Much the same as the elections in Afghanistan, the elections in Iraq have gone by with very little trumpeting by mainstream media. Why am I not surprised?
Here's some insight on the importance of these elections.
(I especially am sickened by the quotes attributed to Ted Kennedy, jerk)
The significance of these elections will probably not be realized in the near future, but if this seedling of democracy can grow in the desert of the Middle East, there really will be hope for our planet.
What is particularly distressing about Senator Kennedy's comments, to the extent they carry any weight at all, is that they seem to be defeatist solely for the purpose of being defeatist. In other words, Kennedy seems to have made his comments, not out of any genuine belief, but rather for the sole purpose of furthering the knee-jerk Democratic response to criticize anything and everything about the conduct of the war in Iraq. Legitimate defeatism would be unwelcome, but perhaps at least understandable. The other criticism or comment which has become tiresome is "exit strategy." "There's no exit strategy for Iraq." Let me tell you my friends on the left, the only exit strategy should be, and I think is, victory. The Dems don't want to win, they just want to get out. Wish they would have felt that way when we got involved in the Balkans. The Dems continually offer the wrong lesson learned from Vietnam with the constant reference to "quagmire." The lesson is not "Don't get involved." The lesson is "If you get involved, win!" And the way to do that is give the military what it needs, point it the direction you want to go, and then stand out of the way. The sooner petty criticism of prosecution of the war ends, the sooner the war will end.
ReplyDeleteGood comments. Also, how about not undermining the effort here and abroad, thereby giving the enemy more reason to continue? Read some recent news articles about the Viet Cong using clips from Jane Fonda, et al, as propaganda.
ReplyDeleteI seem to recollect that Kennedy made similar comments in 1969 as the 101st Airborne was waging the battle for Hamburger Hill in Viet Nam - so maybe at least he's being consistent. I'll have to see if I can find that speech somewhere and post a link to them.
ReplyDeleteYes, I was right. From thehistorynet.com:
ReplyDeleteFinal U.S. casualties [from Hamburger Hill] were 46 dead and 400 wounded. While these losses were high, Hamburger Hill was not the bloodiest fight of the war, even for the 101st Airborne Division. In the earlier November 1967 battle of Dak To in the Central Highlands, 289 U.S. soldiers were killed in action and an estimated 1,644 NVA soldiers also perished, victims of the 170,000 rounds of artillery, the 2,100 tactical airstrikes and the 228 Boeing B-52 sorties that supported the operation. Later, during the week of February 10-17, 1968, in the midst of the Tet Offensive, 543 Americans were killed in action and another 2,547 wounded without causing any outcry from the American public.
The Hamburger Hill losses were much smaller, but they set off a firestorm of protest back home. The American people were growing more weary of the war. A February 1969 poll revealed that only 39 percent still supported the war, while 52 percent believed sending troops to fight in Vietnam had been a mistake.
Politicians were quick to seek advantage in those numbers. Most prominent was Democratic Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, whose brother John F. Kennedy had been the architect of America's Vietnam involvement. As Zaffiri related: "In the early afternoon of May 29 [1969]...Senator Kennedy [who had served as a draftee military policeman in Paris during the Korean War] stood up on the Senate floor and angrily denounced the attack on Dong Ap Bia, calling it 'senseless and irresponsible...madness...sympathetic of a mentality and a policy that requires immediate attention. American boys are too valuable to be sacrificed to a false sense of military pride.'"
Kennedy would escalate his attack on May 24 in a speech to the New Democratic Coalition in Washington, referring to the battle as nothing but "cruelty and savagery," as well as saying that the Vietnam War was unjustified and immoral. He was soon joined by other senators, including South Dakota's George S. McGovern, a decorated World War II bomber pilot, and Ohio's Stephen M. Young, an infantryman in World War I and an Army staff officer in World War II, who carried the attack to a new level.
Found it. See attached from thehistorynet.com:
ReplyDeleteFinal U.S. casualties were 46 dead and 400 wounded. While these losses were high, Hamburger Hill was not the bloodiest fight of the war, even for the 101st Airborne Division. In the earlier November 1967 battle of Dak To in the Central Highlands, 289 U.S. soldiers were killed in action and an estimated 1,644 NVA soldiers also perished, victims of the 170,000 rounds of artillery, the 2,100 tactical airstrikes and the 228 Boeing B-52 sorties that supported the operation. Later, during the week of February 10-17, 1968, in the midst of the Tet Offensive, 543 Americans were killed in action and another 2,547 wounded without causing any outcry from the American public.
The Hamburger Hill losses were much smaller, but they set off a firestorm of protest back home. The American people were growing more weary of the war. A February 1969 poll revealed that only 39 percent still supported the war, while 52 percent believed sending troops to fight in Vietnam had been a mistake.
Politicians were quick to seek advantage in those numbers. Most prominent was Democratic Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts, whose brother John F. Kennedy had been the architect of America's Vietnam involvement. As Zaffiri related: "In the early afternoon of May 29 [1969]...Senator Kennedy [who had served as a draftee military policeman in Paris during the Korean War] stood up on the Senate floor and angrily denounced the attack on Dong Ap Bia, calling it 'senseless and irresponsible...madness...sympathetic of a mentality and a policy that requires immediate attention. American boys are too valuable to be sacrificed to a false sense of military pride.'"
Kennedy would escalate his attack on May 24 in a speech to the New Democratic Coalition in Washington, referring to the battle as nothing but "cruelty and savagery," as well as saying that the Vietnam War was unjustified and immoral. He was soon joined by other senators, including South Dakota's George S. McGovern, a decorated World War II bomber pilot, and Ohio's Stephen M. Young, an infantryman in World War I and an Army staff officer in World War II, who carried the attack to a new level.