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- Newsgroups: alt.rush-limbaugh
- Path: sparky!uunet!stanford.edu!bcm!aio!gothamcity.jsc.nasa.gov!jpsb
- From: jpsb@gothamcity.jsc.nasa.gov (Jim Shirreffs)
- Subject: Clinton and the Vietnam War
- Message-ID: <1992Nov15.182610.24997@aio.jsc.nasa.gov>
- Keywords: clinton
- Sender: news@aio.jsc.nasa.gov (USENET News System)
- Organization: Software Technology Branch - NASA/JSC
- Date: Sun, 15 Nov 1992 18:26:10 GMT
- Lines: 40
-
- There seems to be quite a discussion going on these days about the
- Vietnam war and the role (or lack of) played by Mr. Clinton. As someone that
- served in the military (USMC 1969 - 1971) during the Vietnam war, I feel
- compelled to comment:
-
- * Nobody wanted to go to Vietnam
- * Everyone thought LBJ was wrong in committing massive ground
- forces to the war effort.
-
- There were two reasons for opposing LBJ's war
- * The Vietnam war was a civil war of no concern to the US
- * LBJ *refused* to win it! The war was a meat grinder that
- simply consumed American and Vietnamese lives at an
- alarming rate.
- There was also the radical Lefts' view that the Vietnamese where
- fighting the good fight against the evil Americans. Very few people
- outside of Hollywood believed this. No one has, to my satisfaction,
- proven that this was Mr. Clinton's views at the time.
-
- Men of Mr. Clinton's and my age where caught in a moral dilemma. We opposed
- (for various reasons) the War effort of LBJ and the Democrats in Congress
- but we realized that, as members of a democracy, we had a DUTY to serve if
- called. What to do about Vietnam was an all consuming issue, some of us
- did our *duty* and served, others dodged, and some where never called.
- Each acted according to our own conscience. Who am I to judge?
-
- The problem is that Mr. Clinton now claims to have the moral authority to
- command the men he refused to serve with. He is unique in that regard, many
- people seem to think that because we criticize Mr. Clinton's draft record
- that we are criticizing all those that did not serve when called. This is
- not the case. We are criticizing a man that wants to be the commander
- in chief, but refused to be a citizen soldier. Surely that is not to hard
- to grasp.
-
- Jim Shirreffs
-
- The road to hell is paved with good intentions
-
-
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-