{"id":19739,"date":"2017-09-26T18:23:50","date_gmt":"2017-09-27T02:23:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.richgibson.com\/blog\/?p=19739"},"modified":"2017-09-30T23:44:19","modified_gmt":"2017-10-01T07:44:19","slug":"rouge-forum-dispatch-back-at-em","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.richgibson.com\/blog\/rouge-forum-dispatch-back-at-em\/","title":{"rendered":"Rouge Forum Dispatch: Back at ‘Em! And a CFP to Come Soon!"},"content":{"rendered":"

We Say Fight Back!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Boomers Teach the Grandbabies<\/strong>
\nMore Lies Ahead About the Wars on Vietnam<\/strong><\/p>\n

Burns’ Vietnam<\/a><\/h2>\n

They are at it again. They need to beat their own dead horse to death once more.<\/p>\n

The US rout in Vietnam must be mystified again\u2013to unite a nation reeling from the promise of endless war, the obvious reality of booming color-coded inequality, a flatly failed political system and ruling class, and increasing repression.<\/p>\n

And to fashion the possibility that a similar war could become popular in the future\u2013even World War III.\u00a0 …<\/p>\n

Why Vietnam now?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Perhaps because it is the looming 50th anniversary of the Tet Offensive of January, 1968; that turning point when the quantitative work of the mass of Vietnamese people, leading a peoples\u2019 war against yet another invader empire (in order, the French, the Japanese\u2013and the Chinese Kuomintang\u2013the French again, and then the US), and the efforts of the US anti-war movement, came together to prove to the majority of Americans that the war could not be won\u2013and that the nations\u2019 leaders had lied about everything important.<\/p>\n

Now it is Ken Burns\u2019 turn on PBS\u2013that not-so-public broadcasting system so dependent on corporate sponsors (like Bank of American, feverishly boosting Burns) who, clearly, paid for his work as well as the massive advertising campaign promoting it…. more here: www.richgibson.com\/vietnam\/burns-vietnam\/<\/a><\/p>\n

The Vietnam Wars<\/a><\/h1>\n
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Burns\u2019 Vietnam: Other Problems and Lies<\/a><\/h2>\n
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I found the 9th and 10th episodes to\u00a0 be the most egregiously wrong and sometimes disgusting.\u00a0 For example:<\/p>\n

The war criminal who participated in Operation Phoenix, a massive, illegal action within an illegal war, that killed somewhere far more than the 20 thousand Vietnamese, supported his actions\u2013and is now a judge.<\/p>\n

William Colby led Phoenix, remained respectable, and became head of the CIA. Later, he revealed the \u201cFamily Jewels.\u201d\u00a0www.vvaw.org\/veteran\/article\/?id=1659<\/a><\/p>\n

Among the Jewels, but left out of Burns\u2019 Vietnam, was Cointelpro, an intelligence operation that included murder, drugging unsuspecting people, black propaganda, targeting radicals and leftist in the US.\u00a0www.nytimes.com\/2007\/06\/26\/washington\/26cia-timeline.html<\/a><\/p>\n

The hysteric MD who was held as a POW was, indeed, a war criminal, as were the bomber pilots.<\/p>\n

The notion that people living in the South, under the US\u2019 created and controlled puppet government were \u201cfreer\u201d than those in the North is preposterous (as is the endlessly repeated lie that the North and South were real, separate and distinct countries\u2013the north communists).<\/p>\n

Obviously, for example, conscripts in the puppet Southern army did not want to be there, and fled when they could. NLF and VC troops were overwhelmingly committed to the ideology the NLF leadership put forward\u2013peasant nationalism with a small dose of \u201cequality\u201d that was, to a considerable degree, practiced in the Ho\/Giap led military.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s simply wrong to overplay a divide between Ho Chi Minh, Giap, and Le Duan.<\/p>\n

The only fundamental truth presented in episode nine: We were fighting on the wrong side.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Episode ten was, notably, worse. (More at www.richgibson.com\/vietnam\/lies\/<\/a>)
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n

Congratulations on the publication of (now 40% off at Monthly Review)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\"\"<\/a>and the publication of<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n