Posted on 11/20/2009 5:48:49 PM PST by jongaltsr
I added this section to a CP page about media bias, and will add this article as a reference as well:
Charges of western media bias in favor of the Communist side have often been made by critics,[6] who see such alleged bias as being crucial in turning military victories by America into a loss of the war, much by means of propaganda. Underlying the importance of such is the often quoted exchange between Colonel Harry G. Summers, Jr. and his North Vietnamese counterpart, Colonel Tu. During one of his liaison trips to Hanoi, Colonel Harry told Tu, “You know, you never beat us on the battlefield,” Colonel Tu responded, “That may be so, but it is also irrelevant.”[7]
The rest here http://conservapedia.com/Vietnam_war#Media_Bias Comments?
Missed one:
28. John Kerry served in Vietnam
= = =
Serously though, good post.
When running a war, it seems that it has become important to get good reporting.
When Iraq had imbedded journalists giving eyewitness accounts, the entire country was behind the effort. When the journalists sat in their comfy hotel rooms in the Green Zone in Bahgdad all we got was disinformation.
I hadnt heard that before.
And people still vote for that lying POS.
Not exactly true... but almost... see my other post — service in Cambodia, Laos and Thailand (entering the war zone from those locations... entering in combat against the same enemy ...
OK...I was trying to make the point that the self identified and sort of official distinction can be pretty easily made with that rule of thumb...by those who WANT to...unlike Tom Harkin did all those years...
LOL
I choze .. “Both”.
helluva Combo.
I’m not sure I ever came all the way home. I have as many friends “in country” now as I have at home.
There is a need for additional statistics from the Vietnam era.
These are based on the common misconception that was touted in the US, that if a young male lost his deferment, he “Would be drafted, go to Vietnam, and die!” Radicals and leftists, especially on college campuses, used this lie to foment radicalism and protest by otherwise ordinary students, generating a mood of fear and panic.
The statistics that need to be compiled include the following:
1) What percentage of service age males were drafted? How many volunteered?
2) Of those, what percentage went into combat arms, as opposed to combat support and combat service support branches?
3) Of those who graduated AIT, what percentage went to Vietnam?
4) Of those who went to Vietnam, how many were posted to units that at any point were involved in combat?
5) Of those in combat engaged units, how many reenlisted on condition that they stay with their unit? (Knowing that each of these would ‘bump’ a potential replacement.)
Realizing that this is a *cumulative* group of statistics, what were the odds of “being drafted, going to Vietnam, and dying?”
What I believe it will indicate is that there was a central core of personnel who did most of the combat over several enlistments and several years. Surrounding them was a flux of other soldiers who were less capable because of less experience. Only some of them got most of the combat as well.
This was the group that experienced most casualties, most KIA, and likely most PTSD. A small, elite band of brothers, compared to the vast numbers of scared young men back in the US.
Wow, a quarter a day! you work cheap. If ya need any more work, lemme know. I might be able to find something for ya at that price.
The question asked was regarding the Vietnam era (August 1964 to April 1975)
When did this person serve on active duty in the U.S. Armed Forces? Mark (X) a box for EACH period in which this person served.My future progeny may hate me, but I never responded to the Census at all.
| | Vietnam era (August 1964 to April 1975)That's no lie!
I wondered about the wording, because most questions on job applications or membership forms asking for veteran status ask if you are a Viet Nam Era Vet having served in the U.S. Armed Forces or Merchant Marines from August 5, 1964 to May 7, 1975. I have seldom been asked if I served in the Viet Nam War Theater.
Perhaps the Captains have trouble with reading comprehension.
http://www.pajamasmedia.com/instapundit-archive/archives/017246.php
In 1979, Mr. Harkin, then a congressman, participated in a round-table discussion arranged by the Congressional Vietnam Veterans’ Caucus. “I spent five years as a Navy pilot, starting in November of 1962,” Mr. Harkin said at that meeting, in words that were later quoted in a book, Changing of the Guard, by Washington Post political writer David Broder. “One year was in Vietnam. I was flying F-4s and F-8s on combat air patrols and photo-reconnaisance support missions. I did no bombing.”
That clearly is not an accurate picture of his Navy service. Though Mr. Harkin stresses he is proud of his Navy record — “I put my ass on the line day after day” — he concedes now he never flew combat air patrols in Vietnam. . . .
Mr. Harkin’s Navy record shows his only decoration is the National Defense Service Medal, awarded to everyone on active service during those years. He did not receive either the Vietnam Service medal or the Vietnam Campaign medal, the decorations given to everyone who served in the Southeast Asia theater. “We didn’t get them for what we did,” Mr. Harkin says. “It’s never bothered me.”
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110005496
It turned out Mr. Harkin had not seen combat and was stationed in Japan. What’s more, Mr. Cheney isn’t the first Vice President to fall victim to Mr. Harkin’s acid tongue. In an editorial in 1988, we quoted “Senator Tom Harkin who served in Vietnam” (we thought at the time) saying of his Senate colleague Dan Quayle, who did not serve in Vietnam: “It’s so ironic; they get in Congress or the government and become big hawks. Don’t they have any shame at all?”
Do you think the average joe really recognizes that “vietnam ERA vet” is a different label than “vietnam vet”?
I don’t.
I think the average joe would only go so far as to differentiate between a “vet” and a “combat vet”.
“...well no, I’m not a COMBAT vet, but I’m still a vietnam veteran”
What a POS . . if I was his opponent I would hammer the crap out of the SOB
I volunteered to go. I was doing no good in college and had no idea what I wanted to do and Uncle Sam was paying for a trip to an exotic place. The army wouldn’t take me because I didn’t weigh enough so I ate a LOT for a month and went AF.I’ve been back several times and will go back at least once more, maybe to stay, if we get Obamacare.
Sorry. That was Mark Moyar’s Triumph Forsaken. (Pulitzer nominated). See his website at www.triumphforsaken.com
btt
My own feeling is that in some way the Vietam war much exhausted the expansionist zeal of Communism, after paying such a large price for what they gained, while becoming more well-known for its repression, and need to gain allegiance by force. Had they taken Vietnam quickly i think it would have been encouraged expanded much more.
Meanwhile, the ideological revolution of rebellion against moral authority (with relative little valid quest for a better reality, but which instead sought fantasy thru drugs) which sympathized with Communism, and helped them win over S. Vietnam, also enabled a ideological Communist victory in the US.
This Viet Nam vet believes that we did lose the war,not because of the military,but because our communist-accomadating politicians betrayed us. They wouldn’t let us win. Look at the result: South Viet Nam went communist. This could have been prevented.
I already knew this. But I am not very good at conveying it to the folks on this thread.
I’m really really glad you posted it.
As it was explained to me, all are considered “vets” of some fashion because there were so many that were called up and pulled into the war theater. national guard units, reservists, and other soldiers all over the globe could’ve been shipped off to war at any moment. Lots of them were.
I can’t remember the official terminology, but there is also a distinction made between those that only served in the continental US and those that served outside the continental US...alaska and hawaii are included as “overseas”.
A soldier that spent his entire enlistment term in alaska and/or hawaii is considered a veteran of a foreign war if he was there during the “vietnam war era”.
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