Bush Fails to Re-write History of Vietnam and Iraq Wars

Bush Fails to Re-write History of Vietnam and Iraq Wars

By Gil Villagrán, MSW El Observador, San Jose, August 31, 2007


President Bush may have a degree in history from Yale University, but he fails to convincingly re-write the history of the Vietnam War with his comparison to our present war in Iraq. Last week Bush defended his invasion and occupation of Iraq at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention, comparing this war to the Vietnam war, which he had previously claimed had no comparison. Of course, there are many similarities, as well as peculiar differences within the similarities. First the basic similarities:

1. A war of choice—in neither case was our nation attacked by the nation we invaded. Neither Vietnam nor Iraq presented any threat to our homeland, an ocean away, each a third-rate military challenge. It was our own convoluted “national intelligence” perception that led to our invasions. In Vietnam, an agrarian country the size of New Mexico, our CIA saw our Cold War adversaries, China and the Soviet Union. In Iraq, our war planners saw the 9-11 hijackers, though non were Iraqis, most Saudis, all trained in Afghanistan. In both wars, we fought the wrong enemy, and made enemies of innocent people who did nothing against our nation, until we invaded.

2. False evidence for war—the evidence for these wars was false, based upon manufactured or non-existent evidence. In Vietnam, the Gulf of Tonkin attack by North Vietnamese gunboats upon U.S. Navy frigates either never occurred or did no damage at all to our massive ships an Ocean from our shores. A duplicitous Congress never insisted upon evidence for that war. Similarly, this Congress accepted the call for war without the evidence of Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction or responsibility for the 9-11 attacks.

3. War by Presidential edict rather than Congressional Declaration of War. By our Constitution, only Congress has the power to declare war—the most critical decision for a nation. In World War II, our nation was attacked at Pearl Harbor. The evidence was plain for all to see, and Congress declaration war.

4. Un-winnable wars creating corrupt, duplicitous regimes. In Vietnam as in Iraq, our mission to create a government out of corrupt, duplicitous politicians, army officers, and shady businessmen failed because everyone saw the Americans as an opportunity to amass a fortune from contracts, bribes, and theft. In Vietnam, millions were the goal. In Iraq, amassing a billion is the new standard of corrupt officials. Furthermore, our very own weapons, stolen from weapon depots or given to the native army and police that we train, are sold in the black market to our very enemies—to kill American soldiers.

Some peculiar differences within the similarities of these wars:

Bush claims that our failure in Vietnam caused the Killing Fields of Cambodia. It was actually the war, and our secret invasion of Cambodia that de-stabilized this democratic monarchy and led to the Khmer Rouge dictatorship which left 1.7 million, one-fifth of the population, dead. The war caused the genocide, not our failure in that war.

Bush claims our failure in Vietnam caused the 1.5 million Indochinese refugees. Quite a slight-of-hand by history C student Bush! It was the war, with the countryside devastated by napalm, landmines, and agent orange toxicity which created many refugees. Most of the boat people were subsistence farmers with no allegiance to either communism nor capitalism, but simply hoped to feed their families and live in peace. But when an army invades, no mater the ideology, uniform or flag, it is wise to get out of the way. So 1.5 million sought refuge, while at least two million had already died, most by U.S. weapons. Bush failed to mention these deaths in his speech.

What of Vietnam today? The most interesting peculiar consequence of the Vietnam War today is that this nation we spent fifteen years, 58,000 dead American soldiers, and as much as a trillion dollars to steer away from communism is finally at peace, eager for American business and tourists (including George Bush last year). Capitalism reigns well in Vietnam today with former boatpeople returning with dollars to invest. Nike shoes are manufactured in Vietnam for American feet, paying workers 11 cents an hour. Maybe we did win the war, thirty years later, for Nike!