05/19/05

This is how it felt 30 years ago: Saigon had fallen and Nixon was out. We weren't so much pleased about the ultimate Viet Cong and North Vietnamese triumph over the South (and our troops), as we were glad to be purged of the whole sordid affair. And it did feel like an affair gone horribly wrong: the fatal attraction of Wilsonian messianism trying to make the world 'safe for democracy' one more time. The weapons-of-mass-destruction issue of the day was 'falling dominoes.' If South Vietnam fell, then Burma, Thailand, the Philippines, Australia -- the whole panoply of the world, piece by piece, must fall to monolithic Communism. Of course, it didn't work out that way. To get us into full-scale crusade-mode, Johnson had lied about the Tonkin Gulf Incident, the same way George W. Bush and Tony Blair would lie about Saddam's ties to Al-Qaeda, 9/11 and imminent threats of nuclear destruction...

http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0519-27.htm

from Common Dreams, by Gary Corseri


Informant: Thomas L. Knapp