He was probably one of the most referenced names in the 2008 US election. But he deliberately chose not to comment on the linking of his name with Obama and “domestic terrorism”. Now Bill Ayers has given an interview to Salon. Two things I found particularly interesting – it does appear clear that his acquaintance with Obama was slight (and that Obama was unaware of his past at the campaign coffee in 1995), and perhaps more revelatory – what it feels like to be at the centre of a political firestorm and to be demonised.
Ayers says:
I also felt from the beginning that this is a cartoon character that’s been cast up on the screen and I didn’t feel personally implicated in that character.
Well, what I didn’t want to comment on was the political campaign. I didn’t want to enter into that. The reason is simple: I thought that I was being used as a prop in a very dishonest narrative — and I didn’t want to be part of the narrative and I couldn’t find a way to interrupt it. Anything that I said was going to feed that narrative. So I felt that part of this was the demonization of me — certainly that I’m some kind of toxic agent that has to be feared.
The second thing, and perhaps more important, is that I was being used to try to bring down this promising new leader by the old tactic of guilt by association. The idea that somehow — and this is deep in the American political culture — that if two people share a bus downtown, have a cup of coffee, have several conversations, that somehow means that they share an outlook, a perspective, responsibility for one another’s behavior. And I reject that. That guilt by association is wrong and we shouldn’t buy into it.
Glad to see this blog speaking up for terrorists again:
“On March 6, 1970, during preparations for the bombing of an officers’ dance at the Fort Dix U.S. Army base and for Butler Library at Columbia University,[22] there was an explosion in a Greenwich Village safe house when the nail bomb being constructed prematurely detonated for unknown reasons. WUO members Diana Oughton, Ted Gold, and Terry Robbins died in the explosion. Cathy Wilkerson and Kathy Boudin escaped unharmed. It was an accident of history that the site of the Village explosion was the former residence of Merrill Lynch brokerage firm founder Charles Merrill and his son, the poet James Merrill. The younger Merrill subsequently recorded the event in his poem 18 West 11th Street, the title being the address of the house. An FBI report later stated that the group had possessed sufficient amounts of explosive to “level … both sides of the street”.[23]
The bomb preparations have been pointed out by critics of the claim that the Weatherman group did not try to take lives with its bombings. Harvey Klehr, the Andrew W. Mellon professor of politics and history at Emory University in Atlanta, said in 2003, “The only reason they were not guilty of mass murder is mere incompetence. I don’t know what sort of defense that is.”[22]”
I wonder if the Americans they were planning to kill were also guilty by association?
What is it with the left and terrorism, anyway?
That’s hilarious, Leon!
Glad to see you proving the point about the vacuous nature of guilt by association.
The post links to the interview with Ayers. No doubt you’re confused by the lack of the obligatory LOUD CONDEMN!
Perhaps we could bomb an Afghan wedding party to establish our anti-terror cred to your satisfaction, Leon.
I don’t approve of the sleazy and vicious way the right tried to link Obama and Ayers during the presidential campaign.
But as for Ayers being “demonised”, well, Americans are funny about terrorists, and they do have this strange tendency to demonise them. Can’t understand why.
Ayers doesn’t deserve to be demonised. The Weather Underground were barely terrorist, as the main job of terrorism—inspiring fear—was the one job at which they were totally f&*king hopeless.
Even the bourgie West Germans did it better.
It was a long time ago, just as it was a long time ago, though not quite as long, that the then Liberal Government under McMahon failed to investigate the activities of right wing terrorists in Australia, despite their having training camps in the bush. And so far as the link with Obama is concerned, just as irrelevant.
You do the crime,you get caught, you do the time, and after you’ve done the time, you come out of gaol and a just society allows you to live the usual ordinary life, so long as you don’t re-offend.
well, that’s what’s supposed to happen, anyway.
What is it with the left and terrorism, anyway?
Leon, the real question is, why are you so afraid?
I’m inclined to think Ayers handled the Obama situation well, anyway. It showed good judgement to not make public statements at the time, and that that would only feed the sort of narrative he is talking about.
As to the question of Ayers demonisation, I get the sense that he resents it, but I don’t think he’s denying that he’s guilty of those things of which he has been accused.
Well, I suppose incompetent terrorists are better than competent ones.
I would love to see, however, whether people at LP would take such a blasé attitude to far-right terrorists, such as the racists who murdered 3 civil rights activists in 1964 (‘Mississippi Burning’). If one of the perps now wrote his memoirs, feebly trying to justify what he had done, would he get ‘demonised’ by the left? You betcha. (And rightly so).
Ayers is slime, and if just one of his bomb-planting escapades had gone slightly differently, he’d have been giving that interview to Salon from behind the bars of a maximum-security penitentiary.
klaus k, my problem with the views expressed in that interview are that:
a) Ayers still doesn’t want to give a full account of what was done. (“How many of the Weather Underground bombings did you personally know about?” “I can’t even remember. But I wouldn’t say if I could.”) and
b) He’s still trying to justify it (through the tried-and-true method of “My crimes? No, look over there! Teh Govermint is doing something worse!”).
Paulus, er, why would he be giving any interviews at all, given he would never have met Obama, hence never attracted media interest after all these years?
I will say if we were to judge Ayers purely on the basis of his WU days, then “terrorist” isn’t far off the mark (but he has a fair point that the government was likewise engaged in terrorism against the Vietnamese). However it is worth reading the rest of life story after that – even if you disagree with for instance, his earlier experiments with radical education philosophies, there’s plenty to suggest he’s rightfully earned the respect he has amongst academics and his community in general.
Paulus: that’s pathetic. You’re trying to compare actual successful terrorists (the Mississippi twats) against a hypothetically successful but in reality failed terrorist (Ayers).
But neither of those things implies that he still believes he did the right thing, only that he still thinks he had good reasons, and that he feels that the others involved should take responsibility and come forward rather than him dobbing them in.
