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ONE-FIFTH OF A QUAGMIRE

Phillip Adams:

Like Vietnam, the Iraq war was launched with presidential lies. Like Vietnam, the Iraq war descended into a moral and military quagmire. And if Iraq seems to be less of a stuff-up, consider this fact: it’s taken just three years in Iraq for US deaths to equal the body count after six years in Vietnam.

Consider this fact, Phillip:

The death rate of American troops in Vietnam was 5.6 times that observed in Iraq.

Posted by Tim B. on 08/26/2006 at 04:35 AM
  1. Mr. Adams is very disingenuous with his calculations, especially choosing the first six years of the American presence in Viet Nam.  Ask him how many troops were in-country at any one time during the first six years of an American presence there.  Ask him how long we had advisers there before any real military presence there.  Ask him how many casualties we had once we had the same number of troops on the ground there as we do in Iraq now. 

    Mr. Adams is, in fact, a prick who insults the intelligence of his betters.

    Posted by saltydog on 2006 08 26 at 04:51 AM • permalink

  2. And then we can see how many times I can use the word “there” in a five sentence paragraph.  That kinda puts me outside the category of having any real intelligence, but I’m still better! 

    Sorry, I hit the Submit instead of Preview.  I tell you, it’s all this talk about the Muslims.  Submit submit submit.  It just gets in your brain.  Cunning little devils, they are.

    Posted by saltydog on 2006 08 26 at 04:56 AM • permalink

  3. Lefties and their Vietnam obsession.

    The Korean war went for 3 years, and had one and a half million allied casualties.

    But Phil didn’t go for that comparison now, did he?

    Posted by Quentin George on 2006 08 26 at 05:26 AM • permalink

  4. Also might consider asking mr adams what the NVG (North Viet Gov) and NVA (North Viet Army) leadership had to say about that “military quagmire” the US is so famous for.
    By their telling of it, everywhere they stuck their heads up, they got their heads handed right back to them.

    Ask them about how they feel about what happened to their Viet Cong element of their “tripod of force” during Tet. Seems it was destroyed.

    Ask them what it was what they really felt was the potential outcome. Seems they were ready to call it quits until their Sov masters told them to hold out just a while longer. Why was they were supposed to hold out a while longer? Because, as the Sovs told them, a shit load of cash and effort had been spent in building up the American Communist Party and it was starting to pay off. The stupid, the weak, the feeble, the easily cowed and the cowardly were mobilizing (much like today) to bring down their own government on the behest of the Sovs and their proxies, the NVG.

    Every POS that got played and joined up in that “anti-war” treason should do the right thing. They’ve, each and every single one of them, mr adams, got the blood of millions on their hands for their perfidy.

    Posted by Grimmy on 2006 08 26 at 05:31 AM • permalink

  5. Sorry about that more than usually messy grammar. I don’t do preview when writing in a rage.

    Posted by Grimmy on 2006 08 26 at 05:33 AM • permalink

  6. "Like Vietnam, the Iraq war was launched with presidential lies.”

    The Vietnam war was launched by a pack of leftist scumbags (commie mass murderers), and the Iraq war was launched by some other leftist scumbags (baathist mass murderers), when they invaded Kuwait.

    Neither war was “launched” by American presidents, despite the vivid fantasies of commie “anti-war” loons.

    Posted by Dave Surls on 2006 08 26 at 05:38 AM • permalink

  7. Yes Phil, it was all so easy lets start a war. Lets pick.....

    The decisions to go to war in both Vietnam and Iraq are both seperate and complex issues that deal with far more factors than those able to permeate the thinking process of the leftist brain.

    Im sure there are plenty of ‘pointless’ military engagements that Phil could have spoken about, but then they wouldn’t have involved the US, thus the silence.

    Posted by Nic on 2006 08 26 at 05:41 AM • permalink

  8. I know Bush cannot be re-elected, but Howard can.

    If I may, I would very much like to point out the striking parallels of today’s traitors and A.Lincoln’s struggle with the Copperheads, vile and pernicious as they were, and am very interested in what you all think.

    The one link provided above is edifying. There are many such.

