date: 02 May 00 - 03:10 PM

I came home from Nam on leave after three years there. my father wanted me to come to lunch with some of his friends and him. I said ok but he wanted me to wear my uniform and medals.I said no, it's 1969 and it's a hot issue. he asked if I was afraid I said no, I just don't need any trouble. the up shot is I wore my uniform, I'm walking down michigan ave.(Chicago) a man walked up to me out of the blue, and spit on my medals. I lost it and beat him severly. to cops came up and wanted to know what was going on. I answered them in my best N.Irish brogue. they also being from the old sod took him off to jail. I had lunch with the boys, but I'll never forget it. turns out he was a lawyer and they held him without bail for a couple of days. I had an other incident in San Fransisco but I expected it there and let it go. I don't think any one was more anit-war than the grunts fighting it, but we thought it was our responsibility as it says in the constitution.(I was a newly sworn citizen)I did not understand the tratorus activity here (by the polititions and stuidents)

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Irish Rover
Date: 02 May 00 - 03:18 PM

Trust me, I was spat upon a couple of times myself. not just here but also in england. it was as you say a ugly time. No one is more anti-war than the grunts out there fighting it. but we thought we were doing what we were required to do under the constitution (I had just become a citizen) and did my duty. I am still rather bitter about the treatment I recieved upon my return. The veterans money in Ill. had been used up giving loans to stuidents to buy houses. p.s. I spent 10 years in S.E.A.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: northfolk/al cholger
Date: 02 May 00 - 03:38 PM

My experiences are similar to some, and I am surprized at the reponses that differ from mine. During the late sixties, and to the present, I have been involved, one way or another in working class politics. I was actively opposed to the Viet Nam war, but never against the folks who were forced to serve...they were friends and neighbors, and when they came home, more often than not, they would "explain" to my detractors that the war was being fought to make southeast asia safe for big business. (we didn't call it corporate america, back then). I also worked closely with members of VVAW. I remember with clarity the young vets, who looked like hippies in camo...marching together in a small town 4th of July parade, separate from the VFW...because the VFW and American Legion wouldn't accept them. Many brought huge problems home with them, including drugs and diseases that many still feel are chemical exposure related. Many brought memories of things that they would only talk about, after a long night of drinking. Some were frightening to be around because they had not really readjusted to a life outside of their identity as soldiers. But, never did I witness anyone spitting on these guys. What I did witness is young men returning to high unemployment, an economy that some had a three or four year headstart in, because they did not have to go...and in some ways,I guess, that could be called "spitting".

I saw a lot of political posturing about these guys who were spit on. It was almost like the key to the code that drove our present politics so much further to the right than it had ever been. The same leaders who sent people to kill and die, used that lie to elect the bush's reagans, the armys, delays, etc....

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Peter T.
Date: 02 May 00 - 03:53 PM

A few years ago I was in a Vietnamese Buddhist Temple in Toronto, and in the middle of the service a fight broke out between one man who (I later found out) had been in Ho Chih Minh's army and a "boat person" who had been with the American Strategic Services office in Saigon. About seven seconds after the fight broke out, ten people crowded around me and begged me to leave the temple, as this was a Vietnamese problem. I was virtually dragged out of the temple, and within a few moments the families of the two men came out with each of the men, all of them crying and carrying on. They saw me on the sidewalk, and covered up their faces in shame, and rushed off into the morning. I received a written apology from the head of the temple 3 days later. For nothing, just because I had been there.

Could somebody sometime say a few words about the million dead Vietnamese?

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 02 May 00 - 04:44 PM

Nicely spoken al and peter.........

It is no secret around here that I didn't serve in VietNam. It is equally not a secret that I won't sing songs about diviseness and ones that affix blame. That said..........

Why the hell would anyone write this book? I'm sure that the narrow confines of his "documentation" these incidents did not take place. Now the fact that several people on this thread including myself witnessed them would make me believe that either this guy did no research, has ridiculous criteria for "proof" of these events (names,dates,times,witnesses,film...probably needs a urine sample too), or has some other agenda. And what could that be? Notoriety? The urge to stir things up? Enjoys revisionist history ala the Holocaust? Wants to make a buck with a controversial best-seller? I don't know.....I'd like to read it before I pass judgement.

But the fact of the treatment of returning vets is just that...a fact.

The Movement was filled with people of all stripes. The nutcases tended to make headlines and made it difficult for some of us who viewed it as a struggle to end those things that only divided us.........war, racism, poverty...............I witnessed abusive treatment of soldiers and police and I saw the same sometimes in return. Like other signal events in a lifetime, I too remember exactly where I was when the score went to National Guard-4, Student-0.

For thirty years we have tried to heal. What about a book that brings us together and helps us all understand what each of us did, why we did it, and that there is honor and shame, just plain folks, on all sides? This book seems to say to me that in these past years we have not healed yet. Perhaps we never will be........Or perhaps we won't make it collectively, but on an individual, one on one basis, it has happened, and we have come to understand those times and our parts in them.

Geeziz................

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 02 May 00 - 05:06 PM

Dear Brothers and Sisters:
I was involved in the anti war protests, and was a CO during the last year of the draft. If thier were insidents of spiting by those opposed to the war, it was indvidual -isolated and not condoned by those who were organised against the war, who were, afterall, concerned that our brothers not be sacrificed in a polical war, not a war of liberation or survival. In fact many of our comrads in the anti war movement had been to Viet Nam, and were in the Veit Nam Veterins Against the War.
On the other hand, the same government who sent young Americans to Viet Nam, spit on them quiet literally when they retunred, and count the many Vets on the streets of New York, actualy now in jail in New York because under our present Mayor, being homeless is a crime, well, the US government continues to spit on Vets and one can change the P to an H and it is also true. All the while, the government fosters the myth that, 1. the anti war movement was responcible for the horrible treatment of veit nam vets, though the same has happened to vets from every war thereafter, now we are seeing Gulf war vets, sick and on the streets, and 2. the most obscene myth of all, that of missing in action, and pows held in Veit nam. GET REAL, the MIAs are on the streets of Amercian cities and the POWs are in OUR jails.
I wish people in this bloody country would take the God damn blinders off!
Excuse the anger, as you all know it is not my usual... well listen, Vets, even if you still suport the war, I have nothing but a handshake and a beer for you all, we all had a rotten youth over that war and lost a whole damn lot.
To any who got spit at, there are always assholes on both sides of any issues, and I would hit the son of a bitch who spit at you guys as well.
No more wars, eh?
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Wesley S
Date: 02 May 00 - 05:17 PM

This may be off the topic but it always bugged me that for many years whenever the network cop shows needed a unbalanced nutcase for a character it was often the Viet Nam vet that they used. I thought it was a real slap in the face.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: DougR
Date: 02 May 00 - 05:49 PM

Those were very sad times in America. I worked in Washington D. C. when he anti-war protestors attempted to disrupt the government. I walked from Georgetown to our offices (National Endowment for the Arts) on "K" street one morning, and witnessed young Americans waving Viet Cong flags, and burning the American flag on the streets of Georgetown. Cars were turned over and set afire, young people rented Hertz trucks, and drove down the streets sweeping broken glass into the streets. Attempts were made to torch government buildings. Over 10,000 people were arrested and held in John F. Kennedy Stadium until things settled down. Frankly, as I walked the two or three miles through the rioting crowds of young people, I wouldn't have wanted to be dressed in a military uniform.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 02 May 00 - 07:11 PM

I can only wonder how someone who DID go over there to fight for their Govt. reacts to the Happy commercialism and tourist industry that seems to flourish these days. It wouldn't apply to me as I have never trusted a Government, or a political leader who's ambition drove them beyond city councillor...but I'll bet their anger can never be told. Hippies weren't responsible for this tragedy. Business was.

Rick

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: The Shambles
Date: 02 May 00 - 08:49 PM

Works like this do not help the healing process. It matters little if individual cases of this happening are not documented. Those who were around at that sad time will know the strength of feelings and will not doubt the 'myth'. If it is a 'myth? I don't doubt the personal accounts I have read in this thread.

That WAS the feeling. However it came into being, it was a truth. Documents will not make it truer. Lack of documents will not make it untrue. The book will not change that feeling or make it untrue. Nit-Picking books like these will sell and their 'sensational' revelations will appear in the media. They serve little good purpose, other than to raise the profile of the author.

In the recent libel trail, in London of David Irving (that he lost), one of his claims was/is, that there was no document that demonstrated that Hitler directly ordered the holocaust.

No one is suggesting that Hitler was not in total charge of his country at that time, or that the events (generally) happened. Do we need such a document to exist to make the events truer?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: dwditty
Date: 02 May 00 - 11:46 PM

Well folks, unless you were there you have no idea. I returned on the day that Time/Newsweek/etc released the My Lai pictures. I left Seattle WA to fly back to Boston, through NY. We had to fly in uniform or pay full fare. No I wasn't spit on, but I certainly felt like it. Ironically, the reality of My Lai was only on the news stands. While there was plenty of shit to go around, for most of us, there were no My Lai's. I still wear the scars from that year, both inside and out, but with the anger pretty much dissipated, it is easier. I also think this book serves no purpose - or at least no good purpose. I joined those of you who fought against the war when I returned - some pretty amazing stories there, too. (Yes DougR, I spent the next year in Washington - New Mob, etc. - so I know what you mean.
What I want to say, though, is that I appreciate all of you (both on the Mudcat and everywhere else) who have come to accept those of us who were there. It means so much, and it is through my tears that I say thank you.

DW

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: DougR
Date: 03 May 00 - 12:02 AM

No, dwditty, it is WE who should thank you!

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: bbelle
Date: 03 May 00 - 12:33 AM

Besides losing my fiance' to the war ... I had long term relationships with a POW and a Medivac pilot who did two tours ... they were not well-adjusted individuals ... moonchild

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 03 May 00 - 01:15 AM

The twentyfifth anniversary of the American evacuation from Saigon was last Sunday and I was struck both by how long it had been since then, and how long the war lasted. I suppose we will be the last American generation who was considered expendable by their country. The Gulf War was a sign of how war will be fought in the future: quickly, with massive mechanized fire power, and reported by a controlled media. Never again will Americans be sent into enemy territory to draw fire so that the enemy can be engaged, and the body count tallied. Never again will America engage in war without the government first presenting a solid case for taking up arms. Massive casualties are no longer acceptable. Perhaps we have grown beyond that.

We who were weaned on tales of our fathers' bravery were asked to fight a twilight battle, against an unclear foe, in a struggle whose goals were uncertain. Those of us who stayed shared something with those who went: We all lived with the Vietnam War. And all of us, soldier and demonstrator alike, owe something to those who died there. That we join in an attempt to understand what happened and why it happened, and that we forgive each other and ourselves, is the very least we can do. At our best, we will help our country go forward on a path that is not dictated by fear, but by wisdom. And let us be careful in our use of the great power at our disposal so that, as we do not sacrifice the youth of our country, neither do we sacrifice the lives of our enemies without overwhelming cause.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: canoer
Date: 03 May 00 - 02:34 AM

About the book review, I gather that the writer has found little "documentation" and so uses vast generalizations about other times, other places, other events, to "prove" his case. I, for one, do not credit such an approach.

I thought there were so many different views and theories and ways of acting, in those days, that no quickie characterization can ever be accurate.

My appreciation to everyone who shared their experiences here, contributing their part of the elephant. It was a hellish time. It was also one of this country's most educational eras, politically, since WWII.That's one good and lasting thing we can say about it.
--Larry C.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: canoer
Date: 03 May 00 - 04:08 AM

Near the end of the war, I saw published somewhere a map of the south of Vietnam's shoreline. Oil exploration rights were drawn on that map. Every single inch of shoreline was leased to one oil company or another!

I thought that was a quick and dirty example about why the war went on.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 May 00 - 05:41 AM

A sad time and a hellish time, yes. But that's only part of the story. It was a time when a war by a strong country against a weak country was resisted by a whole swathe of people, who at great cost to themselves and to the country, halted it in its tracks. And that doesn't often happen. In fact I can't think of any other time its happened - and all strong countries have unjust wars in their past.

I don't think that is something for Americans to be ashamed of.

And as for the Americans who went to fight in Vietnam, either they were doing it because they thought that was the right thing to do, and believed what they were told about it being a just war for a just cause, or they were prisoners of the state, forced into uniform. Those aren't reasons for embarrassment.

As for the atrocities, the horrible things that some soldiers did, that happens in every war, a combination of a kind of madness that can turn ordinary people into monsters, and the technological blindness that leads the people in charge to order carpet bombing and stuff like Agebnt Orange. The difference here was that it came to light at least some of the time, and some people spoke up.And that doesn't often happen either.

But there's one thing that sometimes seems to get lost in all this. The focus seems to be on the terrible things that the war did to America, and to Americans. It almost seems as if what happened to the millions of Vietnamese whop died (one million? two? three?)is a secondary matter. And that is scary, because it points to a world in which,if the wars can avoid killing the tens of thousands of "our boys", while still killing the millions of foreigners, there won't be too much opposition.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:15 AM

So, has anyone actually read this book? I think it's interesting that so many people are denouncing a book they haven't read. Shouldn't we suspend judgment until we read the damn thing? From the reviews, I thought the book probably had something worthwhile to say about the way an urban myth can be perpetuated until it becomes the "truth" that informs subsequent attitudes and decisions. But I, too, am suspending judgment until I read it myself.

