HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: quoctp@cs.toronto.edu (Quoc Tuan Pham)
Subject: Re: The Deer Hunter (and Russian Roulette)
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto
Date: 15 Oct 92 12:54:32 GMT

eesnyder@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Eric E. Snyder) writes:


>I was watching _Deer Hunter_ the other night and was predictably
>horrified at the Russian Roulette scenes in the picture.  How common
>was this practice during the war, both in terms of gambling and as
>treatment of POWs.  Did this sort of thing happen often or is it 
>just a Hollywood fabrication?

It's just a Hollywood frabrication. Imagine the captor giving a loaded
gun to the prisoners! Besides revolvers were not used by the communists
(and by the Soviet Army). I really don't understand why so many people
cannot see through this Hollywood ploy.
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: Did We Lose?
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 05:13:26 GMT

In article <1992Oct6.215501.12886@vexcel.com> dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:
>In article <PD.92Oct6023521@horus.sics.se> pd@sics.se (Per Danielsson) writes:
>>In article <5373@gold.gvg.tek.com> mikea@zorba.gvg.tek.com (Michael P. Anderson) writes:
>>
>>>The war was lost precisely because its goals were immoral, and the
>>>men who led that war were also immoral.
>>
>>What's immoral about fighting communism?
>
>It isn't enough to be fighting a "bad" enemy.  You must be fighting for
>a "good" ally, at least for a democratic country.  The South Vietnamese
>government didn't fit that bill.  
-----------
What is your bill ? How many items are there ? Let put it on the table.
If you decide not to help anybody, do not move. If you did, go and help with
all your might and never regret. One step forward, two steps backward. Two
steps forward, three steps backward, and run away.
I am waiting for all items in your bill.
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: Reasons We should Have Kept Vietnam
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 18:55:26 GMT

In article <1992Oct13.164613.18074@b8.b8.ingr.com> larry@b8.b8.ingr.com (Larry Billings) writes:
>In article <1992Oct13.055459.4075@den.mmc.com>, whitmeye@den.mmc.com (Richard Whitmeyer) writes:
>> 
>> In article <1992Oct10.203509.6375@wetware.com>, drieux@wetware.com (drieux, just drieux) writes:
>> 
>> Serious question here.  
>> 
>> Just what were the French after?
>> My guess is we wanted access to the mysterious wealth too.
>> 
>> Rich Whitmeyer                The lesser of two evils, is still evil.
>
>I think the french were just tring to hold onto what they had left of their
>empire.  A question of a similar nature, what did Britian fight over the
>Faulklands for?  I've never heard of anything they produce that is really
>irreplaceable.
>
>Larry Billings
>

------------------
France, Great Britain, Portugal,...as colonists they excavate everything and 
bring back to their country to support for their developing economy. As result,
with that big task, they have to exploit manpower too. To keep unjustice
floating, they don't use too much their regular army, but instead mercenaries
who are foreigners, criminals or opportunists. Violence, brutality,barbarity
having been committed by these bastards cretate deep and numerous sufferings
to our people. If colonists lose the war, they feel bad because they lost
huge resources. You never see or hear any evidence about they or their
public reflect their concern about our suffering.

Differently, except about armaments produced at home to create jobs for AmericanI don't thing US can get much from US. The oil exploration through UN aid
has proved to be non-economicalR; rubber (as suggested by one poster) may be.
But these are not enough interesting motives for US who did spend much more
money than that, youngster's lives to exchange such thing. Right ?

The only practical reason US tries to keep VN is just to block the spread of
communism (Domino theory) far to the south; this, in turn, will threat the
stability of the South Pacific Area, Indochina, Thailand, Malaysia. North
Vietnam will swallow South Vietnam and Laos; China will control Cambodia.
Thailand would be next. US always would like to keep South Pacific safe and
in their control. To keep it as goal, US did do what they can do while the
cold war is very obviou.

So, I think you don't have any doubt about your country's mission anymore and
put aside something unreasonable.z

S
manpower

Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: tthiel@m.cs.uiuc.edu (Terry Thiel)
Subject: Re: Did We Lose?
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept. of Comp. Sci., Urbana, IL
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 14:19:54 GMT

What a silly argument.  We sent a bunch of people to another country for
reasons which were not supported by the Vietnamese or American people.
We got a lot of people killed for nothing, the people we fought now run
the country, and we lost a lot of prestige at home and in the international
arena.  We lost the war.  Get over it.
-Terry
From: kingsley@hpwrce.mayfield.hp.com (Kingsley Morse)
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 23:54:03 GMT
Subject: Please Help
Organization: HP Western Response Center
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam

              Please answer these 9 questions and return.

