"The New Soldier" by John Kerry et al

On Sat, 21 Feb 2004 12:14:39 GMT, Fred J. McCall
wrote:

Peter Skelton wrote:

:On Sat, 21 Feb 2004 03:05:59 GMT, Fred J. McCall
wrote:
:
:Peter Skelton wrote:
:
::On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 14:58:21 GMT, Fred J. McCall
wrote:
::
::Peter Skelton wrote:
::
:::On Fri, 20 Feb 2004 01:00:34 -0500, "John Keeney"
wrote:
:::
:::
:::"Fred J. McCall" wrote in message
:::news:g6pa30tkmdq7db5b8b2efb2nhl38cpip6j@4ax .com...
::: Peter Skelton wrote:
:::
::: :On Thu, 19 Feb 2004 14:41:57 GMT, Fred J. McCall
::: wrote:
::: :
::: :Peter Skelton wrote:
::: :
::: ::Bush simply hopped the fence the other way.
::: :
::: :Where is your evidence for this?
::: :
::: :His national guard servicce was obviously less than enthusiastic
::: r are you trying to imply that he is anti military today.
:::
::: There is a big difference between serving with little enthusiasm for
::: going to war (although you have no evidence even for that) and a
::: transition from 'anti-war' to 'pro-war', which would be "hopped the
::: fence the other way".
:::
::: :Fred, you've got to ask the stupidest questions on usenet, and
::: :that's saying a lot.
:::
::: It only seems that way to you because they are questions attempting to
::: clarify the stupidest **** ever said on Usenet ... usually by you.
:::
:::Now, Fred, Peter does say some odd things but no where near as
:::stupid as some of the NAZIs in Area 51 crap.
:::
:::The reason it's so easy to tie Fred up is that he over-reacts.
:::Here he's trying to argue that Bush's attitude to the military
:::has been constant
::
::No. Not what I said at all. Work on your reading skills, Peter.
::
::I've claimed that Bush has gone from lukewarm to strongly pro,
:
:No, you compared him to John Kerry and said he "crossed the fence
:going the other way". Now, let's look at what that means.
:
:Kerry went from volunteering for service to being a major anti-war
:figure and claiming that pretty much all of the military were war
:criminals.
:
:In your f*g dreams he did. You clearly have not read what he's
:said.

Also in front of Congress and as part of a major veterans group called
'Vietnam Veterans Against the War'. This brings us to the throwing of
(what were apparently someone else's) medals in protest. What he says
about it NOW is quite different than what he was saying back then.

You didn't read that either? Why am I not surprised?

:Now we know what your problem is. Go away and learn something
:about the subject.

And now we know what your problem is, too. You're still a liar who
continually resorts to insult in preference to fact, changing your
past statements however necessary to allow you to continue to spew
your vomit.

When are you going to make a statement that has something to do
with the issue?

Your problem is obvious:

No signal; all noise.

No wheat; all chaff.

No Peter; all dick.

No more; all gone.

plonk

whatever

Peter Skelton

Cub Driver wrote in message . ..
That policy was the
unlimited use of indiscriminate force.

Not really. Many Vietnam vets will tell you that we fared badly in
Vietnam precisely because the use of force was limited.

Read Ed Rasimus's When Thunder Rolled, for example
www.warbirdforum.com/thunder.htm



I do hate to break this to you but that is a book about airplanes,
flying out of Thailand. Danger in the air, yes, restricted areas, yes,
but not the minute to minute uncertainty in your own home grounds that
the ground people took.

"D. Strang" wrote:

:Fine, I said. I'll be sure to send one when they find your sorry ass with a
:dick in your mouth, and be sure to let him see that as well.

:No matter where you go, you will find retarded people.

Yep. And sometimes they self-identify, as you do above.

--
"Nekubi o kaite was ikenai"
["It does not do to slit the throat of a sleeping man."]
-- Admiral Yamamoto

I do hate to break this to you but that is a book about airplanes,

I know it's a book about a fighter-bomber pilot, with a great deal in
it about the extreme restrictions he had to follow. Very far from the
unrestricted use of power you speak of.

Almost every day of the time I spent in Vietnam was in the field,
because it spared me the cost of hotels, laundry (we didn't wash), and
food (someone was always willing to replenish my C-rations).

I never witnessed an atrocity, either by the Americans or by the ARVN.
(Or indeed by the Viet Cong.) It was as clean and as genteel as ever a
war could have been.

