There but for the grace of God go I....

Come on mothers throughout the land,

Pack your boys off to Vietnam.

Come on fathers, and don't hesitate

To send your sons off before it's too late.

And you can be the first ones in your block

To have your boy come home in a box. 

Country Joe And The Fish, wrote that and made the Vietnam Song famous during Woodstock.  Gimme and "F"...Gimme a "U"...

I thought about that song when I started writing these posts on if our effort was worth the cost.  Was the condemnation of  Kitt, Cronkite, Kennedy, King, the hippies justified?  Were they the one's who "lost" the war for us, or, like I believe now, the war was never ours to win since South Vietnam had nothing to offer its people other than being not-communists, which for a peasant, means very little.

I want to go back to Carl von Clausewitz understanding of war:

[T]he use of power involves two factors. The first is the strength of available means, which may be measured somewhat by numbers (although not entirely). The second factor is the strength of the will which can not be specifically measured (only estimated) as it is intangible.  Once a state has gained an approximation of the enemy's strength of resistance it can review its own means and adjust them upwards accordingly in an effort to gain the advantage. As the enemy will also be doing this, it too becomes reciprocal. [third reciprocal action] (1)

We had the strength, no doubt about that.  But in Vietnam, it really did not matter how strong our military was, without the other factor needed to meet our objectives - a stable south Vietnam government - all our military could do is keep the bad guys at bay, which Tet showed in 1968, was not going to be easy.

Now that we knew, and by "we" I mean the people of the US, Carl von Clausewitz's second factor kicks in:

The second factor is the strength of the will which can not be specifically measured (only estimated) as it is intangible.  Once a state has gained an approximation of the enemy's strength of resistance it can review its own means and adjust them upwards accordingly in an effort to gain the advantage.

Walter Cronkite and Robert Kennedy saw what it was going to take, and understood how difficult, or most likely saw it as impossible, for the United States to "win" this conflict.  Which is why Robert Kennedy said in his February 1968 speech:

For years we have been told that the measure of our success and progress in Vietnam was
increasing security and control for the population. Now we have seen that none of the population
is secure and no area is under sure control.

Four years ago when we only had about 30,000 troops in Vietnam, the Vietcong were unable to mount the assaults on cities they have now conducted against our enormous forces. At one time a suggestion that we protect enclaves was derided. Now there are no protected enclaves. 

This has not happened because our men are not brave or effective, because they are. It is because we have misconceived the nature of the war: It is because we have sought to resolve by military might a conflict whose issue depends upon the will and conviction of the South Vietnamese people. It is like sending a lion to halt an epidemic of jungle rot. (2)

I think that was a reasonable and fair analogy.  It is also an accurate understanding of what was happening in Vietnam.  So if we can't "win" with our military alone, how much "means" should we put into it as we "adjust upwards accordingly?"

This is where it hits close to home for me.  I could have been the "means" had we continued.  Without fully understanding my reasoning for taking exception to General Patrick Brady's San Antonio Express News article, I understood when I read it that he was incorrect in his premise:

[O]ur defeat came from the elite in the courtrooms, the classroom, the cloakrooms and the newsrooms, from cowardly media-phobic politicians and irresponsible, dishonest media and professors from Berkeley to Harvard.

General Brady is an absolutist (in addition to being delusional).  Had we pressed on; "Unbelievably, there was no military follow-up." would that have changed anything?  I can't say, but neither can he.  But the fact still remains that we could not achieve our objectives with the military alone.  Unless you don't want to believe the CIA's analysis in May, 1968:

"The situation thereafter will largely depend, as it has in the past, on the question of the will to persist of either side rather than on the attainment of an overwhelming military victory."

General Brady, as an absolutist, thinks the lion can cure jungle rot.  Walter Cronkite and Robert Kennedy, as realists, understand that the lion cannot.