1.) Do you think equal rights for men and women is generally a good idea?
Yes                  [ ]
Sometimes            [ ]
No                   [ ]
Haven't heard enough [ ]
Other                [ ]

2.) Are you pro choice?
Yes                  [ ]
Sometimes            [ ]
No                   [ ]
Haven't heard enough [ ]
Other                [ ]

3.) Are you in favor of adoption?
Yes                  [ ]
Sometimes            [ ]
No                   [ ]
Haven't heard enough [ ]
Other                [ ]

4.) Do you think men should be allowed to legally terminate their parental
rights and responsibilities before fetal viability?
Yes                  [ ]
Sometimes            [ ]
No                   [ ]
Haven't heard enough [ ]
Other                [ ]

5.) What sex are you?
Male               [ ]
Female             [ ]

6.) How old are you?
Under 18           [ ]
19 to 65           [ ]
Over 65            [ ]

7.) What religion are you?
Protestant         [ ]
Catholic           [ ]
Jewish             [ ]
Other              [ ]

8.) What political party are you affiliated with?
Democratic         [ ]
Republican         [ ]
Other              [ ]

9.) How many years of education have you completed?
Grade School       [ ]
High School        [ ]
College            [ ]
More               [ ]
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: Is communism immoral? (was Re: Did We Lose?)
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 16:30:36 GMT

In article <1992Oct9.170417.14437@b8.b8.ingr.com> larry@b8.b8.ingr.com (Larry Billings) writes:
>In article <SMITTIE.92Oct7113241@beach.csulb.edu>, smittie@beach.csulb.edu (Smittie) writes:
>> I still think that if, in a free election, the populace of any country chooses
>> a Communist form of government it is not the United States' place to deny them
>> their own wishes. I opened the can about Communism good or evil but I now
>> realize that even if we determine Communism to be inherently evil and I am not
>> at all sure that we then have the right to deny a  nation the option of
>> choosing that form of government.
>> 
>> smittie
>> -- 
>
>How in the H*** can you say that SVN chose Communism?  It was forced on them 
>by the military might of the North.  SVN had fought for, what was it, twenty
>years before the US got involved.  That is the strangest way I have ever seen
>of choosing something.  Hint: Going to war to prevent something is very much
>"not choosing" that thing. While it may be true that most of the farmers out
>tending their crops, didn't care who was in charge (as long as they left them
>alone), most citizens of South Vietnam didn't want the Communist government
>of North Vietnam running their country.  And make no mistake, that is who 
>was financing and driving the war.  
>The VC and NVA terrorized villages and made the populace scared to accept
>anything from the government of SVN or the US.  I read about the US going
>into villages and innoculating children against diseases, and the VC cutting
>their arms off, to scare the villagers into obedience, and to get back to
>the title of these postings, that sounds real moral to me.  NOT!!!
>A lot of people still think that this was merely a civil war, if it ever was
>it was only in the very begining, most of the time the US troops were over
>there (fighting troops not advisers) the VC was highly ineffective, and was
>being supplemented by the NVA troops.  For example, the 5th VC army operating
>out of Cambodia to the west of Saigon, was over 90% NVA after 1968 or 1969.
>The VC were poorly trained and seldom was a purely VC attack suscessful, the
>NVA on the other hand was highly trained, (in some cases better than the US
>1 year TAD troops) and they had a much higher suscess rate than the VC.  They 
>were battle hardened and knew the jungle better, but still retreated to safe
>(places where stupid Rules of Engagement didn't allow our troops to follow)
>areas to rest and recouperate.
>
----------
The second poster is right. In my city, My tho, 80 km south of Saigon, there is
an US base not far from the north side of the city. Beside combat troop, they
have groups sending out to help people around. VC often finds ways to cut that
operation by using kids or women with dangerous mission to discourage and
cut the tie between US troop and the populace.
From: drk@melodian.cs.uiuc.edu (Dave Kohr)
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
Subject: VN pronunciation (was spelling of Ho's name)
Date: 10 Oct 92 04:37:42 GMT
Organization: CS Dept., Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

