10-18-2020, 07:25 PM
(10-18-2020, 06:48 PM)David Horn Wrote: OK, but so what? We decided to eliminate any potential "Marxist" government in the south, and guaranteed a bloody war as a result. That one's on Ike. If he had OK'd the election in '56, things would have been different ... but, of course, he didn't.
I'm no expert on Vietnam, but it seems what is missing here it that the alternative to a Marxist government was to leave the Catholic elite in charge, and they were the corrupt elites of the French in colonial times. The Marxists were linked with the Buddhist cause, the locals. In fact, it was more the common folk against the elites that was the real conflict, with the various sides using the east - west conflict to make it sort of a proxy war, except it was confused who was using who for what.
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.
