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Those poor Americans died because they were in Nam, not due to bad press. Besides, in the case of 'Nam, the press was right - it was an unwinnable quagmire of death. Iraq is different (IMO) for reasons too numerous to be listed here....but I still don't buy that 'bad press' is killing the troops, esp. given the fact that most of the killers can't read and aren't going home and watching CNN.

I feel bad for those 20,000 Americans who died, but I think all Nam deaths were needless. What a waste of life that hell was. I also think the treatment of Nam vets was deplorable, but that's another thread.

Marshall wasn't the only congressman there. He was part of a House Armed Services Committee delegation. Republicans and Democrats agreed that their media-fed perspectives changed once they were actually there.

http://www.hillnews.com/news/092303/press.aspx

RE: Viet Nam.
If the words of the NVA general citing the media coverage and the anti-war protests are not enough for you... And you're one of those 'quagmire' 'we-couldn't-win-the-VietNam-war' types?

What is your point? Media coverage has no effect on the outcome of a war? The Viet Nam war was eminently winnable. If we could defeat the Imperial Japanese military [that had an Army Navy and Air Force] in the jungle [where our troops and commanders had no prior combat experience], we could defeat the freakin' NVA and VC. I lived in Panama during the VietNam war, I saw the Special Forces training facilities there. The military had what it took to win the war. It was lost at home, because attacking the enemy wherever he was [i.e. victory] was taken off the table. Here is my analysis on the unworkable doctine of limited war and 'containment.'

http://mason.gmu.edu/~walford/IraqNKorea.htm

Let's review your positions:

1. quagmire
2. media coverage has no effect on morale civilian or military
3. the "press was right"

Is the press right now as far as you're concerned? It's just fine with you that they only print the bad things that happen over there and ignore the wells we're drilling, the people who are voting for the first time in their lives, the schools they're building?

there might be a place that you may find more hospitable:

h**p://www.*emocraticunderground.com/discuss/

You obviously did not do what I suggested and are trusting your opinions on uninformed gut reactions. In addition, mimicing the liberal press pontifications about an "unwinable quagmire" - which, by the way, was never the kind of words used during the VietNam era - is really uninformed. VietNam was winnable, and I dare say if George Bush was President at the time, VietNam would probably be another South Korea today. We left VietNam becuse we QUIT in VietNam. The American people and the liberal press betrayed the military and left them out to dry. Nobody will rewrite this history for me. I was there, saw it, felt it, and was it.

Not a single printed word killed one of our soldiers.

Now, explain to me if you think the attacks on our soldiers are an effort to win a war of attrition?

What were the strategic goals of attacking the mosque in Najaf, the NBC bureau and UN headquarters in Baghdad, and remotely harrassing our troops?

Why give interviews to Western print and television journalists in Iraq?

Take the media out of the equation and ask yourself if the tactics would stay the same.