THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume VI, Issue # 71, April 8, 2004
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
THE VIETNAM WAR & THE IRAQ WAR:
IRAQ IS NOT VIETNAM
By Alan Caruba
FULL STORY:
I can remember being in Washington, D.C., to protest the Vietnam War. By then the U.S.A. was well on its way to chalking up over
58,000 combat deaths. I think Richard M. Nixon was U.S. President by then. Nixon's predecessor, Lyndon Baines Johnson, had
literally lied America into a vastly expanded war, although we wouldn’t learn about that until the famed Pentagon Papers were
revealed by Daniel Elsberg, an analyst who, during the Nixon administration, concluded that Americans had a right to know how
badly things were going.
For those too young to know about Vietnam, other than that we lost, the U.S.A. had already been in a long Cold War with the Soviet
Union since the end of World War II. The Cold War and associated hot wars (e.g., the Vietnam War and the Korean War) were, in
reality, World War III -- a worldwide struggle of the U.S.A. and its allies against Marxist-Leninist-Stalinist Communism, a struggle
against the nuclear armed, aggressive totalitarian political regime in the Soviet Union, against Soviet controlled and/or allied
Communist regimes in other countries, and against Communist networks of espionage, subversion, and psycho-political warfare
within the U.S.A., countries allied with the U.S.A., and other countries not actually ruled by the Communists. In Vietnam, with a
bloody civil war raging between Communist and anti-Communist forces, the Communists, who controlled the northern region of the
country were determined to forcibly unite all of Vietnam under the absolute control of a Soviet-style Communist dictatorship. In the
U.S.A., the national leadership, at the time, held to the socalled "Domino Theory" -- the theory that, if the whole of Vietnam fell to
Communist control, a whole string of other nationa would fall as well.
In the 1950s, the U.S.A. had fought in Korea, where a very similar scenario unfolded, with Communist-ruled North Korea invading
and attempting to conquer non-Communist South Korea. U.S. and allied military intervention into the Korean War prevented the
North Korean and Chinese Communists from conquering South Korea, but the stalemate of that war continues today.
In the case of Vietnam, U.S. "military advisors," during the Presidency of John F. Kennedy, were sent to Vietnam, shortly after the
French, Vietnam’s former colonial power, pulled out. Under President Lyndon Johnson, conflict in Vietnam escalated into a
full-blown war between the U.S.A. and the Vietnamese Communists, the Communist regime in North Vietnam as well as the
Vietcong, the Communist insurgents in South Vietnam, who waged a guerrilla war against U.S. forces and the South Vietnamese
government..
It took several years, but after seeing the carnage on their television news every night, most Americans began to think it was the
wrong war fought in the wrong place. It would be the first war America lost and, as it wound down, nobody cared much. We just
wanted to get out and bring our military home. Ironically, the lessons of that war would be applied by one of its participants, Colin
Powell, who, when he became Chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, applied what was be known as the Powell Doctrine. No
future war would be fought with anything less than overwhelming force. It was the principle applied in the Gulf War and again in
Operation Iraqi Freedom to astonishing success.
Powell would tell you, along with the other Neocons surrounding President George W. Bush, that they emerged from the Vietnam
War determined to rebuild America’s military into the most powerful the world would ever see. Defeat leaves a bad taste in your
mouth. It would take until the Presidency of Ronald W. Reagan to make that goal come true. President Reagan would leave his
successor, George H.W. Bush, a military second to none. Modern warfare, a totally integrated fighting machine, began in the Gulf
War and it restored national pride.
In the years that preceded the Gulf War, however, the U.S.A. looked like a paper tiger. That impression didn’t happen overnight.
The Islamic Jihad had its first victory in 1979, seizing control of Iran, along with the U.S. Embassy and our diplomats stationed
there. The mullahs made President Jimmy Carter look so lame, Reagan was elected President in 1980. But Reagan, too, was tested in
1986, when more than 280 U.S. Marines were killed by a suicide bomber in Beirut. He pulled our troops out. Later, though, he would
bomb Libya. Its dictator, Muamar Quadaffi, after last year’s Iraq invasion, decided it was time to give up his arsenal and end his
flirtation with Islamic illusions of brotherhood.
Something strange happened in American politics. Having elected Conservatives like Reagan and Bush I, Americans voted for
Vietnam War draft-dodger Bill Clinton, who, during his eight-year Presidency, made little effort to hide his contempt for the military.