I am fortunate enough to be an veteran of eight years of service in the peacetime American military. I have enormous respect for the sacrifices of those who fought for the United States. I think the Vietnam war was unjust and based on some seriously flawed assumptions, but that is no reflection on the people who actually fought on our side of that war -- whether they were there by choice or were compelled by the government to serve. By and large these were dedicated, honorable people who deserve our respect and gratitude.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 03 May 00 - 10:42 AM

Hey WS.......I said above that I'd like to read the book before I pass judgement, but I do question the need for a book with this premise. What's the point? It may be interesting reading and again I'd imagine that within certain narrow confines of documentation, these incidents did not happen. As others have said, if you narrow the criterion enough, the Holocaust didn't take place, which is ridiculous. All that aside though.....What's the point?

The war divided this country into multiple factions, not just two. From each perspective there were wrongs and rights, truth and lies, honor and shame. All of us carry those with us every day. We have tried to heal the wounds we inflicted on each other and we have both succeeded and failed. Some will never forgive the actions of others. Some will see through the surface and face their own demons with honesty.....and pain. In either case or those many in between, this kind of book can only offer a narrow and, to me, devisive influence that does nothing to further understanding, history, or healing.

But I will read it as I have many others. And I'll remember friends lost and friends made. I'll feel the angst of those times again and question decisions I made. I'll think of the Wall and remember standing before it in tears, amazed that I was now crying for that which I so detested. We were young and the offspring of a generation where the choices were clearer. Now we are old and the choices will live with us for eternity, but we can offer each other an understanding which was beyond us at the time.

I doubt many future VietNam era authors will be reading Mudcat threads, but if they do, may I ask that you give us books of unity and understanding and not division? Just a thought.......

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Amos
Date: 03 May 00 - 10:59 AM

Noble, noble soul leaking through there, Spaw-man. Sweetest prose I have ever seen from your leaky pen. Thanks for a rare moment of pure electric understanding.

A

P.S. ...If you're gonna start waxing eloquent, insightful, full of depth and compassion and vision like that, can I be the Mudcat Garbage-mouthed Curmudgeon? Just wanna see how the other half lives...you understand!

A.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:27 AM

Hey Spaw -- I'm going out on a limb here, since I still haven't read the book. But one possible answer to your "what's the point?" question is that it illustrates how we adopt attitudes and points of view based on "facts" that may not be factual. I find this to be a tremendously relevant and important question. We all carry around a lot of assumptions that are not based on personal knowledge, and we all incorporate these assumptions into our view of the world. We Americans recently fought another war (the 1991 Gulf War) in which we made a lot of decisions based on the lessons we learned from our Vietnam experience. If our view of the Vietnam experience was fundamentally flawed, then our decisions in the Gulf may also have been flawed. And the decisions we make tomorrow, or next year, or ten years from now, may likewise spring from these same flawed assumptions.

Military people and planners are often justly criticized for "fighting the last war". There is some justification for the view that when we fought in Vietnam, we were actually mis-applying the lessons we learned in World War II (that America's overwhelming industrial superiorty would make the achievement of our aims in Vietnam a foregone conclusion). So it's worth examining the lessons we took from the Vietnam era to see if we are also misapplying them to the crises we face today.

If history were just a rehashing of past events that have no relevance today, then I would agree that there's little value in this. But the Vietnam War has had a tremendous impact on US foreign policy in the years since, so I think that questioning our assumptions about that war is worthwhile.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 03 May 00 - 11:43 AM

Well, what say we read the book and find out what he has to say and what relevance we find? We'll come back with book reports, just like in grade school!!!(:<))

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: canoer
Date: 03 May 00 - 12:10 PM

McGrath, I'm glad you mention the Vietnamese. If it was a psychologically hellish time here in the states, it was a total hell many times over for Vietnam. I think the figures of 1 million soldiers killed, and 2 million civilians killed, are roughly accurate.

General Curtis LeMay said "we should bomb them into the stone age."

It is not well appreciated (insert list of reasons here) that a people who basically still were in the stone age, stood up to an invading Goliath and kept on fighting and fighting for their land, in the face of such terrible casualties. They showed an example that said to the whole world, "It can be done."

One reason for the U.S. campaign of mass destruction, was to send another message to the world: "If you try to resist us, this is what you'll get."

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 03 May 00 - 02:19 PM

I'm the person who started this thread, and I am very surprised at the hostile reaction to Lembcke and his thesis. I feel inclined to defend him (although I, too, haven't read the book), but he can probably do a better job himself. Here is an article written by Jerry Lembcke himself on the same topic.

I have searched the web for reviews, but they are pretty scarce:

Here is a review that appeared in the Denver Post.

Here is a "thumbs up" review that appeared in "Storm Warning!" the publication of an organization called "Vietnam Veterans Against the War Anti-Imperialist." It also includes some enlightening quotes.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Peter T.
Date: 03 May 00 - 02:47 PM

McGrath is right. I am perturbed by LEJ's remark that in the next war massive casualties will not be acceptable (not that I attribute bad motives to LEJ, whom I deeply respect, and everyone else here who has been through hell). But it is a revealing remark. He means massive American casualties. There seems to be a filtration system against the lives of other people meaning even a small fraction of American lives. This is perhaps understandable for every country, but in the last two wars that America has been fighting in, first, the Gulf War, 300 or so Americans lost their lives (I am not trivializing this at all), and well over 100,000 Iraqis, with thousands of children dying every few months still; second, Kosovo, where no Americans, repeat no Americans (or Canadians for that matter) lost their lives, and thousands of other people did underneath Allied bombs.

I am not blaming Americans for these messes; nor saying this is a good thing or a bad thing. I have personal opinions about both wars. I personally don't want anyone to die anywhere. But Americans should be aware that this kind of thing frightens people from other countries a lot. There is a widespread perception that only precious Americans matter, and that everyone else is target practice for testing new weapons systems.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 03 May 00 - 02:55 PM

First Jim......Thanks for the links and I see where the book may be going, but I hate the title. I will be reading it and I'm glad you started the thread.

Peter.....Your point is sound and I would be the last to argue your premise against you. But to inject a bit of dark humor, have you seen George Carlin's routine about bombing "brown people?" A few years back, but darkly funny for its truth.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Peter T.
Date: 03 May 00 - 03:18 PM

No, is it on an album or a video? -- not that I would look for it -- the subject of abstracting other people for the purposes of dulling your responses is pretty well worked over on all sides of the debate for me. As the son of a WWII bomber pilot (who never got a service medal because of outrage over the saturation bombing late in the war), and having lived on a U.S. Air Force base in the 60's and watched school friends go off and get killed in Vietnam, I have had more than enough of this subject for one lifetime. It just keeps coming back. Star Wars Mark II will ensure that it will have a continuing life.
yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: MarkS
Date: 03 May 00 - 07:22 PM

For anybody who would like to discuss this issue from the perspective of veterans themselves, just Click here
Here you can ask and get answers directly from the horses mouth.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: MarkS
Date: 03 May 00 - 07:26 PM

Looks like my attempt at posting a blue clicky did not take. One more time
Click here

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Lonesome EJ
Date: 03 May 00 - 07:46 PM

"And let us be careful in our use of the great power at our disposal so that, as we do not sacrifice the youth of our country, neither do we sacrifice the lives of our enemies without overwhelming cause."

Peter, I think you missed this part of my statement in the previous post. My meaning is that, as we have learned an obvious lesson to not consider our youth expendable(unacceptable casualties), perhaps the next step is to consider the lives of the young soldiers of our enemies in a more enlightened way.

LEJ

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,fadac
Date: 03 May 00 - 08:02 PM

It's been a long time. However, VENT MODE ON!

But I was spat upon, had things thrown at me, and my auto damaged. It is very unlikly that anyone was spat upon getting off of the airplane from 'Nam. Why? Because the airplanes landed at Air Force Bases. Then there was a period of processing, your free steak dinner (I got breakfast on both of my homecommings) pay call, uniform issue, etc. etc. So for some reason I didn't see any protestors on the Air Force Bases.

If one want's be selective of their data, you can prove ANYTHING.

Anyway, I'm sick of the whole subject, I don't want some chowder head telling me what a "Good Job" I did. That was probably the same chowder head that tossed a rock through my windshield because of the 4Th Inf. badge on the car.

Now it's fashonable to be pro vet. I think most of this good boy crap is from people that are trying to set them selves streight after screwing the vets over for years.

BTW I worked at a major electronics company and the first people layed off in the mid 80's was all the vets. While the YCP (young collage pukes) stayed on.

So nowdays I don't have much respect for YCP's or anyone in the press. Respect is something that someone earns, and I give what I was shown.

VENT MODE OFF,

Let's forget this crap and go have a nice round of the Hoky Poky!

-fadac

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 03 May 00 - 08:02 PM

"the lives of the young soldiers of our enemies"

But in most modern wars the soldiers are only a tiny proportion of the people who get killed. The exception at the time was the Second Gulf War (the way we forget the first Gulf War, the terrible Iran-Iraq war is a but shocking - just because "the West" wasn't directly in vollved - apart of course from the US Vincennes shooting down the Iranian civilian airbus with its 300 passengers).

But of course the civilian dead since then, through sanctions, has made up then balance by now, vastly outnumbering the 200,000 Iraqui soldiers killed at the time.

And note, I haven't said anything about the rights and wrongs of the war or the sanctions - the point I'm making is that in modern war it's civilians that mostly get killed.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: MarkS
Date: 03 May 00 - 09:18 PM

Sorry, but my attempts at a blue clicky just do not seem to be working out. If you want to try it the old way, try
http://espn.space.swri.edu/vn101/index.htm

So if anybody else can turn that into a blue clicky,please do, and let me know what you did!
Thanks, MarkS

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,mary g
Date: 04 May 00 - 12:15 AM

yes.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: SeanM
Date: 04 May 00 - 12:23 AM

FADAC! Great to see you back and posting, even if it is only here...

OK... I'm 28, which means that about the time all of this was happening, I was still debating the great philosophical discussion of what exactly a toilet was.

However, after reading the blurb from the author available at the link, it doesn't look as if he's disputing that the "spitting" happened. What it looks like he's trying to move away from is the idea that such a reaction was widespread, and extremely common.

I'm not going to debate individual incidents. They happened. There are enough victims and witnesses to call that point in any case.

I WILL say that from what I gathered out of his message, that from HIS viewpoint, spitting at vets as a social phenomena (rather than as isolated acts) didn't happen. And to address the "healing" view that 'spaw pointed out, that appears to a certain extent to be something that he's interested in as well.

I'm too lazy to go and transport quotes myself, but what I gathered out of his synopsis is that he's trying to remove the stereotype of the young, brave veteran vs. dirty, unwashed, agitating hippy. Personally, I think this could be a good thing.

Now of course, the book could be something entirely different. In which case, I've got about 70 different recipes ready for the serving of crow, and I'm entirely prepared to eat my own cooking.

M

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 04 May 00 - 08:37 AM

Dear fadac:
I may be wrong, but in my experience, the same sons of bitchs who sent you and your brothers to Viet Nam, to die for Goodyear Rubber, are the same sons of bitchs who are putting you out of work, and the young college pukes, as you say, whose jobs are preserved, are not the ones who said wake up to the fact that this country is OWNED by a small elete minority, but the sons of the sons of bitchs who OWN the country, though, it is becomeing more of a youth culure where we old grey heads are generally expendable. If it gets much worce, ol pal, we wont be fighting, you and I over the old Viet Nam issue, we will be in perfect agreement, all mixed together in the Solent Green.
All the best, to all,
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Peter T.
Date: 04 May 00 - 09:46 AM

You are right, LEJ, I apologise. I got too hung up on reacting to the first paragraph. That will teach me to pontificate in a hurry.
yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 04 May 00 - 11:15 AM

McGrath, you make a good point about civilian deaths in modern war. But is this a bad thing, or a good thing? It could be argued that societies (American and others) will continue to support a war with the flimsiest of justifications until the reality of that war is brought home to them. This is not a new idea -- General Sherman (American Civil War, 1861-65) "War is hell") made this point many times, as part of the justification for his invasion of the Confederacy. It could also be argued (has been, in fact) that the U.S. is much too willing to go with the military option because our wars always happen "over there," so the civilian deaths are rarely ours.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 04 May 00 - 11:47 AM

Jim Dixon.....Thanks again for the links, especially the one of his own writings which goes far to explain the "why" of the book. I'm sure that the title dose not reflect the real book, and the idea sprang from it instead. Looking forward to another perspective. I still stand by my previous postings regarding my thoughts, decisions, healing, and all.....but I am more comfortable with his personal motivations.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 May 00 - 12:43 PM

Whistlestop. I can't see that the fact that millions of civilians on the other side are being butchered ever stopped most people supporting "our" side in a war. Even with Vietnam the impression I've got is that, for Americans, the casualties that really mattered, both at the time and retrospectively, were American conscripts, rather than Vietnamese civilians. There's no wall of remembrance for the Vietnamese civilians. (And the same is true for other countries in other wars.)

