----- Original Message ----- From: "Bradford DeLong" <jbdelong at uclink.berkeley.edu> To: <lbo-talk at lists.panix.com> Sent: Wednesday, April 10, 2002 10:04 AM Subject: Re: Chomsky on Vietnam
> >I asked Noam Chomsky if I had remembered correctly that he argues
> >that the U.S. didn't lose the Vietnam War. He responds:
> >
> >>'out, were to prevent the "virus"-"rotten apple" effect of
> >>successful independent development...'
>
> Now, the development of South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Malaysia,
> Indonesia, Hong Kong, and Singapore since 1960 has been the fastest
> in the world, ever. So that if U.S. policy was to stop "development"
> in the region, U.S. policy was a catastrophic failure. But I suppose
> development wasn't, in some sense, "independent"--that these
> countries are still clients of the United States out of which
> "surplus" is being pumped at a furious rate.
>
> Why should I not conclude that this is total lunacy?
>
> Brad DeLong
>
>
Seems to me you answered you own question. North Korea and Vietnam are
conspicuously absent from your list (but not the subject line). Chomskys
claim that preventing 'successful independent development' was the primary
U.S. goal is hardly disproved by your above listing of successful U.S.
client states. Why should you conclude his claim is 'total lunacy'?
John Thornton