General Brady is one of "those who said that we could win and must" and Cronkite, Kennedy, Kitt, and "the elite in the courtrooms, the classroom, the cloakrooms and the newsrooms, from cowardly media-phobic politicians and irresponsible, dishonest media and professors from Berkeley to Harvard (3)" are "those who said that even if we could win we should not and that the military considerations were a complete obfuscation of the basic issues." (4 page 2)

General Brady is free to express his reasons as to why he thinks we could win and should have continued on, something he has not done other than denigrate those who share the other view and make up stories in an effort to right a wrong that is there but not there to the degree he thinks it is.  How he feels about what took place is uniquely his own, and. like for me, his objectivity can be compromised by factors that fall close to home.

Without a crystal ball there is no way to determine what course taken - or not taken - would have resulted in a better outcome.  What we do know for sure is that the enemy had the capability of making us work for that victory.  That's where Carl von Clausewitz's "it can review its own means and adjust them upwards accordingly in an effort to gain the advantage" comes in.  Evaluate and re-evaluate.  Left to General Brady, Kid Rock, Hawks, and absolutists, the means is "whatever it takes."

In 1968 I was 11 years old.  When I was 12, Country Joe was telling me what could await me.  When I was 16, Richard Nixon finally put an end to "whatever it takes."

There but for the grace of God go I.


Next Post: My Country Right or Wrong

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In case you don't understand the lingo, that's marijuana."

Continuing on with the theme of two sides to a coin.....

A colleague of David Culbert wrote this to him in July 1978, regarding an essay he wrote on the Adam's photo as well as a proposal for a grant he and Peter Rollins were submitting for the film they were working on.

You seem to be deliberately ignoring the ways in which government press releases, especially the releases from the  Saigon  government, but from  Washington as well, were propagandistic in their insistence upon the corner being imminently turned, the tunnel-end being imminently reached, the democracy of southeast Asia being imminently saved  (as though it had ever existed in the first place).

In short, the government was doing what you and Peter [Rollins]  seem to be doing: acting as though the military truth were the determining context, and, Dave, I swear that readers  and  viewers will remember that the context was one in which the traumatic divisions that tore the country apart was not one in which there was a division between those who thought we were winning and could win on the one hand and  those who thought we weren' t winning and couldn't win on the other, but between those who said that we could win and must and those who said that even if we could win we should not and that the military considerations were a complete obfuscation of the basic issues.  

What I like about this paragraph is the author's contention that the division in the country over the Vietnam war was between "those who said that we could win and must and those who said that even if we could win we should not."

What happens, as far as I can see, is that this Highlander - there can be only one - reality pits one against the other.  How do we handle a situation like that?  How about democratically, you know, put it to a vote?  We don't vote on war.  Our elected officials - who we did voted for - decide, and they decided that blood and treasure should be spent trying to meet our objectives in Vietnam. And, as was pointed out:

"[i]f we stick to it long enough - and this is not a short term proposition - [we were] confident that we shall have reasonable success in achieving our objectives."

See that word "reasonable" in that sentence?  Lets look at how that's defined:

"Having modest or moderate expectations; not making unfair demands"

In other words, based on what we set out to do, and what we knew about the enemy (see post), sticking with it should bring about the success of those objectives.

And then came Tet, the Eddie Adam's photo, and a reevaluation of the cost associated with achieving that reasonable success.  You know that saying "freedom isn't free?"  Well that's a tacit way of telling you it is going to cost blood and treasure.

Did "Uncle Walt" and the use of the Eddie Adam's change the hearts and minds of Americans to go against the war, or was it simply more a realization by more and more people that "even if we could win we should not?"

Here is what George Bailey told Rollins in an interview for the film (Lichty also talks about Walter Cronkite's impact) :

Rollins interview with Prof Lawrence Lichty and George Bailey

This assessment on the cost - and to whom it is applied to - had been going on way before Tet.  Case in point was a confrontation between the actress Eartha Kitt and Lady Bird Johnson (from: Lady Bird: A Biography of Mrs. Johnson By Jan Jarboe Russell):

Before Tet we weren't quite ready to hear about what the cost of the war was doing to those who were the "blood" part of the blood and treasure commitment to achieve our objectives, and Eartha Kitt paid the price - a la the Dixie Chicks - for being "ill-mannered negro."

