General Giap was a brilliant, highly respected leader of the North Vietnam military. The following quote is from his memoirs currently found in the Vietnam war memorial in Hanoi:
"What we still don't understand is why you Americans stopped the bombing of Hanoi. You had us on the ropes. If you had pressed us a little harder, just for another day or two, we were ready to surrender! It was the same at the battles of TET. You defeated us! We knew it, and we thought you knew it. But we were elated to notice your media was definitely helping us. They were causing more disruption in America than we could in the battlefields. We were ready to surrender. You had won!"
General Giap has published his memoirs and confirmed what most Americans knew. The Vietnam war was not lost in Vietnam -- it was lost at home. The exact same slippery slope, sponsored by the US media, is currently well underway. It exposes the enormous power of a biased media to cut out the heart and will of the American public.
A truism worthy of note: Do not fear the enemy, for they can take only your life. Fear the media far more, for they will destroy your honour.
Dear All,
I have always believed the words of Giap are true. The cause of our failure was the media and of course helped by the left
Tragically we are heading this way now in Iraq, and for the same reasons.
Digger James
Hello
The above brief comment is by "Digger" James who lost a leg fighting against the communists in Korea. He subsequently studied medicine and became a doctor.
The aim of war is to destroy the enemy's will to fight. It must be primarily a psychological effort that is achieved by the application of force; it may be overwhelming force applied for a very short period of time to achieve a large psychological effect, eg Hiroshima; or, a small military effort applied over a long period, eg the IRA that eventually brought the English to negotiate.
In Vietnam the aim was not to win, eg by beating hell out of North Vietnam because we thought that was unethical. The aim was to stop losing. That was not a winnable strategy. I you choose war, it must be uncompromising, and in the West, that means you had better have a good moral case.
Recent evidence from Iraq suggests that the Iraqis were killing each other at a rate causing psychological weariness that they do not wish to endure until after the next US elections when there is no guarantee of a US withdrawal.
(This post was supplied by a friend who served for many years in the Australian army. Thanks AP).
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