And when it's your own civilians that get killed by the other side in a war, the effect seems to be to make the country under attack even more determined to fight on. Even death camps have that effect. (So did General Sherman insofar as he waas engaged in terrorising civilians rather than destroying the resourcer s that made continued resistance possible.)

Now if they could come up with some way of waging war which selectively picked on politicians and so forth, it might be a different story.

Short of that, some guarantee that generals and politicians who intentionally kill civilians or commit other war crimes can never be safe from the prospect of facing trial in a war crimes court might just slow them up a bit. Including the ones from England and France and America, not just from the little countries. Too late for General Sherman of course. Pity.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: annamill
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:07 PM

I have tried so hard to stay out of this thread. Just reading the title brings tears to my eyes. I think there was anger and pain here at home at the atrocities that were done. I was angry and very ashamed to be an American.

But not once did I, or anyone I knew, feel anger at the soldiers that had to deal with that pain. I wanted to kill General Blackstone, or whatever Calley's generals name was.

Let me tell you about someone. I dated him for awhile. He was the national sales manager for a very large well known firm. He had a style you only dream about. He and some friends leased about 40,000 acres in Cali for hunting. He had his own winery and served me delicious white and red wine from his own vineyards. We used to take the wine and cheese and ripe pears and sit in his jacuzzi and talk for hours. He loved the same music I did and intrduced me to a few musicians I didn't know. I could have loved this man.

But...he also kept a large amount of guns, rifles, shotguns in his house. Safely of course. He had a house right across from the ocean and used to stand in his house just inside the doors to his balcony and shoot crows off telephone lines. He used to drink himself into mindlessness EVERY night. He used to go to sleazy bars because as head of such a large organization, he couldn't do the things he did in sleazy bars in bars where his peers were.

You see he was a sniper in Vietnam during the war and had $25,000's on his head. He did shoot babies and woman and children and old men and whoever he had to. He once told me "Yes, I'm a baby killer and I enjoyed every moment of it" with a painful grin on his face.

He told me he was very angry about how he was treated back home and very hurt for the hatred he received here. I told him we (war protesters) didn't hate him (the soldiers), but hated the circumstances that made beautiful young men into such vicious killers.

I've never felt more pain for any one human being like I felt for that poor beautiful young man in an old man's body.

He left me against my wishes because he felt he was getting way too close and he was afraid he would really hurt me. He probably would have.

I hate that war!! any war!!

There I go getting emotional again!

Love, annap

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bert
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:17 PM

McGrath,

Actually we were involved in that 'first' Gulf War. We were selling arms to Iran and intelligence to Iraq.

But don't worry about not knowing that. George Bush didn't know it either (Ho, bloody Ho!).

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Peter T.
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:18 PM

The problem seems to me to be far more complicated. Since Napoleon inaugurated the "nation in arms" as a model, the mobilization of an entire country for war is standard. While the Geneva Conventions, etc., have tried to keep civilians separate, when you are fighting nation against nation, the capacity to fight is increasingly not the individual soldiers, but the basic capacity of the society. In World War II the argument was increasingly made that industrial cities were full of industrial workers who weren't civilians. And so it goes. We can remember in Vietnam all the metaphors about "drying up the enemy's swamp" and all that -- if everyone is part of the struggle, who is an innocent?

We find a version of this argument in the rationale of the IRA and other supposed "armies" that no one is innocent -- they are complicit, or obstacles, or whatever. So they are acceptable targets.

And then there is the morale issue, touched on above. Stop the support for the war by punishing everyone who thinks they can get away scot-free.

All this starts with Napoleon, was worked over by Sherman, and we are still in the middle of it. After all, we -- that is NATO countries and the Russians -- spent the last 50 years holding each other's citizens hostage at missilepoint.

I don't pretend to have an answer: but it is a really hard one.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 04 May 00 - 01:42 PM

I agree with most of what you're saying, McGrath. But let's remember that this self-centered aspect ("our casualties matter, 'enemy' casualties don't") isn't unique to America. Every country that has ever fought a war was either indifferent to 'enemy' casualties, or enthusiastic about them. That's war -- I don't like it any better than you do, but it's the nature of the beast. And it didn't start with Sherman, or Napoleon either -- the issue is as old as war itself (although the "rules of war" concept that exempts civilians from the harsh realities of war probably got a big boost in Victorian times).

I admit that there's a certain logic in all of this that I find compelling, in a horrific way. It isn't only the soldiers on the front lines that wage war -- it's the whole society that's backing them up, with its money, its industrial production, and its enthusiasm for the "cause". So why should everyone except the soldiers be exempt from the suffering that war causes? Remember, when Lyndon Johnson was escalating the war in Vietnam, he deliberately sought to insulate the country at large from the realities and costs of that war. It could be (has been) argued that this is a big part of the reason that war lasted so long -- the country was prosperous, and the small portion of the polulation that was suffering the most had no influence (in fact, for most of the war the average age of an American soldier was 19, and the voting age was 21). The result was that public opinion against the war took a long time to coalesce, while the killing dragged on.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 04 May 00 - 02:18 PM

annap: Thanks for the message. I think you were more generous than I would have been toward someone who said he killed babies and liked it. In college I nearly broke up with a girlfriend because she said draft resisters were cowards. Instead, she apologized, I forgave her, and we got married. Years later, we got divorced, over something that had nothing to do with Vietnam, but did have a lot to do with her lack of sincerity and commitment. Who knows, I might have avoided a lot of pain if I had followed my first impulse. You don't do yourself any favors by forming relationships with people whose values are much different from your own, or who have no values at all. I'm talking about REAL values, not just what kind of music you like.

The only time I ever got into a heated argument about Vietnam was with an old friend who totally surprised me by saying he thought Lieutenant Calley should not have been prosecuted. He was not saying they were prosecuting the wrong guy - he meant NO ONE should have been prosecuted. He said, "these things happen" in war and we should just accept them - I think he meant they should just be covered up. He was, technically speaking, a Vietnam veteran, but he spent his entire tour working in an office in Saigon. This incident changed my feelings toward this guy so much that I avoided seeing him for the next 3 years. (He lives in another city, so I wouldn't see him more than a couple of times a year anyway.) We have become friends again, sort of, but we haven't discussed war since then. If it weren't for the fact that his wife is also an old friend (she stayed out of the argument) I don't think I would bother with him.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ditchdweller
Date: 04 May 00 - 02:57 PM

One thing that people forget about the Viet Namese, is that the US did not start the war. After the withdrawl of France from Indo-China, Viet Nam was split into two, de facto, independant, sovereign states, North Viet Nam and South Viet Nam. The Communist Supported North Viet Nam instigated, with Chinese and Soviet funding, an insurgency campaign by the Viet Cong. US forces only became involved after requests from the then LEGITIMATE government of South Viet Nam. Unfortunatly, the US forces decided on TOTALLY the wrong tactics, with a gross overdependance on firepower. Had they studied the tactics used in the, admittedly smaller scale, Malayan Emergency, they may have picked up a few pointers on counter insurgency operations. Another error made was the use of combat units permanently based in VN, so that in any of these units there was a cross section of personel with different amounts of service done. The spread of the war into Cambodia was entirely due to the North Vietnamese Army, acting in support of the Viet Cong, taking over that strip of Cambodia bordering on the two Viet Nams. When informed of the commencement of Bombing in that strip, Sianhouk (sp?) is reported to have commented that, as far as he was aware, no Cambodians were being killed by the bombs. They had already been driven out by the NVA. The Vietnamese War was a nasty, long drawn out and brutish afair in which the wrong tactics were used. Few of the participants can claim any kudos. The Viet Cong were more brutal against their own countrymen than the US forces were. But, had the US forces not been there, S. Viet Nam would have been overwhealmed many years earlier and at much less cost to the Communists than it eventually was. Had this happened, would the sponsors of North Viet Nam's agression stopped there? I know this will offend some people. I do not apologise for that, but I do have the right to put this point of view across, no matter how unpopular it is. Sapper

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 04 May 00 - 03:48 PM

Hi Sapper:
Is that the same legit government of South Viet Nam, whose leader the US assasinated?
Just asking,
All the best
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 May 00 - 04:10 PM

Arguing about different tactics is essentially irrelevant. The essential thing is that America had no right to intervene in that way in a country on the far side of the world.

The war against the French ended in an agreement that should have meant a united North and South Vietnam, and that was broken, with American encouragement, by the South Vietnamn government. As a result of American intervention millions of Vietnamese and Cambodians and Laotians were killed, and tens of thousands of young Americans. And that's not counting the even greater numbers who had their lives wrecked. And no good whatever came of it.

That's all past history. But the important thing about history is to learn from it, so that you don't make the same mistakes again.

"I do have the right to put this point of view across, no matter how unpopular it is"

That's more or less what David Irving said in his recent court case...

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,Ole Bull
Date: 04 May 00 - 04:13 PM

The truth is that at that time you were more likely to be abused, spat upon, beat, insulted and jailed for wearing long hair than for being a vet. Will anyone who lived through that time dispute this?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 04 May 00 - 04:21 PM

Yeah Bull, there was that too......

And Larry, keep in mind that it was the "constitutional" government of South VietNam. Personally, I find it amazing that I can read every word of their constitution without translation in the original English! Evidently an awful lot of South Vietnamese read English ....... I guess....huh?

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Peter T.
Date: 04 May 00 - 05:45 PM

I think that saying that the bombing of Cambodia (part of the euphemism for "the spreading of the war" being used here) was entirely the fault of the North Vietnamese Army makes perfect sense. I also believe that if I knock my feet together, the ruby slippers will take me back to Kansas.
yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: DougR
Date: 04 May 00 - 06:32 PM

So, McGrath of Harlow, I assume you feel the U.S. has no business sending troops to Bosnia either, es so? And following the same line of reasoning, American troops should never have been sent to Korea in the 1950s. In 1941, the Empire of Japan bombed Pear Harbor and that caused the U.S. to declare war on Japan. Did that justify our declaring war on Germany? Should American troops have been sent to Europe?

There were a lot of isolationists in the U.S. that would have been very happy had we sat out WW2. Don't think that would have been possible though myself.

Since you have such strong views about the SE Asia conflict, I just wondered how you feel about the other situations.

DougR

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Fadac
Date: 04 May 00 - 08:09 PM

Right tatics, Wrong tatics. Who cares? It's too late to change it. Perhaps if the US & Britton had gone after Hitler in 1939, when Hitler went into Austria, that might have been the end of it. But no, nobody did a damn thing, so the war was on. Perhaps if we didn't go in VN, that war might have grown too, relighting Korea, Japan, etc. Then we would all be sitting on our big proud rear ends saying "Why didn't we get involved?" You can't win, no matter what you do, someone will find fault.

How do I as a vet feel about protesters? You will be surprised to hear, I'm 100% behind protestors right to protest. And I'll defend to the death the support of that right. Sometimes it's hard, but as far as I'm concerned everyone gets a say.

Those that decided to go to Canada. OK, if that is what one had to do, fine. However I feel that they should stay there. (Remember, Canada sent troops to VN too, as a peace keeping force. I think they were there about three months.)

-fadac

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bud Savoie
Date: 04 May 00 - 08:41 PM

This thread opens up a very sore wound. Yes, I served two years in Nam, spoke the language, and was as close to my Vietnamese friends as to my American ones. I returned with a bad case of what we called "Ho Chi Minh's revenge", which lasted two years, and a case of claustrophobia so bad that I passed out four times on the plane ride back. Most of what you read in the newspapers and saw on TV gave a false picture of the people and the GIs who were there. No, no one spit in my face when I returned, but I haven't any doubt that it did happen to some.

I am a Holy Cross alumnus also, and receiving the various alum mailings, I can tell you that the place has become thoroughly PC and leftward swooning. I can understand a Holy Cross war protester writing a book claiming that we are liars; people of that ilk have to justify themselves, and they do it by attacking others.

I have read so much anti-vet garbage, that I frankly doubt that I will read this. April 30th is always a very emotional day for me, and this year is the 25th anniversary of the day I first felt ashamed to be an American.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 04 May 00 - 09:09 PM

Three million dead Vietnamese. How many dead Cambodians? Laotians? And 55,000 dead American boys. All for a war game dreamt up by politicians and generals.

I can see why people who suffered or had people close to them who suffered want to feel that their suffering was somehow worthwhile, and that the suffering they collectively inflicted on the people in Indo-China was justified. I imagine there are people in France still who feel the same way about the earlier war in the same part oif the world. And people in Japan about the one before that, when was their turn to fight the Vietnamese - and the Americans.

There's only one thing worse than losing an unjust war. It's winning it - and at least America was spared that.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: dwditty
Date: 04 May 00 - 10:27 PM

As I recall, the war in Viet Nam was on for a long time before the Americans went in. While I hated the war while I was there and when I came home, I don't think it was the result of some spontaneous action.

