Similarly, provide a link to support your stats concerning the bombing. Almost everyone agrees the bombing was far too extensive and indiscriminate, but other critical factors are, unfortunately, involved, your tendency to arrogate the moral high ground notwithstanding. You’re omitting hugely significant and absolutely pivotal aspects of the history. It was the North that started the war, as J. M. Del Vecchio writes from the Vietnam Center at Texas Tech University:

“In the 1959, Hanoi’s politburo received a series of reports indicating that even though the North had been directing a phase one guerrilla insurgency in the South for two years, the South was socially and economically out-pacing the North. ‘By Tet of 1959,’ William Colby writes in his book, Lost Victory, ‘it was plain that a nationalist and non-Communist Vietnam was firmly established. It was also becoming apparent that its future was, if anything, more promising than the gray and regimented society in the North.’

“It was in response to these reports that the Communists decided, in May of 1959–to establish Trail 559 [later to be expanded and become known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail], and to launch an expanded insurgency, the Second Indochina War. By 1961 northern Communist were assassinating one hundred southern hamlet, village, and/or district officials each month. By 1962 that figure had grown to one thousand per month. If this is not part of our ambient cultural story, can one make sense of Eisenhower’s or Kennedy’s troop responses?”

Too, while much of the bombing in Cambodia cannot be supported, it was the Viet Minh and Viet Cong who first expanded the war into Cambodia, not the SVN or US commands, and that is what required some level of response, after the former first occupied parts of Cambodia bordering Vietnam.

Still later, recall this ARVN assessment of the Abrams years.

Obviously, too much human tragedy, but your one-sided, distortionist view is not taken seriously by anyone beyond the Moise, Porter, Chomsky, Herman, et al crowd.

You don’t believe our own bombing survey? Or you prefer Reader’s Digest.

Or OUR complete levellig of the country, and the social and political vaccum it produced, created the conditions for any Kook to take over?

Thank God the Vietnamese took care of him. George Bush (Sr.) demanded that Pol Pot have a seat at U.N. negotiations for Vietnam’s withdrawl.

And who’s the apologist for Pol Pot?

No wonder people became communist.

D. Gareth Porter was a long time sympathizer and apologist for North Vietnam’s regime. To place this in perspective consider that it was D. Gareth Porter and George C. Hildebrand who wrote the initial set of apologies even for Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime in the mid to late 70’s. Sophal Ear, a native Cambodian writing his thesis from the University of California, Berkeley, debunked the apologies of Porter and Hildebrand (among others), this thesis can be found here, a pdf version here. This places D. Gareth Porter within the ideological landscape, as does the fact Porter has a long association with the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS), one of the oldest left wing think tanks in the country, Discover The Network’s overview of the IPS is here. This is not to impugn a guilt by association, only to place D. Gareth Porter within an obvious and blatant ideological frame. Further, some of the same techniques used by Porter and Hildebrand in their apology for the Khmer Rouge genocide were used in Porter’s deflection of blame for Hue, 1968, away from the North Vietnamese regime.

Time magazine’s writeup of Hue can be found here.

A more detailed review can be found here. Another reference can be found here.

Porter’s and Hildebrand’s apology for Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime was published under the name “Cambodia: Starvation and Revolution” (1976) and was a sophisticated deflection of the Khmer Rouge’s genocidal regime (though Chomsky and Herman outdid this level of sophistication with their set of apologies). Very much the same for Porter’s deflection of blame away from the Viet Cong and the human tragedy that occurred at Hue. A few thousand civilians were killed at Hue during a single incident, compared to estimates ranging over two million for the Khmer Rouge’s regime over several years, this is one reason Porter’s Hue apology is easier to coverup than his vastly more notorious apology for the Khmer Rough regime.

That’s a starting point, with some on-line references, for people who wish to do more thorough research still.

“You’re less offensive than usual, I assume it’s because you’re beginning to see the reasonableness and common sense I bring to the discussion.”

You’re a comedian, right?

You have brought neither reason or common sense to our discussion. In fact you have brought nothing, as it seems you are only discussing with yourself. You have failed to explain how, speaking on a geo-political level of course, if I
“punch you in the face” it has nothing to do WHAT SO EVER WITH “YOU PUNCHING ME IN THE FACE”. That is terrorism is a reaction, a “blow back” to American (and western) foreign policy the past half century (and more), and not the inherent “evil doers”, “bent on destroying our liberty amd freedom”, “look what America stands for” bull shit coming out of the White House today.

You have not answered how the Soviet’s, never interested in Indochina in the least, got sucked into a war against us there.

