Viet Nam.. What is your opinion?

[grandfather]

Do you have a source for Catholicism being introduced in Vietnam in the 15th century?
You might have meant the 16th century? I just started reading on the subject and you are correct that it was well established before the French arrived.

I did a Google search and scanned quickly through the first three pages of sites. The one that seemed most informative said 15th century. It might have been wrong. Whether it was 15th or 16th does not really matter. The French went there as a result of European colonial expansion, not as missionaries. You can not serve two masters, colonial masters and God.

 

[Ridgerunner]

We’re not allowed to talk about political candidates, so I won’t respond to that part of your post.

The civil war justified? Perhaps not. 600,000 men lost their lives, and despite being free, slavery continued under forced labor laws invoked by the southern states, and continued into the 1930’s.

Hindsight is 20/20, but I believe their was an alternative to ending slavery, other than war. Europe had ended slavery long before without going to war over it.

Jim

Since I did not name a particular candidate, you were left to fill in whomever you chose. Could be yourself. But I do think people need to realize this coming election will not determine whether the Iraq War will go on for “X” years or “Y” years.

Oh, I likewise believe slavery would have ended without a Civil War. The Brits’ bringing Egyptian cotton online, alone, would probably have done that. But that wasn’t known at the time.

Nor did anyone perceive that the war would go on as long as it did or result in the casualties that it did. Not by a long way.
There are also those (I think Patrick Buchanan is one) who say WWII should never have been fought. I’m not familiar with his reasoning, but he, at least, is persuaded of that.

It seems, then, that oftentimes it is not possible to really know in advance whether a war is going to turn out to be a just war or not.

 

[thomfra]

thank you so much for the mention of the books… This confirms my suspicions that the US really did get out of Viet N too soon… Communisim is a worse menace to this world than people realize… It is scary when certain people in our government system lean towards it… (socialism… etc)…

What particular aspect of socialism which is presented in the US that scares you?

 

[SCALCO]

What particular aspect of socialism which is presented in the US that scares you?

You didn’t ask me, but I agree about socialism being scary
because it takes away freedom, competition, individual choice, private ownership. Instead, everything belongs to the society and should be distributed equally.
I prefer the idea that one should be rewarded for hardwork and have the freedom to decide.

 

[SCALCO]

I did a Google search and scanned quickly through the first three pages of sites. The one that seemed most informative said 15th century. It might have been wrong. Whether it was 15th or 16th does not really matter. The French went there as a result of European colonial expansion, not as missionaries. You can not serve two masters, colonial masters and God.

Thanks for taking time to look it up.

You mention the French colonial expansion. They went there mostly for money and power. We went there in the name of freedom. We supported the French because we wanted to keep the Chinese divided. At the time, the Chinese were helping North Vietnam and North Korea and it was in our interest that they not concentrate all their attention to Korea.

 

[thomfra]

You didn’t ask me, but I agree about socialism being scary
because it takes away freedom, competition, individual choice, private ownership. Instead, everything belongs to the society and should be distributed equally.
I prefer the idea that one should be rewarded for hardwork and have the freedom to decide.

Well it depends. You can have the good bits, and not the bad bits. i.e. free medical, schools, unemployment benefits, etc to give at least some balance in society between rich and poor. I.e. people look after one another instead of every man for himself. But then still allow private ownership, reward hard work etc. Many countries have found a good balance between the two. As much as I hate to say it, the US does not have this balance right. It’s too much an “every man for himself” society.

 

[SCALCO]

You didn’t ask me, but I’d like to take a shot at it. Yes – fighting Communism was and remains worthwhile. That doesn’t mean, however, that we can win all the time, everywhere. Vietnam was one such occasion. We charged in without first thoughtfully analyzing the situation, the history of the place or the nature of the people. We’ve made a frighteningly similar mistake in Iraq. A place where we succeeded, however, was El Salvador. I personally worked a small part of that mission, under the leadership of an absolute genius on counter-insurgency (US Army General Gorman). We won in El Salvador, to an appeciable extent, because we carefully applied lessons learned from Vietnam. Of course the setting was totally different, too.

I completely agree with this except I don’t know much about El Salvador.