He’s walking a pretty fine line there ethically, in my opinion. I don’t agree with the position he’s taking, because I would want to reconsider my motivations if I recognised that the means had been so very wrong.
Down and Out, don’t intentions matter? Both had intention to kill — and to cause terror thereby — but the outcomes were different purely due to luck.
The Mississippi racists got ‘lucky’ when one of their members, a local deputy, happened to pull over the 3 activists for speeding and took them into custody.
The WU got ‘unlucky’ when the bomb they were going to plant at a US Army dance prematurely exploded.
As one historian observed, “The only reason they were not guilty of mass murder is mere incompetence. I don’t know what sort of defense that is.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weatherman_(organization)
Sorry, I’ve just realised Leon already provided that last quote upthread. But it is a good one …
It’s not inconceivable it wasn’t incompetence though – maybe there was on rogue member of the team that suddenly realised what a horrible thing they were about to do, and deliberately detonated the bomb early.
Seeing as there was never a proper trial of those involved (due, it would seem, at least partly to FBI incompetence), and almost certainly never will be, we’ll probably never know.
Don’t intentions matter?
They matter, but results matter more. I cannot put it any simpler to you.
Yes, I agree Paulus – intentions and planning are important. If that nail bomb was intended to be used against other people, then that is a pretty serious indictment of anybody involved in making it. Ayers has to take some responsibility for that because he was a very important and influential position within the group. Although the details of his involvement in particular events remain unclear, that is certain.
‘person’ not ‘position’
I’d take more notice of Right Wing shock and horror at Bill Ayers were they to have maintained a drumbeat of opposition to Ayers’ prominent role in a wide range of professional, educational and social activities over the last three decades.
They didn’t, of course.
But let Bill Ayers share a couch briefly with Barack Obama and suddenly Ayers’ past is a matter of the gravest concern.
The Right would be more effective were they to disavow their lazy, hypocritical fellow-travellers — more effective, but much, much fewer in number.
I’d also be much more inclined to bother condemning people like Ayers if we could only acknowledge that deadly bomb strikes are conducted daily, hourly, in all our names, killing schoolkids on their way to work, wedding parties, workmen, mums and oh yes, the occasional combatant, although more by luck than by good management; because those bomb strikes are conducted from the air.
It’s as it it suddenly becomes moral if you put someone else in an aeroplane and tell them to go and bomb someone, so you’re doing it by remote control as it were. Or not even that, or you simply vote for the politicians who put the soldiers in the aeroplanes…
“But, it’s a completely different thing,” you’ll say. Why?
If I were Obama I’d appoint Ayers as Secretary of Education, a job for which he is perfectly qualified. He’s be 16th in line in the presidential line of succession.
Such an appointment would be the perfect fuck you to the right wingers who vilified both Ayers and Obama during the campaign.
Spiros, I don’t think saying ‘Fuck you’ to right-wingers or anyone else is Obama’s first priority. Just a wild guess.
This thread was derailed at the outset by Leon, who seems to think ‘people at LP’ are somehow defending or siding with Ayers, and most subsequent comments have engaged with that notion in some way or another. But I can’t see a single thing in the original post to suggest sympathy for Ayers, only a well-placed interest in how someone whose name was invoked to try to destroy Obama’s candidacy felt about it at the time and afterwards. That is interesting; how could it not be? But it doesn’t equate to defending or sympathising with Ayers in any way that I can see.
Oh come on PC.
Show me the loud denunciation. There isn’t one, is there?
QED
And Helen @ 21 the direct connection with attacks on civilians in the form of cluster bombs,time delay fuses and shock impaction that can only be justified [horribly] to create fear, death and mutilation is a terrible indictment on not just those using these weapons but also those who manufacture and sell them.
I have only the foggiest notion of what Ayers is supposed to have done. And that’s probably all I’m ever going to know because I just don’t care. The only reason I’ve heard of him is a spurious ‘guilt-by-association’ attack on Obama which both I and the voters of America have rejected.
Jenny – that’s a pretty frank admission of wilful ignorance.
For anyone who IS mildly interested in the facts: the Weather Underground (for all their ultra-left craziness) always had buildings evacuated first. Always. Their specifically aimed not to kill people, but rather to attack the US state.
The only deaths they were responsible for were a. their own members (thats who ‘WOU’ is in Leon’s post) and b. I think one security guard or policeman during a botched bank robbery with the Panthers, for which two of their emmbers are still serving time.
Hardly Bader-Meinhof. Wouldnt even attract the attention of the Underbelly producers at Channel 9.
What’s always interested me abut them is the apparently endless 2nd chances offered to white middle class kids. A Black Panther just would have been deliberately shot in a raid had he pulled any shit like this. In fact… they were.
Wrong, Lefty E. In regard to that bomb that exploded prematurely, one Weatherman later wrote:
http://www.markrudd.com/Homepage/Harpers%20piece.htm
Did they intend to phone in a warning and have the building evacuated? I very much doubt it. (Hint: why pack the bombs with nails if not intended to actually cause carnage?)
Well, Paulus – keep reading Leon’s selective tract from Wiki. Ive added it below. Again, no one was killed in the bombings, other than as above, so I fail to see how noting those facts can be “wrong”. Suffice to say there were internal tensions over violence against people which were decisively resolved after that episode – in favour of bombing empty offices.
Underground
After the Greenwich Village incident, the group was now well underground, and began to refer to themselves as the Weather Underground Organization. At this juncture, WUO shrank considerably, becoming even fewer than they had been when first formed. The group was devastated by the loss of their friends, and in late April, 1970, members of the Weathermen met in California to discuss what had happened in New York and the future of the organization. The group decided to reevaluate their strategy, particularly in regard to their initial belief in the acceptability of human casualties, rejecting such tactics as kidnapping and assassinations.