DW

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: uncle bill
Date: 05 May 00 - 01:40 AM

wow! happy anniversay . Everybody's on this thread . The uniniformed, uniformed, well intentioned, politically correct , forgiving , forgived, guiltfull, guiltless, gutless, and a few that are right on. If you weren't born yet at that time, then everything you learned about it in high school and college was probably wrong. If you were there, you know no explanations are necessary. Fadac, right on. If you were against the war (as any sane person), and you went to jail for you belief, you are a hero. If you went to war and did your duty not for your country, or theirs, but for your fellow grunts , keeping each other alive, you are also a hero. If you ran off to Canada, as a deserter, or draft dodger, enjoy the winters you a**hole cowards. Veterans dont have to justify it or apologize. excuse me , I need a valium now.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 05 May 00 - 08:47 AM

If you think that your country is involved in an unjust war, you should refuse to help in that war. Insofar as you can, you should try to change things so that it stops doing it.

Some people chose to resist openly, and went to jail for refusing to be drafted, or refusin to obey orders. Some people went to jail for anti-war activism. Some deserted from the army. Some went underground. Some left the country.

Yes and there were some who were motivated not so much by a belief that the war was wrong, but by a wish not to be killed. And some of them found a way to ridde out the war wiothout being drafted, and are now riding high in politics - Republicans as well as Democrats.

But suggesting that people who chose to leave their country and their place in society because of what they believed in, because they thought their country was wrong, are all cowards to be sneered at is rubbish. It's no better than saying that people who went into the army were all bloodthirsty babykillers - and I don't know anyone who has ever said that.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: northfolk/al cholger
Date: 05 May 00 - 10:33 AM

There is a notion running through this post, and in our interpretation of the end of the war, that the US lost... to reiterate what I said in the BS Kent State thread, I reviewed some old propaganda from the era, and found two FORTUNE magazine advertisements, one from Eaton Yale and Towne Inc. referring to itself as a multinational corporation, doing business in the pacific rim, and that business is GREAT...another by CHEMICAL BANK, which starts WHEN YOU NEED SOMETHING MORE DIPLOMATIC THAN A GUNBOAT...

Watching the two parties of big business in the US voting MFN status for China, I say the war in Viet Nam accomplished just what it intended, so who were the winners/losers?

some of my friends , who went to Viet Nam, never reallized what they were fighting for. and some of my friends in the anti-war movement never knew what they were fighting against.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: annamill
Date: 05 May 00 - 11:21 AM

FADAC!! Welcome back! Things have changed a little and we've had some hard times, but we've seemed to have weathered it. Spend some time catching up. It's good to have you back. We've missed you.

Love, annap

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: canoer
Date: 06 May 00 - 02:07 AM

Northfolk Al, why belittle the Vietnamese's struggle? They forced the U.S. government to decide to quit the war. David beat Goliath, and a lot of Davids around the world took inspiration from their accomplishment, and rightly so.

I certainly agree that the U.S. was later (much later) able, by other means, to impose its business goals on Vietnam. But they had to go another way, longer and slower and less immediately profitable. The war did not succeed. The postwar policies did.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 06 May 00 - 08:02 PM

Hi Fadac
I think we probably would have a lot to agree on, though we had differnt ways of dealing with the Viet Nam war. I agree that we should have gone after the nazis eariler. In fact, my crowd did. We American reds were called Pre Mature Anti Facists, and after the war, there was a return to denying the most basic constitutional rights to those who went to Spain to stick it to hitler while the US and England were sitting at the table with him. After the war, we returned to a pro-nazi, not a pro german stance, using the Gestapo to set up Interpole, our space program was a haven for nazis and well the list goes on, and the Criminocracy in Russia is the result. Now, before you flame me as a Stalinist, Stalin was a criminal, but there would have been a Gorbachev sooner if we had not been so agressive against ALL socialist states.
I only say this because, we have been looking at the Viet Nam war in a vacume. No, not every CO was a coward, I for one, went to Belfast in the worst years of that struggle as a photographer and was shot at there. Yup, I was scared shitless, cold jelly for knees, but I stayed and did my job.
That job, I hoped, was to help us all to realize NOT TO TRUST OUR GOVERNMENTS! Trust each other, I have a lot more in common with you Fadac, than the sons of bitches who stuck a gun in you hand or made some kid from Glascow point a gun at me.
Peaceful aniversery to all, and my hat is off to the US vets who, against their governments wishes have gone back to remove land mines. Thouse men are more than heros, as so many have been, they are saints and heros.
Best wishes
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: MarkS
Date: 06 May 00 - 09:31 PM

Peter T What exactly was the motovation for the bombing of Cambodia if not the reach the North Vietnamese troops hiding and staging behind a supposedly neutral border? Seems to me you need to drop the bombs where the enemy are. Mark S

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 06 May 00 - 10:38 PM

Yes McGrath, I was called a baby killer in a college classroom. The young woman who made the accusation was not pleased when I said that she needed to be more specific. Did she mean by bombs, long range guns, napalm, rifle, knife, or with my bare hands? The professor could not regain controll of the class after that and had to dismiss for the day.Several of the young men in the class wanted to meet me outside to discuss the matter further but backed off when a couple of the older guys in the class took my part. Needless to say, that class was tense for the rest of the semester. I have a good friend who was a medic on a LRP team and he had similar problems.I also have friends who have never really come home.Sometimes they call and we talk but it only helps a little. For myself, I don't want a "well done" or anything else. Just leave me -and those like me- the HELL ALONE!

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: northfolk/al cholger
Date: 06 May 00 - 10:50 PM

Larry, We should sit down and have coffee and... I did not mean to belittle the fight that the vietcong waged, in my post...I would say that there is at least a theory, that the Tet offensive was a strategic change in plans from the vietcong to signal a willingness to seek some compromise to fighting the whole thing out to a victory...but that is not really what this thread is about. My point is simply, US corporate control was what the war was about. The same corporations are selling fried chicken in china, and are manufacturing shoes in vietnam. It is an irony, that to be "niked" in vietnam means to be hit with a shoe for not working hard enough. I am pretty sure that that is not what most people believed "we" were fighting for.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 May 00 - 08:15 AM

The thing is, there were baby killers, and that is not even controversial. Some of the blame for that inevitably spread out over some of those who weren't baby killers, and who did their best in terrible circumstances to do what they thought was right.

In the old South Africa there were decent cops and soldiers, and there were those who tortured and murdered. When the old regime fell, the new government set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, with the idea being that people who had done evil things (on both sides) could tell about what had happened, and receive amnesty, and it would be possible to understand where the responsibility for various things really lay.

This never happened for people who'd been involved in the Vietnam war one way and another, and it's a pity. The poison needs to be cleaned out of any wound befire it can really heal. Maybe it's not too late. (It needs to happen in Ireland as well, and I believe one way or another it probably will.)

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 07 May 00 - 11:05 AM

Dear, northfolk/al cholger
We agree there, the myth that we won the war on the field and lost it in the press is quiet different than that which you present. The reality is we lost it in the field and won it in the movies. This is not to take away from the efforts of the US soldiers. They attempted a job that could not have been done, for many of the same reasons that my families regiment, the 35 foot got pasted in the American revolution (The Otway regiment). Just as Irish troops were fighting against their self interest in the colonies American troops were fighting against their interests in Viet Nam. They are not to blaime. Just as my Otway forefathers sent their troops to war ill equipted for the job, and to keep them from making the changes that should have been made at home, it is not isolationist to say that forign wars drop more bombs at home than on the enamy, to quote MLK.
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,BobAGhanouj
Date: 08 May 00 - 04:38 AM

only by people looking for a scapegoat. wars are fought by ordinary men who think they are doing what's best. they are started by chicken shits who know better

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 08 May 00 - 08:24 AM

McGrath, I'm glad you mentioned the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa. I don't know whether anything along those lines would help us Americans with our lingering Vietnam baggage, particularly after all this time has gone by. But I am very impressed with this approach to healing deep wounds from a long period of conflict and injustice. I know it isn't perfect -- I've heard some criticisms from the people of South Africa, more or less saying that the voluntary nature of the thing means that people who should be part of it are still shielded from full disclosure, and that some of the participants just pay lip service to the process in order to get a free ride. But even an imperfect attempt is worth something, and I think South Africans will be better off for it.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: canoer
Date: 08 May 00 - 01:58 PM

Re the Truth & Rec Commission, a good friend was there working on the transition to "non-racial" government during the period in question. Basically the TRC was one more way of trying to persuade the dispossessed to settle for one slice of bread instead of the whole loaf. In her opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Whistle Stop
Date: 09 May 00 - 08:53 AM

I don't know much about it, so maybe I just bought the hype. It sounded like a worthwhile try, though. We need to come up with some way to break the cycle of vengeance created by long periods of conflict, in so many parts of the world. Maybe this is a good blueprint to follow, maybe it's not. But I liked the idea, anyway.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,mary g
Date: 09 May 00 - 11:05 PM

I think we could have done without the "babykillers" post here. I was an army officer. Put me on your list of "babykillers". I share in what anyone did, or what you think they did. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: lloyd64
Date: 09 May 00 - 11:34 PM

Sorry to say, yes.

Lloyd

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 09 May 00 - 11:49 PM

Mary G, I simply don't think you share in what the occasional insane person did (or ordered others to do)

Every country's military train their kids to be objective killers. I doubt if "sensitive" soldiers are really wanted in any army.

Emotionally damaged people can become privates, and rise through the ranks to become officers, generals, Presidents, Popes and Kings. They aren't in the majority but when they are given authority, everyone suffers.

The Peace Movement (of which I was a part) contained psychopaths, as dangerous as any in a uniform. When they rose to prominence, they easily counselled murder. Once again, they were not in the majority.

Sometimes the killing DOES stop. There are good people who have been taught to use violence, and good people who resist it. Sadly we don't find out about the "bad' ones til it's too late.

Rick

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 10 May 00 - 07:45 AM

Dear Rick:
I had a criminal law professor at NYU, who once said, When you use a bamb, it is always a depraved heart killing.
The baby killing was not just crazies killing kids in retaliation for the damage of war, in fact, I agree with those who said that seldom happened. However, Naplam, landmines, all the many indescriminating ways we killed in Viet Nam killed kids, and I brand that the for of murder refered to as depraved heart killing. Whats more, I dont hold the individual soldier responcible, because it was this democratic nation that launched the killing. We as a nation were child killers, and for a rather piss poor reason.
I have to repete, that when the Vets returned, the real baby killers, the US government, THEY turned their backs on the vets, not the anti war movement. The government spit on the vets and the government policies killed the kids - theirs and ours.
In hopes of a democratic future, you old red pal...
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 05:02 PM

I'm refreshing this, as it seems germane to the concerns expressed by some Mudcatters in other Veteran's Day threads, that others are insensitively "attacking" vets on Veteran's Day.

Maybe this would make a good candidate for perma-threads or at least for linking with other Veteran's Day threads.

We need not keep covering the same ground over and over, but if people want to do it, maybe reviving this thread is the way to go for them.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Gareth
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 07:29 PM

Sapper 82 - I may not totally agree with you on the causes of the Viet-Nam conflict - and history will relate that Imperial Japnese Troops were rearmed under British ad later French control to "disarm" and control the Vietnemese Gurillers (sp) under Ho Chi Min and Giap (1945 onwards)

The Viet Cong and more importantly the NVLA, were no angels, and by any defnition terrorists.

I suspect tho if free elctions had been enforced in the mid 50's the history of that prt of Asia might have been totally different. But then History is so much 'What If ????'

Now before his mind went I was trying to record the experiences of my late father wth the objective of writing them up for publication. This was a man who went from Normandy to Kiel the hard way in 1944/5 30 corps support unit, 91st(Anti Tank)( Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders) A mixture of 17pdr M10's, Towed 17pdrs, AA Crusaders, and White (USA) Halftracks armed with quad 0.5" Brownings.

Unit function - to back up Armour and Infantry with specialised and heavier weapons. ( A 17 pdr could kill a Panther or Tiger, the 6pdr or 75 mm guns of your standard Churchill or Sherman could not, and the concentrated fire of the 20mm Oerlicons of the Crusaders and the 0.5" of the half track could rip a dug in gun position to peices)

I have seen him reduced to tears twice. Once when mentioning what they found at Belson - his troop was one of the first units in. And secondly when he described catching a German Horse drawn artillery unit somewhere between the Rhine and Minden. He was given orders to destroy it. As he said, he didn't mind killing the Wehrmacht, they were out to kill him - but the horses were another matter. 20mm and 0.5" Browning rounds butcher horses, but not that quickly or cleanly.

Interestingly one of his Sargents deal with a group of gaurds at Belson in summery fashion. He told me he had a quick and nasty "cover up" to do - Shot whilst attempting to escape was his report. Fortunately none of his superiors was that inclined to enquire further, if they had, would that have made him a war criminal ???

No - all credit to all Veterans. And from this side of the pond mat all those scars heal, and quickly.