You have not yet responded to
Moise’s critique of Rummel, or Porter’s sources for his study. Nor exactly what your problem with Porter’s Hue study was. If there was some false or questionable information shouldn’t you counter it with some other information? Based on his sources, most American, he presented a reasonable case, which until now you’ve only countered with: “He’s an apologist”. That’s bull shit. I’m getting the feeling you’re full of shit Michael (oops, I’m getting offensive again).

Nor have you responded to my last question about what you believe the reasons were for Russia invading Afghanistan. Or for that matter an earlier question, why you want Angleika Merkel to win Germany’s next election.

And to be sure, proof of D. Gareth Porter being a tool of America’s great, well oiled propoganda appartus is the number of times he’s been on T.V. and magaizine/newspaper features. Man the guys a house hold name, everyone’s read his stuff, it’s virtually stuffed down our bloody throats.

It’s not Porter working for the government propoganda apparatus you dummy, it’s Chi and others that twist information to our geo-political advantage. The one’s that get the air time, that make the print, the shit you and others like to regurgitate.

And while you idiots bicker over the narrow differences of Democrats and Republicans, and the liberal media, age old geo-political games are being played out before our eyes, with the same brutal methods and lack of regard for human consequences. And you my friend seem to be swallowing this shit hook-line-and-sinker.

I heard the “Patriot Act” passed. Nice name they thought up for that, don’t you think? I just love the way political thought and discussion is framed now-a-days in our country.
They could have named it a thousand things, Security Act, Self Defence Act, or something, but no, they had to go below the belt and name it the Patriot Act. What in God’s name does patriotism have to do with it?
If you’re against it you’re un-patriotic? What another load of shit.

I’ll tell you though, if we really wanted to stop terrorism, I have an idea. How about WE STOP FUCKING WITH THESE PEOPLE AND STAY OUT OF THEIR GOD DAMN BUSINESS? ..I’ll bet anything that “grade school” line of thinking isn’t in our Nazi “Patriot Act”.

And you want Condi Rice to be our next President? ..You’re a comedian, right?

Finally for today, bringing up the notion of a well-oiled propaganda apparatus is more than a little ironic given your defense of D. Gareth Porter who not only served as apologist and sympathizer for North Vietnam’s regime but was also the premiere apologist, with George Hildebrand, for Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime during the mid to late 70’s.

“How many of these do you support..”

It’s irrelevant how many I support, what is more important is which one’s our government supports, or other third parties, to steer an internal domestic situation to our own, very private geo-political advantage. And war(s).

“..and excuse on the basis of the notion that conflict does not simply fall from the sky?”

While the sheer numbers of revolutionary groups might make it seem “they fall from the sky” (like snow flakes?) you have, with your list, proved my point: Each represent a political (or religious) group with grievances to bare in their respective regions, here on planet earth. The situation on the ground is what spawns them, not some meta-phsyical, inherently evil force
that only God’s army, the United States, can, and must face, the crap I hear coming out of America today.

I’m going to go through the list and try to see which one’s are ours, or were ours at one time, and which one’s were “theirs”, that is the Soviets, India’s or other Non-alligned sponsors, what each of these grievances were, if they were legitimate, and what diplomacy was attempted or blocked to calm tensions.

Like I said, the list is quite long, so it’s going to take a bit. But I believe my point is still valid. Terrorism does not fall from the sky, there are reasons that lead people to blow them selves and others up, like in our own revolution against the British, who called us terrorists, or Nelson Mandela against South Africa, who was a terrorist to us (and we helped get captured) not so long ago etc.etc.

That there are long festering underlying grievences that bind and motivate our enemy should be obvious. Try and get 18 guys togethere to play a basaeball game let alone blow themselves up. That you, or it seems most American’s, can’t even consider this most basic point, is baffling to me.

It could be due, as you say, to my “comprehension deficit”, or it could be due to a well oiled state propoganda apparatus that has brainwashed its people sufficently to frame the political debate into the narrow context I read here.
Good or bad. Black or white. Anything we might have done to aggrevate these people is off the table, swept into the dust bin.

In the mean time, as you seem to be representive of contemporary American conservative thought, I wanted to ask, what are the reasons given by the American political right for Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan? What were the grounds? Or because Russia was (is?) inherently evil there didn’t have to be any pirticular reason? No one bothered to ask? What are your thoughts on this?

h/t, Belmont Club

Assassinating foreign leaders, conspiring coups that bring dictators to power that ravage societies for decades, then pump and dump them, then invade them, bomb them, sanction them, and cause mass starvation? This is trivial? Oh no, according to Disney’s History of the World “we are good”, “they are bad”. One need not inquire any further.

To you the history of the Middle East is trivial? What happened there is trivial?

Are you denying America’s historic intervention in the region has not translated into any hatred what-so-ever against us? That our enemies are inherently evil people sent by the devil to test God’s will?

“a pathetic grasping for something to say and fling in my direction”?

