A pragmatic view of the Democratic compromise war funding bill.

[flamin lib]

Anybody remember April 1975? That was when Saigon was over-run because funding was suddenly cut for the Vietnam War and the troops were pulled out too precipitously. It looked like this:






This is what Bush tried to force the Democrats to do. By vetoing the funding bill that called for an reasonable and orderly withdrawal and threatening to do so again until the funding ran out he left them no choice but to compromise. Am I happy about the second bill? Hell no but I understand why the Dems did what they did. Will the extension of the war cost more lives? Yes, probably as many as would be lost in a repeat of April 1975. There was no good alternative but to move the ball down the field by accepting benchmarks that Bush will probably ignore.

What does the second bill with non-binding benchmarks do? It will force Bush to publicly admit that there is no progress being made and to try to extend the war anyway. It will give moderate Republicans cover to over-ride his veto of a second withdrawal bill. It will allow for the orderly and safe withdrawal of troops from Iraq unlike what happened in Vietnam thirty-two years ago.

We must hold them to the promise of ending the war but shouldn’t be willing to give up what little good we can get by demanding the perfect. It is cold comfort indeed to take the pragmatic view while men and women are being killed and maimed.

[ValiantBlue]

1. I am not sure I can follow

You do realize that when they do decide to leave it will be chaotic even if it is a planned withdrawal?

[flamin lib]

4. Given the success of the occupation without a plan, how successful

will a withdrawal without a plan be? A sudden cut of all funding would have troops leaving without taking equipment with them. Like Vietnam, when there wasn't enough room for the evacuation helicopters on the aircraft carriers so they were shoved overboard to make room for the next landing. People, civilian and military alike, fighting and clawing to get a place on a copter, pushing others out to get in.

No, a sudden cut of all funding is not a good idea and it was the only alternative Bush left us.

[madfloridian]

10. So let's just give Little Boots 100 billion without strings?

I sure don't understand where you are on this.

They kept doing this stuff back in Vietnam years...playing politics. Saying we can't leave now, just give us a little longer.

[flamin lib]

14. Here's where I am:

My heart says load up the planes and boats today. My pragmatic head says it can't happen.

I'd like to see Pelosi and Reid shove the first bill up Bush's ass but they don't have the votes--yet.

If Bush continued to veto the funding we'd have a repeat of the Saigon disaster when all the money dried up. Bush would point and say, "See what you did! Weak Democrats!"

The benchmark bill isn't entirely toothless. If the benchmarkes aren't met and Bush continues to press the occupation there will be cover for moderate Republicans to over-ride his veto. The '08 elections have them running scared.

From a pragmatic political point of view it's what we could get; a set-up for Bush's defeat in the veto battle.

Still, it's cold comfort at best.

[madfloridian]

23. The benchmarks are optional...Bush can ignore them.

It is a pathetic attempt to spin us that they really did something.

[Tom Joad]

2. We must end the war and occupation, admit that it was wrong

and illegal and get the hell out.

Benchmarks, "threatening" the Iraqi govt with withdrawal, is a cruel joke.

The US should leave now, and it can do so very quickly, and orderly, without billions more of our funds sent to this god-awful war.

the dems only admit it was mismanaged, not that it was one of the crimes of the century.

[flamin lib]

5. Yes, all that is true. But we should get out in an orderly fashion with

the welfare of our soldiers in mind. What happened in Saigon wasn't pretty and is something to be avoided if possible.

[Tom Joad]

21. The fall of Saigon was beautiful in many ways. A wonderful defeat for an imperialist military.

Cut and Run. The only moral option in an immoral war.

We could leave in a matter of a few months (in a very orderly way). But the best the Dems could come up with was to request a withdrawal BEGIN in a several months, and then take 9 months to get most of the troops out (hillary, and i think most of the other contenders for the throne, do see some US troops in Iraq well into their reign)

But they really did not even mean that. They have no intention of stopping this war, or preventing the next.

[bluestateguy]

3. Bush wants to pass the war on to his successor

Even if that person is a Republican. He wants to force his successor to be the one to pull out of Iraq so that Bush and his legacy polishers at SMU (where the Library will be) can blame the 44th president for "losing" Iraq.

[flamin lib]

7. Yeppers, that's the plan alright. nt

[Tom Joad]

22. If Hillary is the next one, she will do the same.

[madfloridian]

6. We only have about 50,000 more deaths of US military to catch up

in Iraq to what we had in Vietnam.

And was it over a million Vietnamese we killed?

And they all kept saying it will only take a little longer.

[flamin lib]

8. Will the last soldier out please turn off the light at the end of the tunnel.

A little longer and a few more troops. 'Nam had over a half million pairs of boots on the ground and ten years.

You can't defeat an enemy that simply will not quit.

Ask the Brits about a rag tag bunch of yanks in 1776.
The French in Vietnam.
The Russians in Afghanistan.
Us in Vietnam.

Ya' think we'd learn.

[terisan]

9. I think you may be engaged in revisionist history.

We were not winning the Vietnam War.
We were continuing to have people, Vietnamese and Americans, killed and maimed.
The war was taking its toll on our economy.
Vietnam was being destroyed.
The South Vietnamese were never able to to fight or win the war on their own. (Unlike the militants whom we backed in Afghanistan who were able to use our supplies and aid combined with their ruthlessness and determination to drive the USSR out of their country).


