Observations on Iraq and Vietnam

Jazz has a post at Running Scared and The Left Right Debate on the marine who allegedly shot a wounded prisoner in the head. It is a rebuttal to this right side post at the Left Right Debate. What this incident points out are the similarities between the Iraq and Vietnam conflicts. Although I was in the military during Vietnam I never served there. I did however come in close contact with men who did, both before and after their Vietnam service. The one thing that stood out was their dislike of the Vietnamese and that was the result of never knowing who the enemy was. We have reached the point in Iraq where the majority see the US as an occupier, an enemy.

Everyone knows there were atrocities committed in Vietnam. You put good people in a situation where there lives are constantly threatened and they don't know who the enemy is they will do bad things. That was true in Vietnam and it's true in Iraq today. The Theocons tell us not to compare Iraq to Vietnam. How can we not compare them, the conditions are the same. In Vietnam we burned villages to the ground to "save" them. In Iraq we destroy cities to "save" them. In Vietnam the young man you gave candy to in the morning would try to shoot you in the afternoon. In Iraq the children you give candy to in the morning will cheer the people who try to blow you up in the afternoon. I can't help but think that Iraq will turn out like Vietnam for the Americans and yes like Afghanistan for the Russians. And don't forget the beginning of the end for the old Soviet Empire was not a speech by Ronald Reagan but the war in Afghanistan. The responsibility for atrocities ultimately lies not with the good men who do bad things but the people who put them in a bad place.