Why Iraq Can't Be VietnamBecause if we let it happen,
future terrorists will learn a lesson from it.
In a letter to his top deputy in Iraq, Al Qaeda's No. 2 leader said the United States "ran and left their agents" in Vietnam and the jihadists must have a plan ready to fill the void if the Americans suddenly leave Iraq.
"Things may develop faster than we imagine," Aymen al-Zawahiri (search) wrote in a letter to his top deputy in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (search). "The aftermath of the collapse of American power in Vietnam — and how they ran and left their agents — is noteworthy. ... We must be ready starting now."The comparisons to Vietnam have been rather upsetting to me. Like many in the blogosphere, including
Neo-neocon and the guys at
Power Line, I came of age during the war in Southeast Asia. My parents were active in the antiwar movement, working on both the McCarthy 1968 and McGovern 1972 campaigns. I chipped in (mostly stuffing envelopes and distributing fliers from door-to-door), and became radicalized while watching the images of the Chicago convention.
But unlike a lot of the 1960s' folk, I have always been willing to reexamine things I did as a youth in light of later experience, and fresh information. As a youngster I believed it when anitwar leaders said that the Vietnamese people didn't really care which side won, they just wanted the war to end. But the million or so boat people who fled the communists convinced me that was not the case. The communists claimed that they would improve the lives of the people, but as time went by it became clear that this was not happening. And the horrors of the reeducation camps and the killing fields in Cambodia showed that the pro-war folks were right when they said that the enemies we faced over there were evil.
And I began to see that many of the other antiwar folks were not willing to reexamine things in the light of later knowledge. Some were simply unable to question what had been such a defining moment in their lives, and I can sympathize with them. It isn't easy to conclude you were fooled about something in which you believed passionately.
As a result, I have been particularly harsh towards those who did the fooling. I am willing to forgive the leaders of the antiwar movement who have seen the error of their ways, like David Horowitz and Peter Collier. I am willing to forgive Mark Rudd of SDS, who apparently is a math teacher in New Mexico and thoroughly embarrassed by his past radicalism.
But those who continue to dupe others, like Tom Hayden, Jane Fonda, Todd Gitlin, and John Kerry? Un-uh. They've got to be opposed with everything we've got. This was a big part of why I started the Kerry Haters blog. I now knew Kerry was a scuzzball, and I was determined that everybody else should learn it.
And it was through KH that I learned something new. We began to attract many Vietnam veterans as readers, and they sent me emails and posted comments. And the one common thread that I began hearing was concern for their South Vietnamese friends and allies. What happened to the young soldiers they had trained and fought alongside? What happened to the girls in the bar, the government officials, the local police? Had they drowned like thousands of others, in the mass exodus of the boat people? Had they died in a "re-education" camp?
Watching the antiwar movement this time around, I feel like Marty McFly from
Back to the Future. I've seen this movie before and I don't like the way it turned out. I recognize now that many of the people in charge of this movement are just like the folks in charge of the 1960s movement. Some are dupes and some are malevolent. And sadly, they want the same thing that their predecessors wanted; an end to US involvement.
But what would be the result of Cindy Sheehan's fondest wish, an immediate withdrawal? Much the same things that happened in Vietnam--a purge of all those who cooperated with the US. Perhaps mercifully, the followers of radical Islam do not believe in re-education camps; decapitation obviates the need.
