Myths of Vietnam War Persist, But Could Its Truths Be Repeated?

[unhappycamper]

http://www.vvaw.org/veteran/article/?id=1772

Myths of Vietnam War Persist, But Could Its Truths Be Repeated?
By Michael Peterson

It was with mixed emotions that I read Francis "Bing" West's commentary, The Vietnam Myth, reprinted from the Free Lance-Star in the Eugene Register-Guard.

Many readers must have groaned "not again!" as another historian, conservative, revisionist, whatever, resurrected the hoary ghost of the Vietnam War and so revived the pain and divisiveness of that era. Given recent events, perhaps it is time to review some history, even if it means raising ghosts.

I write this response to West's article also with mixed emotions because I disagree with much of what he says. I also empathize with him very deeply, for West was not just another Marine infantry captain in the war. He and I are veterans of the Marines' Combined Action Platoon program, perhaps one of the most unique contributions of the US military forces in Vietnam. He, like my skipper, Capt. Edwin Goedde, along with more notable colleagues such as Lt. Col. William Corson, Col. David Hackworth and Col. John Paul Vann, were the "Young Turk" leaders of the Vietnam war. All were outstanding officers, worthy of everyone's respect. It is with that respect I now critique West.

West focuses his discussion on debunking three myths: (1) that we were defeated on the battlefield; (2) that protesters against the war were the moral equivalent of the US soldiers; and (3) that "losing makes little difference."

Taking the last myth first, I don't know where West got the idea that there is such a myth or one that is so widely held. It's a no-brainer, losing does make a difference. Most people, liberal historians included, agree that in some wars like World War II, there are clear winners and losers.

Not All Protesters Were Hippies

As for the second myth equating the moral equivalence of protesters and soldiers, West falls into the bad habit of stereotyping protesters of the war with the participants of Woodstock. It's a cheap shot. It ignores those people who were deeply committed in their opposition; people ranging from traditional religious pacifists and progressives to Cold Warriors who saw a tragic error in policy unfolding; from Martin Luther King to former Marine Commandant and Medal of Honor winner David Shoup.

West's main assertion, that we were never defeated on the battlefield, is offered as refutation to the myth of defeat, and it is true. Col. Harry Summers said the same thing to his North Vietnamese counterpart after the war, to which the officer replied that it was true "but it is also irrelevant."

The war was much more than a series of set-piece, large scale military engagements. To be sure, we lost no regiments and divisions in battle, but neither did we win strategically decisive battles, the enemy survived to fight another day. Moreover, the Vietnam War was one of small unit operations, and there the picture is murkier.

Worse for Wear

While the young American soldiers acquitted themselves well, in those situations where the Viet Cong/North Vietnamese Army initiated contact, we were often the worse for wear. As examples, the 2nd Viet Cong (VC) Regiment in West's Chu Lai area, or the North Vietnamese Army and especially their sappers, which the Marines faced along the DMZ, constituted some of the best light infantry in the world. We never defeated them decisively.

But our loss, or rather error, was strategic. Gen. William Westmoreland planned to defeat the enemy through attrition with search and destroy tactics. Here he blundered twofold:

1. The enemy out-attritted us by forcing us to suffer casualties to a level that became unacceptable to Americans.
2. Search and destroy had the side effect of uprooting and destroying many if not most Vietnamese hamlets, the very center of the Vietnamese identity. The resulting disaffected population made a great recruiting base for the National Liberation Front. Interestingly, early in the war, the Marines, under Victor Krulak, disputed Westmoreland's strategy, advocating a war to be waged in, not on, the Vietnamese hamlets. He was basically overruled, and what operations the Marines attempted to conduct were mostly peripheral.

Here the Tet Offensive of 1968 is as instructive as it was decisive because the enemy was able to strategically surprise Westmoreland by mounting a nationwide offensive after both our military and political leaders had assured our country we were winning. The enemy was not totally routed during the offensive, contrary to the assertions of some historians. They had enough resources to mount a mini-Tet a mere two months later. Westmoreland largely did not act on CIA assessments and warnings, but his deputy, Fredrick Weyand, did, moving his battalions away from the peripheries to Saigon. Had Weyand not done so, there could have been a real disaster.