They wanted to convince the American public that the United States was truly responsible for the calamity in Vietnam.[2] The group began striking at night, bombing empty offices, with warnings always issued in advance to ensure a safe evacuation. According to David Gilbert, “[their] goal was to not hurt any people, and a lot of work went into that. But we wanted to pick targets that showed to the public who was responsible for what was really going on.”[2] After the Greenwich Village explosion, no one was killed by WUO bombs.[24]
We were very careful from the moment of the townhouse on to be sure we weren’t going to hurt anybody, and we never did hurt anybody. Whenever we put a bomb in a public space, we had figured out all kinds of ways to put checks and balances on the thing and also to get people away from it, and we were remarkably successful.
—Bill Ayers[2]
But it would appear they had the intention in at least one case to kill people, and people relatively insignificant to their cause at that.
I loudly denounce such intentions.
The irony of the WOU is that their rehabilitated members are living proof trhat you can basically do anything as middle class whitey – eg the most extreme poltical viollence short of actual murder – and ultimately get away with it, and later resume your elite positions in society as eg Professors.
Who’s “they” though? Clearly five of them did, I guess one has to accept that, though its actually unclear whether tey would have issued a warnign or not – three died in the attempt. Ayers wasnt one of them – but most importantly, the overwhelming number of the WOU “actions” were not of that type, but of the type I characterised above.
Which isnt to defend them (i see them as ultra-left little twits, conducting counter-productive elitist actions rather than honest, patient organising) – but its just a fact. They primarily bombed empty offices – including the pentagon. To fail to note this is to mischaracterise and misunderstand their motive, programs, and ideology.
And as a social scientist, I dont support that.
That is an absolutely awful irony isn’t it?
Now that’s something I’d like to hear Ayers address.
Consider the different outcome had the Fort Dix job been done right. There’s nothing quite so radicalising as being party to an outrage like that – would it have stopped them or given more momentum. Would they have gone into hiding a fizzled, or attracted hordes of nutjobs?
Yep, I’d like to hear Ayers talk about how he’s benefited from US institutional racism.
OK, Lefty E, but you did state in your earlier post, “specifically aimed not to kill people”. The Greenwich Village incident showed that they did have such an aim (at that point in time, anyway).
Oh, and here’s another example of specifically aiming to kill people (again unsuccessfully, fortunately). In this case a New York State Supreme Court justice and his family:
http://www.city-journal.org/2008/eon0430jm.html
But I completely agree with your last comment. As you say, it is indeed a shame that Ayers, and all his surviving white ‘comrades’, are not spending the rest of their days behind bars.
Fair enough Paulus – and I for one feel we’ve learnt more about the WOU and Ayers in two hours of blogging, than we did from 9 months of Republican smears and talking points!
Paulus, but do you likewise believe that Eisenhower, Kennedy et al. should have spent time behind bars for committing terrorism against the people of Vietnam?
Would that be before or after Kennedy’s visit to Dallas, wiz?
To answer your question: no, because I’m one of those few who think America’s involvement in Vietnam was legitimate, notwithstanding how it ended.
If you want to read a recent argument for that, check out this book (written by a lefty, by the way, or at least a liberal Democrat):
http://www.amazon.com/Vietnam-Necessary-Reinterpretation-Americas-Disastrous/dp/0684870274
But let’s not open that can of worms on this thread, please, please … otherwise Katz and various RWDBs will turn up, and this thread will be going for 300 more posts.
Did somebody mention Vietnam?
Hey I like worms – the US may have had a legitimate concern about goings-on in Vietnam, but I don’t see how it was any more justified in dropping napalm on innocent villagers than the WUO would have been in exploding nail bombs at Army dance parties.
Because, wiz, there’s a difference between deliberately trying to kill by planting bombs, and waging a military campaign with air warfare that kills civilians unintentionally.
For an example of the latter, about 60,000 French “innocent villagers” were killed by the RAF and USAAF during WW2. Were the responsible Allied leaders “war criminals”?
http://fh.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/22/4/469
Wiz @41. Moral equivalence between our forces and a bunch of henchmen planting bombs in dance halls? You are bang on though.
It is justified to frag the WUO, just as the Viet Cong tried on allied troops.
Back in the day the WUO were self-indulgent little twerps whose actions compromised the clever Gandhian tactics of diverse groups in the late 1960s.
They got upset when the hoped-for revolution didn’t happen. Like THAT was ever going to happen. Bombing buildings was like a toddler chucking his toys out of the playpen.
The great thing is that twerps can learn. Bill Ayers has been a useful member of society for a long time.
Do folks want him to wear a Scarlet Letter “T” for twerp for the rest of his life?
Gimme a break.
PS SATP, American soldiers famously fragged each other. You should find a different verb to describe what Charlie did to them.
Paulus, do you seriously think that the US military did everything it possibly could to avoid killing innocent villagers? That there was no other feasible way of protecting the South Vietnamese government from communist-backed insurgent uprising?
No doubt everybody thought they were doing the “right” thing. But to take action that will knowingly result in the deaths of others really has to be justified by extreme and immediate danger to the livelihoods of some greater number. That was a plausible position during WWII. I don’t see how it was at any point during the Vietnam conflict.
Paulus, just because something is written by a Liberal Democrat doesn’t make it sensible. (But I do note your prejudice in favour of liberal democrats and wonder how long it may last.)
Its a challenging comparison you make Paulus (and I mean that sincerely), but I would I distinguish them thus:
The allies in WW2 were on very solid ground in believing the French population supported them in the war against Nazi Germany. Civilian casualties were therefore a regrettable side effect of military action, taken with broad civilian support.
By contrast, the US *knew* they had very little civilian support. Indifferently lumping civilians in with armed combatants is the definition of a crime against humanity. And thats just Vietnam – when you get to Cambodia, which was a non-combatant nation, its becomes ever more stark.
Ann Coulter once said that her only regret about Timothy McVeigh was that he did not also target the New York Times building. (later, “she was joking” defence was trotted out, except that she’s subsequently said “I should have added, ‘after everyone had left the building except the editors and reporters.’ ” .. in otherword she’s all for violently blowing up hundred of people.