What is pathetic is you can not even imagine how American’s would react to Arabs playing their geo-political, Macheavellian games out in our living rooms and blowing our children to pieces. What the hell would we do?

Come on Michael tell me, what would we do? Take a deep breath, close your eyes, and just imagine it.

Or is this another one of those question unworthy of your masterful attention?

“Just the way it is”? You choose what you want to answer, or not, and call this a debate? Or is it you turning blue and running scared?

By the way, anything to say about Porter’s study?

And I read his piece on Hue. He made his points and gave his sources, what was it exactly you didn’t agree with
that made you challenge his scholarship, ..and patriotism?

If you scroll up to our first exchange’s and continue down you’ll notice I countered all your points, including Rummel, sighting numerous sources. Stay specific, if there’s something I missed say what it is.

“Finally, I’ve noted all your questions that are worth attention”

Another indication of your dedication to open debate. You decide what is worthy, what you want to answer? How big of you.

And I’m guiless? You’re the one who attack’s people’s patriotism. What on earth could be lower then that?

Yet while quibbling over statistics, you have still failed to comprehend or confront my basic premise, that international conflicts and enemies don’t just fall out of the sky, they’re created, formed and evolve in this swamp we call life here on planet earth. Considering our (U.S.) record of concern for other people’s rights, demonising them, without taking into consideration anything we or others (the west) have done to turn them against us is not only an excercise in cowardous, worse it pours oil on the fire, radicalising our “enemies” in a spiral of violence, turning both sides authoritarian in the struggle against each one another, not to mention creating mountains of human corpses.

This most basic mechanism of social, historic cause and effect is apparently too large an intellectual leap for pundits of the conservative American right to even consider. I predict the killing will continue.

Take your time with Porter, other then his patriotism there’s a lot to consider in what he wrote.

As regards your various questions, a couple of items. 1) Do you really think I couldn’t toss out a dozen questions or more myself, virtually each and every time I posted? 2) While I’ve thought of doing precisely that, when I’ve waited a week or more concerning Moise’s sources, why would I ask additional questions when you fail to provide a response to even a single issue raised?

Having read perhaps fifty books on the subject along with a much broader assortment of articles in various periodicals, it’s fatuous to think I’m unaware of the US’s far less than perfect performance in Vietnam. That is yet another aspect of your comprehension problems, you often depict my views, seemingly, as if I’m imagining complete evil on one side and complete good on the other. I’ve indicated nothing of the sort.

Finally, I’ve noted all your questions that are worth attention, I’ve studied many of the sundry malignancies and malformations of the Left vis-a-vis Vietnam at some length and over a goodly period of time, though am solely an antodidact in this area. I take it upon myself to seek out contrary and contrasting positions. That is the sole reason I am continuing this “dialog” with you. Or perhaps you believe I’m attracted to your warm personality and humanity? Or perhaps to your guileless approach to the subject? Or perhaps again because I’ve grown to admire your ability to comprehend the issues, such as the specific use of the word “apparently”? But that I’ve noted all questions and doubts I deem to be more substantial, and will in fact answer them, as time allows, to my own satisfaction, may or may not mean I will continue any aspect of the discussion with you, regardless of your impatience, your sneering disdain, your pious arrogations, your contemptuous displays, etc.

http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/Vietnam/portermyth73.pdf

As for “red and yellow” flags, I won’t ever play the Nazi “opposition is betrayal” game with you, or anyone else for that matter. How boringly American of you. Moise mentioned there were too many sources for him to write down in an eMail, and asked what specifically I was looking for. I answered him and am now, 1 day later, waiting for his reply. I have no doubt we’ll get them, why wouldn’t we?

At any rate, let’s keep it to specifics. And remember how this is supposed to work, if you don’t agree with anything Porter writes you’re suppose to say “Yes, but Mr. (or Mrs.) So and So said in … that this and that happened, or was the case”. Like I did with Rummel’s “exhaustive” but apparently seriously flawed work.

Now we’re going to check out what some other people have to say, without accusing anyone of being a traitor to his country. I know this is going to be difficult for a guy like you, but I do hope you’ll try.

By the way, other then attacking his patriotism have you nothing to say about Moise’s lengthy remarks on Rummel’s methods or flaws? Or are you checking them out yourself?

And have you ever heard of “Black Propoganda”? You should, because your tax money (and our parent’s) pay(ed) for it. It’s an offical section of CIA operations, and relevant to these discussions.

