Brazil's Lula visits Vietnam's General Giap

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Agence France-Presse

Brazil's Lula visits Vietnam's General Giap
44 minutes ago



HANOI (AFP) - Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on a Vietnam visit Thursday paid his respects to General Vo Nguyen Giap, the architect of military victories over France and the United States.

Lula, a former leftist trade union activist, posed for a photograph with the 97-year-old general dressed in a white army uniform and said he would send the picture to Cuba's ailing veteran revolutionary Fidel Castro.

"The Vietnamese can be proud of being the people that defeated the French and the Americans in the same century," said Lula. "That says a lot about who the Vietnamese people are and how resilient they are."

The general said that whenever he used to go to Cuba he would visit Castro.

Giap, who was a close confidante of Vietnam's late revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh, is regarded as one of history's great military strategists, having defeated the French colonial regime at the 1954 battle of Dien Bien Phu.



Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080710/wl_asia_afp/vietnambrazildiplomacygiap

[Jack Rabbit]

1. Wow, there's a blast from the past

I thought Giap died years ago.

[eridani]

5. Giap was a schoolteacher during WW II

That was back when Americans were training the anti-Japanese Vietnamese resistance. Giap was one of them--apparently the lessons took.

[Doctor_J]

2. I remember studying the VN war and seeing this picture of him & Ho

And thinking, "so those are the men who beat back the world's greatest fighting force". Appearances can be deceiving

[Judi Lynn]

6. Thanks for posting this. It's a memorable photo, for sure. n/t

[David__77]

3. Lula's got some good instincts.

But I wish he set out to more fundamentally transform Brazil so neo-liberalism is dead and buried.

[Hardrada]

4. That's amazing! A great general and patriot still around.

I doubt if Mccain will pay a visit!!

[Bandit]

7. What utter bullcrap..he lost every battle they fought

Politics defeated the USA in it's mission not the North Vietnamese Army. And in fact I don't call coming to our senses and leaving being a defeat...

[One_Life_To_Give]

8. Give him some credit

Dien Bien Phu was a military success.

And Tet 1 was not only great theater but nicely eliminated the VietCong as a political force in the process.

[Winterblues]

9. He is definitely a Great General and Military stratigist but

He did not defeat the American military in any battle or campaign. He did defeat the French as you say. I agree with the poster though that America did not suffer a military defeat but a political one and as he suggested that wasn't even really a defeat but different way of looking at the situation.

[Peace Patriot]

10. A very interesting politician--Lulu. He has played some corporate games, but he

has also been a strong supporter of the new South American left--particularly of Hugo Chavez--and of Latin American self-determination and local control--for instance, the formation of a South American "Common Market." And it was Lulu--not Chavez--who recently proposed a common defense as well (neither thing--common market or common defense--to include the U.S.). Brazil had a big oil find, recently. So did Argentina. So there now five countries that are in Bushite-Exxon Mobil gunsights (the ones with the biggest oil reserves--all with leftist governments): Venezuela, Ecuador (both members of OPEC), and their closest allies, Bolivia (natural gas, and oil), Argentina, and Brazil. (Uruguay, Paraguay and Nicaragua are also leftist, and are targets for different reasons than oil, i.e., not as much urgency to toppling their governments.)

Venezuelan military officials met with the Vietnamese not long ago (I don't know if with Gen. Giap), and I remember them saying upfront that it was to get some training in guerrilla warfare, in case of U.S. aggression. The Bushites have a plot brewing with fascist groups in the oil rich Venezuelan province of Zulia, to try to split Zulia off from the central government (a secessionist plot--similar to the in-progress, Bushite secessionist plot in Bolivia). The Bushites can't win transparent elections, no matter how much of our taxpayer money they pour into rightwing political groups in South America, so Plan B may be starting civil wars to create fascist mini-states that control the oil. Donald Rumsfeld, with mercenary forces, Colombian forces and lots of money stolen from us in Iraq, could proceed with a private war, even without direct U.S. military support; but the secessionist plots are designed to obtain U.S. military support--even, say, from Obama--in a phony ploy to support the "independence" of these secessionist states. (Obama might not support toppling democratic governments--but the cry of "independence" and "freedom fighters" might give him cover.)

In any case--unknown to most of the American people--Bushite war plans are in motion, in South America--and could unfold this year, actually (and be an important election issue). This may be why the president of Brazil is PUBLICLY meeting with Gen. Giap--as a warning.