Then, as now, there were no plans for US withdrawal, Consider how little planning Bush and Rumsfeld put into the occupation of Iraq-practically none. They refused even to provide sufficient troops for an occupation. The plan was for invasion only. When they reached Baghdad, they had not even the most rudimentary plan for peacekeeping and the treasures of the Baghdad Museum were immediately looted by mobs. (Thereafter they could not even keep basic service like electric power going). The only ministry guarded by our military was the Oil Ministry.

Consider for how long Nixon insisted publically he was ending the war and how long the Paris Peace Talks went on, (the road to ending the war was certainly not kept secret from the North Vietnamese) and ask where was the plan for withdrawal.

[Justitia]

11. Amen. The OP has fallen for RW propaganda. Actual history tells a different story.

Paris Peace Accords...Secret Bombing of Cambodia...Secret War in Laos...etc.

Those pics are from the Fall of Saigon, not when US combat troops left.

[flamin lib]

16. I beg your pardon.

The point remains that there is no current exit strategy, no methodology for orderly removal of troops and equipment from Iraq.

The timetable bill would have corrected that. Bush vetoed it. Had it been sent back he would have vetoed it again. If funding ran out a precipitous withdrawal would follow without a strategy, stageing and orderly execution.

Benchmarks, even if not binding, have teeth which will bite Bush in the ass. He will have to admit publicly that there is no progress being made and that will give cover to moderate Republicans to over-ride his veto of a timetable for withdrawal.

No revisionist history in the OP. The fall of Saigon was a disaster--no planning, no staging and no timetable. What did the S Vietnamese and US military think was going to happen? Flowers and candy?

BTW, that wasn't bombing in Cambodia, it was an interdiction, remember?

[Justitia]

19. Your OP said those pics were because "troops were pulled out too precipitously"

and that is a RW canard.

We are soooooo far from events parallel to the Fall of Saigon, that it is not even funny.

I fucking wish we were at the Fall of Saigon stage. That would mean that US combat troops are long gone and the Congress has cut off further military aid to Iraq to keep fighting - who exactly? Who is the corresponding, civil war type enemy?

Whatever point you are trying to make now, it is lost with your faulty use of those pictures as an indictment against those who favor timelines for withdrawl.

And about your Cambodia comment, I really hope you forgot your "sarcasm" smilie.

[ieoeja]

20. See post #18 for more detail on what Justitia is saying here. n/t

[flamin lib]

12. I think you just repeated what I said in the OP.

Not winning either war.

No plan for exit in either war.

Make believe happy talk in both wars.

My only hope is that when the time arrives to leave we can do it in a safer way than we did 32 years ago which is what the first bill with time-tables tried to achieve.

[terisan]

13. True. My point is that cutting future funds for Vietnam did not cause the disorderly leaving,

lack of planning for the withdrawal caused the panic. Nixon had ample time to plan the withdrawal but he was actually widening the war he claimed to be ending.

We may be in a similar situation today. How much planning for withdrawal is Bush doing for right now ?

I think I was reacting to your first sentence.

[flamin lib]

15. Exactly my point. Passing a funding bill with dates for re-deployment

will force the planning for an orderly withdrawl. The Bushites haven't planned anything. The first funding bill would set a planned withdrawal in motion.

As it is now there aren't any plans for anything.

[ProSense]

17. Huh?

First, read up on Vietnam, then read Feingold's cut funding and withdraw the troops (scroll down)

The scenario in the OP has nothing to do Bush repeatedly vetoing the timetable bill. It also has nothing to do with passing either non-binding or binding legislations calling for a timetable or the bill that cuts funding.

Anything Bush admits publicly will be spin. He has no intention of changing course and he's convinced he doesn't have to.

[ieoeja]

18. You have your history screwed up.

You are correct in that these pictures are from 1975. But we pulled out of the Vietnam War in 1973.

These are not pictures of the US military fleeing Vietnam. This is the evacuation of the American Embassy a year and a half after we pulled out of the war. The NVA actually halted their advance for 24 hours to give us time to evacuate!

Furthermore, the helicopter going over the side in that picture isn't ours! It was a South Vietnamese helicopter. Check out the Vietnamese writing towards the tail of that bird.

Had we NEVER fought in Vietnam in the first place, similiar pictures would still exist as the Marines were sent in to evacuate foreign nationals (and a number of South Vietnamese refugees). The Marines do this sort of thing every year.

For official US Marine Corps information on this operation, see here: http://www.okinawa.usmc.mil/Public%20Affairs%20Info/Archive%20News%20Pages/2005/050520-vietnam.html


Actually, this leads into an argument for getting the hell out now. The much maligned ARVN surprised everyone by holding out against the NVA for that year and a half (which for the record made them better than the Cambodian and Chinese militaries). They might have been able to hold out indefinitely with just minor support from us. But ten years of bullshit soured the American public on providing that support. And now we are doing the same thing in Iraq. If we pulled out right now, we could still provide limited help to Iraqi gov't holding off the Shiite militia or whatever. Stay long enough, and it will end up like Vietnam where we no longer had the will to help at all.