I guess what I am struggling with in all of this is how should I feel about it now, compared with how I felt about it before I started doing my research on this?  It's not as easy as it should be because I am also troubled by my ignorance as a teenager heading into draft age who really was clueless about what it was all about.  That's where this is heading for me now.  I was, back in 1973, while the war was still going on, sixteen.  Had it continued I would have been that "blood" my fellow Americans were willing to spend to meet our objectives.

It hits close to home now, and that makes my objectivity towards the war, Tet, General Loan, and the absolutists tainted.

Should my near-miss play into how I see the war? Should it dictate how I feel about our effort, my government, my military, and General Loan?

It can't help but not affect my view of the war, which is exactly the same situation General Loan was put in on February 1st, 1968 when Nguyen Van Lem was brought to him with hands tied behind his back and wearing civilian clothes.

How one sees a situation is uniquely their own.  How dare we punish Eartha Kitt for voicing how she saw the conflict in Vietnam.  How dare we criticize Walter Cronkite and Robert Kennedy for speaking what they saw as the truth. How dare we degrade the men and woman who willingly and unwillingly offered their blood to give us "reasonable success in achieving our objectives."  And how dare we condemn General Loan for this one particular act - committed during a war, during an invasion - elevating ii up to a classification of "moral turpitude."

Condemnation is deserved for those who ignore the cost and reality that comes in to play when you go to war.

As Charles Heston said in Plant of the Apes: Damn them!  Damn them to hell!

Next Post: There but for the grace of God go I....
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Stop the Press! (unless you are spinning it my way)

So one thing always begets another.  Which if you like eclectic stuff, is fun to dive into.  My last post was about General Patrick Brady's assertion that he was going to film a documentary whereby Gen. Vo Nguyan Giap, supreme communist commander during the Vietnam war "agreed to declare Tet the communist calamity it was."

Now that did not sound anything near what a General would ever say, so I went looking and found nothing to support that declaration except an urban myth exuding the same thing.  But a two star General, Vietnam vet, medal of valor winner was stating this as true!  And then I thought, you mean the same one who, just a couple of days ago, had been called out in the San Antonio Express News for giving "demonstrably false information to the public?"  Yeah, that same one.  What to think...what to think.

So in the process of trying to figure out what to accept as a truth, I come across a lot of really poor information.  But in and amongst the dung are some diamonds.

Now one site I stumbled upon takes the position that the Vietnam war was lost due to antiwar sentiment brought about, provided, and perpetuated by the news media.  This is a common explanation of why were not outrightly victorious in Vietnam used by those who consider themselves hawks or believe in the United State as a military superpower and hegemon.

And within this explanation - the press lost it for us - one must ask, is that so?  Had we been kept in the dark, would the war have proceeded differently?  Yes.  Would we have been victorious in all our effort?  Maybe.  Could it have been much worse for us had we not known what was going on?  Maybe as well.

So my question is this: Does our government have the right to keep from us all information that might sway our opinion on a topic that directly affects us?  Looking at it another way, does an 18 year old male have a right to know what is happening in a foreign land where he will be sent and possibly killed?  Do the parents and wives and children need to be told the good, bad, and ugly so that they can decide if it is worth their blood and treasure that someone else has decided they are willing to expend?

So when Steven F. Hayward, the F.K. Weyerhaeuser Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and an adjunct fellow of the Ashbrook Center, writes:

The Cronkite broadcast opened the floodgates for the media to offer their judgments, as opposed to their reporting, about the war.

 I am left to ponder, what good is reporting something if the context is left out?  Or how it is interconnected with something else is not described?  How am I to draw a conclusion on just looking at a raw fact?

For example, lets say I live near a large vacant lot and the newspaper reports that a new business is being built on that lot and it will employee 100 people.  As the building is going up the newspaper reports the number of walls, the number of nails, the cubic yards of concrete poured, but it never tells me the purpose of the building until it is built.  And because I am downwind from it, I get to endure the smell of fish, that had I been told at the very beginning was the purpose of the building, I may have been able to stop it from being built.

