Earlier this week I was driving home from work, and in front of me was a stinky diesel truck. I noticed that it had a ‘Vietnam War Veteran’ sticker on it.
I’ve seen these stickers around for years, and it’s now time to say something about it.
When we take all that is known today about the US involvement in Vietnam, how can any rational, decent person in any way think that their, or their family member’s part in that sad conflict was in any way good and noble?
The US role in Vietnam was absolutely criminal and disastrous.
It wasn’t a war to save anyone from any communists or any ‘evil.’ It was a war of neo-colonial occupation, subjugation, and plunder against a colonized people who wanted to be free of foreign control.
During WW2, Ho Chi Minh and his guerilla forces fought against the Japanese with the US and other allied forces. They liked the US, admired its principles, and hoped that after WW2 the US would help them gain their freedom.
But the US did the opposite. It took the place of the colonialist French, and carried on even worse atrocities into the future.
There is nothing honorable or patriotic about anyone who fought in that disgusting, unnecessary, and homicidal war.
All those who wear their ‘Vietnam Veteran’ hat and display those stickers on their vehicles are shameful vermin. They have as much to be proud of as all those Germans in Hitler’s army did. Both fought for nefarious and morally repugnant aims, and disgraced themselves, their families, and countries.
The modern and militaristic US propaganda machine since 9/11 has done much to erase the stain of shame of that war. Propaganda has been unleashed to make that failed and unnecessary war look good, and turned all those who fought in it into ‘heroes.’
But there’s nothing heroic about invading and occupying another country that hasn’t done you harm, and massacring its native inhabitants.
All those who took part in the Vietnam War (except the deserters), are war criminals. They should be in jail, not putting stickers on their damn cars or wearing hats to celebrate their war crimes.
Many of these Vietnam War vets are tortured people. They, and the society they live in, simply can’t accept the fact that they or their family members took part in a war of repression, and have done themselves such dishonor.
To cover up the deep-seated guilt and embarrassment they feel about their part in that war, VW veterans and their co-patriots engage in pathetic, self-soothing rationalizations and tell themselves warm lies about how the Vietnam War was all about freedom and democracy, and that no matter what happened there, the intentions of the US were ‘good.’
Too bad 3+ million Vietnamese and thousands of villages and cities had to be destroyed, and Vietnam’s environment poisoned up to today in furtherance of these ‘good intentions.’
Nothing good came out of that war. The US ended up virtually bankrupt; millions of Vietnamese lay dead, and 50+ thousand US soldiers; US society was torn apart because of it. Communism was neither rolled back or expanded. In all, it was a stupid, miserable, unnecessary war; a total waste of lives, material, resources, and money.
This is certainly not an accomplishment to be proud of, and the US became worse off because of it.
Vietnam Veterans aren’t heroes and they sure as fuck shouldn’t be honored. They are war criminal vermin, who deserve all the pain and psychological anguish they got.
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