Regarding Moise’s sources, he’s apparently indicated to you, via email, that his sources for his North Vietnam research during the period in question (1945 - 1956 or ‘53 - ‘56 for the rent reduction and land reform campaigns more specifically) are limited to North Vietnamese sources. (He’s done work on China’s land reforms as well, so presumably that’s why he cites Chinese sources.) It doesn’t appear to have raised any red or yellow flags in your mind that, at least to this point, Moise has responded to you about Rummel’s work, but hasn’t been willing to more specifically acknowledge his own sources. One would think he’d be more knowledgeable about his own sources and work than someone else’s.

You asked me the first time yesterday, or was it the day before? These books aren’t big sellers in Germany you know, so hold on to your horses.

If I’ve said something to you “that can be variously answered”, then be my guest and do it. What are you waiting for? For me to go first? What is this, kindergarten? In an intelligent debate I offer something up and you’re suppose to go ..”no that’s not right because Mr. (or Mrs) So and So said this (or that)”, ..or something to that nature. You get how it works, don’t you?

And what is it, Rummel “apparently”
spotted Moise rejecting some of Porter’s claims, or he did actually
spot the discrepencies?

Interesting timing. I’m waiting as well, and have been for some time now. And as already indicated, I don’t jump when you say jump, this isn’t your game and we’re not playing by your rules. The most basic question asked was of Moise’s sources. I’m still waiting, and, again, have been for some time now.

(Also, in Rummel’s work, he indicates Moise rejects at least some of Porter’s numbers. I said “apparently” so if you want a more serious exchange, you might acknowledge some obvious statements and caveats made.)

I sent him another e-mail, and asked him again. In the mean time I found his web-site. There it states he used primarily Chinese and Vietnamese sources, but not anything more specific then that.

If one of the other sources you alleged Moise ignored is Nhan Van, until now I’ve only read articles about the injustice of the land reform, but no specific numbers. If you’ve found they published figures don’t hog ‘em to yourself.

“You’ve offered a lot that can be variously answered” ..I’m waiting.

“But you still haven’t answered the primary question directed at you, concerning Moise’s and Porter’s sources”. ..It’s on the way.

“Primarily Moise, since he apparently rejects Porter’s numbers.” ..He did?

(And you’re misrepresenting my views. For example, when you indicate I’m presuming to “know” - i.e., with near certainty. In fact the very first sentence of the very first paragraph in the Rummel reference very strongly serves to indicate caution, not certainty. When I said Rummel was transparent, that’s a large part of what I was indicating, he’s not presuming to “know” in the sense you’re indicating; this is not certainty we’re dealing with here. In large part what I’m doing is countering the Left’s presumption of certainty or near certainty, in dismissing any numbers excepting their own and in not being transparent with their own sources, hence my pointed question about Moise’s and Porter’s sources.)

You’ve offered a lot that can be variously answered, but you still haven’t answered the primary question directed at you, concerning Moise’s and Porter’s sources. Primarily Moise, since he apparently rejects Porter’s numbers.)

I read Moise and Porter ca. 15 years ago and don’t remember their sources, although obviously I looked. Now that you asked for them I said I would look them up, so what’s your problem Mr. Know-It-All?

And by the way, if you don’t know them yourself how can you be so dismissive of them? If you do know them why don’t you just tell me and save me the trouble of digging them up?

As for the sources we do know, and have discussed, Chi’s data collectiong methods were refuted decades ago. You can’t extra-polate what happended in one village over an entire country. Nixon, a bona-fide liar, never even gave a source (according tho Rummel).

Even if Moise and Porter solely relied on Vietnamese sources, that alone wouldn’t automatically make them false (unless you were a right-wing pundit). All I’m saying is it takes alot of balls to shout out figures as fact when no one is certain, especially when it’s used in a propoganda sense to make ourselves look good. To me the case is still open.

In the mean-time I contacted Ed Moise about Rummel and he sent me the following reply:

His (Rummel’s) work and methods are extremely incompetent.

Comments on selected pages of Death by Government:

p. 246, bottom, says that in the Red River Delta “98 percent of the
peasants owned the land they worked.” This is incorrect; Rummel has relied
on careless authors who misunderstood statistics that actually (if you
trace this figure back to its original source, Yves Henry, _Economie
agricole de l’Indochine_, p. 108) said that 98% of the people who owned
land worked part or all of the land that they owned.

p. 247, lines 24-27, says that the “land reform” involved two campaigns,
the first of which was the Land Rent Reduction Campaign. From here until
the top of p. 249, he appears to be discussing the Land Rent Reduction
Campaign; near the end of this, at the top of p. 249, he cites Gerard
Tongas as having said that 100,000 people were killed. This is a serious
misrepresentation. Tongas was estimating 100,000 deaths not in the Land
Rent Reduction Campaign (the first stage of the land reform) but as a
combined total for both stages of the land reform.

p. 250: “The party’s Politburo believed that 95 percent of the land was
owned by the wealthiest 5 percent of the people.” Baloney; the Politburo
neither believed, nor said, nor hinted at any such idiot thing.