In a round about way, that is what is being offered as acceptable, especially in times of war.  If you just let us do what it takes to win, we will win.  Lets look at another example of how Hayward sees the dangers posed by guys like Walter Cronkite sticking their two-cents in.  Here is what Hayward says in his piece:

On the morning of January 31, the first full day of the Tet attack, Associated Press photographer Eddie Adams and a Vietnamese TV cameraman employed by NBC were wandering around Saigon getting photos and footage of the battle damage when they noticed a small contingent of South Vietnamese troops with a captive dressed in a checked shirt. From the other direction came Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan, chief of South Vietnam’s national police. As Adams and the NBC cameraman aimed their cameras, Loan calmly raised his sidearm and shot the prisoner—a Viet Cong officer—in the head.

Now without any context other than the facts presented in the above description and the fact you can visually see in the photo, should comment be offered, or should only the photo be displayed with just the facts?  Some folks would argue that the photo should never have been shown, that war is ugly and that's just what happens.

Hayward writes:

Most news accounts of the photo ignored this context; the drama of the picture was just too irresistible for most news organizations to try to put it in any kind of balanced context.

In other words, had you known the context - the connectivness to something else - the judgement as to the what and why he was being shot - you would look at this picture differently.  Hayward offers:

Loan walked over to Adams and said in English: "They killed many Americans and many of my men." (It was not reported at the time that the prisoner had also taunted his captors, saying "Now you must treat me as a prisoner of war," and had been identified as the assassin of a South Vietnamese army officer’s entire family.)

So when does offering context cross the line into judgement?  My answer is when you don't like what the judgment is.  The fact that Hayward may find the assassination of a prisoner in handcuffs acceptable based on his value system, others (including myself) may not.  And in a democracy, if more of us disagree with one model we have the right to say change it.

You can blame Cronkite for loosing the Vietnam war, but all he did was point out the context that we were being manipulated by our government and General Westmoreland into thinking all was good, the end was nigh!  Tet may have been mis-characterized as a communist victory by the media, but it was correctly analyzed - in my opinion - by Walter Cronkite on February 27, 1968: (see note)

We have been too often disappointed by the optimism of the American leaders, both in Vietnam and Washington, to have faith any longer in the silver linings they find in the darkest clouds. They may be right, that Hanoi's winter-spring offensive has been forced by the Communist realization that they could not win the longer war of attrition, and that the Communists hope that any success in the offensive will improve their position for eventual negotiations. It would improve their position, and it would also require our realization, that we should have had all along, that any negotiations must be that -- negotiations, not the dictation of peace terms. For it seems now more certain than ever that the bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a stalemate.

What did Cronkite base this on?  Context.  Look at what Westmoreland said to the National Press Club on November 21, 1967:

[t]he communists were "unable to mount a major offensive...I am absolutely certain that whereas in 1965 the enemy was winning, today he is certainly losing...We have reached an important point when the end begins to come into view."

Two months later, Tet.  Now the argument is made by some, such as General Brady, that with reference to what happened after Tet:

Unbelievably, there was no military follow-up. Gen. Vo Nguyan Giap, supreme communist commander, would marvel at the mess we made of our victory. His force was devastated. Yet our dishonest media had presented Tet to the American politicians and people as a great communist victory and many people still believe that.

Brady's contention is, that because we were victorious at Tet and had we pushed, we would have won the war decisively and no peace talks or withdraw in 1972 would have tarnished our military reputation and the men & woman who participated.  Maybe.  Or maybe we would still be there like in Iraq and Afghanistan, fighting an enemy we do not respect for their resolve.  The fact of the matter is, we do not know what turn the war would have taken had the American people been kept in the dark and men like General Brady given carte blanch to just "get er' done,"





Note: Walter Cronkite also said in that same piece: "[t]he use of nuclear weapons, or the mere commitment of one hundred, or two hundred, or three hundred thousand more American troops to the battle. And with each escalation, the world comes closer to the brink of cosmic disaster." Nukes and cosmic disaster did not manifest itself.