Monday, April 04, 2005
Iraq is looking more like Vietam
Bush = LBJ... Hmmm
Jax
PS Vieq or Irnam which is better?
For much of his talk he related the findings of moderator Fredrik Logevall, the author of Choosing War. He said that Logevall taught him that it simply wasn't true that only a lone George Ball warned LBJ against escalating the war in Vietnam. A whole slew of officials gave him stern warnings. The list included Hubert Humphrey, the Senate's three leading foreign policy experts (Richard Russell, William Fulbright and Mike Mansfield), the Bundys, Clark Clifford, and eventually Robert McNamara, who was promptly fired when he told LBJ the war was lost. "So," concluded Ellsberg, "the notion that the president had no alternative to go ahead was false." He was given plenty of notice in advance and along the way that war would end in catastrophe and should be avoided.
So why did LBJ go any way? It was probably because the joint chiefs pressed him to escalate and he didn't want to risk a break with them. A break would lead to the undermining of public support and the end of the Great Society. Of course, the Great Society came to an end anyway and it was because of the war. (Link)
Jax
PS Vieq or Irnam which is better?
For much of his talk he related the findings of moderator Fredrik Logevall, the author of Choosing War. He said that Logevall taught him that it simply wasn't true that only a lone George Ball warned LBJ against escalating the war in Vietnam. A whole slew of officials gave him stern warnings. The list included Hubert Humphrey, the Senate's three leading foreign policy experts (Richard Russell, William Fulbright and Mike Mansfield), the Bundys, Clark Clifford, and eventually Robert McNamara, who was promptly fired when he told LBJ the war was lost. "So," concluded Ellsberg, "the notion that the president had no alternative to go ahead was false." He was given plenty of notice in advance and along the way that war would end in catastrophe and should be avoided.
So why did LBJ go any way? It was probably because the joint chiefs pressed him to escalate and he didn't want to risk a break with them. A break would lead to the undermining of public support and the end of the Great Society. Of course, the Great Society came to an end anyway and it was because of the war. (Link)