p. 250, just below the middle of the page, does a computation starting from
a quota of five landlords to be executed per village in 15,000 villages.
Leave aside the question of whether there was such a quota (the source is
grossly unreliable). The source that claimed there was a quota of five
executions per village used the word “village” to mean the administrative
village, _xa_ in Vietnamese, of which there were less than 4,000 in the
area covered by the campaign. The book from which Rummel got the figure of
15,000 villages was talking about a much smaller unit, the natural village
or hamlet.

p. 252: Rummel says that there was a rebellion in the province of Nghe An
in November 1956, bloodily suppressed by the Communists. “Rebellions also
broke out elsewhere. The worst of these, near Vinh, involved protests . .
.” The problem with this is that Vinh is the capital of Nghe An province.
An author who didn’t know where Vinh was, and didn’t think to check, looked
at some accounts of the Communists suppressing a rebellion in Nghe An, and
some accounts of the Communists suppressing a rebellion near Vinh, and
didn’t realize that both sets of accounts referred to the same incident.
(If the accounts had been accurate, they would have resembled each other
well enough to have tipped him off, but they weren’t very accurate.) He
wrote it up as two different rebellions, one in Nghe An and the other near
Vinh, and Rummel borrowed his error. This is about average for the level
of knowledge of the people from whom Rummel gets his information.

p. 253: Rummel gives an overall estimate of 360,000 people killed by the
Communists between 1953 and 1956. What he did in order to get
the figure this high was to take Tongas’ figure of 100,000 people killed in
the land reform campaign, and misinterpret it as a figure for the rent
reduction campaign so he could *add it* to his own figure of 150,000 killed
in the land reform campaign, and then start adding on other categories.

Comments on Rummel’s statistical table, online at
http://www2.hawaii.edu/~rummel/SOD.TAB6.1A.GIF

Rummel compiles his estimates of the number of deaths the Vietnamese Communists caused by compiling all the estimates he can find from other authors, and putting them together to create big composite estimates. This is, inherently, a pretty bad approach, but there are two things about the way Rummel applies it that make his results worse than they needed to be.

One is that he finds excuses to ignore the smaller estimates for the number of people the Communists have killed, and base his composites mainly on the larger estimates. Example:

In the category “Suppression of Uprisings” (lines 321-326), he has a few estimates to work with: Vietnam scholar Bernard Fall said 2,000 were executed, Washington insider (attorney, lobbyist, Secretary of Defense) Clark Clifford said 10,000 to 15,000 were killed, and two people gave a combined total of 6,000 for people either executed or subjected to lesser punishments. Rummel’s composite estimates, on line 326, are based only on Clifford’s figures; all lower estimates were ignored in the compilation of the composite.

Another way Rummel’s composite totals get inflated is that a single episode of killing may get counted twice, or more than twice.
I notice for example the following:

There were two related political campaigns, the “Rent Reduction” campaign first, which involved a pretty low death toll (probably less than 1,000 killed), and then the much bloodier “Land Reform” campaign. Rummel (line 279 of the table on the web page) gives a figure of 100,000 killed in the Rent Reduction campaign, citing a source that actually gave the figure of 100,000 killed as a combined total for the Rent Reduction and the Land Reform, making it clear that these deaths occurred mostly in the Land Reform. By mistakenly putting a figure of 100,000 on the Rent Reduction deaths, he is able to drive his own figure for the combined total of Rent Reduction and Land Reform deaths (lines 289, 309) up to remarkably high levels.

To these he adds a category he calls “Political Struggle, Repression, Retaliation” for which totals appears on line 319 of the table. This has two major components. Part of it (line 312) is a campaign described by Hoang Van Chi, which according to Chi killed 3 to 5 people per village. Rummel decides to assume that this campaign covered 15,000 villages, which gives him 45,000 to 75,000 deaths. Even if Chi is describing the campaign accurately (which I do not believe), it covered less than 3,000 villages, so Rummel is exaggerating the portion of “Political Struggle, Repression, Retaliation” that comes from Chi by at least a factor of five.

The other major component of “Political Struggle, Repression, Retaliation” (lines 315-317) is the Land Reform deaths as they appeared in the writings of some authors who used the phrase “political repression” when discussing them, instead of “Land Reform.”

So by the time Rummel gets around to compiling his grand totals for deaths in this general period (line 329), the Land Reform deaths have been counted at least three times–once as Rent Reduction, once as Land Reform, and once as a component of “Political Struggle, Repression, Retaliation”. I say “at least” three times because I believe the figure for “Suppression of Uprisings” (line 326, coming from Clark Clifford–see above) is probably also the Land Reform deaths, which I think Clifford confused with deaths in an uprising. But I can’t prove this. For that matter, while the section on deaths in “Purges” (lines 369-72) is so confused I cannot figure out what its figures actually mean, I get a strong impression from line 370 that the deaths in the Land Reform are being counted here once again.