    Posted by MentalFloss on 2006 08 26 at 06:32 AM • permalink

  9. The man’s ego and lunacy are as inflated as his ass.  Does anyone actually listen to this dipshit?

    Posted by Texas Bob on 2006 08 26 at 06:37 AM • permalink

  10. But it bespeaks a reality

    Posted by Lefty Wobbling Right on 2006 08 26 at 06:45 AM • permalink

  11. Adams is either wilfully distorting history or unbelievably ignorant about it. 

    He is selective about his timeframe: when exactly (as saltydog notes) did Adams’s version of the “Vietnam war” start? When there were 10 U.S. advisers? 100? When the first troops went in?

    The only things the Iraq and (post 1956) Vietnam conflicts have in common is a) a determination on the part of the U.S. and its allies (French motives were, as always, “special") to end or forestall a totalitarian regime b) the fact that self-important newscasters and totalitarian fellow-travelers like himself are cheering for the anti-democrats.

    The conflict in Iraq is not a conventional war or even a conventional unconventional ie guerrilla war. It is an attempt by fanatical holdouts of the Saddamite dictatorship and two brands of Islamofascists (Sunni/al-Qaedist from the broader Arab world and Shiite from Iran) to prevent, by force of arms, a unified, democratic nation from supplanting Saddam’s tyranny of torture, fear, and favorable coverage by CNN in return for “access.”

    Which necessitates a continuing struggle by the U.S. and the Iraqi government and its army to prevent that attempt from succeeding. A very violent police action against very violent terrorists, if you will.

    Phadams, being part of the reality-based community, will of course hasten to correct himself once the phacts are made known to him.

    Posted by arrowhead ripper on 2006 08 26 at 06:52 AM • permalink

  12. It is obvious to anyone with the intelligence of more than a bivalve that the Americans are not fighting a war against the Iraqi people (any more than they were fighting a war against the Vietnamese people). The killings in Iraq are between Shi’ites, Sunnis and, to some extent, Kurds. They are NOT fighting the American but each other. Intercommunial deaths are about 60 times the number of American deaths - ie the Americans are there now as peace-keepers.

    Posted by Susan Norton on 2006 08 26 at 07:10 AM • permalink

  13. It’s always a gruesome thing, to play with other people’s deaths as numbers, but as the recent obituaries of Joe Rosenthal - who took the iconic Iwo Jima flag raising picture - have reminded us, 6,800 Marines died in four days in the taking of that island.

    Posted by cuckoo on 2006 08 26 at 07:28 AM • permalink

  14. Early in the Vietnam war the N Viet leadership predicted that they would win because they were prepared to sacrifice as many of their people as it took to get the result. So who were the winners in the end?

    Why did Phil and his mates want to see a communist dictatorship take over the whole of Vietnam?

    A few days ago I posted this challenge on Club Troppo but got no responses.

    “In anticipation of the re-run of the Vietnam war that is impending, I would like to invite the people who opposed US and Australian intervention in South Vietnam to advise what policies the North proposed to implement to enhance the freedom and prosperity of the ordinary folk in Vietnam (north and south).”

    Posted by Rafe on 2006 08 26 at 07:33 AM • permalink

  15. Hang on. Phillip Adams was (or is) a Communist.

    If he is going to judge the virtues of a conflict by its bodycount, it would seem there are millions of ‘facts’ he should consider.

    Posted by Dan Lewis on 2006 08 26 at 07:36 AM • permalink

  16. Phlipper is relying on the ignorance of the youth, most were born after Vietnam so are blissfully ignorant.  Truth is, the US was never at war with Vietnam..

    Posted by rog2 on 2006 08 26 at 08:27 AM • permalink

  17. ..technically speaking

    Posted by rog2 on 2006 08 26 at 08:28 AM • permalink

  18. I heard or read this flatulent wobblebottom about how he does his articles. Apparently he dictades into a tape recorder when the whim takes him and some other poor lackey has to transcribe it later. (or he does).
    Apparently his brain doesnt interfere between his mouth and the tape.

    Advisors and limited involvement in Vietnam for 6 years =??
    Full blown invasion and occupation for 3 =??
    Gee I cant see a diffrence?

    Posted by thefrollickingmole on 2006 08 26 at 09:26 AM • permalink

  19. Adams continues to demonstrate his irrelevancy to coherent and intelligent discourse.

    Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 08 26 at 10:32 AM • permalink

  20. Those who are carping about Philip Adams’ comments should try to avoid the facts that:
    (a) the Vietnam war did start with low levels of casualties, but this accelerated rapidly,
    (b) there were actual soldiers who had input to decisions in Vietnam - not just corporate profit-seekers and PR men, and
    (C) the US is in MUCH deeper shit now than it ever was as a result of the Vietnam War.