Every time any of these fascists declare that we have to disavow Bill Ayers – or whatever left-wing demon of the week they trot out – remember Ann Coulter, urger of terrorist attacks against innocent people, and defender of a violent terrorist who indiscriminately killed 168 people, including children.
Noble sentiment. Couldn’t agree more. I’m glad you think that–obviously there’s no ulterior motive in you declaring you don’t want Obama suffering any guilt-by-association here on this particular thread.
I mean, heck, it’s likely Barack didn’t know squat about Ayer’s sordid past…
Why, I bet the sleazier members of the Left might even try some sort of ‘guilt by association’ trip on Ronald Reagan because he gave a campaign speech declaring, “I Support States’ Rights,” on the steps of the courthouse in Philadelphia, Mississippi, where said killers worked and were acquitted of murder by a jury of their fellow white supremacists.
Yikes, I’m being attacked from every direction! The enemy is about to overrun me — drop the napalm on my position!
Ahem. I cannot honestly say that I am familiar enough with the tactical employment of US air power in Vietnam to know whether they did everything possible to avoid civilian deaths.
However, it is well documented that the strategic use of air power against North Vietnam was heavily circumscribed. Pulling a book from my shelf, “Bombing to Win” by Robert Pape, I find that Pape states:
“The great majority of destroyed targets were isolated from population centres. Also, Johnson’s political advisers went to great lengths to avoid civilian casualties. … Actual civilian casualties were exceedingly low.”
So, at least at the strategic level, the US does appear to have done “everything it possibly could to avoid killing innocents”, to answer wiz’s question.
And Lefty E, surely you realise that the Ho Chi Minh trail was a legitimate military target? The US did not bomb Cambodia because they just got their kicks from killing Cambodians — they did so because it was an enemy supply route. It was the North Vietnamese in the first place who violated Cambodian and Laotian neutrality.
Nickws: I like Obama, I would have voted for him if I were an American citizen, and I’ve been pretty disgusted with some of the silly RWDB attacks on him. (I also had some money on him to win, via Centrebet, so his victory was a win-win all round, as far as I am concerned.)
I don’t quite understand what you’re getting at with that point about Reagan, but if you’re making insinuations that Reagan supported those KKK murders in the 60s, I think that’s revolting and fallacious.
Ah, the above link to Ronnie’s dog whistle from 1980, is it too ambitious in length, or perhaps YouTube doesn’t accept links from the blogosphere?
Hopefully everything should be okay now as I’ve discovered the flaw and have pistol-whipped my disobedient conservative staffer who thought they could prevent the truth from outing.
Paulus, I actually can’t find a lot about napalm bombing during the Vietnam war online, but there is some pretty damning stuff about the use of Agent Orange, including the fact that the military were aware of the long-term toxic effects on humans.
Ultimately though the Vietnam war resulted in as many as 2 million civilian deaths. Whatever cause the US may have had to become involved in the war in the first place, I don’t see how anyone can possibly justify the use of tactics that resulted in the loss of so much innocent lives. Those responsible certainly have far more blood on their hands than Ayers ever did.
Garbage, Nickws. The trial had taken place 10 years earlier. And Reagan was a sincere supporter of States’ rights.
Are you saying that every Republican who ever turned up in that town, or gave a speech from those courthouse steps, was really a closet racist making a coded appeal to all the Klansmen out there? That’s just unbelievable crap.
Would you care to bolster your argment with any more concrete proof of Reagan’s racism? If you can’t, then just go back to whatever rock you crawled out from under, and leave us alone.
Oh, I don’t hate Reagan for the speech (no, not the famous ‘The Speech’, but the speech Paulus doesn’t want to remember/admit there was a nasty context for), it’s nothing compared to Clinton leaving the campaign trail to return home and sign-off on the death of a brain-damaged con.
But it happened.
He said those words, in that place, knowing full well…
And I believe it hurts the argument you’ve been making, what with the allusions about folk here being apologists for naive criminals who were somehow as bad as the Mississippi Burning murderers, even though said bloody-hippies eventually served more gaol time than the aforementioned Kluckers ever did*.
*Zero years, if I’m not mistaken.
Of course, there’s aways the Dellums Committe Hearing
Some quotes:
You can read the rest for yourself.
Leon – I wonder if the Americans they were planning to kill were also guilty by association?
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The Weathermen targeted property not lives. As an example of the increasing extremism from 1968 on they were relatively benign. Apart from the three who blew themselves up they have been implicated in the deaths of, I seem to recall, three policemen. The charges were dropped for lack of evidence. The bomb at the Pentagon that destroyed classified material was more their thing.
.
I’m not excusing it mind merely putting it in context. because they didn’t target people it could be argued that they weren’t terrorists (I don’t think I’d agree) however they weren’t exactly Baader-Meinhoff.
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What is it with the left and terrorism, anyway?
.
Al-Qaeda is an organization of the reactionary Religious Right. More McVeigh than Red Brigade.
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The dividing line isn’t left v right. It’s between those who believe their political ideas give them the right (duty?) to kill and those who don’t. There are times when political violence is warranted, I doubt anyone who wasn’t in the Burmese military would disapprove of revolution there. (Provided of course such a force isn’t dumb enough to piss of the corporations that do business there.)
.
Many in the late ’60 thought that that was such a time. Intergenerational conflict featured worldwide. In every country it took an idiosyncratic character. It was most vicious in Germany (funny that).
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It was nicest in Czecho, eloquent articles, poetry, drama, guitars in the street: Mozard, Charlie Parker and the Beatles. But no spitting, still combed their hair. And, um, guess what happened? Pretty much what happened in the West only much worse.
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Generally it was the ugly, grey, war-bred, regimented generation against the young, beautiful, idealistic, well-educated spoilt brats.
Paulus, judging by the serious change in your tone (for the worse) between posting at 6:19 and again at 6:35 I’m going to take a wild guess–You’d never heard of the Philadelphia speech before clicking on the link I put on this thread at 6:22, had you?
