For decades Art Buckwald brought his unusual penchant for wisdom cloaked in wit to his newspaper column, various books, and to the dinner circuit. He was more than a columnist. He was an institution.
He died last week.
No doubt heaven is now a happier place than it was a few days ago.
Favorite Story
My favorite Art Buckwald story harkens back to his days as a Paris Reporter. He was covering a political convention, and hordes of onlookers were waiting outside the event. It was late. It was dark. And the crowd was starved for attention.
Buckwald stood before a large window and raised his hand. The crowd responded. He raised his hand even higher. They responded with more enthusiasm. And so it went. They assumed or wanted to assume he was a bigwig at the event. He was in fact a short man who at the time was little more than a columnist for the Herald Tribune.
He and his sisters were orphans. He lied and bribed his way into the Marines. He lied his way into USC where the GI Bill funded his activities. He learned he could get the GI Bill in France. And so he went to France, and lived a leisurely life until his funding began to run dry.
He talked his way into a job with Variety. This eventually led to a job and various columns he wrote for European edition of the New York Herald Tribune. Eventually he and his wit returned to the United States.
Some of Buckwald’s More Notable Achievements
At his peak, his column, Capitol Punishment, was published in over 500 newspapers. He published over thirty books.
He married in 1952. He and his wife adopted three children.
He is rumored to have had an affair with Marylyn Monroe.
He was one of the first European reporters to do an in depth interview with Elvis Presley.
He persevered through two painful bouts with depression.
He won a lawsuit against a movie studio. He asserted that the Coming To America—which started Eddy Murphy—was based on a treatment he had written. The movie made over 350 million dollars but according to the accounting wizards in Hollywood did not make a substantial profit.
In February of last year he refused kidney dialysis. He said it was too expensive. He survived.
He good naturedly helped a friend out of a real pinch. Unless this was an unusual act for me, he probably was a very nice guy.
In 1982 his syndicated column won the Pulitzer Prize for commentary.
He established a scholarship at USC for the most irreverent student.
Throughout his lifetime he made various comments that suggested that as fantastic and bizarre many of the exaggerations he wrote about in his columns were, he could not compete with the bizarre realities that occurred in life.
A few of Buckwald's More Notable Comments
Before Nixon resigned, in 1974, Buchwald told Holy Cross College graduates, "As a humor columnist, I need President Nixon more than he needs me. I worship the quicksand he walks on."
He wrote:
"What is the patriotic consumer to do? I went into a shopping mall the other day to purchase a Star-Spangled Banner Sweat Suit. The salesman said they had some from Hong Kong for $10, some from Taiwan for $15 and a few from Pakistan for $4.
`Don't you have any that were made in America?'
`No. The only American-made items we have are these Buddhist robes. They are hand-sewn in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, by the Amish people.'"
"In the good old days, smokers could be counted on to die far before their time, and therefore did not use up their Social Security benefits or health plan credits. Nonsmokers, on the other hand, live too long and to this day are a tremendous drain on the country's finances. We're talking about hundreds of billions of dollars. So, every time we turn a smoker into a nonsmoker we're destroying the entire pension system of the United States."
"I don't want to be a wimp, but senior citizens have to pay $140 for a prescription. To make it up to them, they only pay $5 to go to the movies."
"President Bush keeps referring to the discovery of Iraq's missiles as `the tip of the iceberg.' There are some, not many, who feel that if weapons are the tip of the iceberg, then Mr. Bush is the captain of the Titanic.”
"Every two years I put out a new book and then make a tour of the talk shows plugging it. I can't do it any more because this year it's impossible for someone who is not really weird to get on TV."
"I am known in the hospice as `The Man Who Would Not Die.' How long they allow me to stay here is another problem. I don't know where I'd go now, or if people would still want to see me if I weren't in a hospice. But in case you're wondering, I'm having a swell time the best time of my life."
“Dying isn't hard. Getting paid by Medicare is.”
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Too Serious A Matter provides intelligent, provocative, and often funny commentary on the convoluted intersections of politics, strategy, and history. The title of the blog comes from de Gaulle’s comment, “Politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.”
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
On Spineless, Spiritless, Bumbling Fools—Yes, This is About Democrats
To imply that politics is always logical or always anything is to be foolishly naive. But some things are logical: In US presidential politics, content matters; style matters a lot—perceptions matter a great deal.
The last two Democratic presidential candidates were exceedingly careful. Both split hairs and massaged their prepared statements and formal comments so much that many a yellow dog Democrats found themselves nearly gagging. Gore and Kerry made so many oh so careful and flat out timid comments that many voters thought that Gore and Kerry were spineless, spiritless, bumbling fools.
Milquetoast Hall of Fame
Every political junkie has his or her lists of favorite rhetorical nonsense. One uttered by Gore way back when he was vice-president belongs in the Milquetoast Hall of Fame. While trying to distance himself from charges concerning campaign fundraising irregularities, Gore said, “And my counsel advises me, let me repeat, that there is no controlling legal authority that says that any of these activities violated any law." As the comment suggests, the phrase “no controlling legal authority” was repeated by Gore during his presentation. Eventually, Gore was cleared of any legal wrongdoing. But his comment about there being ”no controlling legal authority” was such a nasty equivocation that Gore’s awful comments contributed to the image that he was a positioning machine—and therefore not a person with the ability to speak clearly and with some modicum of intelligence.
Worse, he was perceived by many to be a candidate without a spine.
Sadly, bland, overly massaged comments are not limited to presidential campaigns. Hillary Clinton’s recent comments about Bush’s troop surge contain so many switchbacks, rhetorical figure eight’s, and other vacillations that they may deserve a separate room in the Milquetoast Hall of Fame.
It’s easy of course to blame handlers for these gaffes. One of the best political sages in the country, Joe Klein adroitly discusses the role of handlers in recent national political campaigns in Politics Lost. Clearly the handlers don’t want the candidate they work for to make a comment that ruins the candidate’s credibility. Dean’s scream after the 2004 Iowa primary is perhaps the most recent and obvious example of a candidate making one comment that destroys his ethos and sabotages his chances.
Evidence in Klein’s book and simply listening to Gore and Kerry on the campaign trail make a couple things obvious. The motives of the handlers may be sincere and sound, but too much soft-pedaling and carefulspeak turns off many voters.
Gore probably is now kicking himself a couple hundred times a day. If he had shown half the passion and a fraction of the spine very much on display in the documentary, The Inconvenient Truth, he might now be President . . . instead of the man who once was an upstart Texan governor who spoke of compassionate conservatism and provoked many conservatives to dream of sunnier days.
While the skies have darkened and various sharks—and no doubt a lot of other nasty things—are swirling around Bush and his presidency now, most Democrats are surveying the terrain and weighing their options for 2008. Which brings us once again to the current Democratic frontrunner—Hillary Clinton. Senator Clinton has great name recognition. But the name carries with it a considerable amount of baggage. One of the heavier bags is similar to one that weighed down Gore and later Kerry. By trying to position herself very adeptly in the middle, Clinton, like Gore and Kerry may overdo it with this positioning thing.
One of the more obvious (and logical) rules of politics is that a candidate who is not the current favorite must distinguish him or herself from the front runner. Which no doubt is one reason why Edwards tossed his hat into the presidential sweepstakes contest so early. Separating himself from Clinton is one reason why he has been trying to recruit young people (with short movies posted in the Internet and a whole slew of other overtures). Distancing himself from Clinton no doubt is one of many reasons why last Sunday Edwards stood behind the podium at Riverside Church in New York City.
It was at Riverside, nearly forty years ago that Dr. King gave a speech that articulated his stance against the US involvement in South Vietnam. Most of King’s comments resonate today.
King’s Speech
King’s speech was logical. Early in the speech King listed the reasons he opposed the war: It would drain resources for campaigns against poverty. Negroes were dying in unreasonably high proportion to whites (which was true at the time of the speech, but not so when US involvement in Vietnam ended); change comes “most meaningfully not via war but through non-violent action.” War damages the very fiber of what is best about America. Winning the Nobel Peace Prize increased his commitment to work for “the brotherhood of man.” It is a natural outgrowth of a Christian minister to follow Christ’s calling to love thy enemies, to increase the feelings of brotherhood amongst peoples, and to strive to end suffering.
King’s speech was provocative. He offered his version of the history of the region and of the student protests against the war. He attacked the arrogance that led Americans to think “that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them.” He condemned many of the forces he thought were essential to continuing the war, “When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.” And he called the United States “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.”
The speech was poetic: “If America's soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read: Vietnam.” “One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway.”
King’s speech was unusually perceptive. Where other commentators who praised or condemned the war relied on reason and rhetoric, King sought a deeper understanding. When he spoke at the Riverside Church, King said, “The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit.” King urged America to “get on the right side of world revolution” and called for a revolution of values, which to him was “our best defense against communism.”
Edwards’ speech pales in comparison. But it is noteworthy.
It did not get extensive media coverage, so significant portions are included here.
Edwards praised King for not directing “his demands to the government of the United States, which was escalating the war.” Edwards praised King for making “a direct appeal to the people of the United States, calling on us to break our own silence, and to take responsibility for bringing about what he called a revolution of values.”
Edwards said:
Escalation is not the answer, and all you have to do is listen to our own generals to know it's not the answer. The answer is for the Iraqi people and others in that part of the world to take responsibility, to take responsibility for their own country. The best way for that to happen is for America to make clear that we are leaving Iraq, and the best way to make clear that we are leaving Iraq is to actually start leaving Iraq.
It's why Congress must step up, now, and stop this President from putting more troops in harm's way.
Silence is betrayal. Speak out, and stop this escalation now.
And I say to all of you—not just members of Congress, all of you who are here today—and the millions like us around the world who know that this is a mistake—your job is to reject the easy way of apathy and to choose instead, to choose the hard path, the path of action.
Silence is betrayal. Speak out.
Our purpose must be to restore America's leadership, moral leadership, in the world. When we speak out about the ongoing genocide in Sudan and Darfur, when we speak out against thousands and thousands of children in Africa being born with AIDS, an entire new generation of children with AIDS--(Why? Because their mother can't pay for a four-dollar dose of medicine.)—the United States of America is better than this. . .. Our people are better than this. When we speak out against human rights abuses in China and other parts of the world, when we speak out, not just about . . . poverty in the United States of America, but poverty across the globe—half of our planet, three billion people, live on two dollars or less a day—the United States of America is better than this.
If anything has been proven over the last few years, it is that raw power alone will not make you a leader. You have to actually have the moral authority to lead.
Our purpose has to be to ignite the revolution of values that Dr. King dreamed about.
You have to take action. You have to take responsibility. That's exactly what Dr. King was talking about 40 years ago from this pulpit. It is not okay to stand idly by. Silence is betrayal.
To solve these problems, we have got to counter apathy with action. We have to replace cynicism with service. We have to stop looking to others, and start looking to ourselves. To solve these problems, we have to break the silence. We need to break the silence about the extraordinarily deep divisions between the haves and the have-nots. We have to break the silence . . . about the millions of our own people who are trying every day just to survive. We need to break the silence about 46-47 million of our own people who are worried sick that if they wake up in the middle of the night with a sick four-year-old, they're going to have to go to the local emergency room and beg for health care. We need to break the silence about our country's addiction to fossil fuels and about the damaging effect that these greenhouse gases are having on God's gift to us, this green Earth.
It is time. In fact, patriotism is about refusing to support something that you know is wrong and having the courage to speak out with strength and passion and backbone for something you know is right.
The world needs to see our better angels.
Separation and a Whole lot More
Edwards’ speech, along with other statements he has made recently, make it apparent that he can speak clearly and logically.
Edwards is trying to make it obvious to the people and to the political elites that he will not make the same mistakes concerning style and carefulspeak that his Democratic predecessors made.
So in a way Edwards is doing what every upstart needs to do, separating himself in terms of content and style from the front runner. Speaking at Riverside also had other delightful sweeteners for Edwards. Because the church is in New York City, it is in the heart of Clinton’s turf. Edwards’ speech shows that he—or his advisors—know something about history—which would have benefited the US and many of its often spineless institutions while President Bush prepared the country to go to war in Iraq.
In a very important way, Edwards is doing much more than putting some distance between himself and Clinton. His stance on the war actually coheres with his policies on poverty, the environment, and foreign policy. Edwards hopes that many will perceive him to be the rarest of all Democratic presidential candidates—one with a backbone.
Clinton’s poll numbers in Iowa are down. Edwards’ numbers are up. Considering the events of last weekend, this should not come as a surprise.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.” Charles De Gaulle
The last two Democratic presidential candidates were exceedingly careful. Both split hairs and massaged their prepared statements and formal comments so much that many a yellow dog Democrats found themselves nearly gagging. Gore and Kerry made so many oh so careful and flat out timid comments that many voters thought that Gore and Kerry were spineless, spiritless, bumbling fools.
Milquetoast Hall of Fame
Every political junkie has his or her lists of favorite rhetorical nonsense. One uttered by Gore way back when he was vice-president belongs in the Milquetoast Hall of Fame. While trying to distance himself from charges concerning campaign fundraising irregularities, Gore said, “And my counsel advises me, let me repeat, that there is no controlling legal authority that says that any of these activities violated any law." As the comment suggests, the phrase “no controlling legal authority” was repeated by Gore during his presentation. Eventually, Gore was cleared of any legal wrongdoing. But his comment about there being ”no controlling legal authority” was such a nasty equivocation that Gore’s awful comments contributed to the image that he was a positioning machine—and therefore not a person with the ability to speak clearly and with some modicum of intelligence.
Worse, he was perceived by many to be a candidate without a spine.
Sadly, bland, overly massaged comments are not limited to presidential campaigns. Hillary Clinton’s recent comments about Bush’s troop surge contain so many switchbacks, rhetorical figure eight’s, and other vacillations that they may deserve a separate room in the Milquetoast Hall of Fame.
It’s easy of course to blame handlers for these gaffes. One of the best political sages in the country, Joe Klein adroitly discusses the role of handlers in recent national political campaigns in Politics Lost. Clearly the handlers don’t want the candidate they work for to make a comment that ruins the candidate’s credibility. Dean’s scream after the 2004 Iowa primary is perhaps the most recent and obvious example of a candidate making one comment that destroys his ethos and sabotages his chances.
Evidence in Klein’s book and simply listening to Gore and Kerry on the campaign trail make a couple things obvious. The motives of the handlers may be sincere and sound, but too much soft-pedaling and carefulspeak turns off many voters.
Gore probably is now kicking himself a couple hundred times a day. If he had shown half the passion and a fraction of the spine very much on display in the documentary, The Inconvenient Truth, he might now be President . . . instead of the man who once was an upstart Texan governor who spoke of compassionate conservatism and provoked many conservatives to dream of sunnier days.
While the skies have darkened and various sharks—and no doubt a lot of other nasty things—are swirling around Bush and his presidency now, most Democrats are surveying the terrain and weighing their options for 2008. Which brings us once again to the current Democratic frontrunner—Hillary Clinton. Senator Clinton has great name recognition. But the name carries with it a considerable amount of baggage. One of the heavier bags is similar to one that weighed down Gore and later Kerry. By trying to position herself very adeptly in the middle, Clinton, like Gore and Kerry may overdo it with this positioning thing.
One of the more obvious (and logical) rules of politics is that a candidate who is not the current favorite must distinguish him or herself from the front runner. Which no doubt is one reason why Edwards tossed his hat into the presidential sweepstakes contest so early. Separating himself from Clinton is one reason why he has been trying to recruit young people (with short movies posted in the Internet and a whole slew of other overtures). Distancing himself from Clinton no doubt is one of many reasons why last Sunday Edwards stood behind the podium at Riverside Church in New York City.
It was at Riverside, nearly forty years ago that Dr. King gave a speech that articulated his stance against the US involvement in South Vietnam. Most of King’s comments resonate today.
King’s Speech
King’s speech was logical. Early in the speech King listed the reasons he opposed the war: It would drain resources for campaigns against poverty. Negroes were dying in unreasonably high proportion to whites (which was true at the time of the speech, but not so when US involvement in Vietnam ended); change comes “most meaningfully not via war but through non-violent action.” War damages the very fiber of what is best about America. Winning the Nobel Peace Prize increased his commitment to work for “the brotherhood of man.” It is a natural outgrowth of a Christian minister to follow Christ’s calling to love thy enemies, to increase the feelings of brotherhood amongst peoples, and to strive to end suffering.
King’s speech was provocative. He offered his version of the history of the region and of the student protests against the war. He attacked the arrogance that led Americans to think “that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them.” He condemned many of the forces he thought were essential to continuing the war, “When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.” And he called the United States “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.”
The speech was poetic: “If America's soul becomes totally poisoned, part of the autopsy must read: Vietnam.” “One day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway.”
King’s speech was unusually perceptive. Where other commentators who praised or condemned the war relied on reason and rhetoric, King sought a deeper understanding. When he spoke at the Riverside Church, King said, “The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit.” King urged America to “get on the right side of world revolution” and called for a revolution of values, which to him was “our best defense against communism.”
Edwards’ speech pales in comparison. But it is noteworthy.
It did not get extensive media coverage, so significant portions are included here.
Edwards praised King for not directing “his demands to the government of the United States, which was escalating the war.” Edwards praised King for making “a direct appeal to the people of the United States, calling on us to break our own silence, and to take responsibility for bringing about what he called a revolution of values.”
Edwards said:
Escalation is not the answer, and all you have to do is listen to our own generals to know it's not the answer. The answer is for the Iraqi people and others in that part of the world to take responsibility, to take responsibility for their own country. The best way for that to happen is for America to make clear that we are leaving Iraq, and the best way to make clear that we are leaving Iraq is to actually start leaving Iraq.
It's why Congress must step up, now, and stop this President from putting more troops in harm's way.
Silence is betrayal. Speak out, and stop this escalation now.
And I say to all of you—not just members of Congress, all of you who are here today—and the millions like us around the world who know that this is a mistake—your job is to reject the easy way of apathy and to choose instead, to choose the hard path, the path of action.
Silence is betrayal. Speak out.
Our purpose must be to restore America's leadership, moral leadership, in the world. When we speak out about the ongoing genocide in Sudan and Darfur, when we speak out against thousands and thousands of children in Africa being born with AIDS, an entire new generation of children with AIDS--(Why? Because their mother can't pay for a four-dollar dose of medicine.)—the United States of America is better than this. . .. Our people are better than this. When we speak out against human rights abuses in China and other parts of the world, when we speak out, not just about . . . poverty in the United States of America, but poverty across the globe—half of our planet, three billion people, live on two dollars or less a day—the United States of America is better than this.
If anything has been proven over the last few years, it is that raw power alone will not make you a leader. You have to actually have the moral authority to lead.
Our purpose has to be to ignite the revolution of values that Dr. King dreamed about.
You have to take action. You have to take responsibility. That's exactly what Dr. King was talking about 40 years ago from this pulpit. It is not okay to stand idly by. Silence is betrayal.
To solve these problems, we have got to counter apathy with action. We have to replace cynicism with service. We have to stop looking to others, and start looking to ourselves. To solve these problems, we have to break the silence. We need to break the silence about the extraordinarily deep divisions between the haves and the have-nots. We have to break the silence . . . about the millions of our own people who are trying every day just to survive. We need to break the silence about 46-47 million of our own people who are worried sick that if they wake up in the middle of the night with a sick four-year-old, they're going to have to go to the local emergency room and beg for health care. We need to break the silence about our country's addiction to fossil fuels and about the damaging effect that these greenhouse gases are having on God's gift to us, this green Earth.
It is time. In fact, patriotism is about refusing to support something that you know is wrong and having the courage to speak out with strength and passion and backbone for something you know is right.
The world needs to see our better angels.
Separation and a Whole lot More
Edwards’ speech, along with other statements he has made recently, make it apparent that he can speak clearly and logically.
Edwards is trying to make it obvious to the people and to the political elites that he will not make the same mistakes concerning style and carefulspeak that his Democratic predecessors made.
So in a way Edwards is doing what every upstart needs to do, separating himself in terms of content and style from the front runner. Speaking at Riverside also had other delightful sweeteners for Edwards. Because the church is in New York City, it is in the heart of Clinton’s turf. Edwards’ speech shows that he—or his advisors—know something about history—which would have benefited the US and many of its often spineless institutions while President Bush prepared the country to go to war in Iraq.
In a very important way, Edwards is doing much more than putting some distance between himself and Clinton. His stance on the war actually coheres with his policies on poverty, the environment, and foreign policy. Edwards hopes that many will perceive him to be the rarest of all Democratic presidential candidates—one with a backbone.
Clinton’s poll numbers in Iowa are down. Edwards’ numbers are up. Considering the events of last weekend, this should not come as a surprise.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“I have come to the conclusion that politics are too serious a matter to be left to the politicians.” Charles De Gaulle
Friday, January 12, 2007
Why Bush’s New Way Forward Will Take the US Backward
At 9:30 PM on November 3, 1969, President Richard Nixon made a televised address to the nation. The speech was timed to come between two large anti-war protests. One had occurred in mid-October and the other would occur in mid-November. Nixon’s motives for giving the speech were very similar to the motives George Bush had for delivering the speech he gave on January 10. Both hoped their speeches and the actions associated them would energize their bases and buttress support for very controversial wars. Additionally, Nixon hoped his speech would dull any momentum the two huge protests might create.
During his speech, Nixon presented his plan to end the war in Vietnam. Much of what he said was old news:
o the US would strengthen the South Vietnamese army so that the South Vietnamese could defend themselves;
o this would allow the US to continue to withdraw US forces from South Vietnam;
o compromise with the North Vietnamese was possible—if they recognized the US backed Thieu [ever mention election make him sole legitimate leader?] regime in the South;
o if the North Vietnamese and/or Vietcong (a group of fighters from North and South Vietnam) increased their actions, Nixon would take “strong and effective measures.”
He concluded his speech, “And so tonight, to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans—I ask for your support. Let us be united in peace. Let us be united against defeat. Because let us understand: North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that.”
A choreographed response followed. Republicans, Veterans of Foreign Wars, members of the American Legion and others sent telegrams and letters—and made phone calls. A man who was then a mostly anonymous but very successful businessman, Ross Perot, delivered thousands of letters supporting Nixon. The messages went to Nixon and to other legislators.
Nixon’s Vice President, Spiro Agnew, went into attack-dog mode. Agnew claimed the news media was a “small unelected elite” that did not “represent the view of America.” Briefly network executives criticized the attacks. But they feared that the Nixon administration would influence the renewal of their licenses to broadcast, so they acted with extreme caution. The three television networks gave Nixon and Agnew’s speeches extensive coverage and attention. The proponents of the anti-war demonstrations were not so fortunate.
Nixon’s actions controlled the news and muted the impact of the two anti-war protests that came before and after the speech. A bipartisan majority in Congress approved of Nixon’s Vietnam policy. His ratings in the polls rose dramatically.
Nixon commented to his aides, “We’ve got those liberal bastards on the run now, and we’re going to keep them on the run.”
Bush’s speech on September 10 has garnered a great deal of attention—as well it should. The speech marks a major turning point in the war. Bush’s actions in Iraq make it obvious that neither he nor his advisors are intelligent students of history. Bush’s speech on September 10 also makes it obvious that neither he nor his advisors have learned what they should have from Nixon’s handling of the war in Vietnam.
* * *
From the prospective available today, Nixon’s great silent majority speech may be viewed as platitudes punctuated by big, fat, juicy lies:
o The South Vietnamese Army, acting by itself, never was strong enough to defend South Vietnam. It was a mess when Nixon came into office in 1968. It was a mess when in November 1969 he said that the South Vietnamese would eventually be able to defend themselves. It was a mess when the US withdrew from South Vietnam.
o Nixon reneged on his demand that the North Vietnamese had to recognize Thieu’s regime.
o Nixon took strong measures, but, in the long term, they were not effective. Before Nixon gave his speech, the US had taken strong measures in North and South Vietnam before. When he gave the speech, there was little evidence that Nixon’s strong measures would be effective militarily.
o And in a few short years, the North Vietnamese defeated the South Vietnamese and humiliated the US.
Ignoring what happened years later and only looking at the short-term reactions to the speech yields entirely different conclusions. The speech Nixon gave in November 1969 and the political machinations he put in place to accent it enabled Nixon to perform some amazing political alchemy. The war in Vietnam had helped to undermine the presidency of Nixon’s predecessor, Lyndon Johnson. However, Nixon was able to manipulate the war to make him appear to most Americans to be both tough and fair. Under the spell of Nixon’s political wizardry, the dark, ugly morass the war in Vietnam became, briefly, a political goldmine. Under Nixon’s guidance, a strong and loyal following supported his efforts in Vietnam. The same core of voters who rallied to support him after the speech served as the basis for the blocs of voters who reelected him via a landslide in November 1972.
For the short term, Nixon’s plans worked—for reasons that are not surprising. Nixon knew the truth about his stance in Vietnam. He realized he was vulnerable. The US was waging a violent, deadly, and expensive war. Nixon confided to his aides how complex the conflict was and how unlikely it was that the US would prevail. So he trotted out the pomp and prestige of the Presidency, told some very big and juicy lies—especially about the abilities of the South Vietnamese Army. His comments about his willingness to compromise implied he was flexible—and therefore, fair.
Though the speech was largely a brief on why the US should continue a violent, deadly, expensive and controversial war, he used the word “peace” thirty-nine times. And Nixon emphasized that the US was handing the war over to the South Vietnamese and that the US was extricating itself from the war. Nixon appeared to be acting boldly and assertively.
At the very least, having his Vice President attack the media gave reporters something else to write about. Comments attacking the media certainly invigorate the Republican conservative base. And Agnew’s comments may even have blunted the criticism Nixon might have gotten from the print media.
Later in his presidency, when Nixon talked about ending of the war in Vietnam, he often used the phrase “peace with honor.” The pledge showcases the US’s historical amnesia and provides yet another example of how the US media failed to do its job during the conflict. Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain used the phrase in 1938. In September 1938 British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met with Hitler in Munich. There the two leaders brokered the Munich Agreement that Chamberlain hoped would endure and keep England out of war. The agreement gave part of Czechoslovakia to Germany. At the time the agreement was announced, it was enormously popular in England. Within a few months, Chamberlain’s actions would be viewed as a capitulation that allowed Hitler’s Germany to gobble up much of Europe. But weeks before that happened, Chamberlain returned to England from his trip to Munich. The Prime Minister greeted well-wishers and said that he had not just brought back peace; he had brought back “peace with honor.”
The lies Nixon told during his great silent majority speech (and later repeated) covered up Nixon’s biggest vulnerabilities about the war and distracted the US public from them. Nixon’s political magic allowed his administration and the American people to deny the truth about what was happening in Vietnam. Though Nixon’s short-term political brilliance helped Americans deny the truth about what was happening in Vietnam, it did not dilute the power of the mistakes the US made. The truth about the war in Vietnam eventually surfaced. The US lost the war it fought in Vietnam—for many of the reasons the US is losing the war in Iraq:
1) The US entered into the conflict without understanding the implications of the history of the region.
2) The US did not study its opponent thoroughly.
3) Other processes related to beginning the conflict were flawed. There were not nearly enough credible voices articulating the hazards of involvement.
4) Distortions muddled the “logic” for entering the conflict—proponents of the conflict sought evidence for the story they wanted to be true rather than the whole truth.
5) The US entered the conflict based on a series of lies it told itself. In Vietnam it convinced itself that it had to keep Communism in check, when both the Soviets and the People’s Republic of China sent various signals that it did not want to confront the US. The clearest were the actions the Soviet Union and later the People’s Republic of China took to end the war the Vietnamese were fighting with the French in the fifties. In Iraq, the US was convinced it needed the oil in the region and that US efforts in the region would facilitate the flow of oil to companies based in the US. History shouts that in the past, US efforts in the region—notably Iran—have been very counterproductive. Senior US officials also convinced themselves that turning Iraq into a functional democracy would be a relatively easy task. This would provide the US leverage in the Middle East and serve to check the growing animosity toward the US in Iran.
6) In both Vietnam and Iraq, the US senior officials told other lies to itself: it overestimated its abilities to influence events. It overestimated the abilities of technological muscle and economic superiority.
7) The US’s institutions let down the people of the US. There was not sufficient demand from the media, senior armed forces officers who had retired, the active senior officers of the armed forces, or the US’s politicians to demand that the difficult questions about the war be answered. This is true during all phases of the conflict. Even today, the US’s institutions have not devoted nearly enough time to the poor planning that preceded the conflict in Iraq, the number of civilian casualties, the role of corruption in the conflict, and the ineffectiveness of the US to address the high number of US soldiers killed by friendly fire. (Hearings on some of these issues will begin in the House and the Senate soon. But there should have been a much more meaningful response concerning these matters years ago.)
8) The US entered the conflict unprovoked by its perceived adversaries.
9) The US entered the conflict with an insufficient force. (Senior military officers in the US said that a million soldiers were needed to win in South Vietnam. At its peak, the US had a little more than over half that number.)
10) The US entered the conflict with a poor plan. Both conflicts were mostly political problems that demanded mostly a political solution—strong, dynamic, honest, and fair national government in conjunction with broad and successful US efforts to win the hearts and minds of the civilians in the region. A second component, having the country develop a powerful and effective army was essential for the efforts of the US to succeed. A third component, overt US military action was, like all the components, important.
11) In both conflicts, the US was abysmally slow to train the armies of the nations they were assisting. In both conflicts a failure to develop young infantry officers and a core of seasoned non-commissioned officers severely hampered US efforts to help the armies become an effective fighting force.
12) The US entered the military conflict with miserable military strategy. It planned to fight what was often an unconventional war by very conventional means.
13) Chauvinism, egocentricity, and ignorance made the US overconfident to the point of being reckless. It did not seek to investigate nor did it learn from the early mistakes it made in the region. In both conflicts on the domestic and military fronts the tactics, especially during the early years of the conflict, were horribly flawed.
14) In both conflicts the US was far too slow to attempt to win the war of ideas in the region. In South Vietnam, the US supported a series of often silly and routinely abusive governments. In Iraq, the US was far too slow to set up a legitimate and honest alternative media and to send emissaries to the people to explain how and why their world would soon be a much better one. Nor has Bush taken any significant actions to show how profoundly charismatic and fear-oriented leaders in Iraq have twisted the classical Islam to suit their purposes. Following elections, the US did not pressure the Iraqis enough to set up a government fast enough. When the government was established, the US was far too slow to mandate reforms that would make the government a more fair, stable, and reliable one.
15) Military successes at the beginning of the conflict delayed any intention the US should have had to revise tactics to address specific needs the troops had.
16) For years the US celebrated falsely optimistic reports. This is really a double-barreled mistake—the country is neither seeking out nor responding to the truth, and the falsely optimistic reports perpetuate a series of lies.
17) The US vastly underestimated its opponent.
18) The tactics and the tenacity of the insurgents muted the advantages of technological superiority.
19) For far too long, the vast majority of the senior US military officers had ample opportunity to realize that the plans for military action were flawed but continued to serve rather than articulate their concerns or resign. In Iraq, this has a particularly nasty resonance. The Powell Doctrine, articulated by General Colin Powell prior to the Gulf War was an attempt to avoid future Vietnams. The very people the doctrine was put in place to help have largely ignored it. The doctrine states that all eight questions it poses have to be answered affirmatively before an action may be taken. Clearly the US actions in Iraq led most aspects of the doctrine to be violated. Many argue that all aspects of the doctrine were.
1. Is a necessary national security interest threatened?
2. Does the US have a clear and achievable objective?
3. Have the costs and the risks been thoroughly and honestly analyzed?
4. Have all non-violent policy options been exhausted?
5. Is there a reasonable strategy to extricate the US and avoid endless entanglement?
6. Have the consequences of the proposed action been thorougly considered?
7. Is the action supported by the American people?
8. Does the US have genuine, broad international support?
20) Both conflicts were plagued by corruption. In South Vietnam, the South Vietnamese government and the South Vietnamese Army were corrupt. In Iraq, there remain clouds of mystery surrounding many of Halliburton’s dealings and far too little investigation has been done by our elected representatives or by the media to address allegations of corruption in the dispersal of US funds in Iraq and corruption in the new Iraqi government.
21) The US created and continued policies that alienated the people US wanted to win over—in Vietnam, this was the result of taking people from villages and supporting a corrupt and ineffective army and government; in Iraq failing to get basic services operating quickly (police protection, power, and water), supporting a weak and often ineffective government, and stories of prisoner abuse did a great deal to contaminate the atmosphere.
22) Someone who knew little about tactics and the various arts involved with war—especially guerilla war—ran US Defense Department during the conflict.
23) A failure to address the high number of US soldiers killed by friendly fire perpetuated these tragedies rather than reduced them.
24) There was a severe problem getting appropriate materials to the troops. In Vietnam, soldiers especially at the beginning of the conflict, had trouble getting the proper boots as well as the materials needed to clean their weapons. Gun cleaning kits were particularly needed because the weapon most soldiers used, the M-16, was such a fussy weapon. In Iraq, the US was far too slow to give all its soldiers body armor as well as armor for its vehicles.
25) The military effectiveness of US soldiers was hampered by the power of and the finickiness of the M-16. In Vietnam, the light bullet the weapon fires often prevented soldiers from mowing down jungle or trees that were in their way. Their opponent’s weapon, the AK-47, was excellent at performing these tasks. In Iraq, the light bullet the M-16 fires will not go through stucco or even many doors. When it is necessary to use the weapon in dirty or dusty environments, the weapon often jams. The weapons the Iraqi insurgents use, the AK-47 or the AK-74, work in almost any situation.
26) Senior US officials appeared callous about the number of civilians killed or wounded—not until December 2005 did President Bush mention that about 30 thousand have died. This is similar to the way senior US officials seemed unconcerned about the loss of Vietnamese life.
* * *
Though the American debacle in Vietnam provides an appropriate yardstick to show how completely the US has failed in Iraq, the US experience in Vietnam does not provide an appropriate model for an exit strategy.
To end the US experience in Vietnam, Nixon and his chief consigliere, Henry Kissinger, started secret back channel conversations with diplomats from North Vietnam. The two parties constructed an elaborate agreement that enabled the US to declare peace with honor had been achieved, withdraw its soldiers, and withdraw US forces from Vietnam. And through it all, Nixon had the trump card bombing provided. Bombing North Vietnam allowed Nixon to look tough and keep his base energized. Additionally, the massive bombing done immediately before the agreement was signed gave Nixon the false hope that the bombing would slow the North Vietnamese so much that their inevitable takeover of the South would occur long after his term was over.
Some of Nixon’s other big, fat, juicy lies connected with the cover-up that followed the burglary at the Watergate sped his departure from the Presidency long before his term was over. For all his short-term political brilliance, Nixon’s actions during the Vietnam war make it obvious that the lies—even big, fat juicy ones—and bombs are little match for an effective, determined, and often ruthlessly violent insurgency.
The agreement that ended the US involvement in South Vietnam led Nixon to announce that peace with honor had been achieved. The agreement brought neither peace nor honor. The North used the lull that followed the agreement to start to rebuild the North and to re-supply the South. Soon the North was seizing large chunks of South Vietnam. Because the peace did not last, there was no honor associated with the agreement.
During the four years that Nixon negotiated with the North Vietnamese, the US conceded most of its demands. The North Vietnamese conceded only one—that the leader of South Vietnam had to go.
During that period over 34,000 US and over 100,000 Vietnamese were killed; a million Vietnamese and 100,000 Cambodians were killed; over 100,000 US troops and a million Vietnamese were wounded; about 150,000 children were made orphans and 60, 000 women were made widows.
Nixon’s “honor’ came at quite a price.
* * *
The Bush Administration and many of the country’s senior political leaders have failed to understand one of the most important aspects of the war in Vietnam: to win, at the very least, the US had to back a sound and fair government, train the South Vietnamese army, and, for the short term, win the military component of the war. In South Vietnam, to some extent the US did perform the later, but the failure to address the other two components of the conflict effectively insured the US would lose in South Vietnam.
A similar scenario is unfolding in Iraq. The US has botched any chance it had of supporting a dynamic, effective, and trusted political regime in Iraq. The corruption in Iraq and the ethnic hatreds there all but doom the modest efforts the US has made to turn the Iraqi army into an effective fighting force.
In South Vietnam, most senior military officers were corrupt, This gave the junior officers little reason to risk doing the hard work necessary to prepare for or to win a battle. In Vietnam, the US failed to create a sufficient number of non-commissioned officers—high ranking enlisted men. Without a large pool of talented and determined non-coms, no army can be an effective fighting force.
The Iraqi army rarely takes an resourceful and active role in the fighting. And there is little evidence that it will now or in the near future be an efficient fighting force. Last summer eight battalions of Iraqi solders were to do sweep through Baghdad and severely reduce the number of insurgents there.
Half the Iraqi soldiers did not show up.
Clearly the Iraqi army did not succeed in its mission. There is considerable evidence that training of Iraqi Army has been bungled as badly as the training of the South Vietnamese army was all those years ago.
There is more bad news: The situation the US is in Iraq is, in some ways, worse than it ever was in Vietnam. In Vietnam, the US dealt with an organized, effective top-down insurgency. The insurgency in Iraq is a very loose confederation of many groups of unusually angry people. Even if Bush were willing to negotiate with the insurgents, they are so decentralized that he would not be able to find two or ten—or a hundred people who could honestly say they can effectively dictate their desires to all the insurgents. This means a negotiated agreement in Iraq is not possible.
There are other problems. Bush has long been unresponsive to the sectarian issues that divide and trouble Iraq. He has done next to nothing to calm these rifts. And attempts to curb them with force also have proved ineffective. Civil unrest is almost sure to continue because the Iraqis neither have nor are they close to having an effective police force.
Because of the sectarian violence, there are many wars going in Iraq. The US is fighting the insurgents and al-Qaida. The Sunni’s and al-Qaidi are fighting the Shia. The Kurds are trying not to fight anyone. If they win, the Sunni will fight al-Qaidi.
There are many reasons why the Iraqi army is not effective. It is difficult to realize how ineffective it is. General Abizaid, the man in charge of the US Central Command stated when speaking before a Senate committee in November that there was not one Iraqi unit that is battle ready. The Army’s own inspector general reports state that the units are understaffed, under-equipped. Some soldiers do not even have weapsons. Perhaps most importantly, sectarian issues haunt the Iraqi army. They are perceived to be so pro Sunni, that Shia’s fear them.
Iraq’s large urban population lacks, in addition to a reliable police force, the other necessities of urban life: clean water, reliable power, and access to the engines of commerce.
These failures all but guarantee that the US’s efforts in Iraq will not succeed.
* * *
During the mid-term elections the US public clearly stated that it wanted a change in US policy in Iraq. Obviously, Bush has elected not to begin an incremental withdrawal of US forces from Iraq. Had he wanted to do this, he could have used the ample political cover the bipartisan commission on Iraq provided. Bush has elected not to tell big, fat juicy lies—per the Nixon model. He has elected not to implement bold initiatives. Instead, years after the US began to encounter problems in Iraq, on January 10 Bush stated there will be a modest increase in troops in Iraq—called a surge—and a short list of other offerings.
There was some good news. Bush’s stated, ”the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq’s provinces by November.” This may be read to mean that if the government in Iraq has not stepped forward by November, the US will begin to withdraw. That the Iraqi army will be working in concert with US forces is good. That there will be more advisors for the Iraqi army and more economic aid for Iraq is also a good thing.
But almost all the remainder of Bush’s new way forward is bad news. The centerpiece of Bush’s initiative is an increase of 21,500 US troops. Most will serve in Baghdad. Bush asserts that the added troops will provide enough to “clear, hold and build” in Iraq. Bush plans that the newfound security in Iraq will provide much needed support for the Iraqi government.
There are at least two problems with the plan. One is that there simply will not be enough troops. Senior Pentagon officials lately have been trotting around the statistic of 1:15. One soldier for every 15 civilians appear to be needed to suppress an insurgency. The new troop levels with US forces, with the Iraqi army, and the Iraqi police will get the numbers to that 1:15 ratio. But counting the Iraqi police as present or even accounted for is a huge mistake. Therefore, even using the Pentagon’s own numbers, even with the increase there will not be enough soldiers to calm the troubled waters in the city.
Another shortcoming of Bush’s initiative is that all the plans to end the sectarian violence are military based solutions. The short history of the US in the region shows that military solutions to insurgencies lead only to a wider conflict with the insurgents. The long history of fighting insurgents tells a similar story. Insurgents must be attacked militarily. But to defeat them, they must be coerced and corrupted from the within. In the middle of a civil war, ideas seem a pretty weak weapon. But they must be employed to attempt to weaken the insurgents. Economic or other means must be employed to alter their structure and corrupt their circular hierarchy.
The key to accomplishing this will vary from insurgency to insurgency. Decades ago the US government fought the Apaches. For years, the US government failed. The US would strike and kill—and the Apaches would adapt. They became brilliant guerilla fighters. And they endured. Then the US gave the Apaches cattle. The Apaches became materialistic. They fought amongst themselves about the cattle. They wavered from their circular hierarchy and began to adopt some vertical organizational structures. Their passion for fighting the US waned.
No doubt corrupting the insurgents in Iraq will be considerably more difficult that giving them cattle. The US did not defeat the Apaches militarily, the US corrupted them from within. The US has to attempt to take similar measures if it intends to defeat the insurgents.
The idea that increased military security will boost the credibility of Iraq’s political regime is flawed. It implies that Iraq’s government is wobbling now because of the insurgency. The political regime in Iraq is wobbling now because it is spineless and because it is corrupt. It is not fighting the war aggressively—it is far too kind to the insubordinate Shia forces. It lacks the tenacity necessary to fight a long and grueling war. And there are many indications that funneling finances for personal gain is happening on a scale that endangers the credibility of the regime.
There were portions of the speech Bush gave on January 10 that stretched the limits of absurdity. Bush stated that the Iraqi army will lead the way in joint exercises with the US. He also implied that relations between the US and the Iraqi government were downright sunny.
Where Nixon acted boldly, and told big lies, on January 10 Bush offered a very modest proposal. Its characteristics are compromise, false hopes, platitudes and, worse, further evidence that he lacks the most important trait of a great liar—the ability to know the truth and use the lie (or new initiatives) to distract the public from it. Clearly, Bush’s speech on January 10, will not garner the praise and generate the optimism Nixon’s great silent majority speech garnered. But, like Nixon’s speech, Bush’s will be used to buy more time for failed policies. It will be used to deny the truth about the war. It will be used to create a false sense of honor.
The US does not do itself or its future any good by being too gentle about how badly the Bush Administration has blundered in Iraq. The US does not do itself any good by responding to meek, overly modest proposals to change the situation in Iraq with muted comments or shallow criticism.
Bush’s new plan to win the war will not work. It offers far too little and it offers it years too late. Most importantly, it does not do nearly enough to address the non-military aspects of the conflict—a failed Iraqi government and an anemic Iraqi police force. It does not do enough to help improve the quality of the Iraqi army.
A tangled web of lies, distortions, and incompetencies led the US to make the mess it made in Iraq; modest efforts like the ones Bush proposed on January 10 to change certainly will not make the situation in Iraq significantly better or speed the US’s exit from the disaster.
If it was not already clear, Bush’s announcement on January 10 makes it obvious that Bush is incapable of pulling off a bold initiative in Iraq at this point in his presidency.
Nixon’s actions in Vietnam demonstrate that when running a controversial war, the tendency of politicians to tell wild and audacious lies presents at best only short-term positive results. Nixon also made it clear how much false honor can cost a country and its reputation.
Clearly, staying the current course in Iraq will not work. If modest efforts and small lies do not offer a reasonable chance of helping the US succeed in Iraq, there are not many alternatives—except seeking out and telling the cold, hard, brutally honest truth. In his speech, Bush went so far at to say, “Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me.” Pollyannas may find cause to celebrate Bush’s comment. This would be a mistake. Bush’s comment was a poorly defined bone tossed to the masses to imply Bush has undergone careful introspection and profound soul searching. The comment is far too formless and tentative to qualify as a pledge to find and respond to the unvarnished, cold, and often brutal truth.
It is very unlikely that Bush will do anything as radical as embrace and celebrate the truth about the US’s incursion into Iraq. This is because the truth presents real problems for Bush. Telling the truth means he would have to admit his shortcomings, his mistakes, and his failures. It means he would have to tell the American people that the US has failed in the region. It means that the US’s efforts to bring democracy to Iraqis and Iraqi oil to American companies have failed. It means that acknowledging the US’s efforts to make Iraq a better place have made the Middle East a worse one.
The war in Iraq is a disaster on steroids. The time for modest changes to the US’s actions in the country ended years ago. If Bush has any hope of winning the war in Iraq, huge buildups are necessary—probably on the order of 150,000 troops. The US forces must quickly learn the nuances of fighting a guerilla conflict. The US must not only fight the insurgents militarily, it must end the flow of money and material that keeps the insurgents armed and well funded. It must fight the insurgents in ways that are less violent and perhaps in the long-term more effective. It must turn the Iraqi army into an effective and respected fighting force. It must eliminate the reasons for sectarian violence and the reasons why so many Iraqi’s hate the US and its cohorts. It must play hardball with the current government in Iraq so that it becomes an effective and fair institution. It must provide essential services to the people in the cities. It must pull off a miracle of miracles and turn the Iraqi police into an effective and respected organization. It must cut a deal with the various factions so that Iraqi oil revenues are shared fairly. It must negotiate with Iraq’s neighbors to make sure that they do not take advantage of the current situation. It must take the drastic steps necessary to reduce the anxieties the Iraqis feel toward the US and its soldiers. And when it stumbles, the US senior staff in charge of the war has to regroup, learn from their mistakes, and make adjustments. To do that it has to find and assess the truth. To do otherwise is to put an old and tattered band-aid on a huge and gaping wound.
In short, to win the war, Bush must do what he and his administration has not done in the last years. To suggest that Bush, the great denier will make these changes is a fantasy.
To some, Bush’s new way forward will be American’s last best hope.
To others, it will be yet another series of pompous compromises designed to mask a refusal by Bush and his advisors to address the hard truths about the war in Iraq.
Histories lessons are clear. Corrupt governments and inadequate armies do not suppress effective insurgencies. Denial does not weaken the truth. False honor is very expensive. Failure to learn the lessons history offers to teach speeds the way for great tragedies.
During his speech, Nixon presented his plan to end the war in Vietnam. Much of what he said was old news:
o the US would strengthen the South Vietnamese army so that the South Vietnamese could defend themselves;
o this would allow the US to continue to withdraw US forces from South Vietnam;
o compromise with the North Vietnamese was possible—if they recognized the US backed Thieu [ever mention election make him sole legitimate leader?] regime in the South;
o if the North Vietnamese and/or Vietcong (a group of fighters from North and South Vietnam) increased their actions, Nixon would take “strong and effective measures.”
He concluded his speech, “And so tonight, to you, the great silent majority of my fellow Americans—I ask for your support. Let us be united in peace. Let us be united against defeat. Because let us understand: North Vietnam cannot defeat or humiliate the United States. Only Americans can do that.”
A choreographed response followed. Republicans, Veterans of Foreign Wars, members of the American Legion and others sent telegrams and letters—and made phone calls. A man who was then a mostly anonymous but very successful businessman, Ross Perot, delivered thousands of letters supporting Nixon. The messages went to Nixon and to other legislators.
Nixon’s Vice President, Spiro Agnew, went into attack-dog mode. Agnew claimed the news media was a “small unelected elite” that did not “represent the view of America.” Briefly network executives criticized the attacks. But they feared that the Nixon administration would influence the renewal of their licenses to broadcast, so they acted with extreme caution. The three television networks gave Nixon and Agnew’s speeches extensive coverage and attention. The proponents of the anti-war demonstrations were not so fortunate.
Nixon’s actions controlled the news and muted the impact of the two anti-war protests that came before and after the speech. A bipartisan majority in Congress approved of Nixon’s Vietnam policy. His ratings in the polls rose dramatically.
Nixon commented to his aides, “We’ve got those liberal bastards on the run now, and we’re going to keep them on the run.”
Bush’s speech on September 10 has garnered a great deal of attention—as well it should. The speech marks a major turning point in the war. Bush’s actions in Iraq make it obvious that neither he nor his advisors are intelligent students of history. Bush’s speech on September 10 also makes it obvious that neither he nor his advisors have learned what they should have from Nixon’s handling of the war in Vietnam.
* * *
From the prospective available today, Nixon’s great silent majority speech may be viewed as platitudes punctuated by big, fat, juicy lies:
o The South Vietnamese Army, acting by itself, never was strong enough to defend South Vietnam. It was a mess when Nixon came into office in 1968. It was a mess when in November 1969 he said that the South Vietnamese would eventually be able to defend themselves. It was a mess when the US withdrew from South Vietnam.
o Nixon reneged on his demand that the North Vietnamese had to recognize Thieu’s regime.
o Nixon took strong measures, but, in the long term, they were not effective. Before Nixon gave his speech, the US had taken strong measures in North and South Vietnam before. When he gave the speech, there was little evidence that Nixon’s strong measures would be effective militarily.
o And in a few short years, the North Vietnamese defeated the South Vietnamese and humiliated the US.
Ignoring what happened years later and only looking at the short-term reactions to the speech yields entirely different conclusions. The speech Nixon gave in November 1969 and the political machinations he put in place to accent it enabled Nixon to perform some amazing political alchemy. The war in Vietnam had helped to undermine the presidency of Nixon’s predecessor, Lyndon Johnson. However, Nixon was able to manipulate the war to make him appear to most Americans to be both tough and fair. Under the spell of Nixon’s political wizardry, the dark, ugly morass the war in Vietnam became, briefly, a political goldmine. Under Nixon’s guidance, a strong and loyal following supported his efforts in Vietnam. The same core of voters who rallied to support him after the speech served as the basis for the blocs of voters who reelected him via a landslide in November 1972.
For the short term, Nixon’s plans worked—for reasons that are not surprising. Nixon knew the truth about his stance in Vietnam. He realized he was vulnerable. The US was waging a violent, deadly, and expensive war. Nixon confided to his aides how complex the conflict was and how unlikely it was that the US would prevail. So he trotted out the pomp and prestige of the Presidency, told some very big and juicy lies—especially about the abilities of the South Vietnamese Army. His comments about his willingness to compromise implied he was flexible—and therefore, fair.
Though the speech was largely a brief on why the US should continue a violent, deadly, expensive and controversial war, he used the word “peace” thirty-nine times. And Nixon emphasized that the US was handing the war over to the South Vietnamese and that the US was extricating itself from the war. Nixon appeared to be acting boldly and assertively.
At the very least, having his Vice President attack the media gave reporters something else to write about. Comments attacking the media certainly invigorate the Republican conservative base. And Agnew’s comments may even have blunted the criticism Nixon might have gotten from the print media.
Later in his presidency, when Nixon talked about ending of the war in Vietnam, he often used the phrase “peace with honor.” The pledge showcases the US’s historical amnesia and provides yet another example of how the US media failed to do its job during the conflict. Britain’s Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain used the phrase in 1938. In September 1938 British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met with Hitler in Munich. There the two leaders brokered the Munich Agreement that Chamberlain hoped would endure and keep England out of war. The agreement gave part of Czechoslovakia to Germany. At the time the agreement was announced, it was enormously popular in England. Within a few months, Chamberlain’s actions would be viewed as a capitulation that allowed Hitler’s Germany to gobble up much of Europe. But weeks before that happened, Chamberlain returned to England from his trip to Munich. The Prime Minister greeted well-wishers and said that he had not just brought back peace; he had brought back “peace with honor.”
The lies Nixon told during his great silent majority speech (and later repeated) covered up Nixon’s biggest vulnerabilities about the war and distracted the US public from them. Nixon’s political magic allowed his administration and the American people to deny the truth about what was happening in Vietnam. Though Nixon’s short-term political brilliance helped Americans deny the truth about what was happening in Vietnam, it did not dilute the power of the mistakes the US made. The truth about the war in Vietnam eventually surfaced. The US lost the war it fought in Vietnam—for many of the reasons the US is losing the war in Iraq:
1) The US entered into the conflict without understanding the implications of the history of the region.
2) The US did not study its opponent thoroughly.
3) Other processes related to beginning the conflict were flawed. There were not nearly enough credible voices articulating the hazards of involvement.
4) Distortions muddled the “logic” for entering the conflict—proponents of the conflict sought evidence for the story they wanted to be true rather than the whole truth.
5) The US entered the conflict based on a series of lies it told itself. In Vietnam it convinced itself that it had to keep Communism in check, when both the Soviets and the People’s Republic of China sent various signals that it did not want to confront the US. The clearest were the actions the Soviet Union and later the People’s Republic of China took to end the war the Vietnamese were fighting with the French in the fifties. In Iraq, the US was convinced it needed the oil in the region and that US efforts in the region would facilitate the flow of oil to companies based in the US. History shouts that in the past, US efforts in the region—notably Iran—have been very counterproductive. Senior US officials also convinced themselves that turning Iraq into a functional democracy would be a relatively easy task. This would provide the US leverage in the Middle East and serve to check the growing animosity toward the US in Iran.
6) In both Vietnam and Iraq, the US senior officials told other lies to itself: it overestimated its abilities to influence events. It overestimated the abilities of technological muscle and economic superiority.
7) The US’s institutions let down the people of the US. There was not sufficient demand from the media, senior armed forces officers who had retired, the active senior officers of the armed forces, or the US’s politicians to demand that the difficult questions about the war be answered. This is true during all phases of the conflict. Even today, the US’s institutions have not devoted nearly enough time to the poor planning that preceded the conflict in Iraq, the number of civilian casualties, the role of corruption in the conflict, and the ineffectiveness of the US to address the high number of US soldiers killed by friendly fire. (Hearings on some of these issues will begin in the House and the Senate soon. But there should have been a much more meaningful response concerning these matters years ago.)
8) The US entered the conflict unprovoked by its perceived adversaries.
9) The US entered the conflict with an insufficient force. (Senior military officers in the US said that a million soldiers were needed to win in South Vietnam. At its peak, the US had a little more than over half that number.)
10) The US entered the conflict with a poor plan. Both conflicts were mostly political problems that demanded mostly a political solution—strong, dynamic, honest, and fair national government in conjunction with broad and successful US efforts to win the hearts and minds of the civilians in the region. A second component, having the country develop a powerful and effective army was essential for the efforts of the US to succeed. A third component, overt US military action was, like all the components, important.
11) In both conflicts, the US was abysmally slow to train the armies of the nations they were assisting. In both conflicts a failure to develop young infantry officers and a core of seasoned non-commissioned officers severely hampered US efforts to help the armies become an effective fighting force.
12) The US entered the military conflict with miserable military strategy. It planned to fight what was often an unconventional war by very conventional means.
13) Chauvinism, egocentricity, and ignorance made the US overconfident to the point of being reckless. It did not seek to investigate nor did it learn from the early mistakes it made in the region. In both conflicts on the domestic and military fronts the tactics, especially during the early years of the conflict, were horribly flawed.
14) In both conflicts the US was far too slow to attempt to win the war of ideas in the region. In South Vietnam, the US supported a series of often silly and routinely abusive governments. In Iraq, the US was far too slow to set up a legitimate and honest alternative media and to send emissaries to the people to explain how and why their world would soon be a much better one. Nor has Bush taken any significant actions to show how profoundly charismatic and fear-oriented leaders in Iraq have twisted the classical Islam to suit their purposes. Following elections, the US did not pressure the Iraqis enough to set up a government fast enough. When the government was established, the US was far too slow to mandate reforms that would make the government a more fair, stable, and reliable one.
15) Military successes at the beginning of the conflict delayed any intention the US should have had to revise tactics to address specific needs the troops had.
16) For years the US celebrated falsely optimistic reports. This is really a double-barreled mistake—the country is neither seeking out nor responding to the truth, and the falsely optimistic reports perpetuate a series of lies.
17) The US vastly underestimated its opponent.
18) The tactics and the tenacity of the insurgents muted the advantages of technological superiority.
19) For far too long, the vast majority of the senior US military officers had ample opportunity to realize that the plans for military action were flawed but continued to serve rather than articulate their concerns or resign. In Iraq, this has a particularly nasty resonance. The Powell Doctrine, articulated by General Colin Powell prior to the Gulf War was an attempt to avoid future Vietnams. The very people the doctrine was put in place to help have largely ignored it. The doctrine states that all eight questions it poses have to be answered affirmatively before an action may be taken. Clearly the US actions in Iraq led most aspects of the doctrine to be violated. Many argue that all aspects of the doctrine were.
1. Is a necessary national security interest threatened?
2. Does the US have a clear and achievable objective?
3. Have the costs and the risks been thoroughly and honestly analyzed?
4. Have all non-violent policy options been exhausted?
5. Is there a reasonable strategy to extricate the US and avoid endless entanglement?
6. Have the consequences of the proposed action been thorougly considered?
7. Is the action supported by the American people?
8. Does the US have genuine, broad international support?
20) Both conflicts were plagued by corruption. In South Vietnam, the South Vietnamese government and the South Vietnamese Army were corrupt. In Iraq, there remain clouds of mystery surrounding many of Halliburton’s dealings and far too little investigation has been done by our elected representatives or by the media to address allegations of corruption in the dispersal of US funds in Iraq and corruption in the new Iraqi government.
21) The US created and continued policies that alienated the people US wanted to win over—in Vietnam, this was the result of taking people from villages and supporting a corrupt and ineffective army and government; in Iraq failing to get basic services operating quickly (police protection, power, and water), supporting a weak and often ineffective government, and stories of prisoner abuse did a great deal to contaminate the atmosphere.
22) Someone who knew little about tactics and the various arts involved with war—especially guerilla war—ran US Defense Department during the conflict.
23) A failure to address the high number of US soldiers killed by friendly fire perpetuated these tragedies rather than reduced them.
24) There was a severe problem getting appropriate materials to the troops. In Vietnam, soldiers especially at the beginning of the conflict, had trouble getting the proper boots as well as the materials needed to clean their weapons. Gun cleaning kits were particularly needed because the weapon most soldiers used, the M-16, was such a fussy weapon. In Iraq, the US was far too slow to give all its soldiers body armor as well as armor for its vehicles.
25) The military effectiveness of US soldiers was hampered by the power of and the finickiness of the M-16. In Vietnam, the light bullet the weapon fires often prevented soldiers from mowing down jungle or trees that were in their way. Their opponent’s weapon, the AK-47, was excellent at performing these tasks. In Iraq, the light bullet the M-16 fires will not go through stucco or even many doors. When it is necessary to use the weapon in dirty or dusty environments, the weapon often jams. The weapons the Iraqi insurgents use, the AK-47 or the AK-74, work in almost any situation.
26) Senior US officials appeared callous about the number of civilians killed or wounded—not until December 2005 did President Bush mention that about 30 thousand have died. This is similar to the way senior US officials seemed unconcerned about the loss of Vietnamese life.
* * *
Though the American debacle in Vietnam provides an appropriate yardstick to show how completely the US has failed in Iraq, the US experience in Vietnam does not provide an appropriate model for an exit strategy.
To end the US experience in Vietnam, Nixon and his chief consigliere, Henry Kissinger, started secret back channel conversations with diplomats from North Vietnam. The two parties constructed an elaborate agreement that enabled the US to declare peace with honor had been achieved, withdraw its soldiers, and withdraw US forces from Vietnam. And through it all, Nixon had the trump card bombing provided. Bombing North Vietnam allowed Nixon to look tough and keep his base energized. Additionally, the massive bombing done immediately before the agreement was signed gave Nixon the false hope that the bombing would slow the North Vietnamese so much that their inevitable takeover of the South would occur long after his term was over.
Some of Nixon’s other big, fat, juicy lies connected with the cover-up that followed the burglary at the Watergate sped his departure from the Presidency long before his term was over. For all his short-term political brilliance, Nixon’s actions during the Vietnam war make it obvious that the lies—even big, fat juicy ones—and bombs are little match for an effective, determined, and often ruthlessly violent insurgency.
The agreement that ended the US involvement in South Vietnam led Nixon to announce that peace with honor had been achieved. The agreement brought neither peace nor honor. The North used the lull that followed the agreement to start to rebuild the North and to re-supply the South. Soon the North was seizing large chunks of South Vietnam. Because the peace did not last, there was no honor associated with the agreement.
During the four years that Nixon negotiated with the North Vietnamese, the US conceded most of its demands. The North Vietnamese conceded only one—that the leader of South Vietnam had to go.
During that period over 34,000 US and over 100,000 Vietnamese were killed; a million Vietnamese and 100,000 Cambodians were killed; over 100,000 US troops and a million Vietnamese were wounded; about 150,000 children were made orphans and 60, 000 women were made widows.
Nixon’s “honor’ came at quite a price.
* * *
The Bush Administration and many of the country’s senior political leaders have failed to understand one of the most important aspects of the war in Vietnam: to win, at the very least, the US had to back a sound and fair government, train the South Vietnamese army, and, for the short term, win the military component of the war. In South Vietnam, to some extent the US did perform the later, but the failure to address the other two components of the conflict effectively insured the US would lose in South Vietnam.
A similar scenario is unfolding in Iraq. The US has botched any chance it had of supporting a dynamic, effective, and trusted political regime in Iraq. The corruption in Iraq and the ethnic hatreds there all but doom the modest efforts the US has made to turn the Iraqi army into an effective fighting force.
In South Vietnam, most senior military officers were corrupt, This gave the junior officers little reason to risk doing the hard work necessary to prepare for or to win a battle. In Vietnam, the US failed to create a sufficient number of non-commissioned officers—high ranking enlisted men. Without a large pool of talented and determined non-coms, no army can be an effective fighting force.
The Iraqi army rarely takes an resourceful and active role in the fighting. And there is little evidence that it will now or in the near future be an efficient fighting force. Last summer eight battalions of Iraqi solders were to do sweep through Baghdad and severely reduce the number of insurgents there.
Half the Iraqi soldiers did not show up.
Clearly the Iraqi army did not succeed in its mission. There is considerable evidence that training of Iraqi Army has been bungled as badly as the training of the South Vietnamese army was all those years ago.
There is more bad news: The situation the US is in Iraq is, in some ways, worse than it ever was in Vietnam. In Vietnam, the US dealt with an organized, effective top-down insurgency. The insurgency in Iraq is a very loose confederation of many groups of unusually angry people. Even if Bush were willing to negotiate with the insurgents, they are so decentralized that he would not be able to find two or ten—or a hundred people who could honestly say they can effectively dictate their desires to all the insurgents. This means a negotiated agreement in Iraq is not possible.
There are other problems. Bush has long been unresponsive to the sectarian issues that divide and trouble Iraq. He has done next to nothing to calm these rifts. And attempts to curb them with force also have proved ineffective. Civil unrest is almost sure to continue because the Iraqis neither have nor are they close to having an effective police force.
Because of the sectarian violence, there are many wars going in Iraq. The US is fighting the insurgents and al-Qaida. The Sunni’s and al-Qaidi are fighting the Shia. The Kurds are trying not to fight anyone. If they win, the Sunni will fight al-Qaidi.
There are many reasons why the Iraqi army is not effective. It is difficult to realize how ineffective it is. General Abizaid, the man in charge of the US Central Command stated when speaking before a Senate committee in November that there was not one Iraqi unit that is battle ready. The Army’s own inspector general reports state that the units are understaffed, under-equipped. Some soldiers do not even have weapsons. Perhaps most importantly, sectarian issues haunt the Iraqi army. They are perceived to be so pro Sunni, that Shia’s fear them.
Iraq’s large urban population lacks, in addition to a reliable police force, the other necessities of urban life: clean water, reliable power, and access to the engines of commerce.
These failures all but guarantee that the US’s efforts in Iraq will not succeed.
* * *
During the mid-term elections the US public clearly stated that it wanted a change in US policy in Iraq. Obviously, Bush has elected not to begin an incremental withdrawal of US forces from Iraq. Had he wanted to do this, he could have used the ample political cover the bipartisan commission on Iraq provided. Bush has elected not to tell big, fat juicy lies—per the Nixon model. He has elected not to implement bold initiatives. Instead, years after the US began to encounter problems in Iraq, on January 10 Bush stated there will be a modest increase in troops in Iraq—called a surge—and a short list of other offerings.
There was some good news. Bush’s stated, ”the Iraqi government plans to take responsibility for security in all of Iraq’s provinces by November.” This may be read to mean that if the government in Iraq has not stepped forward by November, the US will begin to withdraw. That the Iraqi army will be working in concert with US forces is good. That there will be more advisors for the Iraqi army and more economic aid for Iraq is also a good thing.
But almost all the remainder of Bush’s new way forward is bad news. The centerpiece of Bush’s initiative is an increase of 21,500 US troops. Most will serve in Baghdad. Bush asserts that the added troops will provide enough to “clear, hold and build” in Iraq. Bush plans that the newfound security in Iraq will provide much needed support for the Iraqi government.
There are at least two problems with the plan. One is that there simply will not be enough troops. Senior Pentagon officials lately have been trotting around the statistic of 1:15. One soldier for every 15 civilians appear to be needed to suppress an insurgency. The new troop levels with US forces, with the Iraqi army, and the Iraqi police will get the numbers to that 1:15 ratio. But counting the Iraqi police as present or even accounted for is a huge mistake. Therefore, even using the Pentagon’s own numbers, even with the increase there will not be enough soldiers to calm the troubled waters in the city.
Another shortcoming of Bush’s initiative is that all the plans to end the sectarian violence are military based solutions. The short history of the US in the region shows that military solutions to insurgencies lead only to a wider conflict with the insurgents. The long history of fighting insurgents tells a similar story. Insurgents must be attacked militarily. But to defeat them, they must be coerced and corrupted from the within. In the middle of a civil war, ideas seem a pretty weak weapon. But they must be employed to attempt to weaken the insurgents. Economic or other means must be employed to alter their structure and corrupt their circular hierarchy.
The key to accomplishing this will vary from insurgency to insurgency. Decades ago the US government fought the Apaches. For years, the US government failed. The US would strike and kill—and the Apaches would adapt. They became brilliant guerilla fighters. And they endured. Then the US gave the Apaches cattle. The Apaches became materialistic. They fought amongst themselves about the cattle. They wavered from their circular hierarchy and began to adopt some vertical organizational structures. Their passion for fighting the US waned.
No doubt corrupting the insurgents in Iraq will be considerably more difficult that giving them cattle. The US did not defeat the Apaches militarily, the US corrupted them from within. The US has to attempt to take similar measures if it intends to defeat the insurgents.
The idea that increased military security will boost the credibility of Iraq’s political regime is flawed. It implies that Iraq’s government is wobbling now because of the insurgency. The political regime in Iraq is wobbling now because it is spineless and because it is corrupt. It is not fighting the war aggressively—it is far too kind to the insubordinate Shia forces. It lacks the tenacity necessary to fight a long and grueling war. And there are many indications that funneling finances for personal gain is happening on a scale that endangers the credibility of the regime.
There were portions of the speech Bush gave on January 10 that stretched the limits of absurdity. Bush stated that the Iraqi army will lead the way in joint exercises with the US. He also implied that relations between the US and the Iraqi government were downright sunny.
Where Nixon acted boldly, and told big lies, on January 10 Bush offered a very modest proposal. Its characteristics are compromise, false hopes, platitudes and, worse, further evidence that he lacks the most important trait of a great liar—the ability to know the truth and use the lie (or new initiatives) to distract the public from it. Clearly, Bush’s speech on January 10, will not garner the praise and generate the optimism Nixon’s great silent majority speech garnered. But, like Nixon’s speech, Bush’s will be used to buy more time for failed policies. It will be used to deny the truth about the war. It will be used to create a false sense of honor.
The US does not do itself or its future any good by being too gentle about how badly the Bush Administration has blundered in Iraq. The US does not do itself any good by responding to meek, overly modest proposals to change the situation in Iraq with muted comments or shallow criticism.
Bush’s new plan to win the war will not work. It offers far too little and it offers it years too late. Most importantly, it does not do nearly enough to address the non-military aspects of the conflict—a failed Iraqi government and an anemic Iraqi police force. It does not do enough to help improve the quality of the Iraqi army.
A tangled web of lies, distortions, and incompetencies led the US to make the mess it made in Iraq; modest efforts like the ones Bush proposed on January 10 to change certainly will not make the situation in Iraq significantly better or speed the US’s exit from the disaster.
If it was not already clear, Bush’s announcement on January 10 makes it obvious that Bush is incapable of pulling off a bold initiative in Iraq at this point in his presidency.
Nixon’s actions in Vietnam demonstrate that when running a controversial war, the tendency of politicians to tell wild and audacious lies presents at best only short-term positive results. Nixon also made it clear how much false honor can cost a country and its reputation.
Clearly, staying the current course in Iraq will not work. If modest efforts and small lies do not offer a reasonable chance of helping the US succeed in Iraq, there are not many alternatives—except seeking out and telling the cold, hard, brutally honest truth. In his speech, Bush went so far at to say, “Where mistakes have been made, the responsibility rests with me.” Pollyannas may find cause to celebrate Bush’s comment. This would be a mistake. Bush’s comment was a poorly defined bone tossed to the masses to imply Bush has undergone careful introspection and profound soul searching. The comment is far too formless and tentative to qualify as a pledge to find and respond to the unvarnished, cold, and often brutal truth.
It is very unlikely that Bush will do anything as radical as embrace and celebrate the truth about the US’s incursion into Iraq. This is because the truth presents real problems for Bush. Telling the truth means he would have to admit his shortcomings, his mistakes, and his failures. It means he would have to tell the American people that the US has failed in the region. It means that the US’s efforts to bring democracy to Iraqis and Iraqi oil to American companies have failed. It means that acknowledging the US’s efforts to make Iraq a better place have made the Middle East a worse one.
The war in Iraq is a disaster on steroids. The time for modest changes to the US’s actions in the country ended years ago. If Bush has any hope of winning the war in Iraq, huge buildups are necessary—probably on the order of 150,000 troops. The US forces must quickly learn the nuances of fighting a guerilla conflict. The US must not only fight the insurgents militarily, it must end the flow of money and material that keeps the insurgents armed and well funded. It must fight the insurgents in ways that are less violent and perhaps in the long-term more effective. It must turn the Iraqi army into an effective and respected fighting force. It must eliminate the reasons for sectarian violence and the reasons why so many Iraqi’s hate the US and its cohorts. It must play hardball with the current government in Iraq so that it becomes an effective and fair institution. It must provide essential services to the people in the cities. It must pull off a miracle of miracles and turn the Iraqi police into an effective and respected organization. It must cut a deal with the various factions so that Iraqi oil revenues are shared fairly. It must negotiate with Iraq’s neighbors to make sure that they do not take advantage of the current situation. It must take the drastic steps necessary to reduce the anxieties the Iraqis feel toward the US and its soldiers. And when it stumbles, the US senior staff in charge of the war has to regroup, learn from their mistakes, and make adjustments. To do that it has to find and assess the truth. To do otherwise is to put an old and tattered band-aid on a huge and gaping wound.
In short, to win the war, Bush must do what he and his administration has not done in the last years. To suggest that Bush, the great denier will make these changes is a fantasy.
To some, Bush’s new way forward will be American’s last best hope.
To others, it will be yet another series of pompous compromises designed to mask a refusal by Bush and his advisors to address the hard truths about the war in Iraq.
Histories lessons are clear. Corrupt governments and inadequate armies do not suppress effective insurgencies. Denial does not weaken the truth. False honor is very expensive. Failure to learn the lessons history offers to teach speeds the way for great tragedies.
Tuesday, January 9, 2007
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