Without Mentioning 'Tet', WSJ Invokes It

By Meteor Blades

A few days ago, in his column Barney and Baghdad, Thomas Friedman compared Iraq's bloody October with the 1968 Tet offensive in Vietnam. There was follow-up from Tony Snow and Mister Bush. Tet's shock to middle America's psyche, Washington's propagandists and the U.S. military arguably affected the country in a way not seen since Custer left his presidential ambitions leaking into the dust of Medicine Tail Coulee. Although another 34,000 Americans and 2-3 million Southeast Asians would die first, Tet ultimately led to the withdrawal of U.S. troops and a defeat that still divides the nation.

Out of this came the "Vietnam Syndrome," and an American version of Germany's post-World War I stab-in-the-back theory - that is, traitors in the media and the streets  caused the U.S. to lose a war that could easily have been won with a different, more aggressive strategy. Tet, they argued, had been a military disaster for Hanoi and the National Liberation Front, the latter being permanently crippled. But the naive and treasonous on the homefront had allowed them to win the propaganda battle, which had been General Giap's and the NLF's real objective all along. In other words, in the parlance of the time, radical-liberals wimped out, forcing what amounted to an uncalled-for surrender. About the time this myth was being crafted, nascent neo-conservatives began their plans to ensure this never happened again.

The WSJ has made a pre-emptive strike this morning against what we might call "Tet syndrome" without ever mentioning it.

Yes, the Iraq project is difficult, and its outcome dangerously uncertain. The Bush Administration and its military generals have so far failed to stem insurgent attacks or pacify Baghdad, and the factions comprising Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government have so far failed to make essential political compromises. But the American response to this should be to change military tactics or deployments until they do succeed, and to reassure Iraqi leaders that their hard political choices will result in U.S. support, not precipitous withdrawal.

The current American panic, by contrast, is precisely what the insurgents intend with their surge of October violence. The Baathists and Sadrists can read the U.S. political calendar, and they'd like nothing better than to feed the perception that the violence is intractable. They want our election to be perceived as a referendum on Iraq that will speed the pace of American withdrawal.

The "panic" here didn't start in October. There were, after all, 2948 Coalition troops and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis already dead by September 30. There were already 1.3 million Iraqis in exile in Syria, Jordan and elsewhere. Half a million or so displaced inside Iraq. Maybe 50% unemployed. Three hours of electricity a day, even in Baghdad. $6300 a second spent on the war. And that's the short list.

And while every terrorist success is broadcast far and wide, acts of bravery by Iraqi forces go unheralded. Only 10 days ago, insurgents staged a huge attack on government and police offices in Mosul, but it was successfully repulsed by Iraqi forces. Dozens of insurgents were killed or captured, and one heroic Iraqi police officer gave his life successfully defending others against a suicide truck bomber.

See. It's the damned media. Previous failure to report on painted schools - many of them now half-empty because parents fear to send their children to class - has now become the failure to report body counts of enemy dead, a grisly - and usually exaggerated - tally that was popular among the Pentagon's light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel-crowd in the Vietnam era, too.

To remedy what the Journal's editors call a "false picture of what's happening in Iraq" painted by the critics, all that's required is reporting of good news, some tweaking of tactics and perhaps some elevation of "force levels." Two generations ago, Americans got earfuls of that kind of crap.

Comments

[freepatriot]

So why didn't presnit george come up with a plan to avoid the pitfalls of Vietnam ???

it's not like "Vietnam Syndrome" is an "Unknown Unknown" ???

george is the "decider", why didn't he decide to come up with a plan for dealing with "Vietnam Syndrome" ???

now you begin to understand why all of george's excuses fail to fly

Vietnam occured DURING MY LIFETIME

we ain't talking about ancient history here

[lizard]

There were a number of "lessons" learned from vietnam. We may not, Freepatriot, be talking about ancient history, but we are certainly talking about confused history.

Liberals and antiwar folk learned a very important lesson: It Ain't The Soldiers Fault. That is why we see no crowds of protestors shouting "Babykiller!" and throwing feces at returning soldiers. Perhaps this will lessen the trauma of veterans returning from combat somewhat.

Another lesson we could have drawn from Vietnam (and many of us did ) is Government Lies Breed Domestic Distrust. Clearly Bush didn't learn it, but then, wasnt he drinking heavily and pretending to be a pilot during Vietnam?

Chimpo the Cheerleader-in-chief seems to have leared the lesson (probably by proxy, I think Dick might have been paying attention)that we "lost" the Vietnam War because the citizens, those lefty-limp wussies, didnt have the moral fortitude to watch the body count rise daily, see the body bags being unloaded and carry on undeterred.

The lesson THEY learned from Vietnam is that we "lost" because we could not control the thoughts and expressions of our citizens, and because the governemnt payed too much attention to the aforementioned citizens, and lost it's will to victory. We didn't stay-the-course enough.

It has yet to occur to them that we lost in Vietnam because we FOUGHT in Vietnam. And we are going to lose in Iraq because we are FIGHTING in Iraq.

[Beel]

The Deciderer didn't know about the Vietnam Syndrome because he didn't know about Tet or much of anything, even tho he was in the National Guard at the time. He knew to keep his head down.

[Jim E.]

"We see no crowds of protestors shouting 'Babykiller!' and throwing feces at returning soldiers."

Citation for "crowds" of people doing either of these things during the Vietnam era? (I'm surprised you didn't add spitting while you were at it.)

[Jodi]

In business, in corporate America, in many places, there are de facto rules.

Don't say you are sorry.
Don't say you made a mistake.
Don't say we were wrong.

Only the worst circumstances bring about a change in adherence to those rules, because these rules "rule" while "coming up," "gaining power or office or rank or position."

Yes, there are mea culpa's, but these usually occur only when the bodies are piled up in the streets.

And in politics, with the video bites, the audio bites, the horrible nasty attack ads, it is even more ironclad.

Vietnam, and Iraq themselves are quite different, except for the Governments refusal to look logically at the situations and redress mistakes. There both are very similar.

[Carl_W_Goss]

If it were up to the editorial staff of the WSJ, the US would stay in Iraq indefinitely.

Which, I'm beginning to believe, is what the Neocons secretely want. The situation is certainly working out to favor such an approach.

It works like this:

US policy in Iraq causes a civil war, the civil war starts spreading, the native government's security forces can't deal with it. That means, of course, that Washington must use more US troops to deal with the situation. This leads to still more strife and bloodshed; more and more blood and treasure invested in a losing proposition, which leads to still more US forces being sent to deal with the situation and so forth.

Meanwhile, the politicians in Washington, having bought into Neocon delusions as some sort of secular gospel, cannot extricate themselves from the situation. Instead they keep repeating catchphrases such as "cut and run" or "stay the course" or "we'll stand down with the Iraqis stand up" --that sort of nonsense, as a way of dealing with the increasing frustration and anger felt by most Americans.

And so it goes, deeper and deeper into the big muddy, until one day the US finds itself a Raj running an Iraq which is little more than a puppet of the US. Something similar to what the Brits did with Egypt from about 1880 till the end of World War II.

[gregdn]

Right on about the 'stab in the back' theory. You'd be surprised how many kids who weren't even born during Vietnam parrot that line.
It absolves the people who start wars from any fault when they fail.

[CharleyCarp]

Isn't it kind of silly for a nationally read newspaper to be complaining about the media?

[readerOfTeaLeaves]

The WSJ expresses views that are consistent with the interests of those who profit from large military contracts, whose financial interests are served by continued war.

Before anyone starts a war, they need to ask one question:"Is this worth asking someone to die for?" Sometimes, that answer turns out to be 'yes.' The answer was 'yes' in 1942. It should have been 'no' in 2003.

Cheney, Rummy, Addington, Bush -- all of whom failed to fulfill their own obligations for national service -- all thought they knew better than Shinseki. And Congress turned a blind eye. This has to be absolutely THE WORST Congress in the history of the United States.

I hope that I never meet Cindy Sheehan. I would not know what to say to her. I have a cousin who's son was seriously wounded in Iraq. I hope the Bu$hCo bastards see the full weight of the law brought to bear on them. Because that's what my cousin's kid thought that he was fighting for.

Too bad the WSJ can't figure it out. It's really quite simple.

[Jodi]

Cindy Sheehan.

She is a mother that lost her son. That is a terrible tragedy.

But what is forgotten is that her son was proud to serve, as were many that have died. All reports indicate that her son thought that what he was called on to do was worthy.

Men/women are lost in every conflict. Men were lost in Somalia. Should mothers hate Clinton for that. For the mistakes?

readerOfTeaLeaves, you did you homework on
General Eric K. Shinseki. My father knew him. He stated more men would be needed. The tragedy of this war is that Bush decided that if he only used the strike force to occupy the country, he could get his tax cut. Yes others were there backing up that decision, but it was Bush's. He is the President.

As for whether we go to war or not, we elect the President, and the Congress, and the soldiers obey their oath. It must be that way or the system fails.

When my father extended to aid the Iraqi effort, he told my mother "it is a soldiers duty to be there for his country for his fellow soldiers. And without duty, a soldier is nothing more than a rough dangerous man."

A part of that also was that my brother was in Afghanistan, and my oldest brother was gearing up to go to Iraq. My father wanted to be there, in case he was needed, not at home waiting to hear something

(I am crying

[Buttwizer]

The Bay of Pigs, the Vietnam war, Somalia & presently Iraq. All these sums up to one thing, those pencil-pushers in the Whitehouse & DoD micro-managed the actual situations in ground zero, without being at ground-zero itself! Armchair generals, they are.

Setting aside Iraq for the meantime, let's review the record in Afghanistan. If not for the early shift of Bush's war machine into Iran, if not for enjoining Nato & other Allies' commitment early on, at best the Afghan War can be categorized as 'half-full/half-empty'. And as of today, the prestige of leading that war was still an American general. The score... still 'half-full/half-empty'. Have US of A subdued those Talibans? Is Afghanistan been safe or hospitable for its whole territory? Can Karzai run his country without round-the-clock protection from his paid foreign bodyguards?

On Iraq then, let's not talk about Saddam's Sunni surrogates. What about the Shites' Sadr-Mehdis' private army? Had US of A been able to integrate them into the national Iraqi Army? Who effectively are running Sadr City? Isn't it the same situation like Afghanistan, half-full/Hhalf-empty?