"The throw aways of our society populated the ranks of Vietnam soldiers". Who agrees this is why we "lost"?

Question

This statement was made by Rebecca see below for full text.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AmcxH5OVLU6hwq_KfnklEPvsy6IX?qid=20070823215421AAQ5TU2

Answer 1

Absolutely not - that's a very uninformed opinion. My father in law as well as many other family members and family friends were in Vietnam. They were draftees as were most of the soldiers. They were not "throw aways." We lost because we were fighting a foe that willingly laid down their lives for their beliefs/country, they believed it was a sacred act. How can you fight a group of people who don't care if they die? No. 2, there were just too many of them (a simple and yet true statement). No. 3, our soldiers were just not prepared for the country's terrain whatsoever . The Vietnamese however were completely tied to the land and the layout of their country. They used their extensive knowledge of the terrain to their advantage.

The American soldiers who fought in Vietnam for the most part were young draftees who served their country well amidst unimaginable horror. They were fighting a losing battle from the start. Don't blame them for the government's ill-timed and ill-judged campaign.

Answer 2

Give me a break! They were not the throw aways of the country. And just because they were not able to get a draft deferment has nothing to do with their ability to fight. They were average men of draft age.

She ignored the parallel that the enemy was hiding in the woodwork's and underground and would strike the enemy when possible. Just like Iraq. She ignored the parallel that there is no front to the fight. The enemy chooses when to strike and we wait and react. The white house is telling the generals on the spot what they must do to do their job. The parallels keep going.


This shows how a woman that has nothing to do with being a soldier can easily become a chicken hawk and would have no trouble drafting men and sending them to fight in the front line while she drinks her pink ladies at a bar back home and claim she is an equal and not a gutless coward that has the arrogance to claim she is a superior to all peasants and surve that served in Vietnam.

She is an arrogant ungrateful B@$ch!

Answer 3

As a Viet Nam vet, along with three brother-in-laws that are also. I have to ask. How did you arrive at "The throw aways of our society" tag? And as anyone who was THERE can tell you, we did NOT "lose" the war. The grunts did exactly what they were supposed to do. They took every thing they were told to take, they held everything they were told to hold. The political types that ran the thing tied their hands. Wouldn't let them fight the war the way they knew it should be done. Then because they wanted to win the anti-war vote, they just picked up and brought the troops home. Effectively throwing away thousands of good young men, and women, who gave everything they had for this country. I will not have anyone running this GREAT people down. Anyone who disrespects these AMERICANS, is the REAL "Throw aways of our society", and I will throw them away if I ever get my hands on them.

Answer 4

Those "draftees" did a good job. Militarily the US did an outstanding job in Vietnam. Every time Vietnamese forces got into a major engagement with the US they were completely destroyed.

I guess Vietnam is a clear example of how winning battles some times isnt enough.

Answer 5

The primary reason we lost in Viet Nam was that we were trying to re-fight the Korean War. In that conflict the North Koreans lost their Chinese backing and were forced to call a truce. The war itself has never ended which is why we still maintain a presence there. In Viet Nam, due to the guerrilla nature of the enemy tactics and the resulting lack of any clear military targets we were unable to define any achievable military objectives, only a political one, i.e. "Wait long enough and the other side will agree to a compromise." Eventually, the voters got tired of the body count and forced a withdrawal. With this clear precedent, the enemy in Iraq knows there is need to defeat us militarily, only to prolong the pain until the voters lose heart, as they are successfully doing.
As a career man who was on active duty during both Nam and Desert Storm (I retired in '92), the son, grandson, great-grandson, nephew, brother, father, and father-in-law of people who served or are serving in the U.S. Military, I neither saw nor see anything "throw-away" about the people with whom I, or any of us, served. The men and women who choose to serve their countrymen, abroad in the military or at home, such as the Emergency Service and Law Enforcement personnel, remain the truest examples of what it means to be a citizen of the U.S.A.

Answer 6

My mother would disagree. She contends that most of America's good men were devoured physically and psychologically by the jungles of Southeast Asia.

America chose to half fight an undeclared war against a people whom posed no threat to our freedom as a guise. A guise for profiteering and ego trips.

America hasn't been the same since. In this day and age something is beginning to sound rather familiar.

Answer 7

Being that I am a Vietnam Veteran, I take great umbrage at that remark. I certainly don't consider myself, or any of the troops I served with as throw-aways. We lost in Vietnam because we lost the will to finish what we started. I believe a great number of the people who protested just didn't want to participate.

Answer 8

I don't really need to see the text to know that this isn't the only reason why we lost.

We lost because the U.S. forgot what had been winning wars in the past. We won wars through propaganda. When Americans at home are convinced that they are on the 'righteous' side of a war, they stand behind it. Vietnam came at a time when social change was sweeping the nation, and Americans were tired of labeling every Communist government 'evil'. It just didn't make sense to have American boys dying on foriegn soil when the natives didn't even seem to want freedom. Our government did a poor job of 'selling' the war.

If you haven't seen the ranks of our current Army, I can assure you that, although they may be more willing, they are still the 'throw-aways' of society. The well-educated soldiers are few and far between, no matter what you see on T.V.

Answer 9

There were many mistakes made, including far too many draft deferrments for the wealthy.
Second mistake: We trained Ho Chi Minh ourselves, to fight the Japanese.
Third mistake: Americans have never learned how to fight Asians in their own manner. We probably never will.
We allowed Kerry and Fonda to give aid and comfort to the enemy, and did not hang them as traitors, which any other country would have done.
We did not have popular support at home, which is necessary.
We forgot the old saying that the simple things are always important and the important things are always simple.

(Sorry, but I just deleted a large portion of the list of mistakes. Perhaps some of them are being made in Iraq and I do not wish to give al qaeda any ideas.)

Answer 10

this is a very sad commentary

yes there were men who became addicted or criminals or homeless, but who knows what they personally went through

tragedy affects everyone differently

a tragedy in my life made me and one of my sisters more determined...it made my youngest sister into a victim or rather she did it to herself, based on the tragedy

but by and large, most of them men and women who were in that conflict were good people...

i keep stressing that people were poorer then because advances have been made in upward mobility for lower classes since that time

the farm guy whose people may have been destitute probably is able to go to college now

my dad grew up in East Texas on a farm with 8 brothers and sisters and he was very very poor but still a good person when he went, just an ordinary guy with an ordinary position

there weren't as many good psychology programs for veterans and active duty people or integrated religious and psychology programs

the people there were seeing horrible things (yes horrible things are seen in ANY war) and needed some coping mechanisms in some cases

the men and women were human beings, some with more frailties than others, and they DO NOT deserve to be insulted this way