U.S. Elites Learned Much from the Vietnam Defeat
To them, the right lessons; to everyone else, the wrong ones
We just marked the 50th anniversary of the Fall of Saigon on April 30, 1975. Did American officials learn anything from the disastrous Vietnam War?
Of course they did. Just not the lessons you’d have wished they’d learned.
So, what did they learn?
They learned that wars can indeed last forever, but that Vietnam wasn’t the best “forever war” for the military-industrial complex because it became deeply unpopular and was disrupting cohesion within the military itself. The best forever wars are open-ended “wars” like the global war on terror. And perhaps a “new Cold War” with Russia and/or China. Wars that don’t involve the deployment of over half a million men (unless that “new” Cold War turns hot).
They learned to control the narrative. No more journalists traveling freely in war zones as in the 1960s in Vietnam. Journalists are now most often embedded in U.S. military units. Embedded reporters, dependent on the military for access and protection, know what they can and can’t say, even as they tend to sympathize with the troops they’re with.
They learned that forced conscription via a draft doesn’t work well for unpopular wars. So they transformed the military into an “all-volunteer” force. Draftees may well be resentful, rightly so, but volunteers? Too bad—they volunteered for this.
Along with “volunteers,” they learned to indoctrinate U.S. troops to be “warriors” and “warfighters” rather than citizen-soldiers. Warriors exist to fight wars, so shut up and blast away.
They learned to keep the American people isolated from war and its deadly effects. Recall that under Bush/Cheney, Americans weren’t even allowed to see flag-draped caskets. During Vietnam, war was in America’s living rooms during dinner, complete with body counts. Coverage of wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere was sanitized, almost bloodlessly so.
They learned never to talk of sacrifice (except by those volunteer warriors) by the American people. Taxes aren’t raised in the name of war. There are no war bond drives. America’s leaders tell the rest of us to enjoy life, to visit Disney and to go shopping, while “our” warriors fight overseas.
Together with those “lessons,” they continue to preach “peace through strength,” attacking those who truly seek peace as misguided (at best) and treasonous (at worst). As ever, they tend to attack those who’d dare criticize the U.S. military as ungrateful backstabbers. And of course they consistently obscure the truth of how poorly wars like Iraq and Afghanistan were going while holding no one in the upper echelons responsible and accountable for rampant corruption and disastrous endings.
All these “lessons” ensured that Vietnam wouldn’t be the last example of hubris, folly, and atrocity, and indeed it hasn’t been. Until the right lessons are learned, expect future repeats, tragic variations on a theme of Vietnam.
Bill, absolutely correct in each of your points - each echoes down through every conflict through today.
Could I add two things the elites didn't learn (or more likely had no interest in learning)?
The first was not understanding the culture and history of the people it sent young Americans to fight.
The second was not having a well defined objective for the war and the conditions of 'victory' or withdrawal.
Bravo, Bill. I read your Substack daily, finding your voice among the clearest expression of the tole the military has, and continues to play, in the demise of the U.S.A.
I would just like to add two minor points to that analysis.
1. They learned that the “best” wars (and weapon systems) were not those that resulted in a Clausewitz type victory ( ie icompelling another to submit to one’s will). Rather than” best” is defined by how how much wealth can be transferred from the civilian to the military sector, as you described in your previous articles on “ war as a money laundering operation”.
2. The above point was learned in the false narrative that goes back to the decision surrounding the building , and use, of the atomic bomb. THAT, as the late Stewart Udall wrote in “The Myths of August” and subsequent interviews, goes back to the atom bomb:
“ There is nothing comparable in our history to the deceit and lying that took place as a matter of official Government policy in order to protect this industry. Nothing was going to stop them annd they were willing to kill our own people. The atomic weapons race and the secrecy surrounding it crushed American democracy. It induced us to conduct government according to lies. It distorted justice. It undermined American morality.” – Stewart Udall, NYT, June 8, 1993.
Once it was learned how to implement a project of that scale, with minimal involvement of the public or elected leaders, the means for military control of the nation was learned. As Leslie Groves testified at the hearings to strip a Oppenheimer “there was never from about two weeks from the time I took charge of this Project any illusion on my part, but that Russia was our enemy, and the project was conducted on that basis.”
“The way of peace is the way of truth. Truthfulness is even more important than peacefulness. Indeed, lying is the mother of violence.” — Gandhi
Thank you for your outstanding voice , Bill.