In article <1992Oct8.232236.17085@lgc.com> tuan@lgc.com (Tuan Nguyen) writes:
>after many occasions where the man's name was misspelled in this group, I
>have to do this.
>
>It's Ho Chi Minh (yes, with an "h" at the end).
>
>Tuan Nguyen

I have a silly Vietnamese pronunciation question: does adding the "h"
change the pronunciation from something like "min" to "ming", as I have
been lead to believe?  Does this rule hold for other Vietnamese names
ending in "nh"?  (There seem to be a lot of them.)
-- 
Dave Kohr     CS Graduate Student     Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Work: 3244 DCL, (217)333-6561  Home: (217)359-9350  E-mail: drk@cs.uiuc.edu
                   "One either has none or not enough."
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: eesnyder@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Eric E. Snyder)
Subject: The Deer Hunter (and Russian Roulette)
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Date: 14 Oct 92 18:20:05 GMT


I was watching _Deer Hunter_ the other night and was predictably
horrified at the Russian Roulette scenes in the picture.  How common
was this practice during the war, both in terms of gambling and as
treatment of POWs.  Did this sort of thing happen often or is it 
just a Hollywood fabrication?

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
TTGATTGCTAAACACTGGGCGGCGAATCAGGGTTGGGATCTGAACAAAGACGGTCAGATTCAGTTCGTACTGCTG
Eric E. Snyder                            
Department of MCD Biology              ...making feet for childrens' shoes.
University of Colorado, Boulder   
Boulder, Colorado 80309-0347
LeuIleAlaLysHisTrpAlaAlaAsnGlnGlyTrpAspLeuAsnLysAspGlyGlnIleGlnPheValLeuLeu
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: Merits of the Free Press
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 05:40:48 GMT

In article <1992Oct6.220417.13193@vexcel.com> dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:
>In article <1992Oct5.102350.10360@ida.liu.se> yngla@ida.liu.se (Yngve Larsson) writes:
>>One may have many opinions about the relative merits of a free press, and
>>in general I think the press is a slandering, opinionated hypocrite.
>>
>>The press (reporters and editors) selects the message to be published, and 
>>they are very rarely have any knowledge about what they are printing. Thus,
>>the information becomes garbled, biased and incomplete.
>>
>>On the sublect of the Vietnam War however, consider this:
>>
>>
>>	If there had been any resemblence of a free press in
>>	North Vietnam, there would not have been a Vietnam War.
>>
>>Of cause, NV was/is a ultra-totalitarian state able to completetly control
>>the opinions of the people. They probably won because of this.
>>
>>comments?
>>
>Despite the totalitarian nature of N Vietnam, they had credibility
>from beating the French.  This, combined with the new colonialists
>(the US) _may_ have been enough to provide support for the
>government in the north, despite their despotic nature.
-------------
Totalitarian nature ? Credibility ? They must go hand in hand. Do you know
totalitarianism means ? No rival parties, no saying no. In US, people can
say no to the draft like Mr. Clint.....; in NVN, you have no right to say
no. That is why NVN army have burnt a lot their young men, but they still have
more in stock,. From this point, to the world outside, NVN has *credibility*.
Is this another bitterness : to create *credibility*, North Vietnam    or
any other communist countries abuses their citizens to solidate their
*totalitarian nature*.>
>
>-- 
>
>		dingo in boulder	(dean@vexcel.com)


Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: tuan@lgc.com (Tuan Nguyen)
Subject: Re: North Vietnam
Keywords: Invasion
Organization: Landmark Graphics Corporation
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 17:33:32 GMT

In article <1992Oct13.164205.17916@b8.b8.ingr.com> larry@b8.b8.ingr.com (Larry Billings) writes:

>I think that we should have attacked NVM, smash their army, and leave.  We
>did not need to try to hold the country, destroying their army would make
>them spend time, money, and resources to rebuild both the army and the
>countryside they fought in.
>

Easier said.  How could one "smash" an army if it refuses to show up for
the smashing?  The Chinese armies tried many times but came up empty every
time in the last 2,000 years to "smash" the Vietnamese army.  After WWII,
the French tried for 9 fruitless years to again "smash" the Vietnamese army.
The very same mentality plagued the American invasion forces in South Vietnam.
Foreign invaders hear and talk about "guerilla warfare" but don't really
understand it until they step into the tar pit and struggle to get out.
Besides, since the army comes from the people, one can't never destroy
an army unless one destroys the whole population.

