Text 13554, 101 rader
Skriven 2005-06-12 21:42:40 av Gary Braswell (1:123/789.0)
  Kommentar till text 13524 av Ed Hulett (1:123/789.0)
Ärende: Hatred
==============
Ed Hulett -> TIM RICHARDSON wrote:

 EH> TIM RICHARDSON -> ED HULETT wrote:
 TR>> On 06-10-05, ED HULETT said to JOHN HULL:

 GB>>>>> We could have, before we even got involved with our own troops.


 EH>>>> When Vern says Ho was not a man we could back, I'd believe him.
 EH>>>> What evidence do you have that we could have backed Ho?


 JH>>> There is none.  Despite the fact that DeGaulle was a pain in the ass,
 JH>>> and the French were less than enthusiastic after the war about
 JH>>> expressing their gratitude to us for liberating their sorry butts,
 EH> NATO
 JH>>> was of far more importance in stabilizing Europe and countering the
 JH>>> threat of the USSR than some semi-fanatical old man from Vietnam
 EH> who was
 JH>>> already at odds with the French anyway.


 JH>>> To think that we would have chosen Ho over DeGaulle is ludicrous
 EH> on its
 JH>>> face.


 EH>>> Well, I have heard Gary's claim many times. It sorta goes that if
 EH> we would
 EH>>> have helped out Ho (that kindly old grandfather) we wouldn't have
 EH> been in
 EH>>> such a quagmire in Vietnam. Yeah right. Like you said, the
 EH> situation was a
 EH>>> bit more complicated than that. Plus Ho wasn't the nice guy the
 EH> left makes
 EH>>> him out to be.


 TR>> If the left thought Ho was such a nice guy and so good for the
 EH> entire country
 TR>> of Vietnam, why (oh.....why!) didn't they `back' him when they had
 EH> the chance?
 TR>> When Kennedy got elected they had the entire Congress sewed up, and
 EH> the White
 TR>> House. All they'd have had to do was withdraw support from the
 EH> South in favor
 TR>> of the North, and it would have been a done deal!


 TR>> They had the power.....why didn't they do it?

 EH> They say that Ho asked Eisenhauer for the assistance and he declined.
 EH> You see, if Ike had been nicer to Ho he'd not have gone commie and taken
 EH> the other side. At least that's the claim.

Actually, its not my claim. Ho plead to Truman, via Claire Chenault at first.
Ho was French communist since the 20s. He worked with the OSS during WWII and
became enamored with the US


 EH> The left has trouble with complex, critical thinking and would rather
 EH> come up with simple solutions to complex problems. Ho wasn't the
 EH> benevolent old grandfather they try to portray him as, but that doesn't
 EH> stop them from trying to make him out as the victim of the mean old US.

First, I am not on the left.

Second, no one said it was not a complex situation.

The Cold War was a very complex situation. The Geneva negotiations and SEATO
were very complex situations.

And I at no time was trying to make him a victim of this US, Ho that is. He
made his choice and took a road to evil.

My point was, it may not have had to be so.

What did we get out of the whole thing?

The French, even up to the moment of Dien Bien Phu, were convinced US troops
would come in and save the day. All we did was partly pay for their war.

When we did not show up, our loyalty to France paid off by them believing we
had betrayed them by not coming in and helping. They savaged us during the
Vietnam war, eventually left NATO due to US influence being too much in their
opinion, etc.

We ended up with a war.

Now would Ho have gone to China and Russia had we backed him against the
French, again no troops from us, just some money and not paying for French
adventures?

Who knows? Maybe so, much like Fidel. But maybe not. There is little doubt
things would have been quite different.

Heck Ike even said were there an election in Vietnam in the mid-50s, Ho would
have won 80% of the vote.

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