The voters would change control of Congress, giving it to Conservative Republicans, and then wait out a long, embarrassing
process of impeachment, which, in the end, resulted in failure of the effort to remove from office a president distinguished largely
by his very powerful sex drive and his inability or unwillingness to keep it under a reasonable degree of control. In the meantime,
President Clinton would dither and dither, when it came to using the military power at his disposal. He would fail to capture Osama
bin Laden, even when the Sudanese government offered his head on a plate. The U.S. intervention in Somalia would become a
military mess.
Our enemies would take notice. In 1993, the first bombing of the World Trade Center took place. Under Clinton, it was treated, in
the words of U.S. Senator John Kerry, as “a law enforcement” problem. By September 1, 2001, it would become the cause for war.
It is a war unlike Vietnam. It is unlike Afghanistan and Iraq. It is a war that has long since enveloped the whole world. It is a war
being fought in Spain, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Bali, Kenya, Morocco, the Russian Republic. It is an “asymmetric” war fought against
a fanatical vanguard of Muslims determined to impose Islam worldwide. It is World War IV.
As the presidential election campaign heats up, it is essential to understand that the Vietnam War was a very different war, fought
for very different reasons, in a very different era of American history.
The notion that it is now being called up as an example of the supposed courage of Senator John Kerry or a reason why the war in
Iraq was a mistake could not be more wrong. Senator Kerry spent about four months total in Vietnam. By contrast, Secretary of State
Colin Powell served two terms of service there, experiencing plenty of combat before beginning his rise through the ranks. Senator
Kerry came home and denounced the war, called his fellow soldiers and sailors rapists and killers. He would become a politician, a
deceitful, unscrupulous political opportunist.
It is no accident Bush II chose a certifiable hero and veteran of the Vietnam War as his Secretary of State. It is no accident that the
Democrats have done everything in their power to portray Bush II as being “a deserter” whose military service was suspect. Bush II
wanted Powell to represent the nation’s determination to meet and defeat the new enemy of freedom. Senator Kerry, if elected, would
find as quick an exit from combat as possible, leaving Iraq in chaos and civil war and the U.S.A. and the West vulnerable to the
worldwide Islamic Jihad.
The Vietnam War presented the U.S.A. with a choice, and some historians suggest that President Kennedy would likely have
withdrawn our small military presence there. His assassination ended that possibility. The Iraq War was not one of choice, though its
opponents present it as one. Having driven the Taliban out of Afghanistan after 9-11, regime change in Iraq was absolutely necessary
if the United States was to continue the transformation of the entire Middle East from being a constant threat to Western civilization.
The Middle East, if this policy is continued, will be composed of modern nation-states. The despots will have been driven from power.
That will be our real security!
Waiting to be attacked again is not an option, not a choice. That is why President Bush moved swiftly against Afghanistan, created
the Department of Homeland Security, and asked Congress to pass the Patriot Act. The horror of 9-11 sucked a trillion dollars out of
our economy, and its effect is only now being overcome. The U.S. economy cannot suffer another 9-11 without putting the basis of
our power at tremendous risk. The war to liberate Iraq is just a down payment on a more secure future.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
American Politics & Political Competition
American Government & the U.S. Presidency
The Middle East & the Problem of Iraq
Page Two
Page One
The Problem of Rogue States:
Iraq as a Case History
The Middle East & the Arabs
Islamism & Jihadism -- The Threat of Radical Islam
Page Three
Page Two
Page One
War & Peace in the Real World
Page Two
Page One
Disloyalty, Subversion, Sedition, & Treason
Terrorism & U.S. Homeland Security
Islamist Terrorist Attacks on the U.S.A.
Osama bin Laden & the Islamist Declaration of War
Against the U.S.A. & Western Civilization
Islamist International Terrorism &
U.S. Intelligence Agencies
U.S. National Security Strategy
Communism: Longterm Enemy
Russia & Other Former Soviet Republics
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, Communications Director of the American Policy Center,
and Founder of the National Anxiety Center, a clearinghouse for information about media-driven scare campaigns. Caruba writes a weekly
column, "Warning Signs," posted on the Internet website of the National Anxiety Center
(www.anxietycenter.com). A compilation of his past col- umns, entitled Warning Signs, is published by Merril Press. In addition
to Warning Signs, Caruba is the author of A Pocket Guide to Militant Islam and The United Nations vs. the United States,
both of which are available from the National Anxiety Center, 9 Brookside Road, Maplewood, New Jersey, 07040.
Copyright 2004 Alan Caruba
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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