If so, then I’m sorry that I wrote that line insinuating that you only expressed opposition to the Right’s smearing of Obama so you could then bring up the Klansmen=Weathermen analagy. An analagy you tried to hang on people here.
For if you really knew the extent to which Reagan was dog-whistling in 1980 I don’t think you’d be so keen to bring up the other, slightly earlier episode in U.S. history as a clever retort.
(No, I don’t think Reagan was racist, but he was running against an incumbent Southerner in an election that was surprisingly close until the weeek before polling day. And his campaign manager during the primary season had been Lee Atwater. Now there was a man who never feigned ignorance about the meaning of ‘States’ Rights Forever!’)
I would only slither under a rock if I was one to defend that sort of politicking.
Er, make that I don’t think Reagan was personally racist, in that he was a Midwesterner, he had the tolerant attitudes of a lot of mid-twentieth century folk involved in broadcasting sport, acting in films, etc.
But the Mississippi episode and the Chicago ‘welfare queen’ fable shows what he did to get ahead. Exploit racial bigotry.
Did any see Helen Coonan on Agenda on Wedneday, I only caught a short glimpse of her interview in which she suggested that John Howard’s comments on Barack Obama were appropriate as Obama had allegedly not denounced terrorism.
Are senior shadow ministers still living in a FoxNews vortex? Is this ex-moderate scared to say anything critical or get mauled by a keeper of the flame like Minchin? I thought this would be the sort of thing any intelligent opposition would be running miles from. At least Ruddock seems to be reverting back towards a small l-liberal (a bit late) and Brandis looks to be doing some promising work on oversight for the anti-terrorism bills.
Paulus are you out of your fucking mind? Three Million people were murdered by US bombs. They dropped more bombs on this country than all sides in the whole Second World War. They employed chemical warfare which saturated huge parts of the country with lethal toxins that are still causing grotesque birth deformities today.. Southeast Asia is still littered with mines which have killed and mained thousands more – and the US is still refusing to provide maps, let alone money, to the humanitarian demining effort. It was deliberate mass-murder on a truly genocidal scale – and for absolutely nothing. astonishing that anybody can support it and expect not to have their morality questioned.
Utter ignorance revealed in all its appalling glory. Total civilian deaths in the Vietnamese war, including North Vietnamese killing South Vietnamese civilians, was approximately 3 million. Now I know that that will come as shock to you because you will ask how could anyone be so wicked as to accuse our nice North Vietnamese friends of being so nasty, but read up on the Tet Offensive.
It would be helpful if you were to learn to treat the Vietnam war as a historical event and take the trouble get your facts right rather than as a semaphore to project fantasies from your adolescence.
All by the Americans though? In Cambodia, where most of the remaining ones are? If you knew anything at all about the war in South East Asia you’d be aware that the minefields in Cambodia were laid by the Khmers Rouge and by your friends the North Vietnamese after their 1978 invasion. Why the Americans should have maps of these minefields only you can explain and if you knew anything at all about the Cambodian demining effort, which obviously you don’t, you’d know that a significant source of funding for it is Anmerican. I’m not sure about Vietnamese funding efforts, but it’s probably bugger-all.
This thread has gone off the reservation.
It’s always amusing when GregM descends from whatever lofty perch he inhabits to lecture the rest of us on historical accuracy.
Greg might like to educate himself on some of the nastier aspects of the way in which the Americans conducted this war. Try doing some reading on ‘Speedy Express’ Operation Menu, and Operation Lap Son 719, just for starters.
His mention of the Khmer Rouge is also amusing in a perverse kind of way, since it was a result of American bombing and the removal of Prince Sihanouk and his replacement with the American puppet, Lon Nol and the resulting destabilisation of the country, that facilitated the KR’s rise to power in the first place.
Aw c’mon adrian
It’s simply unfair and unrealistic to lay blame for the rise of the Khmer Rouge 100% at the feet of the Americans. Who conducted the sweep through eastern provinces, grabbing territory for the KR? North Vietnamese army, NLFSV forces. Why? Because they were ensconced in eastern Cambodia, from whence they could raid SV, protect their supply lines (“HCM Trail”). They were ensconced because Prince Sihanouk had come to an arrangement with them.
The KR had been a tiny force, practically ignored by the NV and NLFSV hitherto. Lon Nol’s coup was a trigger and a major turning point for the KR. But really, the US alone? It takes ten to tango.
GregM has a point.
America’s air campaign against the North Vietnamese, the South Vietnamese, Cambodians and Laotians was one of the most appalling crimes of the Twentieth Century or any Century. It is appallingly ignorant that anybody can claim a moral equivalence between the Viet Cong and the US Administration – imagine a real war, in which the Vietnamese carpet-bombed American cities murdering countless civilians in retaliation. There is no equivalence. This ‘war’ was a pure slaughter. An organization like the Khmer Rouge could not conceivably have come to power without Cambodia being already reduced to a firestorm by America’s blanket bombing campaign which had already given the whole population a personal experience of extreme, random, catastrophic violence and terror. and maybe you need to be reminded that the Khmer Rouge was supported by the American government as part of its Vietnam policy and was supported by American diplomatic efforts well after the Vietnamese had liberated the country from Pol Pot. The United States owes Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos billions in reparations for its policies.
“….US that facilitated the KR’s rise to power in the first place.”
And it was the Vietnamese army (not “north” by this stage) that took the Khmer Rouge out.
Why anyone bothers defending the US actions in SE Asia (especially the air campaign) is beyond me. They knew they were fighting an entire people (not a ‘commo insurgency’) and acted accordingly, by attacking an entire people.
yeti and Lefty E: if youse are talking to me, I didn’t claim moral equivalence between the Viet Cong and the US Govt, neither did I “defend” US actions in SE Asia.
There were many participants in the conflict. It wasn’t as simple as adrian portrayed it, that’s all. The Vietnamese in SVN and those living in Cambodia (peacefully, not the combatants) had many different interests. The NLFSVN did not represent all of them, just as the US-backed regime in Saigon didn’t represent all of the non-communists.