Ed Moise

As for Giap’s quote it never mentioned numbers, only things were bad. How bad is what where talking about (why it all happened another story all together) . Moise and Porter never contended nothing happened, indeed the 10-15,000 dead they estimated is by no means peanuts. The question is the outrageous inflating, and deflating of numbers for purely propoganda purposes, from both sides of the political spectrum. I’m still open.

And while you’re quaoting the Pentagon Papers:

“Almost as soon as the truce (1954) became effective the Catholic Bishops entered into a test of wills with the Viet Minh, using their self-defense forces to back DRV occupation. The response was predictably ruthless, Catholic villages were attacked by PAVN.
In two instances inhabitants were massacred, churches burned, church property confiscated, priests tortured or jailed, and heavy taxes levied on Church lands and buildings. Among the consequences of that violence was a Catholic propoganda capaign against the Viet Minh, - e.g. the-Virgin-has gone-South-theme, - and a mass migration of whole parishes (P.P., Book 12).”

A mistake for the Church to “test-the-will” of “North” Vietnam.
But then again they had always tested Vietnam’s will. A provocation, with horrid results, then the numbers pinned on “Communism”. I’d like to see what would happen if some one tested America’s will in a similiar situation.

Something else, from the “Red File”, published by Vietnam Human Rights Watch, an exile group in Midway California, certainly no friends of communism. Speaking of the withdrawl from the North after Geneva:

“..Premier Minister Mendes France told Ambassador Douglas Dillon on July 2 that the French had offered to provide public transportation for those of the local population who desired to move with them, but many had preferred to stay where they were”. (Wiesner, 1988)

Yet obviously many did not, ..as the result of the aftermath of provocation, and a U.S. scare campaign (which you have yet to comment on, or admit existed)? Propoganda, twisting of the truth for political advantage. Both sides played it. Now we’re stuck with figuring out what happened.

Another point, as everyone agree’s the Viet Minh left “stay behind’s” in the south (who were executed by Diem), are we to assume no “stay-behinds” were left by the French, that there were no attempts at agitation in the North, with the same response?

Clearly the North and South did mirror each other’s extremely brutal tactics, as Communism was always a mirror of Capitalist (colonial) abuse. For the Red’s it was payback time for the rich, and those allied with them.

In the North they returned land to the poor, the south to the rich. According to the Pentagon Papers by 1960 15& of the people owned 75% of the land again in the South.

With Russian aid Vietnam’s agricultural and nascient industrial sector were rapidly expanding. Northern peasant farmers were doing better then their southern counterparts. America’s worse fear of Communism was coming true: The threat of a good example. It was working, the primary reason it had to be stopped.

Human Rights is only an issue for us when it serves our political-economic ends. If we really cared about other people’ well being they wouldn’t have become Communist (or now Islamic fanatics) in the first place.

“I read them long ago, I’ll go to the library and look ‘em up.” HCM

I.e.: you don’t know.

You may or may not come up with some relevant info in the future. But during this entire time you’ve been presuming to harangue and demand of me answers (which in fact I’ve largely supplied with all the links to R J Rummel and elsewhere), you’ve been silent (”silent” being a generous term indeed) about who or what served as sources for Moise’s and Porter’s claims.

Additionally this, from the Pentagon Papers, in a section entitled “Origins of the Insurgency,” a quote from Vo Nguyen Giap himself, to the communist party of the DRV in late 1956:

“We made too many deviations and executed too many honest people. We attacked on too large a front and, seeing enemies everywhere, resorted to terror, which became far too widespread. . . . Whilst carrying out our land reform program we failed to respect the principles of freedom of faith and worship in many areas . . . in regions inhabited by minority tribes we have attacked tribal chiefs too strongly, thus injuring, instead of respecting, local customs and manners. . . . When reorganizing the party, we paid too much importance to the notion of social class instead of adhering firmly to political qualifications alone. Instead of recognizing education to be the first essential, we resorted exclusively to organizational measures such as disciplinary punishments, expulsion from the party, executions, dissolution of party branches and calls. Worse still, torture came to be regarded as a normal practice during party reorganization.”

To put it modestly, Giap wouldn’t have said this if Porter’s or Moise’s numbers were correct. In the very first sentence of the very first paragraph Rummel indicates any specific set of numbers cannot be ascertained with certainty, which is one reason I’ve noted Rummel is transparent about what he is assessing. By contrast you’ve been insisting on giving Moise and Porter primacy without supplying any of their sources whatsoever.

