Why did the US lose the Vietnam War? page 4

psst, napalm was a gel-like fuel they used as fire bombs. It’s Agent Orange that causes still of children born with spina bifida, cancer(leukemia, sarcoma, hodgins,….)and higher chance on diabetes.

The reason the US lost the war was because of the loss of morale, and the My Lai Massacre. The US were justified in using napalm on Vietnamese villages. I’ve heard a story were a Vietnamese woman ran up to American soldier to hand him her baby. Just as he takes it she pulls out a knife and knifed the soldier. Practically all the villages had soldiers in them.

Originally posted by gm151:

The reason the US lost the war was because of the loss of morale, and the My Lai Massacre. The Us were justified in using napalm on Vietnamese villages. I’ve heard a story were a Vietnamese woman ran up to American soldier to hand him her baby. Just as he takes it she pulls out a knife and knifed the soldier. Practically all the villages had soldiers in them.

So it’s justified to burn villagers to death just in case they’re hiding soldiers amongst themselves?

Half the villagers were soldiers. It comes down to either we kill them or they kill us.

Half the villagers were soldiers.

It’s just another self-fulfilling prophecy. You presume that every village is against you, so you treat them all like shit, bombing away. All the bombing away angers people, which turns the villagers against you. Repeat a couple thousand times, and you are left with American military history over the last 40 or so years.

Originally posted by SaintAjora:

Half the villagers were soldiers.

It’s just another self-fulfilling prophecy. You presume that every village is against you, so you treat them all like shit, bombing away. All the bombing away angers people, which turns the villagers against you. Repeat a couple thousand times, and you are left with American military history over the last 40 or so years.

Technically yes. That’s another reason why we lost the war. We bombed a couple of the wrong villages and it turned more to other side. There’s not much else we could have done. South Vietnam asked for our help we gave it to them and that’s all we could do.

There’s not much else we could have done.

Not bombed innocent villages maybe? Don’t even get me started on the forced relocation programs.

South Vietnam asked for our help we gave it to them and that’s all we could do.

We didn’t have to do it.

Originally posted by SaintAjora:

There’s not much else we could have done.

Not bombed innocent villages maybe? Don’t even get me started on the forced relocation programs.

South Vietnam asked for our help we gave it to them and that’s all we could do.

We didn’t have to do it.

Not all villages were innocent. We only bombed ones that we believed that supported the North Vietnamese. If we didn’t bomb them nothing would get done. We’d sit there and do nothing because we can’t get to them in time before they pull out of a village, and they sit there waiting for enough men to come down the Ho Chi Minh trail to make attacks on the major cities.

Not all villages were innocent.

Ok. Not all people are. Does that mean I am vindicated to begin killing indiscriminately?

We only bombed ones that we believed that supported the North Vietnamese.

Believed? Was there any intelligence behind it, any attempt at rational targeting or negotiations?

We’d sit there and do nothing because we can’t get to them in time before they pull out of a village, and they sit there waiting for enough men to come down the Ho Chi Minh trail to make attacks on the major cities.

Focus on the trail then?

Originally posted by SaintAjora:

Not all villages were innocent.

Ok. Not all people are. Does that mean I am vindicated to begin killing indiscriminately?

We only bombed ones that we believed that supported the North Vietnamese.

Believed? Was there any intelligence behind it, any attempt at rational targeting or negotiations?

We’d sit there and do nothing because we can’t get to them in time before they pull out of a village, and they sit there waiting for enough men to come down the Ho Chi Minh trail to make attacks on the major cities.

Focus on the trail then?

When I say believed I mean we had intelligence that there were North Vietnamese there though it wasn’t always 100% accurate. No you don’t kill each village for no reason. As I failed to state clearly in the last post we only attacked those our intelligence had reports of North Vietnamese. The Most of the trail ran though North Vietnam and China stated that if we attacked North Vietnam directly they’d go to war with the US. We didn’t want to fight China so we didn’t attack them directly. Most of the trail went through the villages we bombed and the headquarters for the trail were in a cave 600 feet beneath a mountain.

By the way can you tell me how you quote only individual sentences. It’s getting kinda annoying to quote whole posts when I don’t have to.

We didn’t lose. It was a stalemate, since no one wanted to fight, and everyone realized war is wrong.

Originally posted by pokarnor:

We didn’t lose. It was a stalemate, since no one wanted to fight, and everyone realized war is wrong.

No we lost. We pulled out South Vietnam kept fighting, lost, and now there’s only Vietnam. The day pigs fly is when everyone realizes war is wrong plus it can be justified in certain instances.

Originally posted by gm151:

Originally posted by pokarnor:

We didn’t lose. It was a stalemate, since no one wanted to fight, and everyone realized war is wrong.

No we lost. We pulled out South Vietnam kept fighting, lost, and now there’s only Vietnam. The day pigs fly is when everyone realizes war is wrong plus it can be justified in certain instances.

Even if we lost our goal, for the USA it was a tie in the actual war.

Originally posted by pokarnor:

Originally posted by gm151:

Originally posted by pokarnor:

We didn’t lose. It was a stalemate, since no one wanted to fight, and everyone realized war is wrong.

No we lost. We pulled out South Vietnam kept fighting, lost, and now there’s only Vietnam. The day pigs fly is when everyone realizes war is wrong plus it can be justified in certain instances.

Even if we lost our goal, for the USA it was a tie in the actual war.

I guess it really depends on your definition of a win, a loss, or stalemate. I just think we lost because we pulled out.

cus the vietnamese were pansies. Hiding, setting traps and stuff

By the way can you tell me how you quote only individual sentences.

bq. TEXT or <blockquote>TEXT</blockquote>

Originally posted by Erim:

cus the vietnamese were pansies. Hiding, setting traps and stuff

All’s fair in love and war. It worked, so they did it.
America nuked Japan. Wasn’t fair. It was a virtual GODMODHAX but still, they did it because they could and because they knew they’d win like that, and lo and behold, it worked.

It was a virtual GODMODHAX but still, they did it because they could and because they knew they’d win like that, and lo and behold, it worked.

on a semi related note

cus the vietnamese were pansies. Hiding, setting traps and stuff

If I remember correctly, that’s what the minute-men in the US did in the Revolutionary War.

Those pansies.

Originally posted by philnotfil:

They lost the war because they lost the will (as a nation) to continue fighting.

Right, the toll in both money as well as lives were just too much for our country. I’m sure that if we wanted to win we would totally crush the opposition.

I’m sure that if we wanted to win we would totally crush the opposition.

The point of a war is to win. If we could have totally crushed the opposition we would have and it wouldn’t have been a loss.

I’m sure that if we wanted to win we would totally crush the opposition.

We killed a significant portion of their population, what more could we have done? No amount of arms can make up for poor strategy.

Originally posted by SaintAjora:

I’m sure that if we wanted to win we would totally crush the opposition.

We killed a significant portion of their population, what more could we have done? No amount of arms can make up for poor strategy.

If you read the posts above I explain way we did this and why it was the only thing we could have done.

It didn’t work. Thus it is poor strategy.