I understand.

I was just underlining the fact that nearly as many troops died under Nixon as under Johnson, and that Nixon took part in what could be described as the start of the "stab in the back" myth about Vietnam.

My problem is (and I suspect this is your problem too) Nixon ran in 1968 on a secret plan to end the war, which of course meant trying to win it. Unfortunately, by the strategy he used, which included massive bombing of the north, and, eventually, illegal incursions into Cambodia, he merely prolonged it to the point where he resigned for reasons having nothing directly to do with the war.

Gerald Ford eventually pulled the plug after funding dried up.

So, oddly, Bush appears ready and willing to leave office with things as they are in Iraq, and McCain has put forth no plan to end anything there; in fact, he appears ready to prolong it, as far as the eye can see.

I take no comfort from that.

I don't remember the exact phrase 'MindWar' from 1984, but it certainly resonates of NewSpeak. The phrase "strengthen our national will to victory" has a similar chilling quality, though a bit more old-school fascist than the well-developed techniques of Orwell's dystopia.

Of course, the deeper flaw in the Vietnam dolchstosslegende is that the real question isn't whether or not we could have won with amazing military force, but even if we could have, why would we have wanted to? Years later, our 'loss' hasn't affected our fundamental national security one whit, and we're now trading with our erstwhile enemy. Doesn't seem like winning in Vietnam would ahve been worth the bother.

So, yeah, maybe we could have won by bombing them back into the stone age. So? Why should we have?

Methinks you are correct and have hit upon an underlying dynamic that affects not just McCain's thinking but that of others as well. Others such as Cheney and Rumsfeld may have this dynamic not just about Vietnam but also about the Soviets and the Cold War. I have always felt these two guys were two left over Cold War warriors/ chickenhawks who have nothing to fight against and thus almost no reason for living.existing. Some religions alwyas fight against the other, which they calll by various names including heathens or Satan.

This dynamic also fits part of the religious right, the evangelical fundie part, who may be laboring under the same dynamic. Their dynamic could stem from their loss of the Civil War and their religious belief that if one just tries harder and prays harder that surely God will grant them their wishes especially as they are righteous Christians, and thus they cannot be denied.

They take Norman Vincent Peale's power of positive thinking and run with it, to an extreme. So if one thinks and wishes and prays for something to occur it will happen. They just never conceive that the other side thinks the same thing and may be willing to go to the limit because it is their lands that are being invaded. They are totally unable to tolerate the thought or reality of losing.

Dirigo: I appreciate your response, but you I think you are misunderstanding my comment. I am not trying to exculpate President Nixon from the consequences of his dishonest secret plan to end the Vietnam War, and as I stated, my post was not in defense of President Nixon. My comment was in response to an erroneous statement that casualties had increased when President Nixon tried to disengage from the Vietnam War. As I also stated, Vietnam War casualties remained high during the period from 1969 to 1971, but casualties gradually decreased during this period from the high casualty levels experienced in 1968, and as I also stated, the high casualty levels of the period from 1969 to 1971 were the result of the strategy President Nixon pursued at that time to end the war by winning the war (i.e., the high casualty rates from 1969 to 1971 were not the result of efforts to disengage from the Vietnam War). When President Nixon finally adopted a more pragmatic approach to ending our military involvement in the Vietnam War during the latter part of his first term, casualties decreased even more significantly.

Of course he won't be back, but I can't resist a parting shot.

Do it well or don't do it at all. And certainly we don't have the political will to do it well. While the "backstabbers" will chafe at the characterization, it remains that their efforts have the same effect. Bring home all the troops and pay off the debt.

(1) Invade a peaceful country

(2) Lose

(3) Bring the troops home! Yay! Victory!

(4) Proceed to next target

"We lost the war -- not because we were outfought, but because we were out Psyoped," he wrote. He urged a radically new approach to psychological operations in future wars -- taking aim at not just foreign adversaries but domestic audiences, too. He called his approach "MindWar" -- using network TV and radio to "strengthen our national will to victory."

If propaganda is an extension of war, then what difference does it make whether the VC whupped us by war or by propaganda? Either way, we got our asses handed to us by a bunch of rice farmers.

Even if there was a "will gap," we still had less will than a bunch of rice farmers.

Should we now expect to see the Army issue field manuals on how to be more willful than a bunch of rice farmers? Will this be the Great Leap into the 21st Century that will finally make us safe from everything?

I know what Chapter 1 will be called: Ignorance Is Strength. That chapter is already written.

If only we HAD bombed them back to the Stone Age! Today Viet Nam would be a bustling, hard-working country moving up in the world economy instead of ... well, that's a pretty good description of Viet Nam today, isn't it?

I'm open to hearing an ongoing historical debate about all aspects of modern Vietnamese history, the involvement of outside nations, and the war. I've read more than one history of the American military effort in Vietnam that seeks to call into question many of what have become the most widely accepted tenets about the war. I have no problems with honest attempts at historical re-assessment, per se.

But I question the relevance of a historical review of the Vietnam conflict that seeks to bring those insights into play regarding the present situation in Iraq, in any but the most general sense (for example, insights that make note of the principle of "home field advantage", which is common to both conflicts.)

It's imperative to keep in mind that there are actually very few specific analogies to be drawn between the course of the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, and the invasion of Iraq and its aftermath.

In South Vietnam, there was a pre-existing friendly political regime playing host to the U.S. diplomatic and military missions. A large fraction of the population had cordial familiarity with various attributes of Western culture that could provide common ground- the French language and the religion of Roman Catholicism, for instance. There was only one armed adversary for the US and RVN to contend with- the Viet Minh, supported by Ho's regime in the North. We were welcomed in by the official political regime, we didn't simply invade. A pre-existing state of armed conflict was in effect. The amount of direct American military involvement began at a very low-key level, and remained that way for several years. Even after the American military presence had grown to several hundred thousand troops, at no point did any RVN government, or faction of the government, ever even hint that the US armed effort had overstayed its welcome.

Questions of the legitimacy of the succession of various RVN regimes or the level of popular support for the American presence aside, that much is clear.

None of those conditions apply to the invasion and occupation of Iraq, which was, and is, driven almost exclusively from outside, by the directives of George W. Bush and his minions.