This is why, among other reasons still, it’s not interesting debating you. There’s far too much presumption, arrogations and other types of insinuations one is required to wade through before anything more substantial can be obtained. You need to clarify and trim your arguments much better if you’re going to sustain any interest. Additionally you’ll need to address people on a vastly more respectful basis. That’s up to you.

Tell us all about how we’re the most foul, vile and destructive beasts that ever walked the planet. But don’t expect us to listen.

We are ther only nation that used “the bomb”. But that’s only one of the reason I believe there is a deep fascist stripe running through America.

Besides the literal dictionary definition above describing America preety good, another reason is fascism and fascists have consistently been our friends, as is evident by all our fascist, military allies over the years. No doubt when they’re usefullness runs out, or as in the Mafia mob world, they’re brutality brings too much attention to our doorstep, they are cut off or disposed off, at any cost
to the people living there.

We can talk about the details (Hitler too) if you like, but now I have to run to work.

If America is at fault for initiating conflicts, what’s wrong with me critising her? No sense in talking generalities here, let’s get specific, which conflict or evil adversary would you like to start with?

Is that why you only criticize & hate America - because you worry that we’ll use them again?

I don’t recall you ever asking me what sources Moise and Porter used.

I read them long ago, I’ll go to the library and look ‘em up.

I went to Rummel’s links and told you what I found: Chi, The Washington Post quoting Nixon, Nixon quoting Nixon, and Honey quoting the Post.

I read somewhere Chi was in the employ of the U.S. and Saigon governments. I’ll check that out too, or perhaps you’ve heard about that?

From The American Heritage Dictionary:
“Fascism” - A system of government that exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with belligerent nationalism.

..And we don’t have the bomb?

does nuke=fascism to you?

Glad to hear you don’t think we should have stolen Saudi oil.

I disagree though, American’s, and other western powers (no fault of ours) have acted in typical colonial fashion. Granted times have changed, the Colonial Govenour is no longer there, but even in Colonial times local’s were called into administrative and leadership positions, again either pliable minorities, catholic’s, or mere thugs. What has not changed is our desire for foreign resources, securing their availability, not to mention strategic foreign soil for military bases, by any and all means, including political assasination or invasion.

“Islamists are basically fascists, after all. I’m not surprised that you support their actions.”

Islamists are not basically fascist.
And no I do not support their actions, I only said we illicited them, I understand where the hate is coming from: Algeria, Iraq, Iran, Palestine, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Jordan, Turkey, Indonesia, all places America has played a decisively brutal anti-Muslim hand the past 50 years, mostly in the context of anti-communism, if it was true or not.

Sorry, I didn’t know “sheet of glass” meant nuking. ..Uh, who’s the fascist here?

Your comprehension problem is pronounced and it does persist. Insist otherwise and hold your breath till your face turns blue, but the simple fact remains. Several examples, but I’ll demonstrate only a couple of those instances.

1) It’s not your game and your rules we’re playing by, I don’t jump when you say jump. That pertains to a few things, one of those is that before you begin making your demands and asking your questions you have some to answer yourself. One of those is you have still failed to say what Moise’s and Porter’s sources are - or, if you don’t know, then you need to admit you don’t know.

2) In the case of R. J. Rummel’s seemingly exhaustive research, I supplied you with the links so if you don’t make the effort to read and understand what he’s saying I can’t help you. (Similarly, if you have some source you believe to be more exhaustive or authoritative than Rummel you can obviously note as much and explain why you believe that to be the case.)

Ooops - I meant to put ‘crime’ in scare quotes. No, I don’t think we should have just stolen the oil and the Islamist response to our non-colonialist actions is proof that attempts to win their hearts and minds are a waste of time.

Islamists are basically fascists, after all. I’m not surprised that you support their actions.

You are going into overdrive with your revisionism here:

You’re right, Saudi Arabia wasn’t bombed into a “sheet of glass”, Afghanistan and Iraq were..

They were?? When did we nuke Afghanistan and Iraq? Nobody told me about that.

You can’t keep making stuff up and yelling at people when they don’t believe you. I don’t know what kind of neurosis that is, but it’s not healthy.

At least we both agree it’s a jungle out there.

You’re right, Saudi Arabia wasn’t bombed into a “sheet of glass”, Afghanistan and Iraq were, proof we are Monkey King. What’s your point?

“Our biggest crime was to pay them
(Saudi Arabia) for their oil instead of stealing it from them outright.”

Now you’re talkin’ like a “real” American”. Whether I or anyone else agree with this type of jungle behaviour is irrelevant. The important thing is anyone who’s voting for you, or any foreigner who is thinking about becoming an ally of yours, can know exactly who they’re getting in bed with. You’re playing with open cards, I like that. What could be more disgusting then the present situation, America concealing it’s jungle intentions behind the good names of democracy and freedom?