Gareth
Dulce et Dulchoram est,
Pro Patria Morie

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 08:04 PM

I don't think this is just about scars healing. It is about forgiveness needing to take place. Let us say theoretically, that every claim of/by vets being spat upon were true. And every claim by vets that they were treated like second class citizens is true. And let us say theoretically that the only segment of society treating vets in this manner, were anti-war activists.

A couple of theoretical questions: 1) for vets who feel they have not yet healed this emotional wound within themselves, what can society do to make it happen? 2) are vets willing and ready to forgive those who wounded them, so that they themselves can have closure on that part of their lives?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 09:51 PM

Okay, now here's one from a former member of the Illinois NATIONAL GUARD.

On May 13, 1968 my NG unit was called "for up to two years federal active duty." In September, 1968, the unit (including my brother, who was the supply clerk) was sent to Chu Lai, South Vietnam (I was eventually sent to Korea, where I served with the Seventh Infantry Division). The unit drove 5K gallon tankers full of things like JP-4 fuel up and down Highway 1 -- and yes, they were ambushed. Like myself, some of the guys were seperated and served in other units, like the 4th Inf. Div., the 9th Inf. Div, 1 Cav., etc. Of those activated, none were killed (although some were wounded). Yes, some of those who were assigned to the unit after it was in-country were killed in both heroic and decidedly non-heroic circumstances.

In August, 1969 we were returned "to State control." Reunited by in our hometown, we all eventually returned to civilian life.

I restarted college, which the callup had interrupted. My reception by the "Peace And Freedom Coalition" folks was, ah, mixed. And I can tell you from experience that flying in uniform from Sea-Tac airport to O'Hare whilst the remains of Woodstock dribbled into the West Coast was something I wouldn't want anyone to experience.

Someone in college DID spit on my brother because of his duty in VN. This was not a good idea and cost the spitter some teeth and considerable pain.

While my brother was in VN, my other brother, who was a flying spy for the Air Force, couldn't go. The second brother eventually spent 18 months in SEA; one of the things he did was fly airborne intelligence for the Son Thuy raid.

One person said thanks. I'm still married to her.

The scars are still often tender, but I don't hate anyone. As was said before, the grunts (and I was light weapons infantry) were the people most against the war -- for them, it was personal.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:07 PM

What always puzzled me was that everyone I knew who was against the war was against the System that Sent young men to war NOT the young men themselves. Most of them went against their will(the draft). What people were protesting against was not the soldiers but the system. That has been twisted around with stories like the "spitting" incidents. It is possible it happened, but I doubt it was the norm by any means. My heart goes out (and always did) to the young guys who had to endure those circumstances. And God help us, here we go again.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bobert
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 10:23 PM

Now, I haven't read this thread but so I'm just gonna wade into it blindly.

First, I graduated from Massanutten Military Academy in 1965 and any graduate with three years of MST (Military Science Training) could go right to Nam as a 2nd Lt. and, out of my graduating class many did. Out of the little more than a hundred of my friends at Massanutten, *8* died in Nam. That's a lot! Throw in one cousin and another who stepped on a mine and almost died and lost a leg and my best friend in grade school, I think I can say I know the horrors of VN.

Now, back in the 60's I was promotin' a rock club in Richmond, Va. and we let it be known to our brothers at Ft Lee, in Petersburg, that they were not only welcome but we let 'em in free. And we we're alone. The struggle was not between those of us who were in the streets tryin' to stop the VN War and our brothers who were caught up in Boss Hog's little game but with Boss Hog.

Now this scared the Hell out of Boss Hog, just as it scares Boss Hog today but in the words of the phophet: Tough Sh*t! Yeah, there will be those true believers who will buy into your trumped up lies that there is a division between the folks fighting in the streets of Bagdad and Washington, D.C. but there *AIN'T*!

That dog won't hunt!

Sure, there are folks around here, like Claymore, who are conservative Repubs who will step to the plate and say that, since I didn't shoot at Vietnamese people, that I don't have a right to say anything.

Bullsh*t. That's partisan, "true believer" politics and nothin' more, thank you.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 12 Nov 02 - 11:43 PM

What are you saying guest these people are lying?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: NicoleC
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 12:32 AM

I may have to pick up this book. The link above to the author's comments show a well-thought out discourse on how modern myth can shape our impressions of reality.

Since I spent the end of the war in diapers, I found his remarks about Hollywood having shaped the images of war particularly appropriate. I have no real first-hand experience with the effects of the war. I was brought up with the idea that the vets were universally hated and reviled, and even though I've never seen specific proof or talked to a single person who felt so, I honestly have never questioned it. (The Vietnamese involved, of course, were never discussed.) And I guess my mental image of a Vietnam vet really *is* Forrest Gump and the crazy pilot in Independance Day, even if logically I understand that these are just stereotypes.

I think the wide range of experiences recounted above show that vets did not all have the same homecoming experience and were not universally reviled... and yet the spitting image is so powerful, it lingers.

Then again, the only place I've ever seen someone spit on another person is in a movie.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 05:34 AM

Yes G*dDamnit some of us were spit on. Thank you SO much GUEST for allowing that it "may" have happened. That just makes everything ok.
Bobert, you have the right, under the Constitution, to say anything you like. But if you weren't in Viet Nam, THEN YOU DON'T KNOW. PERIOD.
It doesn't matter how many friends you lost or how politically aware you were or how hard you worked to end the war. You cannot begin to understand so don't even try. Stick to what you KNOW.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: InOBU
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 07:42 AM

Hi Troll:
Yes and no.... I was speaking with a fellow who landed at Normandy the other day, and found something interesting... he could not watch films about WWII, but could watch other war films. My friend Thomas who was a prisoner on the Burma Railway cannot watch Bridge on the River Kwai (though he thinks it is a stupid movie). I cannot watch films about the North of Ireland... tried watching Bloody Sunday and wept uncontrollably through it... because no other experience is more intense than one's personal view of war. But there is the emotional knowledge and then there is the knowledge that all citizens should acquire in a democracy, which is a familiarity with the facts behind our wars so we can make an informed decision and that needs some cross talk with those of us who have personal and emotional experience of war.
Some may have been spit on by anti war folds ... from my personal experience the anti war movement had huge numbers of vets in it, members of Viet Nam Veterans Against the War, an organisation whose members I stay in touch with to this day, and who do draft counseling at the start of wars that may see a draft. But, the real spiting on the vets came from a government which waged war than dropped the wounded vets, wounded in body or mind, onto the streets of America, into the jails of America, into neglect. They are the real MIAs, while Sylvester Stallone (who taught in a Swiss girl's school during the war) promotes the myth that the VC are keeping American slaves in VN, causing the majority to overlook the MIA on their doorstep while imagining slave labour camps over there.
Peace and healing friend
Hope to see ya in New York again soon
Larry

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bobert
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 08:18 AM

Troll:

I ain't buy that "wuff'wuff" stuff either. I think I represent pretty well the thoughts of those who worked tirelessly to end the war in Vietnam and as such have *my duty* as a memeber of the accused (*spitters*) to stand up here and confront a *lie* that has been allowed to take form and settle in as a general statement of truth.

Sure some folks got spit on. Heck, the spitting went both ways. Its still here, where when I stand up to the lie, you figurately *spit* on me in front of the entire Mudcat kindom. But you troll, do not represent the Vietnam vet in general but just that small minority of vets who have bought into big *spit lie*. I, on the other hand, being a memebr of the anit-war movement know that it would have been a very small nmber within that held any service man accountable for the decisions made by 4 presidents (5, if you include Ike)

There are unstable folks everywhere who do not represent the majoirty and for which the majority should not be defined because of a few folks bad behavior.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 08:28 AM

No, Ireland, I'm not saying these people are lying-there are gonna be assholes in every endeavor. But you can't really beleive that everyone who was against the war was like that, can you? I think that what gets lost in all this is that those against the war were really on the soldiers side. ( at least I was)It was the system that sent young men to die rather than find a more intelligent way to solve problems. I realize that sometimes war is necessary, but sometimes it has to be questioned also.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bobert
Date: 13 Nov 02 - 10:57 AM

Thank you, GUEST, you said it better than I did.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Steve in Idaho
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 11:04 AM

Interesting - Just a fact from me on the whole subject.

Forgiveness is nothing more than giving up hope that yesterday is going to change.

Long as I don't forgive I give the power of my life to the one I refuse to forgive. Doesn't mean I'll forget. I think I need to remember. I'm getting too old and too tired to stay angry for all that long. I do get twisted up momentarily at those that verbally spit on veterans in general and denigrate their service. Like someone above said - we all served in one manner or another.

Hoping you all are having a good day -

Steve

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bobert
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 11:22 AM

Steve:

Amen, brother, from the bottom of my heart.

And other than this bad pickin' thumb, this ol' hillbilly is havin' a glorious day. The maples are beutiful. The Iragis have accepted in principle the UN resolution. And it looks like I'm gonna win an ebay bid for a recorder to relace my old broken one. Life is good.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 12:57 PM

Guest and Bobert, did the spitting happen, yes it did you both acknowledge that. Was it done in the name of anti war protesters.

Bobert you admitted that there were those who did spit, it went both ways, does that make it right, does that mean we negate the feelings of those who were spat on because some one spat back? You have just justified the actions of some of the anti war activists who think it is right to take such actions. You have defended them by saying what you said,that implicates all activists.

Human nature being what it is, with the strong sense of loyalty and protection people have for each other, is it too hard to understand how people feel when one person spits on one vet. Bobert spit on anyone in uniform you may just spit on the whole Army.

With the incidents posted, I ask if that person had the opportunity to spit on all the military would they have done it? That's were the insults lie it is the principle of the thing your attacking what they stand for, your not much of a soldier if you do not have pride for your uniform and what it stands for.

Spit on the American flag and you've spat on every American not too hard a concept to understand and apply to the above.

Guest I have haven't a lot of time for you, Big Mick has shown you for what you are, I think it's a shame that others encourage you and your disengenuous rants.

I totally agree with the sentiments of anti war, no one should go to war, the problem I have is with the tactics that some use and when they decide to use them.

One thing though Bobert as you say you worked tirelessly to end the V.Nam war what in heavens name did you think those poor buggers who were in V.Nam doing. These people have my respect and I believe they are very special people, as they not only take the good times of being an American they also took the bad. Is that not what it is about the rough with the smooth?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 01:22 PM

And you hail from where again in Ireland, Mr. "Ireland"?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 01:29 PM

Once againg you look over the issues raised, answer them, g'wan , some chance! and I'm not sleggin.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bobert
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 01:39 PM

Ireland, Next to Teribus you have the greatest ability to misread other peoples posts and twist them to fit your agenda that I've run into here in the world of cats.

In the most simple terms, yes, spitting went on by a very, very small number of vets and antiwar folk. Not enough for Boss Hog to put his PR guys on it and blow a non-story into the *Big Lie*. Sure, some vet or antiwar person will come on here and perpetuate the *Big Lie* but it is just... the *Big Lie*.

Yeah, as long as Boss Hog can keep to vet and antiwar peons fueding between themselves then no one's gonna look his fat butt in the eye and ask the tough questions, like how come it the folks from the working class and lower who get their butts shot up in these needless wars, Mr. Hog?

Yeah, it's divide and conquer.

Now, if anyone wants to continue fueling this fire, feel free, as fir me, I have said my piece on this thread and will not return to it.

The war is over.

Peace

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: artbrooks
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 01:46 PM

Long ago and far away. You all realize that ANON.GUEST revived this 2-year-old thread and is keeping it going entirely for his/her/its own purient interests, don't you?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 01:53 PM

artbrooks, there are, if my count is correct, currently three anon guests posting to this thread. It was refreshed when Mudcat members provided a link to it in another thread. It being refreshed was entirely relevant to a number of Veterans Day threads going on.

Before you play the "unmask the troll's agenda" game, you might want to get the facts straight first.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 01:54 PM

I have twisted nothing if people choose to ignore the reasons why so many take offence that so call peaceful people spit on the uniform and ultimately on the representative of their country perhaps they should reconsider what they class themselves as.

To say the war is over is redundant, the dog in the street knows that,so people should realise that and let the vets of any war remember and honor their friends in peace, without the spectre of glorying war being laid on them.

And if we all want peace lets think of those who brought it about the hard way, not too much to ask!

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 02:02 PM

Ireland, on the other hand, seems to be doing all he/she can to keep this thread refreshed. Near singlehandedly.

Odd thing for an Irish fellow to concern himself with.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 02:21 PM

I'll never apologise for showing how I feel about vets,your right though guest as you point the finger at me three are pointing right back at ya! along with all the others who have rumbled you.

Should never have taken your post seriously in the first place, here is a challenge for all the activists,I think when vets day comes around next year you will raise the same BS,g'wan prove me wrong and have some courage of your convictions, or show some real human compassion you falsely profess to have.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 02:34 PM

I correct myself. Odd thing for an Irish fellow to be foaming at the mouth about.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: mg
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 02:38 PM

thanks Irish. I am sure many people know that the traveling wall went to Ireland last year (?) to honor those Irishmen, and I believe an Irish-born woman, who died, and many who served. I am not sure if they served as Irish citizens or as immigrants. Of course, some, and I have met one, and so have some of you, immigrated to Australia and got drafted. And even without direct involvement, there are certainly ties between Ireland and America...and people have family members, cousins, brothers etc. There was a wreath laying at the wall this year by an Irish veteran (at least I read there was) in honor of ???not sure..I think Nurse Donavan, one of the few women on the wall (many women who died were civilians and therefore not on the wall but are of course remembered).

