Sunday, October 2, 2005

Vietnam: History as Prologue

Filed under: FrontPage | War | Empire — by Will Kirkland @ 6:09 pm

Our friend Dan Ellsberg appeared in the recent PBS production called “The Sixties.” He sends on a transcript of a promo interview he did with the Washington Post. “Not deep” he says. Far from it, sez I. As usual Dan is reflective, lucid and serious. We’re glad to have it and to share it. Among other things it shows how experience, analysis, emotion, acceptance by new friends, courage changes completely how a person views the world. Onward! [Yes, please pass it on.]

I was a cold warrior who did assume we had a right to be fighting communists in Vietnam and that it was ultimately for the good of the Vietnamese people. I should say that was what I believed when I went to Vietnam. In two years there it became clear to me that what we were doing there was against the interests of the people, that it was making a hell of the countryside. And I came back in 67 determined to help end the war. It wasn’t until I read the Pentagon papers myself in 1969 that I recognized that the anti-war protestors had been right all along in recognizing that we never had any right to be there and that it was an unjust war from the beginning.

Ellsberg Sixties

9 Comments »

  1. Bill Sims:

    I’ve always been hesitant to admit this, but in the beginning I thought our government was doing the right and honorable thing sending troops to Vietnam. I didn’t really question the rightness of the war until about the time Ellsberg did his thing, and I didn’t fully understand the depth of insanity of the war until after I was drafted, saw how the Army worked, and started hearing stories about how the war was being fought. Somehow it’s comforting to realize that such anti-war heros as Ellsburg were almost as slow to recognize the utter wrongness of the war.

  2. Will Kirkland:

    Jeesh! I was in the effing military! I started subscribing to Ramparts and other such magazines and lo! learned. It is always an error of the first magnitude to think that those who resist ideas can’t come to accept them — and fight for them. Dan was helped by the testimony of young men going off to jail to finally make the jump, not by young men screaming war monger at him…

  3. Bill Sims:

    Will:

    I’m not sure I understand your comment, particularly the Jeesh! Was it directed at something I said?

  4. admin:

    Bill,
    The jeesh! is to say that your hesitancy is over nothing to be ashamed of. Plenty of us were believers longer and stronger. Rather, the fact of change is something to be proud of, to be used in argumentation. What folks should be hesitant to admit is that they never learn and change…

  5. Bill Sims:

    Will: I agree with what you say, of course - at least it should be like that. Too bad so many Democrats (like Kerry and almost everyone else that voted for the war) are so afraid of being called flip-floppers that they can’t admit to a change of heart.

  6. Bob Meyer:

    One of my old favorites, Socrates, said the beginning of wisdom is knowing what you don’t know.

    A tangential point: one of the political imperatives by which I operate is always take your opponent’s arguments seriously. Learn how to counter them effectively, but also, just in case, is there anything you could learn from them? (A thought that is anathema to some here on the blog, I sometimes think.)

  7. Bob Meyer:

    About changes of heart and resistance within the military: there’s an excellent film being shown at the Mill Valley film festival on Sat. Oct 8 at 5:00: Sir No Sir. It’s on GI resistance during the Vietnam war. It’s powerful, (I receive an advanced copy) and was incredibly moving. The GI coffee houses, the newspapers they put out, the GI demonstrations against the war. Many of them got put in the stockade for a good long time. There’s an event afterwards at Sweetwater with the GI Resistors, the director (Zeigler: a good guy) , also Country Joe McDonald et al. Ruth Group is a co-sponsor. Be there! I’ll announce it on the blog and to N & L.

  8. Will Kirkland:

    Bob
    Have you seen the film? Is this the one with David Harris and the Connie project in it? Friend of mine from that time recently saw a film and I wonder if this is the same?

  9. Bob Meyer:

    “Have you seen the film?”

    I’ve seen the first 40 minutes or so. Mr. Harris has not appeared so far. I can give it to you to pass around.

    Holly Near just signed on this morning to do a brief appearance at Sweetwater. Should be a good event. Let’s have a Ruth Group presence there!

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