 

[distracted]

and the fact that this crime is sanctioned by any government makes that government illegitmate before God. It can be called freedom, but it is murder, genocide, a holocuast.

freedom is and has been an excuse for many, many evils… There is somehting in Scripture about how the devil “promised them liberty…” i thikn the rest of it is that, something to the effect that he delivered death instead…

That is the sin of Lucifer… he wanted freedom from God’s “ways”. I guess he didn’t like it that the Word of God was going to be made flesh “and dwell among us”… In any case, it is the devil who promises freedom… and, as we can tell, he does not deliver. Sin can never give true freedom…

but oh well… we must have “freedom” to do wahtever we want (think we want) anyway… such “freedom” is God in America…

 

[SCALCO]

Well it depends. You can have the good bits, and not the bad bits. i.e. free medical, schools, unemployment benefits, etc to give at least some balance in society between rich and poor. I.e. people look after one another instead of every man for himself. But then still allow private ownership, reward hard work etc. Many countries have found a good balance between the two. As much as I hate to say it, the US does not have this balance right. It’s too much an “every man for himself” society.

I agree there has to be some balance. Which countries do you think have a good balance?

 

[distracted]

What particular aspect of socialism which is presented in the US that scares you?

this aspect:

It is basically the same as Communism… and leads to it…

 

[SoCalRC]

That was about the 1/9. Or so I thought.

Yes, it is. I had missunderstood your post, I thought you were correcting me. I was just making the point that the Walking Dead and the 1/9 are the same thing, and apologizing if I had not been clear before.

I’m sorry to have brought up bad memories. That wasn’t my intention. I simply was trying to show that you were correct, the 1/9 still has the highest casualty rate in Corps history.

No need to apologize, I just meant to indicate that there are a few subjects that I can’t (or at least won’t) discuss in this sort of situation. Within limits, I do not mind discussing my Vietnam experiences, but you brought up a day that I simply don’t discuss with anyone.

Peace

 

[SoCalRC]

From a Catholic perspective, that is an inadequate standard by which to determine if a war is justified. The Catechism is very clear about the standard:

I think that you missunderstood my point. Just War tradition dates from St. Augustine, who reasoned that just war is possible because of the possibility of it being the consequence of a licit application of our Christian obligation to Love our Neighbors as Ourselves.

We have a set of standards, but there is so much sophistry and twisting that it can get confusing. For example, our obligations with regards to the treatment of prisoners appears crystal clear, as does our obligations to non combatants. But you can even find theological arguments for the use of indiscrimate weapons of mass destruction. So I think it is helpful to look at the foundation.

Let’s face it, if there is no personal call to action, then support of societal violence is almost certainly not driven by a person’s Christian conscience. Think about it, if God is not calling the individual to act, how can that same person honestly claim that God is calling others to act?

In other words, I agree that, by itself, a willingness to serve is an adaqute measure of Just War, but I also think it is a very good litmus test on the sincerity of Just War arguments.

Similiarly, I think it is a good measure on the sincerity of non-theological arguments. We are hearing talk about ‘fighting communists’ and ‘preserving America’. Rather one views it as an obligation to God, or simply a secular obligation to the common good of society, the question remains - what is, and is not, worth dying for?

The way I see it, actions speak louder than words. If one elects to keep one’s own skin out of harms way, than any arguments about duty or common good such a person makes, are simply empty rhetoric - presumably self serving in some capacity.

That is not to say that individuals do not face moral dillemnas. I enlisted to serve in a war that I personally did not support because I believed that it was my duty to my country. On the other hand, I ended up serving as a combat medic because of what I perceived to be my higher duty to my faith.

I can respect Catholics who elected to serve and did not share my moral reservations. Similiarly, I can respect Catholics whose call to faith made participation in any form out of the question. I do not respect Catholics who actively supported the war, but kept themselves and their loved ones out of harms way. I strive to remember that they are still fellow children of God, but to me they will always be chickenhawks - the only creature I am aware of that primarily communicates via its rectum…

 

[distracted]

Hindsight is 20/20, but I believe their was an alternative to ending slavery, other than war. Europe had ended slavery long before without going to war over it.

Jim

Good point… about Europe…

It seems to me that when there is a conflict between two “parties”… countries or states… why can’t they just have a chess tournament or something… Sounds unorthodox… but is it really?? Doesn’t it beat all those thousands/millions losing their lives?? That is waht sounds unorthodox… (among other things) to me…

 

[Ed_Rand]

I completely agree with this except I don’t know much about El Salvador.