I met a Mexican man who says he and many others enlisted from Mexico. I can't verify this other than to believe him. And of course Puerto Ricans enlisted in great numbers, and are in a different category of citizenship. I have heard it said there were whole villages in Puerto Rico where there were no young men at all. Not a one.

And the thing that shocked me so much when I first looked at the book of the dead was (1) how many officers there were and (2) how many Irish names there were. And you will heard it said that many many of the Nurse Corps at the time were Irish American young women. I can't verify this either..

mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 03:15 PM

"I correct myself. Odd thing for an Irish fellow to be foaming at the mouth about"

Not that odd Guest my father lost his life there,he was in the British Army. You are really showing your ignorance.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 03:22 PM

Approximtae number of US military who served in 10 years in Vietnam:

2,700,000

Approximate number of US military women who served: 5,900

Approximate number of US military men killed: 58,000

Number of US military women killed: 8

Estimated number of Vietnamese civilians killed: 2,000,000

Perspective is everything.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 03:38 PM

The British occupation of Vietnam:

Even before the Japanese surrender, Communist led Vietminh forces had been taking control of the northern provinces of Vietnam. When the war finally ended after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Vietminh marched into Hanoi. The forces entered the city on 19 August to a tumultuous reception. Soon afterwards, on 2 September, the Communist leader, Ho Chi Minh, proclaimed Vietnamese independence from French rule in front of a crowd of half a million people. Ho's expectation was that the victorious Allies would accept this fait accompli and that the French would have to negotiate on Vietminh terms.

While the Vietminh were strong in the north, in Saigon and the south they faced a challenge from rival nationalist and socialist organisations, including a strong Trotskyist movement. They warned that independence could only be achieved through struggle and the Allies could not be trusted. The Vietminh established a provisional government in Saigon, the Committee of the South, but when the British arrived it had still not succeeded in gaining undisputed control of the city.

South Vietnam had been placed under British control at the Potsdam, conference of July 1945. The British commander, Lord Mountbatten, sent over 20,000 troops of the 20th Indian division under General Douglas Gracey to occupy Saigon. The first soldiers arrived on 6 September and increased to full strength over the following weeks. The Committee of the South attempted to open negotiations, but was ignored. As Gracey later boasted, 'I was welcomed on arrival by the Vietminh. I promptly kicked them out.' Instead he set about driving the nationalists off the streets, banning meetings and demonstrations, closing down the Vietnamese press, prohibiting Vietnamese from carrying weapons and restoring Japanese curfew regulations. On 23 September, with his connivance and under his protection, French troops staged a coup. They seized public buildings, including the town hall, and made widespread arrests. This provoked fierce resistance.

Saigon was paralysed by a general strike and fighting broke out in many parts of the city. Barricades were erected and poorly armed rebels attempted to fight it out with heavily armed British troops. For a while it looked as if the British were in danger of being cut off from reinforcements when Vietnamese forces nearly succeeded in overrunning Tan Son Nhut airfield. They were driven off. While this fighting continued the Vietminh took the opportunity to destroy the Vietnamese Trotskyist movement, executing its leaders.

At last the British secured control of the city but only after the liberal use of artillery, the deliberate burning of areas held by the rebels and the rearming and use of surrendered Japanese troops. According to Edmund Taylor, an American officer in Saigon at the time, the city reminded him 'of a town newly occupied by Franco's forces in the Spanish Civil War'.

After the city was cleared fighting continued on the outskirts and into the surrounding countryside. Here once again use was made of Japanese troops in an effort to keep down British casualties. The orders issued by Gracey instructed his troops to 'always use the maximum force available to ensure wiping out any hostiles... If one uses too much no harm is done'.

By the end of December--as large numbers of French troops began arriving--British withdrawal began. Gracey himself left at the end of January but the last British soldiers were killed in Vietnam in June 1946. Altogether 40 British and Indian troops were killed and over a hundred were wounded. Vietnamese casualties were officially 600 killed but unofficially three or four times higher.

Gracey had saved Vietnam for the French and thereby precipitated a war of national liberation that was to last another 30 years.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 03:44 PM

That is a canned summary of British involvement in Vietnam. I presume your father was killed during the occupation, Ireland? You have my sympathies for the loss of your father While your anger and vehemence seems very intense to me for one who lost a loved one so many years ago, doesn't mean you aren't entitled to expressing it here, if that is your wish.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:05 PM

Try 1967, you really do not understand do you?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:12 PM

I'm not aware of any British army troops being in Vietnam in 1967, Ireland, so perhaps you can explain to me how your father came to be killed there. I know there were Australian troops in Vietnam and hundreds of them were killed. But if you wish me to understand your perspective, you will have to enlighten me. It is impossible to understand something I am wholly ignorant of, which I am regarding British troop involvement in Vietnam.

If you wouldn't mind explaining the circumstances of British military involvement, you would likely also be educating others besides just me. I don't think most Americans are aware of the British military involvement in the US' war with Vietnam.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:20 PM

So you really do not know,but you still comment.

I'll leave it up to the vets who know to educate you.

You really do not care what you say as long as you get your point across, I'm irish so why should it matter to me?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 04:37 PM

I also haven't been able to find any information online that substantiates your claim about British military involvement in the US war with Vietnam, Ireland. I'm a pretty fair online researcher, and I can find nothing about the British army in Vietnam at that time.

If it is understanding you are seeking, IMO, you should be willing to meet people half way. So I ask again please, put aside your anger, and share with us what you know, that we do not. That would truly further understanding Ireland.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:00 PM

Here is the problem guest,which guest am I answering? When did V.Nam go from having military advisors to having the US military there?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:09 PM

Are we counting Old Ironsides?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:20 PM

Just to help you out here Ireland, "Guest 1" who refreshed this thread says that there are three guests posting to it. While that may be true, the other guests have posted only once each and I think you can probably figure them out by reading the tone and phrasing. One was on the 12th and the other on the 13th I believe, but since then, the rest of the "Guests" are all Guest #1.......She stays quite busy.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: mg
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:32 PM

so much to understand, so little time. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:44 PM

That was intended as a joke, Ireland. Lighten up, please?

Trick question. US military advisors are US military. The first US POWs in Vietnam were captured in 1954.

So, Mad Jack Percival aside, the US helped fund France's attempt to retake Vietnam as a colony post WWII. The US sent it's first few advisors in 1950. After Ho Chi Minh defeats the French at Dien Bien Phu, the country is partitioned by international conference in 1954 (though the US wasn't a signatory). US takes over in 1956, installed Diem as premier and set up MAAG (Military Assistance and Advisory Group). By the time Kennedy takes over, there are around 700 "advisors" in Vietnam.

Diem's crackdown on Buddhists and nationalists begins, many South Vietnamese flock to join the ranks of the NLF, Diem falls when the US backed the generals/gangsters' coup. The generals/gangsters got overzealous, and started to overthrow one another, leading finally to nine coups, and tremendous political and economic instability. US military involvement goes from the 500 or so US military dispatched to Saigon in the mid-50s, to approximately 25,000 at the time of the 1964 election. By the end of '65, there will be almost 200,000.

Now, what does this have to do with your father being killed while in service to the British army in Vietnam in 1967?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 05:54 PM

Here is a link to the American Veterans Traveling Tribute website:

http://www.avtt.org

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:02 PM

There were many special forces units in V.Nam,my father was in one of those such units,it is a pity that someone who offers opinions really lacks the finite details.

Look up hearts and minds, it was a strategy that the BA used when they were in Malaya, the US later tried it in V.Nam.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:15 PM

What British Army special forces units were in Vietnam though Ireland? I can't find any information about them anywhere. Considering how well documented the US side of the war in Vietnam is, I find it nigh on impossible to believe, without you providing some references, online or offline. I promise you to look them up, and treat the information as fairly as I can.

I notice that the Traveling exhibit doesn't make any mention of the Vietnam Veterans Against War, and I don't see any discussion of the vets themselves who became anti-war activists in these threads.

I'd like to ask politely and respectfully, how the Mudcat vets feel about the VVAW's involvement in anti-war protests then and now, and how they feel about their fellow vets organizing against the current military buildup and war planning against Iraq this year on Veteran's Day? Both Veterans for Peace and Vietnam Veterans Against War participated in anti-war activities on Veteran's Day here in Minnesota, as a way of honoring vets.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:16 PM

The American Veterans Traveling Tribute was on show at Queens University,it in no way glorified the war and I fail to see how the Vets day at the real war does. Many and I mean many people men and women came away from the tribute with tears in their eyes, for me it was the sense of loss and the ending of potential in young lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 06:29 PM

My trips to the Wall in DC always effect me that way too, Ireland. As do trips to Ft. Snelling here in Minnesota.

I just find it curious that it doesn't include the VVAW, as there are many distinguished Vietnam vets among their ranks, including members of Congress.

So far, my vet contacts tell me they know of a reference to one Brit LRRP who was with the 101st at Cam Ranh, but they say he wasn't with the British Army. They say he had emigrated to the US and enlisted in the US Army.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 07:13 PM

Respectfully submitted to the friends we lost and those who still grieve. dwditty and Bick Mick I still remember.

Remembrance

He was getting old and paunchy
and his hair was falling fast,
And he sat around the Legion,
Telling stories of the past.

   Of a war that he once fought in
And the deeds that he had done,
In his exploits with his buddies;
They were heroes, every one.

    And 'tho sometimes to his neighbours
His tales became a joke,
   All his buddies listened quietly
For they knew where of he spoke.

But we'll hear his tales no longer,
For ol' Bob has passed away,
And the world's a little poorer
For a Soldier died today.

   He won't be mourned by many,
Just his children and his wife.
For he lived an ordinary,
Very quiet sort of life.

He held a job and raised a family,
   Going quietly on his way;
   And the world won't note his passing,
   'Tho a Soldier died today.

When politicians leave this earth,
   Their bodies lie in state,
While thousands note their passing,
   And proclaim that they were great.

Papers tell of their life stories
From the time that they were young
   But the passing of a Soldier
   Goes unnoticed, and unsung.

Is the greatest contribution
To the welfare of our land,
Some jerk who breaks his promise
And cons his fellow man?

   Or the ordinary fellow
Who in times of war and strife,
   Goes off to serve his country
And offers up his life?

The politician's stipend
And the style in which he lives,
   Are often disproportionate,
To the service that he gives.

While the ordinary Soldier,
Who offered up his all,
Is paid off with a medal
   And perhaps a pension, small.


    It's so easy to forget them,
   For it is so many times
   That our Bobs and Jims and Johnnys,
Went to battle, but we know,

It is not the politicians
   With their compromise and ploys,
Who won for us the freedom
That our country now enjoys.

Should you find yourself in danger,
With your enemies at hand,
Would you really want some cop-out,
With his ever waffling stand?

Or would you want a Soldier--
His home, his country, his kin,
Just a common Soldier,
Who would fight until the end.

He was just a common Soldier,
And his ranks are growing thin,
But his presence should remind us
We may need his like again.

For when countries are in conflict,
We find the Soldier's part
Is to clean up all the troubles
That the politicians start.

   If we cannot do him honor
While he's here to hear the praise,
Then at least let's give him homage
At the ending of his days.

Perhaps just a simple headline
In the paper that might say:

"OUR COUNTRY IS IN MOURNING,
FOR A SOLDIER DIED TODAY."

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Ireland
Date: 14 Nov 02 - 07:17 PM

To end this the Aussies had their SAS there, the BA had theirs, I never met my father, well only as a babe in arms, you will not find ref to him as so and so SAS, as they are recorded under their original unit.

My father was in Malaya and Borneo, were they tried hearts and mind a tactic used later by the US in V.Nam. Look up the SAS site it gives info about Malaya and Borneo, I have a picture of him in the jungle in Borneo. I do not know where he was when he got killed in V.Nam,my mother always said I'll tell you later, now she has passed away and that's it.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Wolfgang
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 06:37 AM

Ireland,

veterane members of Mudcat have learned to avoid responding to that particular GUEST. It saves nerves and time.

Wolfgang

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 08:31 AM

I agree Wolfgang, that Remembrance poem is maudlin and trite almost beyond belief.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 08:47 AM

Not really Guest #1.... It was by a different guest.....obviously. Fact!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 09:31 AM

Bobert, I was not addressing you on the question of whether or not Viet Nam Vets were sipt on. I was speaking to GUEST, but since you seemed to see fit to respond for GUEST, I will address these remarks to you.
I don't know where you got the idea that I think that the spitting was widespread. I said that "some of us" were spit on. I guess that isn't exact enough but I don't have precise numbers to quote. I personally know of two men to whom it happened.
You also mentioned that "Boss Hog" (whoever that is) is fostering the "lie" and that when you stand up to that "lie" people who challenge you are, in effect, spitting on you.
Bobert, I haven't the faintest idea what "lie" you are talking about.
That's a nice piece of convoluted logic. You admit that it happened and then call it a lie.
You say that I do not represent the average vet (I never said I did, that's your invention) but you cheerfully claim that you know that if the spitting happened, it was done by a very small percentage of anti-war protesters.
Since I notice that you have said goodbye to this thread, I will PM this post to you .

