The Unreported Vietnam-Iraq Parallel

The Unreported Vietnam-Iraq Parallel

Danny Schechter, CommonDreams.org

Published on Sunday, May 1, 2005 by

There is a word missing in most of the coverage of Iraq. It's a ghost-laden word that conjures up distressing memories that Washington and most of our media prefer to keep in that proverbial "lock box," hidden away in dusty archives and footage libraries. The word is Vietnam.


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Here are some of the largely ignored parallels:

l. Both wars were illegal acts of pre-emptive aggression unsanctioned by international law or world opinion. Earlier, U.S. interventions involved successive US administrations. JFK's CIA helped put Saddam in power, Reagan armed him to fight Iran. George Bush, 41 led the first Gulf War against him. Clinton tightened sanctions. George Bush, 43 invaded again. Five Administrations--Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon and Ford fought in Vietnam.

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6. Illegal weapons were "deployed" in both wars. The US dropped napalm, used cluster bombs against civilians and sprayed toxic agent orange in Vietnam. Cluster bombs and updated Mark 77 napalm-like firebombs were dropped on Iraqis. Depleted uranium was added to the arsenal of prohibited weapons in Iraq.

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10. Both wars took place in countries with cultures we never understood or spoke the language, Both involved "insurgents" whose military prowess was underestimated and misrepresented. In Vietnam, we called the "enemy" communists; in Iraq we call them foreign terrorists. (Soldiers had their own terms, "gooks" in Vietnam, "ragheads" in Iraq) In both counties, they was in fact an indigenous resistance that enjoyed popular support. (Both targeted and brutalized people they considered collaborators with the invaders just as our own Revolution went after Americans who backed the British.) In both wars, as in all wars, innocent civilians died in droves.

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0501-32.htm

BushCo learned its lessons from Vietnam. For the Iraq invasion, they learned to:

1) Control the media
2) Control access to body counts
3) Control protests
4) Control popular music
5) Control Congress