El Salvador was no righteous victory. Ask the parishioners from Archbishop Romero’s diocese how much they enjoyed the victory. From the article:

In 1979, the Revolutionary Government Junta came to power amidst a wave of human rights abuses by paramilitary right-wing groups and the government. Romero criticized U.S. military aid to the new government and wrote to President Jimmy Carter in February 1980, warning that increased US military aid would “undoubtedly sharpen the injustice and the repression inflicted on the organized people, whose struggle has often been for their most basic human rights”. [1] Carter, concerned that El Salvador would become “another Nicaragua,” ignored Romero’s pleas and continued military aid to the Salvadoran government.

We should also note that he was killed by men connected to Major Roberto D’Aubuisson Arrieta. Footnoted from the Washington Post, December 5, 1984:

In December 1984 D’Aubuisson visited Washington to attend a dinner held in his honour by a group of US conservative organizations, and to receive an award recognising his “continuing efforts for freedom in the face of communist aggression which is an inspiration to freedom-loving people everywhere.”

When we speak of human rights abusers in Latin American we also must remember that D’Aubuisson and others connected with attrocities have attended the School of the Americas From the article:

On September 20, 1996, the Pentagon released seven training manuals prepared by the U.S. military and used between 1987 and 1991 in Latin America and in intelligence training courses at the U.S. School of the Americas (SOA). The manuals were based in part on lesson plans used by the school as far back as 1982 and, in turn, based in part on older material from Project X.[2] According to Lisa Haugaard of School of the Americas Watch, these manuals taught repressive techniques and promoted the violation of human rights throughout Latin America and around the globe.[13] The manuals contain instructions in motivation by fear, bounties for enemy dead, false imprisonment, torture, execution, and kidnapping a target’s family members. Joseph Kennedy said “These manuals taught tactics that come right out of a Soviet gulag and have no place in civilized society.” The Pentagon admitted that these manuals were a “mistake”[14]

After this investigation in 1992, the Department of Defense discontinued the use of the manuals, directed their recovery to the extent practicable, and destroyed the copies in the field. U.S. Southern Command advised governments in Latin America that the manuals contained passages that did not represent U.S. government policy, and pursued recovery of the manuals from the governments and some individual students.[15]

Enough Wiki!!! The best info on the School of the Americas can be found here:

soaw.org/

Basically, in El Salvador, we supported the most brutal sector of the population because it served our economic interests. We have no right to do this sort of thing regardless of a possible victory. Shameful in every way.

 

[JimR-OCDS]

I think pretty much everybody knows that the civil war had little or nothing to do with slavery.

It very much had to do with slavery. Everything that led up to the civil war, was about slavery.

The south claims it was states rights, but slavery was the issue of states rights.

Jim

 

[Ridgerunner]

While doubtless there is a lot that can be wrong with colonialism, and it’s politically incorrect to say anything favorable out it, I am not persuaded it has always been a totally bad thing.

Lots of places that are not very good today were British colonies, but a lot of them are examples to the world in many ways. Australia, Canada, U.S., N.Z., Not such bad places at all. Rule of law. Reasonably good opportunity in those places.

India has certainly had its bad times. But before the Brits, theplace was a chaotic patchwork of competing kingdoms. The Brits left, but they also left at least a semblance of the rule of law, representative democracy, respect for a good education, and now, of course, India appears to be on its way to joining the First World. Hope it makes it.

Of course there are the Zimbabwes, Burmas and the Sudans. But it does seem the more the British way took hold, the better was the eventual outcome.

We will never know what Indochina would have been without the French. Communism has ravaged the place, and a free and independent Viet Nam or Cambodia never really stood a chance after the Japanese occupation and the Japanese encouragement and arming of guerilla forces. Soviet and Chinese agents and armaments did nothing to help the lives of the people either. I don’t think older Vietnamese living in this country would say it’s better under the communists than it was under the French.

And how much worse would Libya have been had the Italians governed the place just awhile longer? Hard to picture how it could have been.

I don’t know that independence, of itself, is necessarily better for all people and under all circumstances. Possibly a period of “mentoring” isn’t so bad, as long as it’s fairly benign and the colonial power really undertakes to inculcate its better values and institutions before it leaves.

 

[mlchance]

The south claims it was states rights, but slavery was the issue of states rights.