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 09:55 AM

As a grassroots political activist, I can't even count the number of times I've been harrassed while in the line of duty, be it on a picket line, walking in a march, demonstrating, at rallies, etc.

In fact, it is so common for "decent Americans" to "spit on" dissenters, it never even gets discussed, except in passing among ourselves when it occurs.

My favorite epithet that gets hurled at us over and over again is "Why don't you go vote!" :)

To me, it is ludicrous in the extreme that people even have this discussion. Who ever said standing up for what you believe in was easy, and that you wouldn't get shit for doing it from your fellow citizens?

I'll start taking the claims made by some troublemakers that VV were spat upon seriously, just as soon as they stop making spurious claims about it, simply as a means to silence anti-war messages and political dissent.

Americans have many, many other people they enjoy spitting on nowadays, like Muslims and Arab Americans, for instance.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 10:00 AM

Cite the spurious claims please. With links.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 11:55 AM

More from the spurious claims dept--that these same "anti-peace activist" vets are really anti-war. Right. Except the ones they fought in, and most the wars before that, and certainly this one coming up...

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 09:29 PM

Spaw is very perceptive, and right, I, Jaze was the guest who posted on the 12th and 13th. Not to be confontational, just to state how I've always felt.Lost my cookie and don't even bother with it anymore. I'm sure it was hurtful to returning soldiers to be spit upon, but as I said, there are assholes in every endeavor. But I do beleive the majority of protesters against the war were NOT against the individulal soldiers.So sad isn't it that the division that existed in this country over that war exists even now , in this? Jaze

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Beer
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 09:56 PM

Out of all the stories that have been told so far, Annamill, you have touched me. I am not a vet. Nor was I a protester. I just want to tell my story of that time.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Beer
Date: 15 Nov 02 - 10:45 PM

OOps, sorry but I just have to much to say and can not continue.
Beer

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: dwditty
Date: 16 Nov 02 - 12:29 PM

ah, never mind

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From:
Date: 16 Nov 02 - 04:16 PM

I just finished reading David Grossman's "On Killing;" he refers to a book Bob Greene wrote. The columnist thought the spitting was legendary rather than factual. He solicited letters from vets, and over a thousand testomials letters persuaded him otherwise.

BTW, I highly recommend Grossman's book. Not for simpleminded partisans of either side. The core argument, and it's well defended, is that there's very little killer instinct (except for the 2% of us who are sociopaths) -- which is why nations take so much trouble training adolescents to overcome their innate reluctance to kill. The spitting, even if its incidence was overstated, nonetheless stands for the lack of re-integration ceremonies and rituals for returning 'Nam vets -- an element, in Grossman's view, of the complex that made their postwar experience much more traumantic than that of many earlier veterans who had experienced, qualitatively, quantitatively, more horror.

Adam

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 16 Nov 02 - 06:12 PM

Thank you, Adam. I shall get the book.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Big Mick
Date: 16 Nov 02 - 06:12 PM

At last, a perceptive post. Nicely done, Adam.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: mg
Date: 16 Nov 02 - 06:35 PM

People might not have heard yet but Linda V., nurse, author, has died. You can b.c. me for details. I am sure she went out fighting so I put her in this thread. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 16 Nov 02 - 07:21 PM

Thanks Adam, sounds a good read.

I like the word "simpleminded." In the many threads and discussions we have had here on those times, it has always been a kind of pleasure in sharing thoughts and ideas with those who were, in those days, on all sides of the issue. We have a broad cross section here and the only time things have ever broken down in communications of feelings is when the few simpleminded fools show up and try to show that there is somehow an easy answer.

I look forward to reading this other book because I think the lack re-integration was indeed a major factor. What caused that lack? Korea vets were never properly welcomed either probably because there was such little understanding by those at home of what that was was. It was also close to WWII so there at least was no antagonistic attitudes toward returning soldiers. VietNam, because of the media attention and the availability of seeing the war on your TV nightly, changed all of that. It also brought out many people in total opposition to the war. Being generationally removed from WWII made a difference as well.

What I think this brought out were the nutcases from both sides. Certainly there were those who spit on soldiers and just as certainly there were soldiers, returning from an emotional experience without any real debriefing/cool-off/integration time who were willing to think that everyone held the entire war against them personally. That's easy to see and for most of those vets........well, where's the end? For a few, every protester became the enemy and every look a spit.

Anyone on either "side" here who boasts of what they did and proudly say they would always do it again under any circumstance is simpleminded. Every one of us lives with what we did then and most of us have reconciled our actions but continue to question.......and talk.....and feel.......and hope that sometime it will be behind us forever. I fear that is a hope only fulfilled in the grave. We all played our parts, but were indeed pawns...and only pawns. I am proud of what many vets did; I am proud of what I did. I am often ashamed of what our leaders did.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,Jaze
Date: 17 Nov 02 - 12:54 PM

Amen,Spaw.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Big Mick
Date: 17 Nov 02 - 02:20 PM

Spaw's post demonstrates the difference between him (and others like him) who are real searchers, and the so called peace activist that I regularly go after on this forum. One of my very best friends during that time, went to Canada. One of my prized possessions is a picture on three young men standing together. All are dressed in the garb of the time, that being bell bottoms, sandals and t-shirts. Two of them have long hair, and beards. The third has a military haircut. My friends, Rick and Mack, were headed to Canada. I was headed off on my military sojourn. I always considered Mack to be very heroic. He left hearth and home and went away. When amnesty was offered Mack came home. But he didn't accept amnesty, rather he said he wanted to be tried. He said he was following his conscience when he left, and that he would rather go to prison than do anything that suggested he was wrong to do so. So much for being a coward. He was found guilty, but was given community service. I was proud of him then, and I am proud of him now. Spaw did time for his beliefs. And both of these men never vilify veterans as pawns of anyone, or any organizations. Neither of them stir up crap just because someone is asking others to thank a vet. In short, they are warriors in a cause. Real warriors, not phoney academics who preach from an ivory tower. They understand that many warriors are as committed to peace, probably more so than most, by virtue of their past.

Good job, my friend. I am proud to call you friend.

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: mg
Date: 17 Nov 02 - 02:44 PM

I could never understand why abusing veterans became so entertwined in peace stuff. It seems to me like abusing fire fighters when you work in fire prevention. I'm all for fire prevention and I am all for disease prevention and I am all for war prevention but I sure want a backup plan. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Nov 02 - 08:07 PM

I am a Marxist theorist, and live by the Groucho maxim "nothing is sacred." Not even Vietnam Vets.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: mg
Date: 17 Nov 02 - 08:53 PM

Hope Groucho didn't have any big surprise on judgement day. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 18 Nov 02 - 06:00 AM

"Nothing is sacred" is OK but some people go out of their way just to be nasty. There is a big difference between the two concepts.
One indicates a sense of irreverence.
The other indicates a defective personality.

troll

'Spaw, Mick, right on.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Nov 02 - 11:43 AM

Ah yes, Real Warriors, Real Bards, manly men. Complete with long suffering women who perpetually grieve for them as their preferred form of worship. Heroes and sheroes all, those who are on the side of the Real Warrior. And for those who aren't, well it is obvious. They are The Enemy the Real Warrior must hunt down in thread after thread, to "regularly go after" until victory is his. For the Real Warrior has the unshakable certainty of their own moral superiority, and the certainty of victory. In an internet discussion forum.

There are now over 150 repetitive posts to this thread. A reasonable person might consider giving it up and letting it go.

A bit of a quagmire syndrome taking hold here, perhaps?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Big Mick
Date: 18 Nov 02 - 12:12 PM

Go back to the Crumb thread. At least there you have some depth. Seems as though you can be quite coherent, even intellectual, when you want to be. You are the one who keeps this thing going.

As far as your condescending comments about my wife; it is fortunate for you that you didn't say them with her around. She would immediately peg you for the self righteous ass that you are. She neither grieves for me in a "enabling" way, nor is she indifferent to vets and the problems many face.

You have finally said what it is that really bothers you. You are a very cynical person, hence you don't deal with sincerity very well. It really bothers you that someone would claim the title of Warrior, and Bard. Perhaps the terms have come to mean something to you, that they don't mean to me. I use them in the street level sense. A warrior, to me, is simply a fighter in a cause. A warrior has achieved a certain level of competence in the fight, and pursued that with honor. Now.....there is another term that will cause you a problem. Honor. I don't apologize for valuing this. It is what separates Gandhi from Hitler, the bully from the decent person. If you are a Celt, then you should understand why I use the term Bard to describe those that try to make a difference with their music. If you are not, try to find out. I am not trying to create a romantic vision with either term. Rather I am trying to use them in the real, working, sense that they are meant to be used.

Tired of the quagmire? Quit contributing to it. But you won't be able to help yourself. That's OK. Tell you what. You stop posting, and so will I. In fact, I think I will no matter what you do. You have shown yourself for what you are.

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 18 Nov 02 - 01:17 PM

If you truly believe I have shown myself for what I am Big Mick, then nothing I say should bother you. Then, you wouldn't feel compelled to respond to my posts, or to hunt down posts by anon. guests in different threads. Which is what makes this whole sordid thing an obsession with you, and this charade your personal vendetta, not an honorable crusade. There is a fine line between the two. Look behind you.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: mg
Date: 18 Nov 02 - 10:30 PM

ah you left the ladies out again. I hate it when they do that. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Nov 02 - 10:16 AM

An attack of last worditis, Mary?

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,Nerd
Date: 19 Nov 02 - 05:47 PM

I think it's interesting that in Adam's post he points to what the spitting "stands for." What people don't bring up much is that "spitting on" people is both a real activity (expectorating saliva) and a metaphor. If you read this long thread, you'll see that many people, in arguing that VV were spit on, are speaking metaphorically.

It is impossible to tell when someone says "I came back to peace activists spitting on me" whether this is literal or metaphorical, and this is surely a factor in the accounts of this activity being so much more widespread than the documentation plausibly supports. The author of "The Spitting Image" also explains the spitting in terms of what it stands for, psychologically, mythologically, metaphorically. This is crucial to understanding the meaning of all these stories.

Stories about getting spit on, whether they are true or not, hold certain meanings for and to people in our society. The image of the spit-on VV is a myth, not in the sense of a misconception, but in the sense of story that cuts to the heart of our society and exposes some crucial meanings. It is also a "mythology" in Barthes's sense, that is, not a falsehood but something that comes to stand in a grand way for the ultimate in something: Einstein's Brain is a mythic representation of intelligence, just as the spitting anti-war protestor is a mythic representation of betrayal. Einstein really was smart, and some assholes really did spit, but why do these images mean more than, say, Tesla's brain or anti-war protestors embracing veterans? We don't say "who do I look like, Tesla?" when we can't figure something out, and we don't picture weeping people embracing uniformed soldiers when we think of anti-war activists, but both images would be appropriate, just as "true" are their mythic counterparts.

In the end, it doesn't necessarily matter "how true" a myth is, or even how often it really happened. If you, like troll, were one of the victims then you may be justifiably angry. But this is true of someone who got robbed by a black person, too, and it is still true that the mythic image of the thieving black person is unfair. No, what really matters is how we process it. Is resisting the government's attempt to make war REALLY tantamount to spitting on a veteran, or is that just what Nixon and/or Bush would want us to feel?

With respect to all who lived through that era, as I did not.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 19 Nov 02 - 06:07 PM

What a lucid post, Nerd. Thank you.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 04:42 AM

Nerd, if I gave you the impression that I was spat upon, I was not. When I said "some of US were", I was lumping myself with the whole body of veterans.

I hope this clears up and confusion that my choice of phrasing may have caused to you or anyone else on the Forum.

The two veterans that I know who were spit upon were physically spit upon. There was nothing allegorical about it. One was called a "baby killer" and the other was just spit on.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Nerd
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 09:34 AM

Thanks Troll. As I said, some were physically spit at. But others (like Larry Otway) have used the spit image as a metaphor (I believe he said you could change the p to an h and it would still be true!)

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST,The O'Meara
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 12:25 PM

"For every complex question, there is an answer that is simple, elegant, and wrong."

OK, I'm a Vietnam Veteran. I was also active in the Vietnam Vets Against the War, in the Washington, D.C. area in the very early 70s. Please note that it says Against THE War, not Against War. I have never been a pacifist, but I could not allow more people to be killed in a war we would never win if I could help it.

As for being spit on, that has been used often by VVets as a symbol of the attitude we felt from those around us when we came back from Vietnam. Those who supported the war, the John Waynes, suspected people were dying for no good result, and the anti-war people, the Jane Fondas, suspected their activities were in fact prolonging the war. None of them could handle dealing with their own guilt and the last thing they wanted was an actual Vietnam Vet around to bring up the problems. So we were pushed away.