    If these facts were not there, you Neo-Patriots would not be putting forward such red-neck vituperations as you are. On you Phil..from Phil Another

    Posted by Rational Phil on 2006 08 26 at 10:57 AM • permalink

  21. Why don’t fuckers like Adams acknowledges that the efforts of the peacniks and hippies resulted directly in the collapse of South Vietnam and the bloody exodus of hundreds of thousands of boat refugees?

    Posted by Wylie Wilde on 2006 08 26 at 11:04 AM • permalink

  22. Hey, we got a visitor from the reality-challenged community! One who feels it necessary to proclaim his rationality right in his posting handle, no less...pretty good indication that you’re really a delusional loon, Phil. The content of your post then simply reinforced that initial impression.

    Posted by PW on 2006 08 26 at 11:15 AM • permalink

  23. "Hang on. Phillip Adams was (or is) a Communist.”

    Judging by the arrant stupidity and the endless parade of untruths Adams spews forth, I’d say he has the tools to make a grade A commie.

    Posted by Dave Surls on 2006 08 26 at 11:43 AM • permalink

  24. I hereby proclaim myself a Redneck Vituperator; love the sound of it! Sounds like a new model from Dodge.

    Posted by paco on 2006 08 26 at 11:43 AM • permalink

  25. I demand that Phillip Adams explain the Ukrainian Famine of 1932-33.

    Or the genocide of Armenians by Turks in WWI.

    Or the present-day massacre taking place in Darfur.

    Or the brutally slow starvation of North Korea by Kim Jong-Il.

    Come on, Mr. Adams, don’t be so specific, let’s open all the cans of worms, and examine all the body counts, and take a good hard look at all the offenders.  Surely Vietnam was not the worst thing that ever happened to the world, and yet that’s all we ever hear out of the mouths of leftists.

    Posted by RebeccaH on 2006 08 26 at 11:49 AM • permalink

  26. you never hear that the communist side in Vietnam lost over a million, and for what, to reunify a country and 20yrs later adopt capitalist practices, could it be America won the war after it ended, because the rarest thing in vietnam know seems to be a communist, if only the same could be said for our own societys.

    Posted by phillip on 2006 08 26 at 12:16 PM • permalink

  27. Neo-Patriot?

    Posted by Crispytoast on 2006 08 26 at 12:32 PM • permalink

  28. Rational Phil, Puh-leeze.  What is the actual depth of the deepness of the shit the US AND HER ALLIES are in?  Be specific, you Philtard.

    Paco, I thought a Redneck Vituperator was the newest Harley out.  I love that Van Halen-like engine sound!

    Oh, and RebeccaH--don’t disturb out little Philtard.  remember--the world’s history began with Viet Nam!

    Posted by ushie on 2006 08 26 at 12:42 PM • permalink

  29. Vietnam casualty statistics can be found here or here.  You will note that the vast majority of combat deaths occur from 1965-1971, in other words after the Gulf of Tonkin resolution until just about the time of the Paris “peace” talks.

    Iraq casualty statistics can be found here (you can also find OEF statistics). 

    From these statistics I calculated that 1.7% of those who served in SE Asia (including those who died of noncombat related injuries in places as far from the fighting as Thailand) were KIA.  A similar percentage of KIA in Iraq/Kuwait/Persian Gulf would be found from a total of 151763 GIs-or about one rotation.

    Adams is distorting the historical record for his own purposes.  It is unsurprising that some of his admirers have shown up here to cheer him on.

    Posted by 68W40 on 2006 08 26 at 01:18 PM • permalink

  30. The day that the last person who came of age in the 60s is put six feet under will be a day for the world to rejoice.

    Posted by Kyda Sylvester on 2006 08 26 at 01:35 PM • permalink

  31. From Rational Phil:

    (a) the Vietnam war did start with low levels of casualties, but this accelerated rapidly,

    And your point is......?  Vietnam started with US advisors, and ramped up to full combat units.  I can only respons with “D’oh!!!!

    I might also point out that GWoT started out with almost 3000 casualties.  Is that your definition of a “low level”?  (Yes, this is a non-sequitor....I merely note that “low level” is a question begging term.)

    (b) there were actual soldiers who had input to decisions in Vietnam - not just corporate profit-seekers and PR men, and

    Not entirely true.  Robert MacNamara was SecDef during that war, and developed micromanagement into a high art.  President Johnson also required that he personally approve major operations and even some bombing attacks, because he was concerned about their impacts on voting. 