The KR had been around for many years: you can trace them back to the early 1950s. There is conflicting “evidence” about whether US bombing of Cambodia so brutalised the KR core, that it was the sole cause of their brutality. North Vietnam and the NLFSVN “used” Cambodian and Laotian territory to wage war against the Saigon regime. Sihanouk didn’t prevent it. Doesn’t he too, carry some blame for subsequent disasters? So too, doesn’t the DRV carry blame for giving the KR a massive leg up, after the Lon Nol coup?
No? Only one cruel, ruthless, war-like historical actor was there?? I don’t think so.
Ambigulous, nobody is saying that there was ‘only one cruel ruthless, war-like actor’ involved in the VVietnam war, and I don’t know where you got that impression from.
However there is no doubt that the cruelest, most warlike and ruthless ‘actor’ was the United States. It also happened to have by far the deadliest weaponry and monetary resources of any other participant. yeti is correct to characterise its involvement as one of the most appalling crimes of the 20th century.
The historical revisionism surrounding the war is also pretty appalling.
As to the KR, well America was primarily responsible, and the word was left out of my hastily edited and poorly constructed sentence.
Sorry, adrian. As far as I’m concerned, the KR was (primarily) responsible for the actions of the KR. As was the US for its actions, the DRV for its, and so on.
It was an appalling war, I agree.
Some of the ‘historical revisionism’ has occurred because new information has come to light, e.g. memoirs of DRV generals, detailed investigation of the KR regime (including by Australian scholars). I can’t believe you think it’d be better that no new material should come to light?
And then, if we find out more, isn’t it a natural consequence that some views and understandings may be revised (in part or fully)?
Lefty E: The irony of the WOU is that their rehabilitated members are living proof trhat you can basically do anything as middle class whitey – eg the most extreme poltical viollence short of actual murder – and ultimately get away with it, and later resume your elite positions in society as eg Professors.
By far the most perceptive thing anyone has said, and ultimately the most irritating thing about Ayers and his cahoots. And no, a post about the similarly incompetent activities of far-right terrorists would not be so anodyne.
So when did Angela Davis turn white?
The career of Angela Davis and Bill Ayers are quite parallel to each others.
It helps to do a little research before making broad generalisations.
No need to be sorry, but you have misinterpreted my point. America was primarily responsible for the rise of the KR. Of course the KR was responsible for its subsequent actions. It’s just that they probably wouldn’t have been in a position to carry out those actions were it not for the US. Please note the word probably.
I’m talking about the sort of revisionism displayed by GregM. If you think that kind of re-writing of history is acceptable, that’s fine. However no point in us continuing this discussion in that case.
‘It was an appalling war, I agree.’
And I said it was one of the most appalling crimes of the 20th century, so I don’t exactly know who you are agreeing with.
To say it was an appalling war is axiomatic, to use a term from another thread.
The irony of the WOU is that their rehabilitated members are living proof trhat you can basically do anything as middle class whitey – eg the most extreme poltical viollence short of actual murder – and ultimately get away with it, and later resume your elite positions in society as eg Professors.
.
True but anomalous. The baby-boomers got away with murder. Most people, most times don’t.
“It helps to do a little research before making broad generalisations.”
Quite so Katz. And if you had, you’d know Ayers was involved in a string of office bombings, including the Pentagon. And Angela Davis (who, incidentally, I met at Berkeley last year, so am aware of, despite my apparently benighted state) wasn’t.
The closest she came to any accusation of violent direct action was an attack by others on the Soledad Brothers trial – which she wasnt present at, though a gun registered in her name was – and she was later acquitted of any involvement.
Hardly “quite parallel” at all, is it?
Several panthers who did way less than Ayers were extra-judicially shot by police.
Here’s a list of Weathermen.
It appears from a cursory glance that Bill Ayers is the only Weatherman to become a prominent professor.
Weathermen still living appear typically to be involved with political activism of some kind.
Besides Ayers, none of them could be counted among “the elite”.
Some are still in gaol for later crimes.
Well, thats the problem with cursory methods. A decent look will tell you his wife and former WOU leader (and co-Pentagon bomber) Bernadine Dohrn is a professor of Law at NW Uni – and thats after being at a “prestigious Chicago law firm”.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernardine_Dohrn
That’s two.
Any more?
A cursory glance at the members’ list of the Black Panthers indicates that Jamal Joseph became a Professor at Columbia University, Jon Gwara was elected to the Connecticut legislature, Robert Trivers is a “notable professor” at Rutgers University, David Hilliard is a professor at the University of New Mexico.
Nile Rodgers and Chaka Khan?
I suppose it’s a stretch to conclude that the majority of the Black Panthers more resembled the Salvation Army.
Interesting that immediately after sweet victory for all the people of the region was achieved, a generation of my soon-to-be neighbours and friends fled from paradise regained, and sought sanctuary in a member nation of that axis of terror.
the only explanation being that they constitute sleeper cells, tasked to inflict their wrath on the invaders — with Pho? that just won’t cool down and burns my tongue while they glare angrily at the table occupied for too long. HoHoHo
Adrian @ 69. I am going to challenge (mildly) your statement that the United States was the “cruellest, most ruthless” actor in the Vietnam War.
The “Most Ruthless” belongs to South Korea. By a country mile.
Actually Katzo, I went through the entire list, and found three other ex-WUO who were professors. I didn’t bother posting the news. But since you insist, thats five, and doesnt include other ex- WUO radicals rehabilitated in respectable professions other than academia.
But really, if you say so -I guess it must be true that America aint racist after all.
After all, you’re the perceptive one here.
I don’t think we can conclude this, Monsieur Gauche.
My modest point is that the post-guerrilla careers of the WUO and the Black Panthers don’t indicate much at all about the question of American racism, one way or another.
The persistence of ghettoes, scandalous incarceration statistics, and a myriad other indicators provide a rather more reliable measure of racism in the United States.
