Was the Vietnam War a "Holy War?"

I wasn't around for Vietnam, but I don't remember hearing that it had religious overtones. Maybe it did. Now we have a president who early on "mentioned" a Crusade and is supported by fundamentalist Christians; a president who believes he was appointed by God. We have a general making speeches about how his God is better than their God.

They have their own radical elements inside the Islamic faith and use this for political gain. Did Vietnam have this "clash" of faiths in the mix?

Can't forget those "Godless" commies.

By the way, I wonder what happened to all those evangelicals who were ready to enter Iraq to preach the word of God?

at least not the way the way bush has made it. johnson and nixon didn`t think that god told them to wage a holy war. yes the commies were godless but no one saw the war that way-well a few did.

a HOLY MESS!

If anything, it was the most secular of wars.

Oh my name it is nothin'
My age it means less
The country I come from
Is called the Midwest
I's taught and brought up there
The laws to abide
And that land that I live in
Has God on its side.

Oh the history books tell it
They tell it so well
The cavalries charged
The Indians fell
The cavalries charged
The Indians died
Oh the country was young
With God on its side.

Oh the Spanish-American
War had its day
And the Civil War too
Was soon laid away
And the names of the heroes
I's made to memorize
With guns in their hands
And God on their side.

Oh the First World War, boys
It closed out its fate
The reason for fighting
I never got straight
But I learned to accept it
Accept it with pride
For you don't count the dead
When God's on your side.

When the Second World War
Came to an end
We forgave the Germans
And we were friends
Though they murdered six million
In the ovens they fried
The Germans now too
Have God on their side.

I've learned to hate Russians
All through my whole life
If another war starts
It's them we must fight
To hate them and fear them
To run and to hide
And accept it all bravely
With God on my side.

But now we got weapons
Of the chemical dust
If fire them we're forced to
Then fire them we must
One push of the button
And a shot the world wide
And you never ask questions
When God's on your side.

In a many dark hour
I've been thinkin' about this
That Jesus Christ
Was betrayed by a kiss
But I can't think for you
You'll have to decide
Whether Judas Iscariot
Had God on his side.

So now as I'm leavin'
I'm weary as Hell
The confusion I'm feelin'
Ain't no tongue can tell
The words fill my head
And fall to the floor
If God's on our side
He'll stop the next war.

If you worship corporate nationalism, then it was a holy war. The film "the quiet american" is insightful if you care to see it.

Why we entered vietnam i'll never know for sure, there are several reasons/theories:

1. Vietnam was deemed a strategic supply of rubber, like iraq is oil, and if it fell to "the enemy" as in soviet communism, then we would have a hard time making tyres... and though by the time the conflict excalated, we had developed petrochemical replacements to rubber plant, it was too late and we were in the swamp up to our necks.

2. We took over from the french who simply did not have the spine to keep vietnam FREE. We took over, 'cuz inside of every gook is a democrat waitin' ta get out. quote from a texas vet i roomed with who slept with a 45 under his pillow.

3. Vietnam was percieved as the key to southeast asia, and if it fell, we could write off cambodia, laos, and even thailand and burma... and ironically, this has proven strangely sorta true, and sorta not... just the american way of winning over hearts and minds by killing people is sooooo mongolian, that few hearts were won. Had we spend the money on gifts and trade, likely the entire place would be entirely different.

4. Vietnam was a communist test of american willinness to extend global power across the pacific, and if it fell, it threatened the sability of american allies from taiwan to south korea who depended on american military muscle and our willingness to use it to keep the soviet menace at bay.... uuuhh? beavis... that wuz coooool.

God knows why we were there, but whatever reason you hear. Its a lie.

Evangelical christianity was very small then and pretty much confined to the South

deeper and more personal.

with VietNam. Don't mistake me, religion figured in to it. We appointed a Catholic ruler in a 80% Buddhist country. Buddhists immolated themselves in protest. The religious "clash" in Viet Nam had to do with the fact that America refused to acknowledge the faith of the VietNamese people.

A month later our Catholic ruler (JFK) was assassinated (by the CIA?). October-November 1963. Diem/Kennedy. Neither was, by any exterior manifestation, a religious zealot.