What really happened in Vietnam? Nick Turse investigates war crimes files.

Journalist Nick Turse investigated Vietnam war crimes files, thousands of them. As he explained to Bill Moyers, there is much America did in Vietnam that it should be ashamed of. Why dredge up the past? First, Vietnam is within the lifetimes of many people currently alive. Second, a powerful lesson illustrated by Turse is that in the absence of accurately reported information our government excels at hiding the truth and painting rosy pictures. This is a very important lesson pertaining to Iraq and Afghanistan. We always have spotty and hyper-censored media coverage concerning the conduct of our troops. What have our troops been doing? The assumption should be that in the absence of vigorous and accurate reporting, things have been going on in Iraq and Afghanistan that could not possibly withstand the light of day. That is certainly what happened in Vietnam, which was a concocted war, just like Afghanistan and Iraq. Americans need to quit pretending that they are getting accurate information from their government in the absence of any trustworthy verifying source of information. In the absence of trustworthy information, we need to assume that war is a theater for war crimes and make believe. How many decades will we need to wait before the truth comes out about the wars of "freedom" we are fighting in the Middle East? How many decades will pass before historians declare that these needless wars were conducted in shameful ways. How long before Americans realize that our biggest wars are wars to clamp down on information waged by our government against the people of the U.S.? Here are a few excerpts from the Turse interview by Bill Moyers:

All the atrocities that [John] Kerry mentions by name [before Congress] I found evidence of all of those types of crimes represented in the records of this Vietnam War Crimes Working Group in the government’s own files. So at the same time that-- you know, that Kerry and the veterans that he was referring to there were being smeared as fake veterans or as liars, the military had all these records that proved that these were just the very crimes that were going on in Vietnam. [An army medic named Jamie Henry] saw these things. And when he first spoke up about brutality his life was threatened by fellow unit members. And even his friends came to him and said, "Look, you have to keep your mouth shut or you're going to get shot in the back during a firefight and no one's going to be the wiser." So Jamie did keep his mouth shut, but he kept his eyes open. And he kept cataloguing everything he saw. And this culminated in-- it was February 8th, 1968. And his unit moved into a small hamlet. And his commanding officer, a West Point trained captain-- ordered all the civilians there rounded up. It was about 19 civilians, women and children. And Jamie was taking a break, smoking a cigarette. And over the radio he heard this captain give an order. And it was to kill anything that moves. And Jamie heard this. And he jumped up. And he went to go try and intervene. But he was just seconds late. He showed up just as five men arrayed around these civilians, opened up on full automatic with their M-16 rifles, and shot them all dead. And Jamie told me that 30 seconds after this took place, he vowed that he would make this public. And he made it, you know, his duty to do so. As soon as he got home from Vietnam, he sought out an Army lawyer. And he told them everything that he saw. And this Army lawyer told him that he needed to keep quiet, because there were a million ways that the Army could make him disappear. He went to spoke to an Army criminal investigator. But that man threatened him. He went and sought out a civilian lawyer who told him to get some political backing. He wrote to two congressman. Neither of them returned his letters. Then he started speaking out. He went on the radio. He went to public forums. And even the winter soldier investigation He spoke out there. But he could never get any traction. And finally, you know, it was years later that Jamie just gave up. And you know, he decided that he just had to move on with his life.

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Oscar Wilde on war

As Christopher Hedges has written, war is exciting and carries its own meaning, regardless of the flimsy excuses that politicians bandy about.

The enduring attraction of war is this: Even with its destruction and carnage it can give us what we long for in life. It can give us purpose, meaning, a reason for living. Only when we are in the midst of conflict does the shallowness and vapidness of much of our lives become apparent. Trivia dominates our conversations and increasingly our airwaves. And war is an enticing elixir. It gives us resolve, a cause. It allows us to be noble. And those who have the least meaning in their lives, the impoverished refugees in Gaza, the disenfranchised North African immigrants in France, even the legions of young who live in the splendid indolence and safety of the industrialized world, are all susceptible to war’s appeal.

I've previously written about the power of how we frame war; how is it that human slaughter can be seen as glamorous? Oscar Wilde also touches on this issue of how we frame war: As long as we uncritically bandy about horribly vague phrases like "Support the Troops," we will not expose America's needless wars for what they are.

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More on the drone wars

I'm sick of the undeclared drone war that the U.S. (led by President Obama) is waging against thousands people in the Middle East who have not been shown to be guilty of anything at all. Who are all these people we are killing? The Obama Administration says "Trust Us," but I don't. I'm tired of hearing the U.S. claim that these drone attacks are killing "insurgents" while more reputable sources show the bodies of civilians and children. This reckless use of drones is causing millions of people to HATE the United States. The drone wars are thus contrary to our national interest. Even if you very much prefer Obama to the insane GOP alternative this November, please speak up against the drone wars. The following cartoons were drawn by a friend of mine, Ray Gregory, who is no fan of the drone wars. -- ---------------

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Military Voting Philosophy

I remember the presidential election of 2004, during which the armed services were flooded with the message that it was seditious to speak out against your Commander in Chief, and certainly bad to consider voting against your own commander. Luminaries of the time like Ann Coulter published the principle that anyone who casts doubt on ones president is a traitor. This was a solidly accepted conservative plank. But the message fed to members of the armed forces has changed for the 2012 election: Not My President This image has been going around on Facebook, among other sources. I suspect that the message they receive about their Commander in Chief is different than before. There also is a busy meme insinuating that Democrats are busily working to deny military members their right to absentee vote. Does this mean that the military is a Republican organization? Or does it cleave to one of the Three Tea Party branches?

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Mitt Romney: Certified and Dangerous Chickenhawk/Prevaricator

It would be hypocritical for those who spoke out in favor of the Vietnam War to have taken multiple steps to avoid going to Vietnam as a member of the military. Yet this was the situation of young Mitt Romney, pro-Vietnam War but unwilling to go there, and then he spins a wild lie in an attempt to cover his tracks. That is the news story told by Steve Benen at the Maddow Blog:

Many years later, in 1994, Romney said, "It was not my desire to go off and serve in Vietnam, but nor did I take any actions to remove myself from the pool of young men who were eligible for the draft." That wasn't true -- he took several steps to remove himself from the eligibility pool.
Romney is certainly not the first chickenhawk to run vie for high political office. We've seen it before, and every time I see it, it reminds me of the words of Chris Hedges (who wrote War Is A Force That Gives Us Meaning), and I think to myself, "If he had fought in a war he wouldn't be nearly so willing to start yet another war." To me, the word "chickenhawk" is not a mainly an insult because I can respect the fact that people avoid going to war. To me, the importance of the term is that it refers to a dangerous psychological profile of many people who seek powerful political positions. It refers to a type of reaction formation. It is a common tactic of those who are willing to sacrifice American soldiers so that they can feel a psuedo-manly inner glow. The fact that one is a certified chickenhawk, as Mitt Romney is, should disqualify him for office. American voters just don't seem to "get it," however. We should run from politicians who bellow pro-war platitudes after having avoided war. What kind of candidate would be trustworthy on matters of war? Those who actually fought, or equally, those who avoided war when of military age and continue to avoid war now.

Continue ReadingMitt Romney: Certified and Dangerous Chickenhawk/Prevaricator