Syria's Bashar al-Assad Warns America Of Another Vietnam

Investor's Business Daily ^ | August 28, 2013 | IBD EDITORIALS

[raptor22]

Foreign Policy: Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad's bravado is based on the myth of a U.S. defeat that never happened and a timid White House that let four Americans die in Libya. It might be time to set him and others straight.

The fruits of President Obama's ever-shifting red line regarding Syria's use of chemical weapons might be ripening as U.S. warships and aircraft prepare for possible cruise-missile strikes on Syrian targets. Weakness, both real and perceived, invites conflict and emboldens enemies, and our impotence in Benghazi didn't support our warnings to Damascus.

One of the reasons Syrian dictator al-Assad might not have taken Western warnings seriously — aside from the wobbly and apologetic foreign policy of an Obama administration that either calls terrorist attacks "workplace violence" or blames them on irrelevant videos — might lie in the echoes and myths of an earlier war.

"Failure awaits the United States as in all previous wars it has unleashed, starting with Vietnam and up to the present day," he told Russian daily Izvestia on Monday, when asked what would happen if Washington decided to strike or invade Syria.

Perhaps al-Assad should be reminded that similar bravado was once shown by the now-deceased Saddam Hussein when he invaded Kuwait. His elite Republican Guard was going to vanquish demoralized American forces in the "mother of all battles."

Yet his military was routed in 100 hours in a massive ground offensive led by Gen. Norman Schwarzkopf from Feb. 24 to Feb. 28, 1991.

Al-Assad and other regional bullies, such as the Iranian leadership that is surely watching, need also to be reminded of what happened after Saddam failed to honor the terms of the truce after the lightning success of Operation Desert Storm: Operation Iraqi Freedom.

[GraceG]

LBJ started ‘nam

.....

[skeeter]

Assad should just shut up as only a tiny minority here support Obama’s war anyhow.

[BubbaBobTX]

Actually Kennedy did. He sent in our first advisors. LBJ just used Gulf of Tonkin event to send in the Marines.

[Zuben Elgenubi]

Vietnam? How about Armegeddon?

[Buckeye McFrog]

Goodie, a new source of flannel shirts at Walmart...

[tractorman]

I thought the French initially started it and then as usual asked us for help.

[onedoug]

We could have kicked the living hell out of Vietman anytime we wanted had it not been for milquetoasts like Cronkite and those dems whose capes he trod upon.

[raptor22]

IBD EDITORIALS

[Eric in the Ozarks]

Ike loaned the French the first US Military “advisers” in the 1950s.

[TexasRepublic]

There is no jungle for those muslim monkeys to hide in. We could flatten them if we had the will.

[onedoug]

Actually, it was Harry Truman started it. I think it woud have been a different world had he supported Vietnamese independence under Ho Chi Minh, as American troops were in Hanoi when it was declared, as was Vo Nguyen Giap who actually saluted during the whole playing of the Star Spangled Banner. Ol’ Ho had even used the American model for the Vietnamese Declaration Of Independence.

But alas. ‘Tis water under the bridge as they say, as Truman accommodated the French re-entry after Japan’s defeat. And, history is what it is....

[spel_grammer_an_punct_polise]

“had it not been for milquetoasts like Cronkite and those dems whose capes he trod upon.”

Actually, the French left Vietnam and never asked for our assistance. It was Eisenhower who initially supported intervention in Vietnam claiming that the reason was bauxite. Yes, I heard him say it.....bauxite.

[GraceG]

But alas. ‘Tis water under the bridge as they say, as Truman accommodated the French re-entry after Japan’s defeat. And, history is what it is....

Truman should have told the French to mind their own damn business then we may not ever had been involved in Vietnam...

My Dad was in the army after WW-II he was too young for the war but got out a few years in due to my grandpa getting sick and needing farm help before Korea warmed up. Many of his brothers were in WWII.

He said there were a lot of officers then (1946-1948) saying “Watch French Indochina, we may be deploying there someday....”

[Logical me]

Syria would be totally dead in a week if we put a full scale attack. No Vietnam BS. Having said that I believe that we should stay out of Syrian civil war. Let them kill each other. This means nothing to America's security. Both sides are our enemies.

[raptor22]

IBD EDITORIAL PING

[Veto!]

Let them kill each other. This means nothing to America's security. Both sides are our enemies.

There you go. OBarry isn't even disguising this as a "peace-keeping" operation. He just has some kind of bloodlust. Could be his Arabic-muslim dna.

[Grampa Dave]

"Actually Kennedy did. He sent in our first advisors. LBJ just used Gulf of Tonkin event to send in the Marines." AMAZING how quiet the Anti-War liberal left is on yet another pending undeclared war by the Peace Prize President Obozo Liar, isn't it??

LBJ went from being a so called great president with the liberals with his war on poverty, which is still being lost, to one of the worse presidents ever after he deepened the Nam War because of the so called Gulf of Tonkin event.

Now, Obozo Liar appears to be following in the footsteps of LBJ with his lies about Assad and Syria, while covering for the Muslim Brotherhood Thugs and al Queda in Syria.

"Obozo Liar is drawing us in and he will go with or without the consent of the Congress and the Consent of the Governed. This could be an impeachable act if he botches it and was not legally covered. What's it to him if a few US pilots get shot down, some guys get seriously injured in the cruise missile prep on our ships, Americans citizens are kidnapped by Hezbollah in Beirut,, US Embassy and consulates across the Middle East are MANPAD-ed with major strikes, and otherwise all hell breaks loose. Domestically, he can get NSA, Obozo care, Fox News wiretap-gate, IRS-gate and Benghazi off the front pages."

[Grampa Dave]

re JFK and his so called limited advisors in Nam.

http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/kennedy_vietnam.htm

” Kennedy’s response was to send more military advisors to Vietnam so that by the end of 1962 there were 12,000 of these advisors in South Vietnam. As well as sending more advisors to South Vietnam, Kennedy also sent 300 helicopters with US pilots. They were told to avoid military combat at all costs but this became all but impossible to fulfil.”

[fungoking]

He should worry about becoming another Saddam