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Date:         Mon, 1 Feb 1999 09:44:45 -0800
Reply-To:     joe@countryjoe.com
Sender:       Vietnam War Era Forum 
From:         Joe McDonald 
Organization: Acme Music
Subject:      Re: Us deranged Vietnam baby-killers
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i have worked with people in the VA and other professionals who work with
veterans after the war and yes there are lots of problems today.  30-40% of the
nations homeless are veterans and lots of those are vietnam veterans.  but we
must remember the vietnam veteran population is getting old and many have died
on the streets.  there are lots of reasons and i am not a professional but i do
know that PTSD is part of it.  much more money is put into making a soldier
before the war than money put into taking care of that soldier after the war.
it is also a fact that the vietnam war combat soldier saw more actual combat
that the average WWII soldier.  also the vietnam soldier was 19 yrs old, not
really grown up, while the average for WWII was about 25 yrs. the casualties for
the marines in I corps by the DMZ was higher that the taking of the
Phillipines....80% for Vietnam.   The american vietnam soldier fought an enemy
that Col Bigard of the French Paratroopers who jumped into Dien Bien Phu
described and the "best infantry soldiers in the world" but american forces held
their ground for the most part and performed as well as any soldier ever has.
Until you have been placed into a situation where you must kill or die most
people will not be in contact with the "killer" inside themselves and so can
believe that there is "choice" involved.  There in reality is little choice
involved.  the best and luckiest survive.
but it is good to remember that in the beginning almost all americans wanted war
and in the end almost all americans did not want the war but the actual "vietnam
experience" was had by a very small minority of the generation both the frays at
home and the frays in country.
i for one believe that terrible leadership resulted in needless american deaths
not the anti-vietnam war movement.  and i worked almost exclusively with a group
of vietnam veterans who wanted the war to stop.  i figured they have been there
and they knew the truth.

as far as vietnam truths are concerned we know very little even today.  the task
is to help vietnam veterans who need help and find out what really happened not
argue about it with all the data still not in.  i for one would love to know
what happened in Long Binh Jail  the military's infamous prison for soldiers.
and how south vietnam wound up with a nuclear reactor in Da Lat a gift of the
american people and who gave malfuntioning M16's to the marines.

it is a fact that babies get killed one way or another in war.  the communists
did their share.  during the occupation of Hue during the Tet Offensive the
communist forces killed hundreds of people in a mass grave. there are other
instances.   it is hard for everyone to realize that crimes were committed by
all sides.   also it is hard for anti-war people to understand that yes american
communists and foreign communists played a big role in the anti vietnam war
movement.   it is also hard for those who supported the war in vietnam to
realize that leaders lied about enemy troop strengths and their belief that we
could win from day one up until the fall of saigon.

as rodney king said "cant we all just get along?"  cheers, country joe mcdonald

   -- "The eldest son wont leave home nor cook soup.  The ozone layer thins .003
milliliters more.  The wise person bends like bamboo in the wind." Me Ching.
country joe Home  Pg 
country joe's tribute to Florence Nightingale

Berkeley Vietnam Veterans Memorial 
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Date:         Thu, 11 Feb 1999 11:29:03 -0500
Reply-To:     Vietnam War Era Forum 
Sender:       Vietnam War Era Forum 
From:         "Marilyn B. Young" 
Subject:      Re: bilbiographic note
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The following might be of interest to subscribers:
 THE VIETNAM WAR THROUGH VIETNAMESE EYES; a review of literary fiction and
cinema. It's by John Kleinen and Cao Xuan Tu, published in Huynh Sanh Tong,
ed., THE VIETNAM REVIEW, March 1998 (pp.345-368) available through Yale
University Press.
also note two new books on women in Vietnam, one by Sandra Taylor
(VIETNAMESE WOMEN AT WAR and one by Karen Turner (title, I think, EVEN THE
WOMEN MUST FIGHT).