Those young men who died in Vietnam did play an important part in stopping the progress of Soviet Communism.

Did they? Remember that the Vietnamese *won*. If Vietnam did anything, it showed the Communists that a country which really cared about it *could* stand up to everything the US could throw at them. Vietnam was something for Communism to be proud of. (At least until they made the same mistake in Afghanistan.) And if you think the fact of US involvement stopped other countries "turning red", remember that the rise of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia was a direct cause of US destabilisation by carpet-bombing that country. Vietnam was an abject failure in every area.

Communism only failed because it couldn't stand the economic pace and people were left destitute in a country (Russia) with the richest mineral resources in the world. That would have happened anyway. The arms race accelerated it, but Vietnam was never a factor.

Graham.