    Go re-read your history.

    (C) the US is in MUCH deeper shit now than it ever was as a result of the Vietnam War.

    A mere assertion that 91B30 tore apart.

    Your blog name is wrong.....it ought to be IRrational Phil.  It describes you and Philip Adams down to a gnat’s ass.

    Posted by The_Real_JeffS on 2006 08 26 at 02:53 PM • permalink

  32. #30 Kyda: “The day that the last person who came of age in the 60s is put six feet under will be a day for the world to rejoice.”

    What, no exceptions?  :-)

    Posted by Old Grouch on 2006 08 26 at 03:11 PM • permalink

  33. Well, there are a few of us I suppose…

    Think we can outlive The Other?

    Posted by Kyda Sylvester on 2006 08 26 at 05:12 PM • permalink

  34. Adams may be referring to one-fifth of a quagmire, but he’s about six-fifths of a dumbass.

    Posted by paco on 2006 08 26 at 05:17 PM • permalink

  35. paco, that’s a lot of fifths.  Getting up into the Keef Richards frame, there.

    Posted by ushie on 2006 08 26 at 05:25 PM • permalink

  36. Looks like Phil the Dill is about as well researched as Terry Lane.

    Do these lefty pricks have no shame at the shoddyness of their research and the utter depravity of their ingrained biases? Do they not fear making themselves a laughing-stock?

    This ain’t journalism folks. It’s the cloud cuckooland scribblings of the insane. And a curse on those that give them the forum to do it.

    Posted by Bonmot on 2006 08 26 at 05:31 PM • permalink

  37. (C) the US is in MUCH deeper shit now than it ever was as a result of the Vietnam War.

    So Phil, lets stipulate that’s true on some level.  What exactly comprises the “deeper shit”?  It can’t be Islamo-fascist terrorism, cuz the leftover left have been denying that threat since the day Mohammed Atta strapped on an airliner.  Terrorism’s just something Bush and Cheney got up to scare us red state boobs into voting for them and to make a profit for their rich white oil industry and Haliburton buddies.  Must be global warmingclimate change eh?  Now there’s some “deep shit”!

    Posted by Vanguard of the Commentariat on 2006 08 26 at 07:35 PM • permalink

  38. With all due respect, Kyda, you use the language of the collectivists.  It has happened so slowly, this taking over of the premises of the discussion.

    Do you remember how the New Left began by demanding free speech.  It turned out, of course, that free speech meant the right to sneer obscenities in public; side by side with the free speech placards were those denigrating manners as phony put-ons and lies.  They screamed about “labels” because they needed to do something about those calling a spade a spade.  They changed the labels, and the direction of the discussion.

    There are those boomers, who shall remain nameless, who never fell in line.  Not all boomers think alike—that is a collectivist concept.  The world won’t be a better place when all of us are gone.  There are those, who shall remain nameless, who ought to remain to keep the record straight.  There is value in a reasoned life that is worth passing on.

    Posted by saltydog on 2006 08 26 at 08:49 PM • permalink

  39. I have a brother who is deeply scarred by the Viet Nam war. But it was not the Viet Cong who damaged him. It was evil slime like Phlipper in the Australian MSM.
    Speaking of which, on our ABC’s Insiders this morning I watched General Leahey do a great job of fielding the moderator’s loaded questions. The moonbats can’t stop themselves from using such phrases as ‘bogged down in Iraq’.

    Posted by Skeeter on 2006 08 26 at 09:44 PM • permalink

  40. Yes, well, let God attend to the sorting. The world will be well rid of us.

    Posted by Kyda Sylvester on 2006 08 27 at 04:15 PM • permalink

  41. ... and less than half the death toll for taking the tiny island of Iwo Jima in WW2.

    So let’s get a bit of perspecive about this, Phil Baby. 

    Nobody said saving Western civilisation was cheap.

    All we could, and should, do is thank those brave men and women who are fighting Islamofascism on THEIR doorstep, rather than on OURS.

    Posted by Apparatchik on 2006 08 27 at 10:05 PM • permalink

  42. Oops, looks like I was out-posted by #13.

    We have such talented and knowledgable readers on this ‘Blog.

    :-)

    Posted by Apparatchik on 2006 08 27 at 10:07 PM • permalink

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