Truthout: Going in Circles: Vietnam, Iraq, Calls for Impeachment

Going in Circles: Vietnam, Iraq, Calls for Impeachment
By Steve Hammons
t r u t h o u t | Guest Contributor

Tuesday 16 January 2007

The recent passing of former President Gerald Ford reminds us of the idea that, in sometimes unusual ways, events in life seem to move in circles and patterns.

Ford entered the presidency when US involvement in Vietnam was deemed a lost cause and the American people and Congress demanded an end to the bloodshed.

With a steady hand, Ford facilitated the final withdrawal.

Prior to this stage in the Vietnam War, some US officials kept thinking that if they just added more troops, there would be "victory" and "success." After more than 58,000 US military deaths and many more wounded, maimed and damaged veterans, the war seemed to be going worse than ever.

The deaths of, and injury to, innocent Vietnamese civilians, of course, far exceeded even this tragic number of US casualties.

Circles of War

As the futility of the Vietnam effort became obvious, a stepped-up training program for South Vietnam's military was implemented by President Richard Nixon. US troops would hand over more responsibility and bases to them under the plan called "Vietnamization."

How similar this all is to the situation we face in Iraq now.

In Vietnam and Iraq, we tried to occupy a country that posed minimal threat to the US. We waged a counterinsurgency effort against adequately skilled, motivated and well-supplied fighters who did not want us occupying their land. We tried to prop up a weak and corrupt foreign government that we had helped to install.

The circle has come around again in frightening and depressing ways, complete with thousands of US troops and innocent civilians (including children) dead and horribly injured, war profiteers getting rich, and America's reputation in the world severely damaged.

We also have a US administration, like the Nixon administration, that has lost the trust of most of the people and the Congress, and which strikes many as being out of touch with reality and dangerous.

Now, as in the days when Nixon was leaving the presidency and Ford assumed office, Congress is trying to take responsibility to resolve a difficult and poorly thought-out war of choice, waged in an apparently incompetent way. ......(more)

The complete article is at: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/011607D.shtml