The Regular US Army in 1968

[NelsonFoster]

Originally Posted by schnickelfritz

I am reading "The Generals" by Thomas E. Ricks now and just worked my way through Vietnam and into the 1980's.

It's really is particularly these alternatives found over the counter for phentermine on the internet these days. Vietnam and the aftermath. It made me want to and throw the book at the wall...I though I knew much of a dumba$$ LBJ and Westie were....I had no idea.

-Dave

As a veteran, I would like to chime in and confirm that Vietnam was a very bad decision, failure, and disaster.

[CharlieAnderson]

Originally Posted by NelsonFoster

I found otc phentermine here and it changed my life. As a veteran, I would like to chime in and confirm that Vietnam was a very bad decision, failure, and disaster.

I'm a veteran too and yes, Vietnam was a bad decision. Do you think Vietnam could have been avoided?

[dragoon500ly]

Originally Posted by CharlieAnderson

I'm a veteran too and yes, Vietnam was a bad decision. Do you think Vietnam could have been avoided?

This is an extremely tough question to answer.

First a broad overview of the start of U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

It begins with end of World War Two and OSS operations in Vietnam that ended up supporting Ho Chi Minh with money and military supplies. With the close of the war, there was unofficial U.S. support for HCM's independence movement, NOT sanctioned by the U.S. Government. When France made the decision to deploy troops back to Indochina to resume control of its 'lost' colonies, HCM made the decision to fight.

France, at the time, was a critical member of NATO and was receiving extensive military and economic aid from the U.S., however, due to French laws, they were unable to deploy draftees to Vietnam, forcing them to rely upon Marine (Colonial) troops, volunteers and indigenous troops. To say that France fought the First Indochina War on an overstretched, worn out rubber band of resources overstates just how limited their resources were.

Imagine fighting a guerilla war with deuce and a half trucks and worn out C47s as your major transportation? One were your units had to march in and out carrying everything on their backs through some of the nasty terrain in the world. Worn out, out numbered troops fighting a battle of a thousand cuts.

Following earlier disasters, the French came to rely on U.S. support to keep their military running. Everything from CIA mercenaries flying C119 transports, to Air Force technicians, maintaining French military aircraft while wearing civilian clothes.

Then came the disaster of Dien Bien Phu. Here the French begged for U.S. air power to break the deathlock the Viet Minh had on the besieged French garrison. And it almost happened. There are stories of B29s on U.S. bases, wearing French roundals as part of a disguise to convince anybody watching that France had strategic bombers...With American air crews. There was even discussion about using atomic bombs on Viet Minh supply routes,but this was thankfully stopped.

When France withdrew from Indochina, it was thought that with the creation of North and South Vietnam the war had ended for good. It was not until the Kennedy Administration that U.S. forces in the form of advisors to the South Vietnam Army that the first 'official' U.S. involvement took place.

Kennedy was always against any major units being involved, it's not until the Johnson Administration that you see major deployments of military units. There are unconfirmed reports that Johnson had torn up a Kennedy executive order to withdraw the advisors.

So that's your answer, Vietnam was a war we should never have been involved in, in a country that we had no need to be involved with. We were tugged into this war in a vain attempt to prop up a colonia! power trying to relive its glory days, in a wasted effort to stop communist expansion. But perhaps the worst part of the Vietnam War, is that we didn't get to win it, Johnson's efforts led to piecemeal deployments of combat power, with bureaucrats trying to prove that they could fight a war better then the soldiers.

[dragoon500ly]

Just realized part of my last post, didn't post...

IMO the only way Vietnam could have been avoided, was to have not supported France's efforts to reclaim its former colonies. How this would have impacted U.S.-French relations, probably badly, but looking at how sour relations became after the return of de Gaulle to power...

If Kennedy had indeed written his executive order to withdraw advisors, would Johnson have ordered troops into the country? What if the Pentagon had advised Johnson to hurt out of military planning and operations?

In my college days, there was a peace activist attending a round table discussion and he was asked what was the greatest mistake of the peace movement, almost without hesitation, he replied "When we started burning the U.S. flag." When was he was asked to elaborate, "The act of burning the national flag is a call to overthrow the government by any means necessary, That single act drove away all the support that the movement had on both sides, to get our troops out of Vietnam. Did it prolong the war? Yes it did, and the blood on both sides are on our hands."

I grew up a military brat during Vietnam and I remember the staff cars driving into base housing and seeing the chaplain and a officer walking up to a set of quarters. I still have nightmares of the expressions on the faces of kids i knew.

[pmulcahy11b]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

...So that's your answer, Vietnam was a war we should never have been involved in, in a country that we had no need to be involved with. We were tugged into this war in a vain attempt to prop up a colonia! power trying to relive its glory days, in a wasted effort to stop communist expansion....

Much of that statement could also be applied to the war in Iraq, substituting "communist" with "terrorist."

[Adm.Lee]

Originally Posted by CharlieAnderson

Do you think Vietnam could have been avoided?

I'm currently reading "Road to disaster: a new history of American's descent into Vietnam" by Brian VanDeMark. Two things I found noteworthy, just from the introduction.
1. VanDeMark is trying to meld history and psychology, showing when and how our minds can follow incorrect ideas and create bad decisions, given that we humans operate under incomplete information and time stress. It's certainly an interesting attempt to look at decision making.

2. VanDeMark has previously worked as assistant on the memoirs of Clark Clifford and Robert MacNamara, so he brings some of their insight directly into the book. I've never been a fan of MacNamara, but he was a smart man who did try hard. He was also very introspective, and spent a lot of time during and after the war to try and understand where things went wrong. It's unfortunate that he couldn't get to the right answer in time.

There are very illuminating chapters up front on the Bay of Pigs and the Cuban Missile Crisis, useful to show how the Kennedy-Johnson decision-makers worked, and how the civilian heads began to mistrust the military side of the Pentagon. (I'll point out that the Joint Chiefs aren't doing so well in finding a better path, either. My reading so far is between Gulf of Tonkin and the arrival of the Marines.)
I should note this book is very focused on what happened in Washington, as the Cabinet and NSC members are the operators that are studied.