Quotes About Vietnam

Diffie was one of a legion of bright young men who, were it not for the Vietnam War, would probably not have considered the idea of military-funded basic research. But it seemed like a reasonable compromise when facing the equally dismal alternatives of being shipped to Indochina, fleeing to Canada, or going to jail.

In the end, the war in Vietnam was much like any other. There were those who profited. Those it devoured. And then there were those for whom there are no words.

The violence of the Left is symbolic, the injuries are not intended. The violence of the Right is real - directed at people, designed to cause injuries. Vietnam, nuclear weapons, police out of control are intentional forms of violence. The violence from the Right is aimed directly at people and the violence from the Left is aimed at institutions and symbols.

Militarily, we succeeded in Vietnam. We won every engagement we were involved in out there.

Tim O'Brien's book about Vietnam, 'The Things They Carried', has won every award, is studied in college and is considered to be definitive. But it's fiction.

I remember in the spring of 1971, a hundred thousand people converged on the Pentagon in June of 1971. They threw blood; I guess it was goat's blood or something, on the steps to the Pentagon. People were being accused of being murderers and baby killers. You just can't imagine the civic outrage.

I was so opposed to the war in Vietnam that I initially refused President Nixon's urgings for me to go there.

The collapse of this ideology in the Soviet Union and its substantial adaptation in China and Vietnam does not, however, necessarily mean that these societies will import the other Western ideology of liberal democracy. Westerners who assume that it does are likely to be surprised by the creativity, resilience, and individuality of non-Western cultures.

The decimation of Lebanon was showing up in Chicago as a series of restaurants and little shops, just as the destruction of Vietnam had been visible here a decade earlier. If you never read the news but ate out a lot you should be able to tell who was getting beaten up around the world.

I think Operation Smile is in more than 22 countries, mostly Third World. It just happened that my schedule opened up at the time they were heading to Vietnam.

If John Kerry had a dollar for every time he bragged about serving in Vietnam - oh wait, he does.

One of the pleasures of loving the Chinese man is to write him down. She may be loving him to have something to write. She has a story to tell because of having loved him. I listen to war veterans say that when they were dumb kids, they went to the Vietnam War (which the Vietnamese call the American War) to find something to write about.

A month after it ended, President Johnson decided not to seek reelection, and Westmoreland would shortly thereafter be removed as its commander. Richard Nixon was elected president eight months later mendaciously promising not victory, but a secret plan to bring the war to an "honorable end.

Hue had become a city of the dead.

prepare for a great push to be called Tong-Tan-cong-Noi-day (General Offensive, General Uprising). It would take place during Tet, which in 1968, according to the Chinese calendar, was to be Mau Than, the Year of the Monkey.

At the very least, Vietnam should stand as a permanent caution against going to war for any but the most immediate, direct, and vital national interest, or to prevent genocide or wider conflict, and then only in concert with other countries.

Mohr quoted Westmoreland, after the general had toured the bullet-riddled embassy grounds in Saigon, saying the enemy's efforts had failed, and that they had sought "to cause maximum consternation in South Vietnam." "It was clear that consternation had been achieved," Mohr wrote.19

A CIA report completed in 1968 found similarly: "The war and the bombing have eroded the North Vietnamese economy, making the country increasingly dependent on foreign aid. However, because the country is at a comparatively primitive stage of development and because the bombing has been carried out under important restrictions, damage to the economy has been small.

China is traditionally Vietnam's enemy. [Vietnam] had been kicking [invaders] out for millennia. And we were just the latest.

The United States had complete control of the air over all of Vietnam, and could presumably deliver a decisive blow at will. The failure to do so was blamed on the very notion of "limited war." America was fighting with one hand—or so the story went.

The river's name, Huong, evokes the pleasing scent of incense or the pink and white petals that float downstream in autumn from orchards to the north. The Americans called it the Perfume River.

In April 1967, Johnson had dispatched General Creighton Abrams to Vietnam as Westy's deputy. Abrams, a famous tank commander in World War II, had more combat experience than any other officer in the upper ranks of the US military, and some saw his appointment as a hint that LBJ was not entirely satisfied with Westy's progress.

More bombs had been dropped in North and South Vietnam by the beginning of 1968 than had been dropped over Europe in all of World War II, three times more than were dropped in the Pacific theater, and twice as many as in Korea.

The Battle of Hue would be the bloodiest of the Vietnam War, and a turning point not just in that conflict, but in American history. When it was over, debate concerning the war in the United States was never again about winning, only about how to leave. And never again would Americans fully trust their leaders.