> >I expect that after he sobered up, that man would have
> >given anything to take back his words.
>
> Only because they became endlessly repeated. If the war was a bit more
> popular, such a slogan could have been taken at face value and could have
> even been a rallying cry for the troops and the public.
The Colonel's words were one of two famously repeated enemy claims made during the Vietnam War that helped greatly in the clarification of resistance goals. The second was a bit more complex and not so easily woven into a conversation as were the Colonel's words. They were Lyndon's own (I quote from memory, but I think accurately enough). "If," he said,
you want to know what America's foreign policy is, look
at our policy at home.
Lyndon, of course, was depending on the knee jerk tribalism of American Liberals to assume that of course our policy at home was well intentioned and any remaining difficulties were being rapidly ironed out by the more respectable elements of the Civil Rights struggles and Johnson's own War on the Poor, a war which of course since then has been greatly intensified under such labels as the War on Drugs, the War on Crime, and Welfare Reform. (These are usually attributed to Reagan, but Jimmy Carter was instrumental in launching all three.) But I think essentially he provides a good template. We can see America's policy abroad visibly on display in the anti-crime of the Giuliani administration or the bombing of MOVE headquarters.
"Henry C.K. Liu" wrote:
> April 3 1999 - London Times
>
> Public support for land war is on the increase
>
> DESPITE growing concern that the air
> campaign is not working, public opinion across
> Europe is swinging more firmly behind Nato.
> After a week of war, support for the military
> action against Yugoslavia is growing, and in
> some countries there are now public calls for the
> use of ground troops.
This is to be expected. U.S. Grant, in his remarkable *Memoirs*, after calling the Mexican War the most unjust war ever fought by a large nation against a small one, argues that resistance to a war becomes utterly futile once hostilities have begun. (There was considerable opposition to that war before it began.)
Grant, of course, was dealing only with the typical wars of the 19th century, which for the most part involved only professional armies, did not involve whole populations, and above all did not drag on endlessly. But it remains true, I think, that no effective opposition to a war can be developed during its early stages, and the strategy of "bombing them back into the stone age" is designed to make use of this window of opportunity. That is if both the physical plant and the social fabric of a region can be sufficiently destroyed, then even if (as in VietNam) the aggressor troops must eventually be withdrawn, the process of "Africanization" will have proceeded far enough that the IMF, Nike, and where useful sanctions can complete the task without need of military back-up. We see this happening in the FSU at a pace which ought to satisfy the most militant of the heirs of Leopold of Belgium.
While popular pressure cannot at this time be marshalled to impact on the aggressors, efforts in that direction must begin immediately. I would say that, roughly, it takes about two years for a public campaign to mount massive enough resistance to become a significant factor. (Number is pure guess -- some substantial length of time.) That is one of the reasons why calls to do something to be of "immediate" use are so emtpy or cynical. It just doesn't happen.
There's an old saw, I think from the 19th century, that goes "Alas poor Mexico, So far from God and so near to the United States." At the end of the 20th century through free trade, the IMF, Nato, and the B-2 bomber the reach has extended -- now the entire world is "so close to the United States" and *hence* so far from God.
Carrol