But military objectives achieved at tremendous political costs are never
popular with politicians, especially American politicians.  They were
already overwhelmed trying to correct their first mistake, which was to 
send troops into South Vietnam.

>Larry Billings

Tuan Nguyen
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: quoctp@cs.toronto.edu (Quoc Tuan Pham)
Subject: Re: Did We Lose?
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto
Date: 10 Oct 92 23:39:38 GMT

dean@vexcel.com (Dean Alaska) writes:


>It isn't enough to be fighting a "bad" enemy.  You must be fighting for
>a "good" ally, at least for a democratic country.  The South Vietnamese
>government didn't fit that bill.  

Like that of Kuwait? Or the British Empire? Or the French colonialists?
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: North Vietnam
Keywords: Invasion
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Sun, 11 Oct 1992 22:03:56 GMT

In article <Smith.21@biotec.arizona.edu> Smith@biotec.arizona.edu (Roger A smith) writes:
>Does anyone have an idea why the United States or South Vietnam did not 
>invade North Vietnam?

---------
A very, very good point.
As a ordinary citizen, back then, I heard that Nguyen-Cao-Ky would like to
use his skillful and courageous pilots to make an all-out bombing Hanoi but
US Administration, suppliers of bombs and aircrafts, did not agree.

Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: smittie@beach.csulb.edu (Smittie)
Subject: Re: Did We Lose?
Organization: Cal State Long Beach
	<1992Sep30.053341.10600@den.mmc.com><1992Sep30.124440.28171@doug.cae.wisc.edu
	> 	<5373@gold.gvg.tek.com> <PD.92Oct6023521@horus.sics.se>
	<SMITTIE.92Oct6125519@tui.csulb.edu>
	<1992Oct7.142304.15177@m.cs.uiuc.edu>
Date: Wed, 7 Oct 1992 18:44:00 GMT

>Also remember that Ho Chi Minh was our good buddy and ally when he was
>fighting the Japanese.  But as soon as he got uppity about throwing out
>FRENCH COLONIAL OCCUPIERS we demonized him.  So much for our support of
>freedom and democracy.  There's alot of racism in this too.

We did almost exactly the same thing in the Philippines. We supported the grass
roots nationalists when they were fighting the Japanese. Then [sacrasm:
begin]  the great MacArthur [sacrasm: end] rounded up all the grass roots
nationalists, took away their weapons and threw them in jail. They no longer
served the needs of US politicos and they were hindering efforts to return the
land owning elite to government. We got away with all this because we declared
the grass roots nationalists communists.

American Foreign Policy as regards Asia has always been driven by racism. Of
late we have become rather sophisticated in hiding or rationalizing it.

smittie
-- 
___________________________________________________________________________
GEnie, MCI, AOL:Smittie   All of these accounts except MCI will die on or
smittie@beach.csulb.edu   about Dec 31. UNIX will be forwarded for 2 weeks.
___________________________________________________________________________
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: pd@sics.se (Per Danielsson)
Subject: Re: Is communism immoral? (was Re: Did We Lose?)
Organization: Swedish Institute of Computer Science
	<PD.92Oct7040559@horus.sics.se>
	<1992Oct8.172936.16740@doug.cae.wisc.edu>
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 1992 14:16:43 GMT

In article <1992Oct8.172936.16740@doug.cae.wisc.edu> mccullou@cae.wisc.edu (Mark McCullough) writes:

>Uh, quick note, communism is an economic system (as oppossed to capitalism)
>and is not necessarily a form of government.  

Yeah, show me a democratic communist country, and I might believe you.

>Communism is merely a form of socialism, and as Sweden has proved,
>socialism can be beneficial, and made to work.

Ha! Sweden is currently plagued by the worst economic troubles since
the thirties. This is after mismanagement of the economy by the Social
Democrats during the eighties. (The Social Democrats have ruled this
country since 1933, with the exception of the years 1976 through
1982. They lost the election last year, and a coalition government of
non-socialist parties was formed).
I am not sure that it is correct to call Sweden a socialist country.
We have free enterprise and capitalism, but the taxes are very high
and large portion of the economy is controlled by the government. It
is a strange mixture.

