What Lesson Did The Vietnam War Teach The Americans?

Question

.....That the civilian leftists within America (in governmental positions and on the streets) can usher in defeat and bring a mighty county to it`s knees ???......Is that what you are hoping for now ? Just which side are you on ?

Answer 1

The lesson learned was not to trust Washington, then and now, added to that is the question... Who is benefitting from this financially and who is paying the price and at what cost? Did Washington learn that? It does not seem so does it?

Good question.*

Answer 2

Lessons learned from Vietnam War:

1. Butting into business that is not ours is never a good idea.

2. The PEOPLE rule this country, not the bureaucrats. If you do not have the support of the people, complete with the REAL reasons you want to go, then your war is as good as lost. Lying to the people makes it worse.

3. Never go into a foreign war without multilateral support. The less allies you have, the more burden is placed on your beleagured troops.

4. Nation building only works when the majority of the country wants you to do it, or when you have broken them down to the point of being unable to resist. The former never occurred in Vietnam, and the latter failed due to the other problems listed here.

5. Study and understand the culture and history of a nation before you invade them. It makes a big difference. Lots of the mistakes we made in Vietnam was because of ignorance on our part in regards to the needs, desires, and cultural norms of the society we were fighting in.

6. Without a solid, stable local government, it is impossible to rebuild a country and its infrastructure. We learned the positive side to that in WWII when rebuilding Germany and Japan. We SHOULD have learned the negative side to that in Vietnam.

7. This is the most important thing that should have been learned from Vietnam: don't pretend the war is something it is not. You'll lose support at home, within the country you are "correcting," and abroad. Without support in all three of these important spheres, your war is doomed.

Now if only we had applied these ideas to the current war, you would not have to ask such dumb questions as "which side are you on?" We would all be on the same side. I'd rather be on the "losing" side than the "wrong" side.

Have a good one!

Answer 3

That intense questioning is necessary at the same time as lives are at stake. regrettably this lesson nevertheless has no longer hit domicile. i ought to point you watch the Fog of war. it really is largely a 2-hour interview with Robert S. McNamara who became the secretary of protection in the course of the onset of Vietnam. He purposefully would not communicate about Iraq, yet provides a candid perception into the idea mind-set of the persons who make those judgements.

Answer 4

The only thing worth learning about Vietnam is that the young leftists of that era make for patently silly tin "leaders" today. Imagine that. Liberal and "military strength" simply do not belong in the same sentence. It's an oxymoron at best, and at the least in regards to liberals, it's merely being a moron. I am an unrepentant classical liberal who puts America, its people, its Constitution, and military might at the head of the line. Modern liberals are shameful and disgraceful. Period.

Answer 5

The Vietnam War taught Americans that our brave military does not give up on freedom or democracy no matter how hard the Left fights to derail any conflict that opposes terrorism or Communism . God bless our military heroes !

Answer 6

They learned to control journalists and they learned not to show dead and wounded troops on the evening news.
Bush did a pretty good job of bringing the US to its knees by creating a massive deficit, killing 3250 US troops, 655,000 iraqi civilians, creating terrorists, privatising half of the army with Halliburton and Blackwater and going to war on the Constitution.

Answer 7

I' m a vet I didn't ask to go, I didn't ask to fight and see my buddies die, we just did what we were told to do. We came home to be disgraced. It wasn't our war it was a police action.That's the one lesson we learned that we were spit on and called baby killers. Don't hear anyone calling these guys that do you? Or anything else that we were.

Answer 8

nothing! the democrats have been bitter that the politician lost that war and them being in power at the time they lost it. now they cant wait for republicans to do the same with this one thats they are sabotaging this war. we should of known to keep politicians out of the war. let the army do what it does which is to bring enemies to their knees and beg for peace then politicans can enter it. no sooner

Answer 9

That we were wrong to engage a people that simply wanted to get rid of French Colonialism. That there must be a God afterall.

Mr.Taco there said it all! Five Star rating.

Answer 10

I think the democrats didn't learn a thing about support of troops.