There are many out there who fought in the Vietnam War. Many were drafted to fight and had no alternative in the scheme of things. Perhaps coincidentally, what is happening in Iraq now is being compared to what turned out to be the debacle of the Vietnam War.
Mike Carlton, who usually writes acerbically in his weekly op-ed piece in the SMH this week writes about having been fighting in Vietnam and his return for the first time recently:
"Vietnam, mon amour. When I left Saigon in 1970 after my bit part in Richard Nixon's invasion of Cambodia, I swore I would never return. The search for lost time can only end in tears, I told myself.
My wife eventually talked me into going back. Warily, I went.
It was marvellous. We have just spent 12 days in Vietnam on one of the most delightful holidays I can recall.
The truly remarkable thing - the humbling thing - was the warmth of the Vietnamese people. Given the horrors they have endured, that was about the last thing I expected.
In the war years - I was there in 1966 and again in 1970 - even those Vietnamese nominally on the side of what everyone ludicrously referred to then as "The Free World" would often make it coolly plain they couldn't wait for Whitey to get the hell out of their country. Saigon was venal and vicious.
In the hamlets of the countryside you could see the fear in people's eyes or sense the cold hatred drilling between your shoulder blades.
Today, all gone. We were met everywhere with gentle courtesy. Almost everybody seems to be under the age of 30 and for them the American war, as they call it, is history."
Mike Carlton, who usually writes acerbically in his weekly op-ed piece in the SMH this week writes about having been fighting in Vietnam and his return for the first time recently:
"Vietnam, mon amour. When I left Saigon in 1970 after my bit part in Richard Nixon's invasion of Cambodia, I swore I would never return. The search for lost time can only end in tears, I told myself.
My wife eventually talked me into going back. Warily, I went.
It was marvellous. We have just spent 12 days in Vietnam on one of the most delightful holidays I can recall.
The truly remarkable thing - the humbling thing - was the warmth of the Vietnamese people. Given the horrors they have endured, that was about the last thing I expected.
In the war years - I was there in 1966 and again in 1970 - even those Vietnamese nominally on the side of what everyone ludicrously referred to then as "The Free World" would often make it coolly plain they couldn't wait for Whitey to get the hell out of their country. Saigon was venal and vicious.
In the hamlets of the countryside you could see the fear in people's eyes or sense the cold hatred drilling between your shoulder blades.
Today, all gone. We were met everywhere with gentle courtesy. Almost everybody seems to be under the age of 30 and for them the American war, as they call it, is history."
Comments