--
Per Danielsson				pd@sics.se
Swedish Institute of Computer Science, PO Box 1263, S-164 28 KISTA, SWEDEN
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: Domino Effect (was Re: Did We Lose?)
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 00:01:56 GMT

In article <1992Oct10.043309.4589@m.cs.uiuc.edu> drk@melodian.cs.uiuc.edu (Dave Kohr) writes:
>In article <81165@ut-emx.uucp> wolfone@ccwf.cc.utexas.edu (Patrick Chester) writes:
>>You forgot to add one major component to defeating a giant capitalist
>>power: 
>>
>>Another great power sympathetic to your "popular" cause to supply your
>>fighters with massive amounts of military supplies.
>>
>>Patrick Chester
>
>I've heard this argument before, but I've also heard that for much of the
>war the NLF supplied itself mostly with weapons stolen or captured from GVN
>troops (this in F. FitzGerald's _Fire in the Lake_), and that Ho didn't get
>a particularly warm welcome in Moscow, at least not initially.  Does anyone
>have any substantive evidence to support this claim?
--------------
Good point.
Sure but not much. All the weapons captured in any small and big operations
by SVN amy are often displayed for citizens to watch. Almost all of them, as
I remember, are made in China (Chinese writing) like grenade, AK 52 (?), 
hand-held anti-tank rocket, small SAM rockets, dry food. Another thing is
VC often uses AK (from Tchekoslovakia ?) and SAM (China or USSR ?) to
attack the post near my home (500m away). I still remember the dry and
horrible sound from those AK.
The main supply route must be from Ho-Chi-Minh trail. 

Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: smittie@beach.csulb.edu (Smittie)
Subject: Re: North Vietnam
Organization: Cal State Long Beach
Date: Fri, 16 Oct 1992 18:05:51 GMT

>Besides, to those who ran the show and knew better, it would be folly to
>invade and attempt to hold the entire country, when you didn't feel all
>that secure about the half you had.

This is exactly it. The puppet government set up by the French and propped up
later by the US, was never very secure in its hold on the South. Ho
sympathizers were numerous and a real threat to the security of the puppet
regime. Little wonder that regime wasn't anxious to wander into the lion's den
when its own home was within paw's reach.

smittie
-- 
___________________________________________________________________________
GEnie, MCI, AOL:Smittie   All of these accounts except MCI will die on or
smittie@beach.csulb.edu   about Dec 31. UNIX will be forwarded for 2 weeks.
___________________________________________________________________________
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: drieux@wetware.com (drieux, just drieux)
Subject: Reasons We should Have Kept Vietnam
Organization: Castle WetWare Philosopher and Sniper
Date: Sat, 10 Oct 1992 20:35:09 GMT

agbrooks@teaching.cs.adelaide.edu.au (Zoz) writes:
] 
] Rubber, for one. American tyre companies had huge rubber plantations etc.
] in Vietnam.


funny, I had always heard it was becaus of the rice....


ciao
drieux


ps: how many tyres have been made of 'real rubber' since
WWII when the fall of the major rubber plantations to
the Japanese?????

Hum????

Why ever did the synthetic rubber think come about....

OOOPS... that History thing again....


-- 
Modern Day Problems:

Don't Just Rock the Vote
Kick OUT THE JAMS!
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
From: knguyen@emr1.emr.ca (Kim Nguyen)
Subject: Re: North Vietnam
Keywords: Invasion
Organization: Energy, Mines, and Resources, Ottawa
Date: Wed, 14 Oct 1992 03:08:40 GMT

In article <1992Oct13.051846.2479@den.mmc.com> whitmeye@den.mmc.com (Richard Whitmeyer) writes:
>
>In article <Smith.21@biotec.arizona.edu>, Smith@biotec.arizona.edu (Roger A smith) writes:
>|> Does anyone have an idea why the United States or South Vietnam did not 
>|> invade North Vietnam?
>
>I do have an "idea" on why the north half of Vietnam was not invaded.
>I don't know the US government policy though.
>With the partition of Vietnam, the population was divided too. The
>folks who went south were happy to be in charge and away from those
>who went north. Unification of Vietnam was not an issue, because we
>were there to "protect our allie". If the world was to beleive the lie
>of two Vietnams, then the sovereignty of both had to exist.
--------


Can you clarify why you say "...the lie of two Vietnams..."
>
From: kingsley@hpwrce.mayfield.hp.com (Kingsley Morse)
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam
Subject: Re: Please Help
Date: 9 Oct 92 15:53:30 GMT
Organization: HP Western Response Center

Oops! My apologies for posting my previous "Please Help" survey to this
group. It was an honest mistake and won't happen again.

Kingsley
Newsgroups: alt.war.vietnam