Indeed it was. And its perpetrators, who violated the sovereeign territory of two neutral nations, against the wishes of the governments and people of those neutral nations, in order to get at their quarry are still to be brought to account for their war crimes. I am referring of course to the war criminals who comprise the North Vietnamese regime who are still holding the people under their sway in oppression without freedom of conscience, freedom of assembly, freedom to dissent, the right to democratic government or the rule of law.
Bombing them in order to reduce their capacity to wage aggressive war was no more criminal than the bombing campaigns which reduced their predecessors in aggression, Nazi Germany and the Empire of Japan, to ruin and submission. The only tragedy is that on this occasion it did not work.
Still there will always be a few in the West who find a certain attraction to dictators and criminals whose business in oppression, even if masked as national liberation. Stalin even had his supporters into the 1970s even after his crimes were exposed in the 50s, just as there are a few sad characters who still cling on to the illusion that the dictators of Hanoi are a repository of virtue even if they violate the neutrality of their innocent neighbours to wage aggressive war.
They always duck and weave around the unavoidable fact that in order to pursue its war against the South North Vietnam invaded the sovereign territory of two neutral countries- Laos and Cambodia – and that is, at international law, an incontrovertible war crime.
Still it will we comic to see Adrian squirm about getting around that undeniable fact. More likely though he will pretend it never happened. Better for him to hold to adolescent fantasies than face up to the fact that the side he supports are war criminals and that in supporting them he supports the commission of war crimes.
Yada, yada, yada Greg M. Or blah, blah, blah if you prefer.
You have nothing to offer but peurile insults. Try reading some history, and start with the suggestions I mentioned above. You’re never too old to learn.
I’ve got some good texts that I could recommend also if you’re interested.
Greg, people had good reason to be afraid of what it might mean if the Axis powers prevailed WWII, and very little reason to be afraid of what it might mean if North Vietnam got its way – rightly so, given that ultimately it did, with no radical changes to the world order.
Hence no mass street protests over WWII, even during times it seemed to be going badly for the allied, and despite the hardship that it caused to innocent civilians, especially in the UK.
Wizofaus, are you not missing something here? Are not the Cambodians and Laos people. Did they not have a great deal to fear if the North Vietnamese got their way? Were those fears not fully justified when in Cambodia the Khmers Rouge, creatures of the North Vietnamese, came to power and in Laos a communist government was imposed by North Vietnam and is still in stultifying power, its authority not derived at all from the Laotian people, who despise it, but from their overlords in Hanoi? Was there not a radical change to their world order?
Then again did not the millions who fled South Vietnam in the aftermath of its occupation by the North have a great deal to fear and were not their fears realised to the extent that they risked their lives to the perils of the seas rather thaan stay and edure that occupation? Are they not also people?
Is there some distinction that you think we should draw between those who live at one end of the Eurasian landmass and those who live at the other such that the Dutch and the Belgians, citizens of two neutral counties invaded by a malignant aggressive power are people but the Cambodians and Laos, citizens of two neutral countries invaded by another malignant and aggressive power, are not?
Perhaps you have a point though: that the supporters of the North Vietnamese aggression, who called themselves anti-war, didn’t see the Cambodians and Laos as people and that their movement was, at its heart, racist.
OTOH, Cambodians and Laotians had little to fear from the Axis powers, and hence didn’t participate in WWII.
And you really are fooling yourself if you believe the US entered the war to protect Cambodians and Laotians, let alone South Vietnamese. Hell, they couldn’t even the support of the UK.
However, all that is essentially moot. Perhaps the US did have some justification for becoming involved – if I was put the shoes of Kennedy in the 1960′s I honestly don’t know what decision I would have made. But there’s no way you can claim there was justification for the tactics it used while there, particularly the use of Agent Orange, and to a lesser extent, napalm. There’s certainly no excusing the flagrant disregard for the lives of innocent civilians, which many soldiers openly admitted to (read the transcript link I posted above).
wizo, GregM didn’t say the US’s prime goal was to protect Laos and Cambodia; he said North Vietnam violated the neutrality of both those nations (and later assisted totalitarian takeovers in both) to further its war aims in SVN. I believe that is historically accurate. Do you think it’s untrue?
The South Vietnamese government was one of the worst group of fascist torturers on Earth, so it’s pretty laughable to try and pretend there’s somesort of humanitarian aspect to the genocidal slaughter that was rained down on the South Vietnamese population for trying to overthrow them.
and obviously it is incorrect to describe the Khmer Rouge as creatures of the North Vietnamese. If there was one humanitarian act in Southeast Asia it was the Communist Vietnamese overthrow of Pol Pot, which outraged the United States enormously.
More garment-rending from the Wooda, Cooda, Shooda school of revisionism, I see.
The territorial integrity of neutral Cambodia and Laos was well and truly disrespected by all sides during the 10,000 Day War. And the Khmer Rouge had a great friend in the Reagan administration when it joined with the PRC to veto the allocation of Cambodia’s United Nations General Assembly seat to a representative of the Heng Samrin government. Moreover, Lee Kuan Yew, no friend of marxism leninism, claims that China, the United States, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand spent more than $1.3 billion in a largely secret program in the 1980s to support Khmer Rouge in Cambodia fighting Vietnamese troops and allied Cambodian forces.
When sympathising with suffering neutrals and non-combattants in South East Asia, there is plenty of blame to go around.
But overriding any attempt by either side to attempt to score moral points about this war is the central issue that the US fought an unjust war when they acknowledged to themselves that they were incapable of achieving their war aims.
A primary criterion for a just war is that a belligerent must have a “serious prospect of success”. Perhaps Eisenhower, Kennedy and initially Johnson could argue that they sincerely beleived that the US had a reasonable chance of achieving their stated war aims — that is a stable, friendly government in Saigon.
But in March 1968 Johnson acknowledged that this task was beyond his administration. Nixon never contradicted Johnson’s acknowledgement, yet massively bombed two neutral nations and invaded one neutral nation.
