Could America Have Won the Vietnam War?

[Ming]

Originally posted by OldWarrior_42
Since both of my older brothers were able to be lucky enough not to be drafted, I am assumng that the law of averages would have caught up with our family and I would have been screwed, so to speak.

What was your draft lottery number... Rah and I had 52

[OldWarrior_42]

Never knew it. My old man held that and never let on. Suffice it to say, he would be upset when talking about it.

[OldWarrior_42]

Hence why I say.... assume.

[cgannon64]

You guys got draft numbers! Wow, I didn't know that this place had a population of that age. Is anyone a vet? If so, my condolences go out to you.

[Ned]

Ming, mine was 121, IIRC. Actually got called up in '72, but flunked the physical due to poor eyesight.

[cgannon64]

How did the draft numbers work (sorry I'm not familiar in this area of Vietnam)? Were a bunch of people assigned to one number, and were you all called up when they called your number?

Wow, Ned, you were lucky.

[Kramerman]

My dad enlisted toward the end of '68 and fought in '69 and '70. He was awarded a purple heart, two bronze stars and a silver satr, IIRC, among other commondations. He wishes he would have enlisted for more tours of duty... he had $8,000 (a lot back then) in the bank when he got home after his second tour, and much of his friends had a similar amount. Most of them bought brand new Corvettes or put down payments on a house. My dad gave some to his family and invested the rest in mutual funds. Anyway, hes the kind of guy you dont see in any of the Vietnam movies, the kind that was unphased by the death and destruction, who actually believed in the war.

I dunno if he really knows why he (or we) fought, though, all I do know is that he was proud to serve his country having faith in it and its ideals. It is weird that I think this to be both naive, yet respectable at the same time. I dunno, I guess my father has a real sense of old fashioned honor and valor and the like about him that is almost virtuous, though others may think it simplistic and rediculous.

Kman

[Ned]

Originally posted by cgannon64
How did the draft numbers work (sorry I'm not familiar in this area of Vietnam)? Were a bunch of people assigned to one number, and were you all called up when they called your number?

Wow, Ned, you were lucky.

IIRC, Every year they had a lottery where they pulled birthdays from a bin and gave the birthday a number, beginning at 1. They drafted in numerically increasing order.

I guess I was lucky that my eyesight was no good! If I had my choice, though, between good eyesight and going to Vietnam, I would have chosen Vietnam.

[joseph1944]

Tried to respond on this thread but cannot. My Hands will not work.

[Ned]

I thought the following would be interesting on the causes of our military intervention in Vietnam.

From Halbertson's book,

"I had an hour alone with President Kennedy immediately after his last meeting with Khrushchev in Vienna at that time. [June 1961] Khrushchev had assumed, Kennedy said, that any American President who invaded Cuba without adequate preparation was inexperienced, and any President who then didn't use force to see the invasions through was weak. Kennedy admitted Khrushchev's logic on bath points.

"But now, Kennedy added, we have a problem. We have to demonstrate to the Russians that we have the will and the power to defend our national interests. Shortly thereafter, he increased the defense budget, sent another division to Europe and increased our small contingent of observers and advisors in Vietnam to over 16,000. [Nov. 1961]

"I have always believed, on the basis of that private conversation, that this particular summit was an event of historic significance, leading to Khrushchev's decision to send nuclear weapons to Cuba and to Kennedy's decision to confront Khrushchev by increasing our commitment in Vietnam.

"Kennedy dealt with Khrushchev's misjudgment by forcing him to turn back his nuclear weapons from Cuba or risk the possibility of war. Khrushchev turned them back, but the American commitment to Vietnam went on. The Kennedy people have always denied that there was any connection between Khrushchev's threats in Vienna and Kennedy's decision to confront the Commumst threat to South Vietnam. But I know what I heard from Kennedy in Vienna 17 years ago, and have reflected on the accidents of summit meetings ever since."

Also, in the initial stages of planning our intervention in 1961, Bundy, Rostow and other called for an invasion of NV if they directly interveneD in the South. They also suggested the use of nuclear weapons if the Chinese invaded.

By the time the final plans were approved in Nov '61, the planned US response to a direct NV intervention was limited to increasing our force level in SV and bombing the North.

It seems that Kennedy's plan was actually carried out by Johnson.

[cgannon64]

Originally posted by Ned
They also suggested the use of nuclear weapons if the Chinese invaded.

That would have been a disaster.

[Ned]

Cgannon64, I think the Kennedy plan actually adopted proved to be a disaster for all involved.

Who knows what would have happened if the US made it clear to the North in 1961 that any direct intervention in the South would result in a declaration of War by the US on the North?

The whole problem with Kennedy's plan was that it maintained the fiction that the war was still a guerilla war even if the North intervened. We would not invade the North and we would prevent the SV from invading.

[Inverse Icarus]

in short, we could have won.

when you fight a war, it should be all or nothing. our fighting in vietnam was at best half-assed.

we coulda nuked the jungle too

[Ned]

UberKruX, I take you agree that we should either have not gotten militarily involved at all or have invaded the North when they intervened?

[Ned]

Have any of you seen he movie, "When we were soldiers?" This is the story of the first engagement between the US and the NVA in the war. It occurred in 1965. The movie protrayed much of the action, but left out a critical piece. The engagement took place near the Cambodian border. The NVA had their artillery and heavy motars located just across the border. When the US commander asked permission to provide counterfire against these batteries, the request went all the way to the White House, and LBJ said no.

The History Channel had a show with the real soldiers who fought the battle. While the host wanted to talk about the movie, all they wanted to talk about is being handcuffed by Washington when they were under fire. The bitterness was still there.

This battle was a turning point in the war. LBJ could have unleashed our troops and gone after the NVA wherever they were. But he didn't. From this point on, it was clear we could not win militarily.

The agonizing thing is that Kennedy and Johnson planned this in 1961. What amazing b*stards.