The South claimed it was withdrawing from the Union precisely to protect the institution of slavery. Other grievances were listed, but slavery was the crux…for the South.

It wasn’t the crux for Unionists. President Lincoln would’ve preserved the Union at any cost, to include ignoring slavery. He was not an abolitionist.

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[RobHom]

I was in Vietnam 68’, 69’ & 70’. I was running an Infantry Ground Surveillance Radar Team in the Mekong Delta…for part of the time on airfields and the last year or so supporting MACV on the Cambodian border.

I have read much on the history of the Vietnamese people, their country and the war. There are different sides to it…and its not an easy one to come to a concrete decision as to the whys and wherefores.

Here is a site or three that gives “timelines” of the war and its aftermath.

1. english.uiuc.edu/maps/vietnam/timeline.htm
2. landscaper.net/timelin.htm
3. servercc.oakton.edu/~wittman/chronol.htm

I won’t go into details…simply because I don’t where that period in time is concerned…but I will say this…no…I won’t.

 

[Al_Masetti]

You also need to look at the Communist International.

The ComIntern established Communist parties in every country of the world.

They worked tirelessly to bring Communism everywhere.

And were successful in many cases.

They used propaganda, sowed disaffection and often used violence and murder to get rid of political competition.

Ho Chi Minh was a typical example of someone who “purchased” the Communist “franchise” for IndoChina.

We really don’t know Ho Chi Minh’s real name. The name often attributed to him may actually have been a case of “identity theft”.

vietquoc.com/HCM-04.HTM

HIS PERSONAL DATA AND BACKGROUND

What personal data ? We don’t even know his year of birth with any certainty. As many as five years are found in the literature. He himself gave two of them: 1892 in his application to the French Colonial School and 1890 in his book under the pseudonym Tran Dan Tien. The Service of Control and Assistance to Natives of French Colonies (Archives Nationales de France) recorded the year 1894, which probably came from Ho himself. His passport taken for his first trip to Russia (1923) showed 1895. Yen Son , an agent of the Viet Communist Party, claimed the year 1891 in an article entitled “Nguyen Ai Quoc, the Brilliant Champion of the Revolution” in the Thong Tin (Information) Newspaper, Aug. 30 1945, Hanoi.

According to the list of candidates in the 1946 election (the first after he took control), his place of birth was in the province of Ha Tinh. Only years later did people find out that his real place of birth was the village Kim Lien, district of Nam Dan, province of Nghe An.

Among his many names, two are most widely known. These are Ho Chi Minh (= Ho Who Enlightened) and Nguyen Ai Quoc (Nguyen the Patriot). But, as will be shown later, they were not his. He appropriated them from other persons for political purposes. Here we prefer to call him only by his real name, which is Nguyen Tat Thanh or Thanh, even after he has become Ho Chi Minh or Nguyen Ai Quoc.

His father, Nguyen Sinh Huy, attained the academic rank of “pho bang” (subdoctoral) and for some time was a small mandarin. Thanh was the youngest of the three children. His brother Nguyen Tat Dat (or Ca Khiem) did not achieve any academic success and made a living as a geomancer and Oriental physician. His sister Bach Lien or Thanh was unmarried and considered herself as a failure.

Nguyen Tat Thanh was educated at a French-Viet school and after getting a certificate of basic study in 1905 went to teach at the elementary school Duc Thanh in Phan Thiet province. In 1911, he went to France on board the Admiral Latouche-Tre’ville, earning the travel expenses by working, probably as a waiter or kitchen aid, for the Compagnie des Chargeurs Reunis, which operated the ship.

 

[JimR-OCDS]

The South claimed it was withdrawing from the Union precisely to protect the institution of slavery. Other grievances were listed, but slavery was the crux…for the South.

It wasn’t the crux for Unionists. President Lincoln would’ve preserved the Union at any cost, to include ignoring slavery. He was not an abolitionist.

– Mark L. Chance.

Lincoln was most certainly an abolitionist, but he had to play the politics of the time.

If you read Doris Kearns Goodwin’s book, “A Team of Rivals,” she presents parts of the draft that Lincoln wrote for his inauguration speech, and how he included words calling for the end of slavery. That speech however, was edited by his staff, and he was advised not to include anti-slavery in his speech. She also presents much evidence on how much Lincoln loathed slavery.

Jim