Moreover, South Vietnam was never a member of the United Nations. This added de jure credence to the de facto claims that the Hanoi regime was attempting to unite a nation that had been sundered illegally.
This was the claim of the US Federal Government in relation to the Confederacy during the American Civil War. The United States refused to recognise the legitimacy of the CSA and threatened war on any nation that did. (The British discovered a formula whereby HM Government recognised the CSA as a belligerent without ever going so far as to grant formal recognition.)
There is nothing novel about the attitude of either the US or the Hanoi regime to illegitimate breakaway regimes.
Interestingly, the grounds for US bellicosity in Vietnam were enunciated in the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. This resolution served as the legal justification for the war so far as US constitutionality was concerned. Yet in January 1971 Nixon signed the repeal of the Tonkin Resolution on the grounds that the US was no longer trying to win the conflict, as defined by the Tonkin Resolution. Thus, de jure, after January 1971 Nixon acknowledged that he had no legitimate war aims in Vietnam beyond the orderly withdrawal of US armed forces.
Thus, when the Wooda, Cooda, Shooda school of revisionists claim that the US “wooda cooda, shooda” won the war, the first question that has to be asked is “what war?”
Of course, the Wooda, Shooda, Cooda” revisionists could take refuge in the Nixon dictum that if the president does it, it is therefore legal. Constitutionally, this theory argues, the President is not compelled to provide any rationale for his actions, or he can provide an infinite number of contradictory rationales for his actions.
Congress and the Supreme Court begged to differ.
Ambigulous, I don’t know enough about the details, but sure, North Vietnam plans in the 1960′s may well have gone beyond simple reunification, even accepted that both Laos and Cambodia had been part of Indochina less than a decade earlier. However it was hardly Hilter marching into Poland (or Russia invading Afghanistan, or Saddam marching into Kuwait). Whichever way you look at it, at the point the U.S. started providing military assistance to South Vietnam, North Vietnam presented relatively little real threat to the lives and freedom of citizens in the surrounding region.
OTOH, if there was a time when U.S. military presence in the region was justified it was when Japan took it over in 1945. Japan was obviously a major imperial power that clearly threatened U.S. and allied interests, and it’s somewhat baffling that it was able to occupy Indochina more or less unopposed.
Also, from what I understand, the division of Vietnam in 1954 into North and South was something the U.S. backed despite not having the support of the Geneva Accords, and was a historically new division (Vietnam had been composed of three separate nations before the French took over).
One interesting feature of the Vietnam conflict is that the United States did not recognise the Hanoi regime as a legitimate government until 1995.
However, the US did recognise the sovereignty of the Saigon regime. This situation was parallel to the two China conundrum blundered into by the US, when the US recognised the sovereignty of Chiang Kai Shek over the whole of China, despite his defeat in the Chinese Civil War.
Thus during the entire era of the conflict, by implication the US reserved the right to impose regime change on the whole of Vietnam, not merely protect a friendly regime in the South.
But to add treachery to incompetence, even though the US insisted that the Saigon regime was sovereign, nevertheless the Paris Accords were negotiated behind Saigon’s back. Saigon had no input into matters vital to its future.
Thus the US negotiated with a regime it didn’t recognise behind the back of a regime it did recognise, prejudicing the interests of its supposed ally.
After the repeal of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. the US had no rationale for its effort in South East Asia that it was willing to acknowledge.
The war aims of the US, as enunciated in the Paris Peace Accords, represented a denial of the primary rationale for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution — sovereignty for the Saigon regime and non-recognition of the Hanoi regime.
Katz, a few quick points.
“Moreover, South Vietnam was never a member of the United Nations.”
Neither was North Vietnam, so if that’s an important criteria for legitimacy, both were in the same boat.
It intrigues me that people just assume that SV was the “illegitimate breakaway regime”, as you put it, and just assume that NV was the rightful owner of sovereignty over the entire nation. Who gave NV that sovereignty? God? The Buddha?
The fact remains that, in the aftermath of the French Indochina War, two separate states had coalesced into being. Although the details are not precisely the same, it was broadly similar to the formation of East and West Germany, and North and South Korea.
Although there is only one Korean people and ultimately one Korean nation, it can hardly be argued that either the ROK or the DPRK owns exclusive rights to that sovereignty, and would be entitled to reunify by force. So too with North and South Vietnam.
At this point, people always respond, “Ah, but what about the Geneva Accords and the elections they were supposed to have?”
To which the response is: SV never agreed to have those elections, and had quite reasonable fears that they would not be free and fair in the north.
You can only consider SV bound to those elections if you consider the South Vietnamese to be simply a chattel of the French, which they could dispose of in any manner they saw fit.
I doubt most lefties would take such a view of any other decolonising people, so why make a special exception for SV?
That’s precisely my point. I’m not trying to score points off South Vietnam at all.
The legitimacy or otherwise of the Geneva Agreements is an old and barren argument.
My interest is far more modest than attempting to prove the rights and wrongs of the various claims about morality.
Rather, my aim is to attempt to understand how the US understood its own role in South East Asia. The US was and is a nation of laws with a superb constitution. The great strength of the US has been its adherence to its foundational principles, as enunciated in its Constitution.
This constitution requires the different branches of government to act lawfully, including in its diplomacy and warfare.
Constitutionally, Congress must agree to the Declaration of War resolution, usaully proposed by the President.
Quite evidently, the US ceased to act lawfully in relation to South East Asia. If you doubt this, what exactly were US war aims in SE Asia after the repeal of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in January 1971?
Can you point to a Congressional Resolution post January 1971 that states the reasons for and the desired outcome of US bellicosity in South East Asia?
Much loose talk revolves around comparison of WWII and Vietnam. However, one powerful contrast can be made. In late 1941 Congress endorsed the US Declaration of War on both Japan and Germany, and Congress endorsed the demand for unconditional surrender. The US remained steadfast to this demand until it was achieved. For contrast’s sake, note how irresolute were the serial statements of US war aims in relation to South East Asia.