So here is the problem of this murky war: For every point West raises, someone else can raise an equally valid counterpoint. Yes, we helped the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) beat back an NVA offensive in 1972, but the enemy seized Quang Tri, once the Third Marine Division's headquarters site, and held it for six months. The vaunted 1st ARVN Division broke and ran. Interestingly, a line was held by a hodgepodge of ARVN tankers, joined by the local, despised, lowly CAP trained militia.

Yes, it didn't help the South out in 1975 when we cut off our aid. Instead of giving out what would be the last transfer payment of $1 billion, Congress "slashed" it to "only" 700 million.

Finally yes, the communists were emboldened in 1975 to begin what would be the final offensive, and, for sure the Americans had left Vietnam in what one Australian general called "a bugout." But weren't the communists also emboldened by an almost reliable incompetence of the senior ARVN echelons? Didn't they have hints as indicated by the above poor performance by the 1st ARVN (under the command of the usually competent Ngo Quang Truong) and the disastrous 1971 ARVN incursion into Cambodia, Operation Lam Son 719? Here was another source of frustration to the Americans, after all those years and billions in aid and training; with a few exceptions, the ARVN still could not defend their country. An interesting statistic, the ultimately victorious NVA, having scored in the mid-teens as the best equipped army, shot to number four as a result of the fall of the South in 1975.

West is right about one thing. There are more than enough myths going around about the war. Politicians stole it from the generals and lost, or we could have won with just a little more sacrifice, or the US soldiers were just a bunch of baby-killers. And West is absolutely right in honoring our comrades.

But before we lay this ghost away one more time, consider this haunting parallel. A stampeded Congress has given the President a Tonkin Gulf-style resolution to wage an open-ended war against a constellation of terrorist entities, some of which are vaguely defined and our forces are being committed piecemeal to engagements overseas.

The Vietnam quagmire was no myth, but a brutal reality. Will this again be our fate?

http://www.vvaw.org/veteran/article/?id=1772

[bluestateguy]

1. If anything the real hippies were the apathetic turn on, tune in, drop out crowd

They just wanted to get stoned and did little to promote social justice or a better world.

The real protestors may have done some drugs, but they kept it within reasonable limits because they were actually doing something constructive, and they stayed away from all that hippie bullshit.

[old mark]

2. The "other REALITY" of Vietnam was that it was pointless. The French,

after their defeat by the Viet Minh, had warned the US to avoid sending troops there. The US had "observers" when the French were still there, and later sent "advisors" after the French left, but the commitment of the first group or Marines was done solely for political reasons - our President did not want to be acused of being "soft on Communism" or to appear weak.

There was absolutely NO reason for US involvement other than politics.


mark

[unhappycamper]

3. Guess who paid for 70% of the French occupation?

Uncle Sam. We've been doing this crap for a looooong time.

[Octafish]

7. Guess who opposed French colonialism?

Hint for the Lurker Set: The same guy later, as president, ordered the withdrawal of every U.S. service member from Vietnam by the end of 1965

[Recursion]

5. Containment

our President did not want to be acused of being "soft on Communism" or to appear weak.

Well, to be fair, he also actually didn't want Communism to continue to spread in Asia.

[old mark]

8. I believe that was the rationale - the reality was he didn't want a bad rep

and felt it was the "manly American" thing to do...I tend to believe politicians are motivated by self interest, and any redeeming factors are pure spin or marketing...but I am old and cynical.


mark

[Recursion]

9. Eh. The world's not that simple

If Ike and JFK had just wanted to look tough, there were better fights to pick. It's hard to persuade myself they didn't genuinely hope they could keep communism out of the rest of asia.

[old mark]

12. Believe what you like - as you say, the world's not that simple, but ALL

politicians lie by definition, sorry to say, even famous Democrats and liberals.


mark

[madrchsod]

4. it already is our fate....

[RSillsbee]

6. Not everyone that went to Viet Nam came back as some basket case

The myth I hate most is the myth of the drug crazed, Rambo, homeless Viet Nam Vet. The best man at my wedding went to Viet Nam when he was 22. He was there a year, he saw combat and he came home and went on to his next duty station, married his wife, raised his kids, finished his career and opened a chain of Laundromats. He lives in Denver and he was a Mentor, as well as a second father to me.