The attitude I felt was a subtle but effective shunning, especially devastating when it came from my immediate family and old friends. ("Call me sometime, we'll do lunch.") My old buddies wanted to drink beer and talk football, but running through my head were memories of blood and death and thoughts of betrayal and unanswered questions. Their response was to push those things, and me, away. "You don't know how to have fun anymore."

There's no "fault" involved here, no one knew what was going on down in the mind's secret corners. None of us understood that for the first time in history the private soldier was being held accountable for his actions in the insane world of combat, and being blamed for somehow causing the war in which we were, at best, victims.

Thats too much for most of us to explain, or even to understand, so instead we said we were "spit on."

I'm sorry, but I can only talk about Vietnam in short bursts, and I have to get away from it now. Maybe I'll have more later.

O'Meara

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: catspaw49
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 01:38 PM

Nerd and O'Meara........Thank you both for some excellent postings.

I was trying to make that point earlier and you have both phrased it far better than I was able to do. There were peace people who saw every vet as a "baby killer" and vets who saw every protester as someone spitting on them.

O'Meara, I understand your friends reticence as many I'm sure had no idea how to even begin to talk about it with you. As for me, in many of the groups I was in, vets against the war had a special status. Perhaps too, that was because I was never too involved in pacifism or pacifist groups either, but rather I was against THAT war...as were most vets. And as far as people talking to you, I ran into the same thing from the other end. When I was released from Petersburg, no one knew what to say to me......different reasons of course, but you do feel alone.

One other thing O'Meara.......Welcome back...Glad you made it.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 02:12 PM

If you have ever had cancer, you have likely suffered from the same sort of alienation and disconnect from friends and family as Vietnam Vets experienced. For those who experience such painful life altering events, there is always an adjustment period, when they learn to accept no one, except those who have also been through the same experience, will ever be able to understand their experience.

People with cancer often describe how, once they have "come out" about having cancer, they are treated like lepers. People the cancer patient once considered reliable family, friends, and colleagues, often disappear and are mysteriously no longer available when needed. The cancer patient, or the divorced person, or parent of a murdered child, or person with a SO murdered, or survivors of concentration camps, of being bombed and living in a war zone--any number of people who have gone through such traumatic, life changing events, knows when they are being ostracized because of it, and can easily identify it when it is happening to them.

That said, for survival sake, most people who have survived such experiences also learn they must move on, and do just that. If they don't, they become lifelong sufferers of acute and chronic diseases, and mental health disorders.

The problem I have with this whole VV thing here in Mudcat is this. It has been just over 27 years since the last guys came home from Vietnam. I know PTSD, and health problems associated with their service (like Agent Orange exposure) has lasting effects. But so do many other life altering experiences such as those I describe above. Vietnam Vets don't own the market for suffering, or for being shunned.

My position is, after 27 years, anyone getting as vociferous as those here claiming military service in Vietnam, getting all up in people's faces with these "we were spat upon" sort of claims, is merely using the Vietnam Vet as victim ploy for manipulative power mongering and point scoring in arguments in internet discussin forums.

If I seem unsympathetic to the Vietnam Vet as victims here in Mudcat, it is because I am unsympathetic to people using their service in this way online. There is no shortage of VV wannabees in the web world, and I take all Mudcat claims of military service in Vietnam with huge grains of salt, just as I would in any online discussion forum where the diatribes got busy dissing each other.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: dwditty
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 06:52 PM

Oh Baby

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From:
Date: 20 Nov 02 - 07:10 PM

The reason the horse is still getting flogged is, it isn't dead. We're still fighting Vietnam over here, in the sense that I get 80% young republicans, probably parroting parents, sitting in my composition class saying it was a noble cause, or we lost because we fought a limited war, or because of Jane Fonda et al. I don't think anybody who wasn't there is entitled to an opinion about the veterans' experience (I was, I thank God, too young), but all Americans need to think through the experience, as we show signs of getting ready to repeat at least some of the errors. And not just Americans -- when we sneeze, the rest of the world gets pneumonia. So talk it up, those who know; decent folk will recognize those who don't for the sacks they are, and listen respectfully.

Adam

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Troll
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 05:24 AM

GUEST, may I suggest that you look at your post of 02;12 PM and in place of "Viet Nam Vets" put the words "rape victim" or "victim of sexual (or child) abuse".
Gives it a different read doesn't it?

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 08:12 AM

Actually troll, it doesn't give a different read at all. I expect that after 27 years, trauma has either been integrated into one's life experiences, or the psyche has disintegrated, and the identification of self as victim has become pathological. That is the mark of a disturbed individual.

Adam, I question your "80% young republicans" figure, and I rather think your class time would be better spent teaching composition, than discussing Jane Fonda.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From:
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 09:30 AM

The students do the discussing, and I never thought it was my place to silence them, though I'll grant there's a substantial body of opinion that insists the function of education is to prevent thinking. I'll further grant there are those who think that the teaching, specifically, of writing should avoid dealing with ideas, especially difficult ones, and stick to grammar and punctuation. But it is very difficult to find any such who actually teach composition. A lot of them teach business, and would not be happy if I were to insist that economics courses should stick to teaching these people to balance a checkbook. Occasionally, they will approve controversial prompts like: "Resolved: dogs on the loose are a nuisance" (actual topic from my high school text). And most of the people who think this way are, no surprise, cultural conservatives, Republicans.

Composition is the inheritor of rhetoric, and discussion of controversial topics is used to explore the arts and techniques of proof, demonstration and persuasion, what's valid and effective, and what's the reverse. I assure you, 80% is no exaggeration. The current generation is remarkably blinkered. But when the disproportion is on the other side, then the socratic method/devil's advocate role requires me to switch. For classroom purposes, I do my best to check my own beliefs at the door -- if I'm doing my job as I think I ought, they'll end the semester with no clear idea what my beliefs are. But that doesn't stop me from expressing my frustrations elsewhere.

Adam

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 09:59 AM

Adam, while I applaud your commitment to quality education, your claims of "80% Republican" still suggests your grasp of statistics to be in the rudimentary manipulative stage. BTW, one of the many worst things you can do as a teacher is check your beliefs at the door. That just makes you an empty suit of clothes, doesn't it?

Seems to me you are more worried about your opinions influencing your paycheck, than anything else.

I would be quite pleased if my children's composition teacher was using meaningful, timely topics for assignments. While I can appreciate some teachers do work in Republican controlled precincts, creative minds have been getting around cultural conservatism in the classroom for decades. It isn't nearly as large an obstacle as your fear of speaking your mind in your workplace seems to be.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Nerd
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 11:11 AM

GUEST do you teach college classes? I do, and I think I know exactly where Adam is coming from. It's not that he's "afraid to speak his mind" or "afraid to lose his job," it's that once your students know exactly what your position is, many of them will start to mirror it in hopes of getting an A. This kills effective discussion of the issue.

Students, even at great Universities, are grade-driven rather than idea-driven these days, and will repeat whatever you tell them, even if you hint that they should not do so. In some areas, where I will be quite clear that my theoretical position is unusual or innovative (after all, I have my own research), my students will answer exam questions as though my own position were the accepted and normative one within my discipline.

In short, Adam is protecting the discussion, not his ass. In my own classes, I usually also avoid directly stating my political positions for this reason. If a student asks me privately, or if it comes up in a discussion where it's relevant, I will own up to my positions, but generally I keep them out of discussions.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From:
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 02:02 PM

Well, I hadn't offered the statistic as scientific, just as illustrative of why the meaning of Vietnam remains a live issue, especially in an academic setting, where arriving at some rational basis for interpreting events is important. It's what we do. I'm very sure that a substantial majority of our students interpret Vietnam in ways that offer no real challenge to a traditional understanding of the U.S. as occupying the moral high ground, and those who were critical of the war as somewhere on a spectrum ranging from misguided to treasonous.

I'll amend to, "my perception, based on the positions taken by those speaking in class, is about 4/5 identify with culturally conservative positions." Our campus has a student voting precinct, and they go very heavily republican, though not quite to the degree the surrounding (rural) areas do. A really systematic approach would want to correlate party affiliation/ideological identification with indices of political participation, from reading through voting to letter-writing and active campaigning. But I'll stick to my guesstimate as such. Anyhow, studies indicate that 89.53% of statistics are made up on the spot.

Adam

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 02:14 PM

Nerd, I trust your (again) lucid post isn't a description of some of the best things about higher education?

I teach community ed classes p.t. geared to high school students on post sec options, including some writing classes for college application essays.   

It hasn't been that long since I was in college myself. My best classes were with professors and lecturers, tenured and non, who were open and honest about their beliefs--and not just their political beliefs. There was also no shortage of professors and lecturers who were dishonest about them, for whatever reasons, and those who were oddly silent. So my experience in the mid-90s was one where the openness/secretiveness about people's belief was no different than it is in any workplace. There is a widespread belief amongst teachers and professors, I think, that students will do anything for an A, but that was never my experience as a student either. There were plenty of students whose main interest was in getting their money's worth out of their education, considering the cost of tuition these days.

Obviously, people's mileage varies in this regard.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: Bobert
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 02:31 PM

Adam:

Made up or not, 4 of 5 I think says more about your employer than 18 to 22 years old college kids in general. I went to Virginia Commonwealth University in downtown Richmond. VCU is a state supported university, with a high percentage of minorities in the student body and staff.

I would think that percentage of conservative kids on your campus would be offset in the political leanings of the kids who now attend VCU.

And, no, I'm not getting back into this thread on the *spitting-non-spitting* issue, troll. Just thought since the thread has drifted, I drop in with my two cents worth.

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From:
Date: 21 Nov 02 - 03:56 PM

Bobert, it truly does me good to hear it. I would be very glad to think of the situation I described as an outlier, and any generalization I might draw from it as distorted. I'm really not with the gloom'n'doom view; things do have a way of cycling back around. Just hope the lights don't stay out TOO godawful long this time.

Adam

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Nov 02 - 01:05 PM

Adam, as to balancing your rural Republican students--there is not only the large urban youth votes going heavily Green and to the "democratic wing" of the Democratic Party. Look at who is in the streets demonstrating against the war on terrorism, globalization, and the war on Iraq. It isn't all middle aged hippies from the 60s by a long shot. The half million demonstrators in Europe recently were overwhelmingly in their late teens and twenties. Same with the demos bringing out the numbers around the US. The anti-war resistance movement is being led by youthful leaders as often as more experienced older leaders. And the confrontational anarchists have been successfully marginalised by the mainstream movement post-9/11, without having divided the movement or weakening it.

No, this is already a much more formidable movement today than the anti-Vietnam War movement was at it's post-72 height, when the anti-war movement's efforts began to take effect, and the war began winding down. This is a movement that I believe will be able to keep Bush in check, so long as the UN inspectors get enough cooperation from Iraq.

I just hope that the movement will then be able to turn itself to the seriousness of the need for a revitalized disarmament movement, to deal realistically with the post-Cold War realities of the arms race which is winding it self up, not down. I believe there is no greater danger to world security than weapons of mass destruction. But I was in the streets demonstrating against that, and working to pass ballot initiatives against the military build-up of weapons of mass destruction, throughout the 1980s. This business of going after Iraq for their weapons of mass destruction is nothing more than a smokescreen for the Bush administration to get into the Middle East, and control the oilfields. It has nothing to do with the administration's concern for the threat of weapons of mass destruction to world security. Nothing whatsoever.

Subject: RE: BS: Were Vietnam veterans spat upon?
From: GUEST
Date: 22 Nov 02 - 02:56 PM

Hmmm - this is a complicated discussion. The "issues" are often not what they seem.

I figure that every war has at least two issues involved. One would be the issue that causes the Grand High Poobahs (those who play the King Game)to start the war, (economics, greed, territory, etc.) and the other a reason for the "common people" to support the war and fight in it. Often this latter issue is different for the adversaries. In the U.S. civil war, it was to abolish slavery for the north, but to halt northern agression for the south. (Please allow me to be a bit simplistic for the sake of discussion.) In the book "The Killer Angels" by Jeff Shaara, about the battle of Gettysburg, there is an incident in which northern soldiers capture some southern soldiers and ask them about slavery. The southerners say slavery is wrong, none of them would ever have slaves even if they could afford them, but that's not what they're fighting about anyway.

In the gulf war, there was the issue of oil, but there was also the issue of allowing a big country to invade a smaller one and take over by force of arms.

These "common people" issues have to be good ones, that hold water and stand on their own or they won't work. In Vietnam we were fighting to save the French rubber plantations, but we were also fighting to keep south Vietnam free from a communist takeover.

The question becomes which issues do you look at and which are valid? Should we have not fought the gulf war because the issue of who controls the oil is a bad one, or should we have fought it anyway because of Iraqi agression? Should us "common people" say ok, that's a good enough reason to fight, regardless of the the issues of concern to the Kings?

War is a horrible thing, and extracts a horrible price, as the Vietnam Memorial attests. Is the issue good enough to pay that price for it?

PS - GUEST, you have some excellent points in your messages, but I suspect many people disregard them because you come across as something of a vent for fecal matter. Try toning it down.

O'Meara