As for Russia and Saudi, in the 1950’s there was a pan-Arab movment that rejected Islamic theocracy and tyranny and rallyed around Moscow, which in turn illicited us to export Wahabi religious fanaticism and terroism against it (sorry, again under our direction). Egypt was no.1 recipient of Soviet arms. Nasser was circling Arabs around the red flag. Russia was historically a threat to the Saudi’s.

Again, I’m not saying anyone is better then another here, only pointing out what happened.

Not to get side-tracked, but you wonder as an American why Saudi Arabia is exporting terrorism? Becuase “you” paid for it (your folks anyway), in Afghnaistan too by the way. And why, to stop the export of Soviet style Socialism? That much is clear. But doesn’t the western supported, some times created, tyranical regimes, what made them “go east” in the first place, figure into your formulation? Had we created democracies instead of tyranny, and brought some benifit to the people of the region they wouldn’t have had to turn eastward? Why didn’t we?

My explanation for that points to America’s fundamental contradiction. Business, international investment, requires political stability, the number one pre-requisite of foreign investment, while democracy, real democracy anyway, is inherently unstable. People can vote for whoever they want, we can’t control it (completely anyway), it’s dangerous to our economic interests. Thus you have America backing fascist style tyranny all over the world, sometimes killing elected leaders, at the same time doing a damn good job of “brainwashing” American’s and others into believing we stand for “democracy and freedom”, simply laughable.

Our primary concern now, as always, is our business, markets and resources, other people’s resources. People can play our game or not, and suffer the consequences. No wonder Arab’s don’t trust or like us.

As for China-Saudi relations, I haven’t heard much about them, so I presume they’re good. China certainly needs oil. The Chinese though have a way of doing business with foreigners without occupying them militarily and leaving behind a pandora’s box, triggering a mess of violent conflicts which no one can seem to end.

If you want to discuss Tibet we can.

“Otherwise, your analysis of history is laughable. Supposedly you don’t hate democracy, but that’s the only form of government that you criticize. Communism was a reactionary response to American imperialism?”

There’s plenty to critise communism for, I just don’t see the point if it was our “imperialism” that illicited their creation and radicalisation in the first place.
I have never said one ideology, democracy or communism, is better then another. In fact both contain elements of the other. With Michael I was only trying to discuss the validity of certain Land Reform statistics, not dismissing that anything bad happened.

And I’ll ask you, if Marx didn’t get his idea’s and theories from the world around him, colonialism, where did he, from a burning bush? Did they fall from the sky into his lap? Colonialism, in all it’s grotesque forms, business and social, is the era he lived and made his observations in, what compelled him to formulate and write in the first place. In his writings and personal correspondences he continually refers to the suffering of the masses. Why then are you so suprised?

As for revisionism I’m not trying to alter anything or deny anything that happened, only trying to make people like you see that it is “OUR” sometimes brutal actions and meddling that illicit and give birth to movements “WE” and sometimes “OUR CHILDREN” are forced to later face down. WAR. And if anyone is serious about avoiding conflict in the future we should make ourselves aware of this most fundamental (jungle) rule of “human” behaviour.

That might require a “revision” of how you connect your dots, but so be it.

A waste of time is it? Saying good-bye? Off with Michael to Disneyland are you? ..Have fun.
When you see him say hi from me, ..and to take his head out of his ass too.

Actually, your line of reasoning is basic law of the jungle. I don’t have a problem with that, but if the American government followed your advice, Saudi Arabia would have been a sheet of glass after 9/11.

Fortunately, we don’t.

The British did put the Wahhabis in power, and many of the British love the Wahhabis more than most Muslims do (I saw more Saudis in Harrods than I did in all of Muslim Malaysia – the Brits are probably the only people in the world who have genuine affection for the KSA). Our contribution to Saudi Arabia has been mostly monetary. Our biggest crime was to pay them for their oil instead of stealing it from them outright.

They’ve used their money to spread their philosophy of hate around the world. No, I don’t approve of our alliance with these fascists, but, given the opportunity, Russia and China would gladly trade places with us and our ‘best friends’ relationship with the scummy Saudis.

Otherwise, your analysis of history is laughable. Supposedly you don’t hate democracy, but that’s the only form of government that you criticize. Communism was a reactionary response to American imperialism? Marx must be spinning in his grave. You’re a revisionist, and a very incompetent one. You have to come to terms with your leftist guilt. Yes, your philosophy has been responsible for millions of deaths, but you can only deal with the past by facing it.

I’ve read your revised version of history, I’ve read Chomsky and his ilk, and I know that trying to debate with an anti-war, pro-oppression reactionary just wastes my time and annoys the reactionary. So I’ll have to echo Michael’s ‘bye’