From: russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence)
Subject: Re: Anti-AR movie goers - Please read
Organization: WP Group
Date: Mon, 16 Nov 1992 02:52:45 GMT


In <Bxqzxu.6nu@wpg.com> russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence) writes:
rl> Hmm.  Perhaps because our revolution wasn't obliged to contend with
rl> a corrupt dictatorship that enforced it's religious and economic
rl> bigotry by means of hit squads financed by the taxpayers of a foreign
rl> superpower (ie the US). 

From article <viking.721866088@vincent2.iastate.edu>, by viking@iastate.edu (Dan Sorenson):
ds> The US Revolutionary War was about religous and economic freedom,

So was the revolution in Vietnam, Dan.   

ds> and I doubt that any minuteman would think King Henry anything but a
ds> corrupt dictator.  Hit squads?  Could you mean redcoats?  

No, I was thinking of the US financed hit squad's used by Diem to 
stiffle opposition after his seizure of power in 1954.

ds> No, the reason
ds> for the patriotic and freedom-loving brush is that we won.  In addition,
ds> you will note that ol Ho Chi Mihn's troops were no better.  The VC were
ds> not known for being polite to people who supported the US forces, or the
ds> French forces for that matter.

Is this true?  [no]   What did the viet minh do to the french after their
victory at Dien Bien Phu?  [They let them walk away.]  

I agree that the viet cong were far less generous with americans 
later on, but it behooves us to consider the role that the 
Phoenix Project (a quota system for extortion and torture) and 
"rural pacification" (ie indiscriminant bombing) played in 
downgrading the notion of mercy.  

> ...
rl> I think most historians now agree that it was a popular 
rl> revolution with roots dating back to the turn of the 20th 
rl> century, and most historians also agree that the US played the 
rl> ignoble role of supporting a faction that violated many 
rl> principles that americans hold dear.

ds> Many historians obviously don't apply their theories to both
ds> sides with equal fervor.

Your own theories don't seem to fit the facts, Dan.  If you're
interested, I'd be happy to recommend some books on the history 
of the vietnamese colonial period and the subsequent years of
revolution.

rl> Do you think that human animals have a right to make decisions
rl> about their own reproductive lives?  Or, would you agree with the
rl> position of the (roman catholic) Diem dictatorship that the possession
rl> of contraceptives ought to be punishable by a mandatory prison
rl> sentence?

ds> Do the catholics actually think this?  You should know that
ds> I'm for the choice of the individual, hence I'm pro-birth-control.

Diem's dictatorship passed a number of "Family Laws" that weren't 
popular among the buddhist citizens of his country.  (Bear in 
mind that buddhism was the principle religion among the "common" 
people, whereas roman catholicism was the religion-of-choice among 
the landed aristocrats whose political and economic privilege had 
been threatened by the departure of the french.)   Examples of
Diem's laws: 

1) divorce was banned;
2) the religious practices of several sects were banned; and
3) the use of contraceptives was declared a crime, and punishable
   by five years in prison.

Initially, the Diem regime was supported covertly via CIA 
funding, but after 1962, the active role of US military personnel 
became more and more important as the Diem regime began to 
crumble.  One of the atrocities that began to foment early 
opposition in the US was the "buddhist crisis" in 1963.  Under the 
instigation of Diem's brother (the archbishop of Hue), the Saigon 
government issued a degree that forebade the flying of the 
buddhist flag on the Buddha's birthday.  Many buddhist citizen's 
protested, and some were subsequently shot by Diem's Civil Guard, 
under the direction of catholic officers.  Some buddhist monks 
protested this religious intolerance in a curiously buddhist 
way...  by setting themselves on fire with gasoline.  Diem blamed 
the whole episode on the "viet cong", which made the event seem 
all the more shocking later on when several american "advisers"
overheard Diem say that he'd be happy to supply the monks with 
additional matches and gasoline if they wanted to have another
"barbeque".  

ds> However, were this example you mention the case, would you support
ds> an all-out war against the police and government, the enforcers of
ds> the laws, even if your side only represents a small faction of the
ds> population in general?  

You seem to be missing the point.  The foreign policy of the Eisenhower 
administration supported a dictator like Diem precisely because the
democratic majority in vietnam favored social reforms that seemed 
unthinkable in the post-McCarthy era.   We weren't fighting an invader
in Vietnam;  we were fighting the vietnamese people.

ds> The government in Vietnam, had the revolution been a truly
ds> popular one, could have been voted out as the US had promised
ds> elections once the Viet Cong were quiet.  Had the VC stopped fighting
ds> and let the elections tell their story, would all the bloodshed have
ds> been avoided or would the popular uprising have been proven false?

Such promises were embodied in the Geneva Peace Treaty signed after
Dien Bien Phu, and yet, the US exercised it's military muscle to
stifle democracy.

Speaking of broken promises, whatever happened to Nixon's promises
of $3 billion in war reparations?

ds> The fact remains that change takes time, and that painting
ds> the Vietnam war as a popular uprising or revolution is no
ds> different than saying that all Americans were bearing arms against
ds> the British.  It wasn't so.  

You're unfamiliar with the facts, Dan.  

-- 
Russell Lawrence, WP Group, New Orleans (504) 443-5000
russ@wpg.com   uunet!wpg!russ
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals