"Remember Maggie Haberman, right? Y'all remember the Maggie Haberman who allowed Hillary Clinton to literally tie her up with a rope, correct? Y'all remember the Maggie Haberman who was caught red-handed via WikiLeaks as Hillary's secret operative at the New York Times, right? Y'all remember the Maggie Haberman who attacked everyday people as a means to protect her Precious Barry, right? Well, now you are gunna remember Maggie Haberman as a Platinum Member of the Russian Retraction Society.In yet another one of her overlong, leftwing diatrabes disguised as journalism, The Worst Journalist In The World attacks-attacks-attacks Trump, and does so sounding much more like a jilted girlfriend than anything resembling a reporter. There is just one problem… Because Haberman is nothing close to a journalist, she fell for one of those fake news, Internet canards about "17 WHOLE intelligence agencies believing Russia interfered with the American presidential election!"
Imagine that, 17; 17 intelligence agencies! A whole 17!
Except, nope. That number is not only untrue, it is not even close to true.
Wanna know what the true number is?
Four.
Yep, 4." dailywire
——————
Actually Jimmy the Clap (Clapper) under pressure from Republican members of Congress admitted that the non-paper had been coordinated with only three members of the IC: FBI (Comey), NSA (Rogers), and CIA (Brennan). Clapper and Brennan evidently could not get the concurrence of any of the other agencies: Army, Treasury, Energy, etc. They could not get the concurrence of DIA and State INR. Did that slow up the MSM, NY Times, the 24/7 propagandists like Joe and Mika? It did not. Their program is to restore the revolution for which Obama and HC were enablers. To do that they will lie, omit salient facts from the news and persecute all those who do not share their fanatic leftist dreams.
DJT is giving them ammunition on a daily basis through the twitted evidence of his emotional and developmental maladies.
God help us. pl
http://www.dailywire.com/news/18162/another-day-another-russia-retraction-%E2%80%94-time-john-nolte
New Ken Burns 18 hour documentary on Vietnam war
“It was really profound to begin to appreciate the scale of tragedy there, the scale of loss. I think Americans understandably focus on the 58,000-plus Americans who lost their lives in the war, which was a tragedy for the families involved and there’s no way to make that up to them, but when you go to Vietnam you begin to understand that a country of 30 million lost as many as 3 million people; that’s 10% of the population. What that means is that everyone you meet knows somebody who died … Every single person you ask says, ‘Oh, my uncle, my cousin, my neighbour, my niece’ – someone they knew personally died. So the weight of that for a country, for a people, is indescribable. Feeling it over time is a profound thing.”
“At every intersection, there was the explosion of myth, there was the humiliation of being just dead wrong about what we thought had happened.
“The Vietnam war drove a stake right into the heart of America.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/jul/01/ken-burns-america-foreign-policy
Trump’s tweets might be cringe-worthy but they are also exposing the fake media’s chronic phoniness.
Why does poor Mika get more attention then the millions of people who have been forced out of Syria due to Hillary’s war?
Why is the media more concerned about psycho Joe than the Saudis attacks on Yemen?
It’s not really a “media” at all, its a plaything for the rich to attack their enemies.
makelovenotwar
How about all the Vietnamese who died fighting the communists? you make it sound like we Americans killed all those who died. How about all the Vietnamese murdered by communist agitprop cadres to maintain control in villages? How about the millions who fled the country rather than live under communism. You are a true communist sympathizer. pl
The science of influence has progressed significantly in the last few decades. Big data mining has provided a great deal of information on how memes propagate and how to exploit them commercially and politically. Democrats have seized on the “Russians did it” but Trump also exploited the visceral, and correct, notion that the coastal elites were aligned against him. Had Trump lost there would now be foment about how the MSM elites stole the election.
The techie elites created the social media revolution and now look on the baby they created as a monster. Project Veritas, as partisan as it is, accurately captured and publicized the thinking of CNN and shows how dysfunctional things currently are. And DJT is playing into their hands. I suspect a significant component of DJT’s behavior is learned from his experience in Reality TV programming. Reality shows emphasize voyeuristic and boorish behavior. DJT is not only intuitively using what worked in that stage of his career, and it has magnified his worst instincts.
My major concern is that DJT’s traits make him highly manipulable.
Here is an article by Robert Parry about the New York Times retraction which admitted that the so-called “report” about alleged Russian hacking of e-mails was not a product of all 16 or 17 intelligence departments–
https://consortiumnews.com/2017/06/29/nyt-finally-retracts-russia-gate-canard/
SST looked in detail at the DNI report alluding to the FBI, CIA, and NSA back on 9 January 2017–
http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2017/01/httpwwwtheamericanconservativecomarticlesno-smoking-gun-on-russia-hack.html
The AP also jsut admitted that the 17 agency claptrap was a lie:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_TRUMP_RUSSIA?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2017-06-30-17-32-29
/quote/
Clarification: Trump-Russia stories
The Associated Press reported that all 17 U.S. intelligence agencies have agreed that Russia tried to influence the 2016 election to benefit Donald Trump. That assessment was based on information collected by three agencies – the FBI, CIA and National Security Agency – and published by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which represents all U.S. intelligence agencies. Not all 17 intelligence agencies were involved in reaching the assessment.
/endquote/
At least AP got the 3 agency thing right. The NYT counts the DNI as an agency which is wrong.
Some of the “17 agencies” people then come up and say “But I mean that October thing the “whole intelligence community” put out through DHS. But that DHS paper was written by only 2 agencies.
Right now the irRussianal “resistance” is trying to make something up about an old Republican donor, now dead, who tried to find “hackers” who had the 30,000 emails from Clinton’s email sever that were not published. He claimed that he knew General Flynn or at least his son. The WSJ has two pieces about it full of “Russia” stuff but there is no Russia at all in the factual case.
One of the involved persons describes here what it did. His piece mentions Russia 21(!) times including in the headline even though the person admits that it has no idea if Russia was involved at all. There is zero evidence that it had anything to do with the issue or the people involved.
https://lawfareblog.com/time-i-got-recruited-collude-russians
Mika was appointed. We just don’t have term limits or consent when it comes to news corps who can do what they like on a public license.
With all due respect, that was NOT my statement, that was a direct quote from Ken Burns, please read the linked story. Maybe you think Ken Burns is a “true communist sympathizer”?
Before it gives anybody ideas, let it be known that said donor died of lung cancer and it is not a suspicious death.
makelovenotwar
Ken Burns is a “precious” little s–t like you except he probably doesn’t live in New York City. You think you are clever in claiming to merely quote Burns. Another tricky lefty heard from. You went out of your way to put this on the post abt the perfidious lying of people like you. Get lost. pl
Perhaps I am reading too much into these two articles, but it looks like Koch brothers have decided to back Trump in a big way.
Can this be linked to the run of retractions?
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-koch-idUSKBN19I137
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-super-pacs-idUSKBN19J2GI
I may be wrong, but as I recall the NSA only had “moderate confidence” about RussiaGate – which since as Bill Binny points out they’re the ones most likely to know if any of this was conducted over the Internet, if they only have “moderate confidence”, they likely really mean they have “no confidence.”
I’ve long thought that if Russia really wanted to do a serious hacking penetration of an organization here in the US, they wouldn’t use the Internet at all, but actual in-country spies using a combination of physical and wireless penetration methods which the NSA couldn’t detect at all.
As an aside, I’d love to see Anna Chapman back in the US for any reason. 🙂 Her crew of spies illustrate the point (except they got caught.)
The bulk of the MSM definitely has some explaining to do and retraction isn’t enough. They owe an explanation. Then they can explain thir stories about the Russians hacking the French, Canadian, British and one of the North European states elections. A true story on the lead up and results of the Ukrainian election would be in order and they can also come clean on the last internationally monitored election in Syria. (Not holding my breath)
But I would still like to know what the FBI, CIA, NSA and DNI are saying and why they are saying it. If they don’t stand by the hacking story lets know that. If they do lets know that as well.
Trump is a mad genius. A fool sent by Providence to take down the New World Order. With his antics, he is destroying the aura of the media, while at the same time destroying the aura of the presidency. He is emptying the reputation of the Deep State and making a mockery of American Exceptionalism. The idea that the American president has a God-given right to decide the fate of other countries (in the name of democracy) is no more. A humbled America is what the world needs.
…”Brevity is the soul of wit”.. Well done. :).
Whether it was yours or Burns you quoted it which violates the sanctity of the American Soldier who served at that time. Ask any adult alive at that time and they can tell you the stories of the guy that sat next to them in home room, was on the same sports team, caddied for so and so’ s son who went to West Point, the screwup down the street etc. who did not come home or the many times they went through the hundred bed gauntlet to find their friend or neighbor whose guts were pushed back in and sewn up. Never mind the mental anguish of those who returned like my buddy who got two Bronze Stars while assigned to graves detail or mortuary duty the man was never right again and left us early like many others. Me I didn’t go nor was I called but that is my problem to dwell on.
Have not seen this Burns show but those losses are still skin deep.
Dear Colonel,
Hmmm not sure how I missed the vietnam war in your briefing, even though Ir ead it twice.
Perhaps consider not posting OT comments (or way OT topic).
Why does it matter whether it is one intelligence agency or 17? Should the Office of Naval Intelligence have to concur with a finding of Russian interference in an election for the finding to be credible?
Colonel,
http://original.antiwar.com/justin/2017/06/27/vladimir-putin-suitor-spurned/
Vladimir Putin: A Suitor Spurned
Oliver Stone’s The Putin Interviews reveals a pro-American Putin disdained by Washington
IMHO the leftist leadership has finally realized this dog won’t hunt anymore. So, they are quietly abandoning the Russiaphobia and now attacked from a new front by pushing the narrative Trump is insane and must be removed for psychological reasons using the 25th Amendment. These idiots fail to realize Pence would be an even worse disaster than Trump. If they remove Pence then they get Ryan who is even worse than Trump.
I believe the American people spoke loudly and clearly by electing Trump that Clinton was such a horrible candidate and even a bad choice like Trump was better than a demonstrable monster. However, he was an unknown and the voters rolled the dice figuring he can’t be any worse than her. So far i is a wash but I suspect things would be far worse for the US if she was in office. But, the Democrats just can’t accept that which is going to cost them the next 2 elections.
To be fair, there has never been a true communist government anywhere yet. The closest anyone got was extreme autocratic socialism. They may call themselves communists but it is always unequal and no one has ever established a communist government that would meet Marx’s definition (my Russian wife makes this point often and she is distantly related to Marx). I believe communism just like capitalism will never actually exist in the real sense nor can it because of the human nature for greed and power. They are merely philosophical mind experiments. It will always boil down to the few leading the many ( what we call the 0.1% now) regardless of the label used to define a given government style. Those in power are always loathe to leave. I suspect that democracy falls into the same problem and also doesn’t exist anywhere.
The figures were worse for Russia in WWII. Far worse. They won the war for us at great cost.
A Serious Case of Mistaken Identity
The U.S. is not the ‘indispensable nation,’ as a growing WWII mythology would suggest.
BENJAMIN SCHWARZ, Editor, Atlantic Magazine
This was an LA Time Op-Ed.
Every year on May 9, millions of Russians take to the streets carrying pictures of those they lost. Including Putin. Sombre day.
http://articles.latimes.com/2000/jun/22/local/me-43656
Our soldiers aren’t trained to run therapy groups. They are trained to know who they are fighting, be better than them, smarter, more pragmatic, and kill them. Nothing less. That’s the nature of war.
except he probably doesn’t live in New York City.
No, but he was born there. His ass is parked in Maine or New Hampshah I think.
My own view on why the Vietnam war ended as it did:
1) The hybrid Nationalist/Communist nature of North Vietnam:
Ho Chi Minh racked up some sizeable nationalist credentials on his own right.
Unifying Vietnam was a nationalist core tenet anyway.
Difference between ethnic Vietnamese in the North and the South existed, but were not sufficiently large to create distinct ethnic identities.
In addition, given that China was/is/will be the largest threat to Vietnamese statehood, the North offered both the capacity to deterr China via its alliance with the Soviet Union (whats not to like about a great power that borders your largest threat but is too far away to actually control you?) while also being able to engage with it diplomatically (where the Soviets could, play a role of Vietnams lawyer).
While Ho desired good relations with the USA, one could easily argue that the USSR was a better choice of ally for Vietnam.
One should note that the Soviets provided considerable support to Vietnam in Vietnams 1979 war with China, and well as to the Vietnamese liberation from Cambodia against the Khmer Rouge (imho one of the few just wars in the last centuries).
2: North Vietnam being able to play off China against the Soviet Union and thus being more able to maintain its agency.
Basically, the more independent an actor is, the more efficient he tends to be. North Vietnam had 2 foreign backers, and was able to play them against each other and thus avoided becoming overly dependent on one of them. This was quite important for the internal perception of legitimacy.
South Vietnam meanwhile was increasingly reliant on just the USA in all manner of ways, this lead to a point where currying favor with the USA was often a way forward in South Vietnamese politics. South Vietnam was a puppet/protectorate/vasall (its state oscillated considerably) while North Vietnam was a pretty independent client. Puppets fight worse then mostly independent states.
3: Luck of leadership:
Both Ho and Giap were surprisingly competent. While Diem was imho better then his reputation, South Vietnamese leadership was simply less able.
4: American mistakes and misconceptions:
The most prominent here were:
A) Failure to exploit ruptures within the communist camp. Treating USSR and China as a monolith was quite inept. Likewise, the US failed to exploit quite real tensions between the South Vietnamese Vietcong and the North Vietnamese regular units.
B) Failure to understand Vietnamese history, doctrine, cultural attitudes towards warfighting. Basically, launching massive surprise attacks at Tet is as Vietnamese as lets say moving Tanks through terrain considered as not tank permissable by the adversary is German (or Soviet). Vietcong even referred to itself as the new Tay Son (Vietnamese peasant uprising which turned into a short lived dynasty and won one of Vietnams greatest victories ever against the Chinese precisely by doing a massive surprise attack on Tet) in some of their internal PR. Any general who gets “surprised” by a Vietnamese Tet offensive should be shot for incompetence.
C) This is honestly just my opinion, but the increasing US (and earlier french) reliance on Montagnard or pretty special religious minorities was imho a mistake as well. In some ways, it abandoned the more decisive Kinh/Ehtnic Viet population to the Communists. In addition, while the Montagnards were pretty tough, they had some considerable issues with literacy which impeded their combat performance, especially if employed outside of their native areas.
D) Incidentaly, the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese were both pretty thorough with alphabetisation, and generally used this opportunity to indoctrinate as well. Meanwhile public education services werent exactly a priority for either the AVRN or the USA.
Compared the the Korean conflict, I think the following distinctions were noteworthy:
1: Due to Soviet bumbling mistakes, the US was not fighting alone, had international law on its side and had some (Turkey) quite combat capable allies.
2: The Kims lost their agency and military fairly early, turning it into “US puppet vs Soviet puppet” as opposed to “US puppet vs Soviet client”.
3: DPRK forces fought conventionally, while the Vietnamese communists fought both conventionally and unconventionally. They also strived, with some success, to fight conventionally where their adversaries expected unconventional warfare and to fight unconventionally where their adversaries expected a conventional approach. This flexibility was missing from North Korean forces. Incidentally, North Korean militaries blamed their defeat on the failure to establish a guerillia movement in the South.
4: The Kims in general being considerably less competent then Vietnamese leadership. This was partly due to them starting out as Soviet puppets, rather then rising mostly on their own merits like the Vietnamese. Kim also purged leadership of those competent enough to threaten him, which further reduced North Korean competency. Ho by contrast had no great need of purges.
May we infer two thumbs down for his Civil War series?
All
In spite of the NY Times and AP withdrawal of the story concerning IC unanimity, John King today repeated the story on CNN. pl
DH
I have always thought it was very one sided. I liked the music. pl
Sounds like Burns is part of the PC army.
When my son was a teen in Scouts he was at some sort of Civil War re-enactment. Maybe just a Scout event, maybe at New Market. He told me it was cute when a group of cub scouts came charging in, yelling and waving their weapons, after the skirmish was over.
“Why does poor Mika get more attention then the millions of people who have been forced out of Syria due to Hillary’s war? Why is the media more concerned about psycho Joe than the Saudis attacks on Yemen?”
Could not agree more. That’s why I now ignore the MSM and seek out top-quality websites like this one.
According to South Front, the US is setting up a base at Taqba which gives the US a foothold west of the Euphrates. It also looks like a strategic location for controlling water sources at the dam.
Will this be an area where the US and Russia will clash?
https://southfront.org/us-is-going-to-use-tabqah-air-base-in-syrian-province-of-raqqah-reports/
I agree with the influence of the idea of a state of the Viet people.
I also think that it will be a good idea for US leaders to accomodate the various nationalism extant; such as those of Iran and Russia.
AE Schmelzer
You are German? I see that you have read a lot of scholarly articles about VN. Most of what you say is the kind of illusion that emerges in opinions acquired by reading scholarly articles authored by people who were not participants and who have spent too much time in libraries. Among the many errors in your opinion: 1. there were no significant “tensions” between the NVA and VC (political and military). These had all been overcome by North Vietnamese power plays and assassinations long before the French left. I interviewed many PWs from both groups and there was little distance between them on the basis of local identity or politics. 2. the notion that the French and then the US relied on montagnards, ethic Chinese or ethic Cambodians to do the fighting is simply completely and grossly incorrect. What ethnic minority forces we had were employed in fairly minor if heroic roles, the principle reliance was always on the Vietnamese manned armed forces of the RVN. pl
MRW
If he is in Maine he should stay in the coastal strip with the “summah people.” pl
Macgupta123
Truth is not absolute. there is always more than one plausible version of the truth. The National Foreign Intelligence Board (NFIB) or whatever it is now called is made up of the heads of all the agencies. They vote on the nature of truth. Without that a few politicos like Clapper and Brennan can define truth, Get it? pl
ISL
Thanks for your opinion but I will always engage on the subject of the VN War, a tragedy in which I was a participant as a combatant and analyst. A comment which I deleted in a rage claimed here that because the non-communist Vietnamese eventually lost their country, the US is responsible for all the deaths of every origin that were suffered on the way to defeat. By this principle evil cannot be resisted if defeat may ensue. pl
Col.,
Stephen Henderson of the Detroit Free Press said today on ch-4’s Flashpoint show that Maggie Haberman was the kind of journalist to pay attention to. And they wonder why people call them fake news.
…I’ve seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate [people]….[We’re there] to conquer, not to redeem. It should be our pleasure and duty to make people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions their own way….I’m opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.
Mark Twain
Col.,
The local Sunday news show, “Flashpoint”, had a discussion on integrity in the press today. Detroit Free Press editor Stephen Henderson stated Maggie Haberman is just the kind of journalist we need to pay attention too. The show sounded more like a gather of political operatives with by-lines than an fair discussion of journalistic integrity.
“Summer people — some are not.”
– graffito on the underside of the drawbridge at Woods Hole, MA.
Other end of New England, but same idea.
He has his place on the shores of Lake Winnipesauke, in New Hampshire. I worked for an HR VP who was his neighbor.
Solid Maine joke: A couple from ‘away’ breeze into a Maine general store and browse the postcards. One asks the proprietor how much they are and he replies ‘a dollah each’. The both berate him, telling the cards back where they are from are only a dime. He stares at them for an appropriate few seconds and states ‘Well, why don’t you buy them there next time and save yourself the long trip up heah.”
Babelfish a gay couple from away approach a downeastah sitting on the pier at Perkin’s Cove and the “man” shows his new .357 Magnum revolver. He asks if that will work for beahs. The old timer says yes but he would file off the front sight so that it won’t hurt so much when the bear shoves it up the visitors ass. pl
Col.
I’d be curious about your take on this article from earlier this year in the NYT (or any other VN veterans who post on here).
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/07/opinion/sunday/vietnam-the-war-that-killed-trust.html?smid=fb-share
I wasn’t born until long after the war was over so the only conception of the Vietnam war for me or my generation was that, much like Iraq, it was a tragic waste of lives and resources for an otherwise ethereal goal (meaning no disrespect to those who fought and died there). But the idea the Vietnam war was something of an awakening or a birth of our present political dysfunction, without devaluing those who fought there, I think holds some currency.
As a fanatical european leftist I very much dislike being equated to these neoliberal corporatist thieves who have supported HRC and Obama – like Mika and her beau.
I have nothing in common with them and their entitled thieving ways. They do not “lead my thoughts” nor represent me.
There are many rightists I have more in common with than Americas “centrist” Democrats and their media lackeys.
A pleasure to read your thoughts again Col. Lang.
theporkchop
The US has been through any number of experiences called something like “the end of childhood.” With regard to VN it is all BS and cover for the left. pl
That comment was quite likely written precisely to enrage you, not to convey any useful information. The Borg fights dirty…
EEngineer
that was my conclusion and I have banned him/it. pl
Love it, Pat. I lent one of my coworkers my 870 Express after he called his prospective Alaskan fishing guide and told him he was bringing his .357 with him. I believe the guide told him much the same.
Porkchop,
Your should read the other coast’s paper. They ran a story about the Democratic led Californa State Senate forcable removing the a woman Senator for speaking out against praise for Tom Hayden on the Senate floor. Guess that didn’t make the definition of “all the news that’s fit to print” or upset any of the women in the US House or Senate (of either party).
Sen. Janet Nguyen is nation’s first Vietnamese American female state legislator. She came to the US legally. To quote the Senator (in the linked article)
“Mr. Hayden sided with a communist government that enslaved and/or killed millions of Vietnamese, including members of my own family,” she wrote. “Mr. Hayden’s actions are viewed by many as harmful to democratic values and hateful towards those who sought the very freedoms on which this nation is founded.”
Further on the actual truth (!), to quote the article: “Many of the same politicians, after all, seem to be spending every waking moment trying to protect Latinos who, unlike Nguyen, migrated to this country illegally.”
http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-sac-skelton-janet-nguyen-senate-democrats-20170302-story.html
Fred,
Thanks for the article. I read it, I can’t say I’m surprised by their actions although maybe a little bit that they owned up to it, but I also am not following its relevance entirely. Could you elaborate?
I was speaking more generally about the dysfunction of our entire political system and how, whether rightly or wrongly, the Vietnam War was viewed as a sort of seismic shift when institutional trust was more or less broken–at least in retrospect, if not at the time (I wasn’t alive at the time so I can only rely on my reading of the past and based on the authority of those who were).
I suppose that’s true re: childhood’s end (great book, by the way).
I’m curious, though, cover in what regard? Eisenhower sort of got the ball rolling but Kennedy and Johnson really kicked things up significantly, no? Do you mean the ideological, American-flagellating left? As in it was more a rallying cry in opposition to Nixon and a way to saddle the Republican party/right with an unpopular war/specific political narrative?
Great work and thanks for sharing
Porkchop,
Tom Hayden was married to Jane Fonda, she of waving the NVA flag around in Hanoi while we were at war against that country. He and the radical left became the Establishment because of all the “institutional trust” problems you mention. They promptly betrayed the government and people of South Vietnam when in 1975, two years after the Paris peace accords and withdraw of US forces, when they refused to provide any support, military or financial, when the North Vietnamese army invaded the South. That’s how Ms. Nguyen (now a state senator) became a refugee. Of course supporting refugees back then wasn’t a cool Democratic party theme.
Old Microbiologist,
The #TheResistance leaders are all Establishment Clintocrats. Their Pink Kitty Kap marchers in the streets are all useful idiots.
It remains my deeply held feeling that while the Useful Pink Kitty Kap Idiots would consider Pence a worse disaster than Trump, and would consider Ryan an even more worserer disaster than Pence; the Establishment Clintocrats would consider Pence or Ryan to be better than Trump, and much to be preferred as President. This is because Pence and Ryan are members of the same political establishment that the Establishment Clintocrats are members of. They support the same Free Trade, R2P Indispensable Nation Exceptionalism, etc. that the Establishment Clintocrats support. They know how to lift the pinky in all the right drawing rooms right along with the rest of the Political Elite.
Blood is thicker than water and cronyship is thicker than blood, thicker than thieves, thicker than anything. Pence and Ryan are political wise guys, political made men, just like Clinton or Biden or McConnell or McCain or all the rest of them. If the Establishment removes Trump from office, it will be to install either Pence or Ryan into that office. Most probably Pence. The Clintocrats will pretend to oppose it for the pleasure of their Pink Kitty Kap masses in the streets, but the Clintocrats will do whatever they are called upon to do to make sure that Trump’s departure leads to President Pence or maybe President Ryan. But most likely President Pence.
I am not so bold as to predict Trump’s departure at this point. I would prefer he stay there to the bitter end of his term.
Thanks for the clarification. If I’m following you correctly, your underlying premise is that the radical left was able to use Vietnam as a fulcrum point to garner power for themselves? If that is the case, then I would think it speaks somewhat to Marlantes’ point about trust; ie, both the right and moderate left had no answer for the American public why there were so many inconsistencies (if not outright fabrications) about the reasons for/conduct of the war. And those inconsistencies piled up to such a degree that there our polity hit a breaking point and allowed the far left to fill the vacuum.
Apologies if I’m being pedantic. I’ve always been fascinated by the Vietnam war particularly because talking to people who were alive during it or those who participated in it, there has always been such a vast difference between how Americans viewed that reality at the time. I can’t help but to see parallels to our present circumstances from about 2002-present.
Partly guilty as charged, although I am half Russian as well, have relatives on that side who apparently were there in “advisory” roles for the other side (in the case of the relative air defense) and that is partly their input.
Peter Scholl Latour, who was there for quite a while, had a different opinion opinion concerning the extent of North Vietnamese vs Viet Cong differences (and very much noted that the just pre Tet Vietcong was a pretty different and recogniceably North Vietnamese thing then the original one).
I would put the timetable of “when did the NVA take over the Vietcong” to “shortly before Tet” (I am also giving some credence to the thought that Tet had some criteria of a massive purge by American guns, if the NVA felt the need to purge the VC this way, it would strongly imply that they did not perceive themselfs in full control of it) rather then “during the French period”. The Viet Cong was not homogenous over Vietnam, and it is quite likely that North Vietnamese ursurpation of the Vietcong proceeded at different speeds and to different extents in different areas.
I would further hazard the guess that replacements and indoctrination of replacement cadres in safer North Vietnamese areas (being an insurgency leader against the USA is not good for life expectancy) were the largest drivers of the northern takeover of the Vietcong.
There were enough Montagnards and other minorities in combat roles that the Vietnamese had sufficient cores of truth in their propaganda efforts to paint the US backed factions as a motley collection of minorities only held together by the foreign masters.
Does it matter? There is NO disagreement. The conclusion remains the same… http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2017/jul/06/17-intelligence-organizations-or-four-either-way-r/
I’m trying to follow this. The Fall of Saigon occurred during the administration of Pres. Ford. You’re saying that President Ford was just the catspaw of the radical left?
Well, it might not matter. But the point here is that media widely reported that 17 agencies concurred, when it seems they did not.
Dai Uy
Yes it does matter because it is claimed by Clapper that the entire intelligence community agreed in the conclusion and it did not. pl