Once again, what you think is "history" and what actually happened might as well have been on different planets. Since I was there at the (alleged) Tonkin gulf (non) Incident, and wrote a book that starts with Tonkin Gulf in detail (I was staff of the command in charge of the destroyers) and explains who was "running with it" to use for the war they had been pushing since they came into power in 1960 (Vietnam got stated by that pissant JFK and pushed throughout till they were defeated in 1968 by the "Best and the Brightest" of the so called "New Frontier). My research for "The Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club" - now that one can access formerly top secret reports downgraded by the 50 year rule - showed that Johnson was paying no attention in the spring/summer of 1964 when the US military was running provocative aerial operations into North Vietnam and we were sending destroyers to cruise down the "3 mile limit line". Johnson took the "incident" seriously because he was afraid of the goldwaterites using it against him. For 20 minutes after he was first told of the "event", LBJ was the only guy on the planet who had it right, when he exclaimed "Those poor damn sailors were probably shooting at flying fish," which in fact they were. In 2006, it was finally proven that the "Lights in the water" that night were actually the reflections of the moon through the clouds and the lightning flashes from the storms in all quadrants, off the enormous school of flying fish that annually transits the Gulf of Tonkin in the first week of August. What I discovered researching that book was that we were all yelling "Hey! Hey! LBJ! How Many Kids Did You Kill Today?" at the wrong guy. It should have been "Hey Hey JFK - the guy who was NEVER going to withdraw, despite all the dumb lefties who just KNOW that the great JFK was "assassinated because he wanted to get out of Vietnam." HAH!! And again, HAH!!!!
I think both JFK and LBJ were trapped by the inevitability of McCarthy-like accusations that they тАЬlostтАЭ Vietnam in the same way that some experts on China were accused of тАЬlosingтАЭ China. The problem was that neither the Chinese mainland or Vietnam were ours to lose to begin with. In Vietnam, the North Vietnamese viewed us as an obstacle to winning their civil war. Despite North VietnamтАЩs willingness to accept help from the USSR and the PRC, Neil Sheehan recalled in his book тАЬA Bright Shining LieтАЭ that one young NVA guard holding an American civilian prisoner told him that Vietnam was not going to let the Soviets or MaoтАЩs China dictate to them.
Nixon and Kissinger issued a back door request to the South Vietnamese government to refuse to participate in the Paris Peace Talks in 1968 and LBJ was too exhausted to do anything about it. Nixon and Kissinger lied that they had a special plan to тАЬend the war,тАЭ and they pointlessly managed to continue the American war in Vietnam until 1973, and the South Vietnamese government collapsed two years later.
He trapped himself, worse he manufactured the Gulf of Tonkin provocation for the war.
Once again, what you think is "history" and what actually happened might as well have been on different planets. Since I was there at the (alleged) Tonkin gulf (non) Incident, and wrote a book that starts with Tonkin Gulf in detail (I was staff of the command in charge of the destroyers) and explains who was "running with it" to use for the war they had been pushing since they came into power in 1960 (Vietnam got stated by that pissant JFK and pushed throughout till they were defeated in 1968 by the "Best and the Brightest" of the so called "New Frontier). My research for "The Tonkin Gulf Yacht Club" - now that one can access formerly top secret reports downgraded by the 50 year rule - showed that Johnson was paying no attention in the spring/summer of 1964 when the US military was running provocative aerial operations into North Vietnam and we were sending destroyers to cruise down the "3 mile limit line". Johnson took the "incident" seriously because he was afraid of the goldwaterites using it against him. For 20 minutes after he was first told of the "event", LBJ was the only guy on the planet who had it right, when he exclaimed "Those poor damn sailors were probably shooting at flying fish," which in fact they were. In 2006, it was finally proven that the "Lights in the water" that night were actually the reflections of the moon through the clouds and the lightning flashes from the storms in all quadrants, off the enormous school of flying fish that annually transits the Gulf of Tonkin in the first week of August. What I discovered researching that book was that we were all yelling "Hey! Hey! LBJ! How Many Kids Did You Kill Today?" at the wrong guy. It should have been "Hey Hey JFK - the guy who was NEVER going to withdraw, despite all the dumb lefties who just KNOW that the great JFK was "assassinated because he wanted to get out of Vietnam." HAH!! And again, HAH!!!!
Keep telling the truth, maybe someday ears will listen and eyes will see
I think both JFK and LBJ were trapped by the inevitability of McCarthy-like accusations that they тАЬlostтАЭ Vietnam in the same way that some experts on China were accused of тАЬlosingтАЭ China. The problem was that neither the Chinese mainland or Vietnam were ours to lose to begin with. In Vietnam, the North Vietnamese viewed us as an obstacle to winning their civil war. Despite North VietnamтАЩs willingness to accept help from the USSR and the PRC, Neil Sheehan recalled in his book тАЬA Bright Shining LieтАЭ that one young NVA guard holding an American civilian prisoner told him that Vietnam was not going to let the Soviets or MaoтАЩs China dictate to them.
Nixon and Kissinger issued a back door request to the South Vietnamese government to refuse to participate in the Paris Peace Talks in 1968 and LBJ was too exhausted to do anything about it. Nixon and Kissinger lied that they had a special plan to тАЬend the war,тАЭ and they pointlessly managed to continue the American war in Vietnam until 1973, and the South Vietnamese government collapsed two years later.
Do you have PTSD?
None of your business, dude.
You are right, I should not have said that