The only two times I’ve ever seen him mention Viet Nam was the night we went to a fireworks display and he told me about watching his best friend get blown in two by a motor. And one day (1992) in formation I was standing behind him and our company commander was talking about how well trained and well educated today’s American soldier was and he compared today’s soldier to the uneducated, redneck, inbred idiots that fought in Viet Nam and I watched my friend’s neck get red and his fists clench and his whole body start to shake. (He was the only Viet Nam vet in the company) He never broke his military bearing but he never forgave the commander either.

Not everyone that went to Viet Nam came back as some basket case

[Bigmack]

10. I'll add two things...

1) We did lose battles in Vietnam. And I don't mean the kind we called "the battle of the next trail bend" or "the battle where Cpl. X got fucked up".

http://www.g2mil.com/lost_vietnam.htm

... some examples...

"Battle of the Slopes - A company of American paratroopers was searching for the NVA in rough terrain when it was attacked by a large force. It suffered 76 KIA as it fled, with two platoons wiped out.

Battle of Dai Do - A Marine Corps infantry battalion was mauled and forced to retreat after a disorganized attempt to dislodge a large North Vietnamese force near the DMZ. The Marines suffered 81 KIA and 397 wounded while killing hundreds of NVA. Accounts of this action are hidden within reports of operations in region of Dong Ha.

Battle of Ong Thanh - After minor enemy contact the previous day, a battalion commander led some 150 American soldiers single-file into the bush to destroy the enemy. They ran into an NVA regiment with some 1400 men. Alpha company was wiped out in 20 minutes, and by sundown, 59 American soldiers lay dead with 75 wounded.

Battle of Two July - The 1st battalion, 9th Marines went up a road to find the NVA, and found them. Information is vague, but Bravo Company was overrun and the remnants of Alpha Company pulled back, leaving a combined 53 known dead, 190 wounded, and 34 missing.

Battle for Firebase Mary Ann - Some 50 NVA sappers attacked at night, then slipped away. The U.S. Army suffered 33 killed and 83 wounded among the 231 soldiers at the base. Their brigade commander was relieved of duty and the firebase closed."



2) The US military was on the verge of collapse because of the war.... something we need to think about with our two current clusterfucks.

http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/Vietnam/heinl.html
The Collapse of the American Military.... By Col. Robert D. Heinl, Jr.

"...the Pentagon has now disclosed that fraggings in 1970(109) have more than doubled those of the previous year (96).
Word of the deaths of officers will bring cheers at troop movies or in bivouacs of certain units.
In one such division -- the morale plagued Americal -- fraggings during 1971 have been authoritatively estimated to be running about one a week.....Shortly after the costly assault on Hamburger Hill in mid-1969,the GI underground newspaper in Vietnam, "G.I. Says", publicly offered a $10,000 bounty on Lt. Col. Weldon Honeycutt, the officer who ordered(and led) the attack. Despite several attempts, however, Honeycutt managed to live out his tour and return Stateside....."Search and evade" (meaning tacit avoidance of combat by units in the field) is now virtually a principle of war, vividly expressed by the GI phrase, "CYA (cover your ass) and get home!".....That "search-and-evade" has not gone unnoticed by the enemy is underscored by the Viet Cong delegation's recent statement at the Paris Peace Talks that communist units in Indochina have been ordered not to engage American units which do not molest them....a Congressional investigating subcommittee reported that 120 to 15% of our troops in Vietnam are now using high-grade heroin, and that drug addiction there is "of epidemic proportions."....Only last year an Air Force major and command pilot for Ambassador Bunker was apprehended at Ton Son Nhut air base outside Saigon with $8 million worth of heroin in his aircraft.....At least 14 GI dissent organizations (including two made up exclusively of officers) now operate more or less /31/ openly. Ancillary to these are at least six antiwar veterans’ groups which strive to influence GIs.

[eridani]

11. For resistance within the military--

--see "Sir! No sir!"