| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"*GODS__CREATOR*" |
| Date: |
19 Jun 2005 07:22:45 AM |
| Object: |
IS BUSH WORRIED ABOUT... FRAGGING ? |
=09
Viet Nam: how the soldiers stopped the war
The Vietnam war was not stopped by large, legal protests alone =96 it was=
=20
stopped by the very GIs who were ordered to fight it.
The American military in Vietnam was mostly made up of working class=20
conscripts and enlistees; their officers, on the other hand, tended to be=
from=20
the middle and upper middle class. The officers =96 or =93lifers=94 as th=
ey were=20
called derisively =96 often put their men in deadly situations, in order =
to get=20
promotions. This was not the only source of tension. GIs increasingly res=
ented=20
the fact that they had been lied to; they were not defending democracy in=
=20
South Vietnam, they were defending a hated police-dictatorship.
In the U.S., some young workers were becoming radicalized by the ghetto=20
uprisings and wildcat strikes, and came into contact with left-wing ideas=
=20
through the student anti-war movement. Other young workers drafted in the=
se=20
years were radicalized after they went into the army =96 when they came i=
nto=20
conflict with the =93lifers=94 and were forced to defend a government tha=
t the=20
Vietnamese didn=92t want to defend.
In 1968, in the wake of the Tet offensive, tensions within the army explo=
ded.=20
Drug use and AWOLs skyrocketed.
Mutinies erupted over the next two years and spread from individual units=
to=20
whole companies. One Pentagon official admitted that, =93mutiny became so=
common=20
that the army was forced to disguise its frequency by talking instead of =
=91combat refusal=92=94.
=93Fragging=94 =96 the GI term for using violence against their officers =
for their=20
behavior =96 was extremely widespread in Vietnam. The army still cannot a=
ccount=20
for how 1,400 officers and non-commissioned officers died. This number,=20
combined with the official fragging statistics, suggests that 20 to 25 pe=
rcent=20
of all officers killed in the war were killed by their men, not =93the en=
emy=94.
In addition to widespread individual and collective rebellion, rank-and-f=
ile=20
GI papers sprang up on bases, ships, and in units in the field. The rough=
ly=20
200 papers were enormously popular, because they told the stories of sold=
iers=92=20
struggle in the language of soldiers =96 and were produced by soldiers=20
themselves. Vietnam GI, a national paper with a circulation of 10,000 - m=
ost=20
of it in Vietnam itself =96 carried stories of technicians sabotaging bom=
bs,=20
exposed Nixon=92s peace initiatives as the fraud they were, and interview=
ed=20
soldiers about their experiences in =93the Nam=94.
As the war within the army grew more intense, many soldiers began to real=
ize=20
that their real enemies were the =93lifers,=94 politicians, Pentagon bras=
s, and=20
corporations, not the Vietnamese people. The slogan of the U.S.=92s bruta=
l war =96=20
=93search and destroy=94 =96 became =93search and avoid=94. Patrols into =
the field=20
deliberately evaded contact with the National Liberation Front (NLF) and =
the=20
North Vietnamese Army (NVA), and night patrols would halt and take up=20
positions a few yards beyond the base perimeter. Another tactic was for a=
=20
patrol to secure a safe place in the jungle and camp there.
In this way, GIs declared their own cease-fire with the NLF. In fact, the=
NLF=20
and the NVA were ordered not to fire on U.S. troops wearing red bandanas =
and=20
peace signs, unless fired upon first. Two years into the tremendous soldi=
ers=92=20
upsurge, GI combat deaths were down more than 70 percent from the 1968 hi=
gh.
The war was ended from below =96 and because it coincided with urban upri=
sings,=20
wildcat strikes, and mass protests in the U.S, the American ruling class =
decided it would rather keep Detroit and lose Vietnam, rather than lose=20
Detroit over Vietnam. This is why Washington has been reluctant to use wo=
rking=20
class troops as cannon fodder for its economic and political domination o=
f the=20
globe ever since.
The soldiers=92 revolt in Vietnam showed that people in the military can =
become=20
a major force in fighting against war and occupation. But in order to do =
that=20
tomorrow, the work of patient explanation and organizing must begin today=
=2E =09
http://www.traveling-soldier.org/9.03.vietnam.php
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Todays U.S. Holy Wars News:
http://www.antiwar.com
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