So I know something about the life of a footsoldier in Vietnam, and
not from books.

all the best -- Dan Ford
email: (requires authentication)

see the Warbird's Forum at www.warbirdforum.com
and the Piper Cub Forum at www.pipercubforum.com

Cub Driver wrote in message . ..
I do hate to break this to you but that is a book about airplanes,

I know it's a book about a fighter-bomber pilot, with a great deal in
it about the extreme restrictions he had to follow. Very far from the
unrestricted use of power you speak of.

Almost every day of the time I spent in Vietnam was in the field,
because it spared me the cost of hotels, laundry (we didn't wash), and
food (someone was always willing to replenish my C-rations).

I never witnessed an atrocity, either by the Americans or by the ARVN.
(Or indeed by the Viet Cong.) It was as clean and as genteel as ever a
war could have been.

So I know something about the life of a footsoldier in Vietnam, and
not from books.



It is easy to take a single viewpoint and extrapolate to a general
situation. My experience, although second hand, was 25th Infantry
artillery people marveling at the ability to shoot at live targets in
the early 60s, aviators extolling the virtues of knowing what you
dropped wouldn't earn points but actually take someone's life, people
sent to seemingly peaceful parts of the Delta and being unable to get
ashore without supporting fire, collecting museum pieces of 240mm
rockets with the warhead removed and every kind of explosive device
available packed into 55-gal drums as a substitute and fired into Tan
Son Nut.

I have seen something in the paper today that the wise ones are
starting to believe there is a 'bomb school' that teaches terrorists
how to make these IEDs. Well that started in Vietnam and those things
don't have 'friendly-enemy' sensors on them.

Many came back with the concept of the Yalie who is quoted in a study
on Yale and the Vietnam War: One student expelled for a prank became
an infantry officer, participated in ferocious combat in 1967-68, and
then was readmitted to Yale where in 1970 he took the author's course
on the history of American foreign relations In 1970. Invited to speak
to the whole class about the war, he said his combat experience could
be summarized In three principles. "If it runs, It is VC [Vietcong-the
Communist enemy], waste it. If It hides, it is VC. Waste it. If It is
dead, it is VC. Count it and wait for your promotion."33
http://beatl.barnard.columbia.edu/cuhistory/yale.htm

You can deny your involvement in what we would call atrocities 30
years later but at the time and for many areas in Vietnam the enemy
was not obvious.

(Jack Linthicum) wrote:

:You can deny your involvement in what we would call atrocities 30
:years later but at the time and for many areas in Vietnam the enemy
:was not obvious.

You're an idiot, Jack.

--
"Rule Number One for Slayers - Don't die."
-- Buffy, the Vampire Slayer

"Fred J. McCall" wrote in message
news
(Jack Linthicum) wrote:

:You can deny your involvement in what we would call atrocities 30
:years later but at the time and for many areas in Vietnam the enemy
:was not obvious.

You're an idiot, Jack.

--
"Rule Number One for Slayers - Don't die."
-- Buffy, the Vampire Slayer

"Fred J. McCall" wrote in message
news
(Jack Linthicum) wrote:

:You can deny your involvement in what we would call atrocities 30
:years later but at the time and for many areas in Vietnam the enemy
:was not obvious.

You're an idiot, Jack.

If he's an idiot, at least he's one who's not in denial. Sounds to me like
you're the one who has a problem facing the reality of what went on there in
those days. Too many reports from too many sources all to be wrong. Too many
news photos of dead VN civilian bodies piled up in ditches to have been posed by
a press that had been religiously supporting the government's line up to that
point.

There's nothing that Jack said that sounded like the ravings of an idiot. On
the contrary, they had a ring of truth to them.

George Z.

"George Z. Bush" wrote in message ...
"Fred J. McCall" wrote in message
news
(Jack Linthicum) wrote:

:You can deny your involvement in what we would call atrocities 30
:years later but at the time and for many areas in Vietnam the enemy
:was not obvious.

You're an idiot, Jack.

If he's an idiot, at least he's one who's not in denial. Sounds to me like
you're the one who has a problem facing the reality of what went on there in
those days. Too many reports from too many sources all to be wrong. Too many
news photos of dead VN civilian bodies piled up in ditches to have been posed by
a press that had been religiously supporting the government's line up to that
point.

There's nothing that Jack said that sounded like the ravings of an idiot. On
the contrary, they had a ring of truth to them.



Merci, George Z. The lone monkey got one right again. It doesn't happen often.