New racist movie

PCB66 said:

I bet that asshole Spike Lee didn't direct this commercial

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So your evidence for Spike Lee movies being racist is a commercial Spike Lee had nothing to do with...

PCB66 said:

I bet that asshole Spike Lee didn't direct this commercial

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Wow! A Chinese condom commercial.

OldFatGuy said:

The 45 year old mama who the pimp worked for and definitely they were VC informers.

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Exactly... so my question is this... if the VC knew some sparky Spec 4 named "Lee" from the 313th Sigs Co. was getting his rocks off in an alley off Lao Tu St. at 1330 on 04 Nov... what the hell didn't they know?

Cordelier said:

Exactly... so my question is this... if the VC knew some sparky Spec 4 named "Lee" from the 313th Sigs Co. was getting his rocks off in an alley off Lao Tu St. at 1330 on 04 Nov... what the hell didn't they know?

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Not as much as you think. When American politicians gave up the ghost, they were ready to call it a day. American TV won the American War in SE Asia, and the Viet Minh never had a clue.

OldFatGuy said:

Not as much as you think. When American politicians gave up the ghost, they were ready to call it a day. American TV won the American War in SE Asia, and the Viet Minh never had a clue.

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All due respect, I think you're fooling yourself OFG. When we pulled out of there, we left the South Vietnamese with all the equipment they needed to defend themselves. I think at the time they had the 4th largest air force in the world, based on number of aircraft. But they still folded up like a house of cards. The other guys knew what they were fighting for, and our guys didn't. I think if we hadn't pulled out, we'd still be fighting there today. Why? Because they had no place else to go and we did. It's as simple as that.

Cordelier said:

All due respect, I think you're fooling yourself OFG. When we pulled out of there, we left the South Vietnamese with all the equipment they needed to defend themselves. I think at the time they had the 4th largest air force in the world, based on number of aircraft. But they still folded up like a house of cards. The other guys knew what they were fighting for, and our guys didn't. I think if we hadn't pulled out, we'd still be fighting there today. Why? Because they had no place else to go and we did. It's as simple as that.

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The south Vietnamese government was one of the most corrupt regimes in the history of SE Asia, which says a lot. Their military, worse. Equipment wasn't the issue for them, but raison d'être. Their own people hated them.

The North Vietnamese and the Viet Minh were exhausted. They wanted peace, and as much as they were nationalist for one Vietnamese nation, they were considering a solution like Korea's. The war was ending, one way or another. You forget Ho was educated in the US, his declaration of independence from the French was almost identical to our own. His followers in the north never understood why Americans opposed them. They did not want the American war, not ever. Yes, they had no place to go, but peace was their immediate objective. Our country did not have a quality reason for sacrificing 50k some odd dead, and far more American lives destroyed because of a few rabid old anticommunists. American TV brought that war into the American living room at dinner time. That defeated the anticommunists. A price not worth paying for a place few had heard of before the war escalated. American blood wasted on the news at 6.

South Vietnam was never going to last. If was an extension of the corrupt unpopular colonial regime the French installed, and never had the support of it's population. Some people fought for it because they hated communism, but no one fought for it because they actually *liked* their own government.

OldFatGuy said:

The south Vietnamese government was one of the most corrupt regimes in the history of SE Asia, which says a lot. Their military, worse. Equipment wasn't the issue for them, but raison d'être. Their own people hated them.

The North Vietnamese and the Viet Minh were exhausted. They wanted peace, and as much as they were nationalist for one Vietnamese nation, they were considering a solution like Korea's. The war was ending, one way or another. You forget Ho was educated in the US, his declaration of independence from the French was almost identical to our own. His followers in the north never understood why Americans opposed them. They did not want the American war, not ever. Yes, they had no place to go, but peace was their immediate objective. Our country did not have a quality reason for sacrificing 50k some odd dead, and far more American lives destroyed because of a few rabid old anticommunists. American TV brought that war into the American living room at dinner time. That defeated the anticommunists. A price not worth paying for a place few had heard of before the war escalated. American blood wasted on the news at 6.

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Your first paragraph says it all. The whole effort there was built on quicksand. We were going to lose there no matter what. The North Vietnamese knew that too... the only reason they agreed to a ceasefire was to give us an "honorable interval" in which to get out.

PCB66 said:

You are not my supervisor. If I want to ridicule a racist Negro movie I will.

The sonofabitch doesn't know a damn thing about Vietnam.

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So don't watch it and the the n*****ers can't get in your head. Except that they already are.

Cordelier said:

Your first paragraph says it all. The whole effort there was built on quicksand. We were going to lose there no matter what. The North Vietnamese knew that too... the only reason they agreed to a ceasefire was to give us an "honorable interval" in which to get out.

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or decent interval, the name given to the infamous tell-all book written by Frank Snepp III, former CIA officer in vietnam (whose father was then a federal judge)
who lost all income from the sale of said book based on a supreme court decision

justabubba said:

or decent interval, the name given to the infamous tell-all book written by Frank Snepp III, former CIA officer in vietnam (whose father was then a federal judge)
who lost all income from the sale of said book based on a supreme court decision

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Decent interval... that's the phrase I was trying to remember. That was Henry Kissinger's exact wording he used in the ceasefire negotiations.

Cordelier said:

Your first paragraph says it all. The whole effort there was built on quicksand. We were going to lose there no matter what. The North Vietnamese knew that too... the only reason they agreed to a ceasefire was to give us an "honorable interval" in which to get out.

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It was no longer a question of winning or losing, an anachronism for wars of all kinds. Honor is a myth, bestowed upon the dead, and quickly forgotten. Quicksand is an apt metaphor for the American presence in all of SE Asia. We neither understand the cultures nor the underlying forces of nationalism, let alone the destruction of colonialism and the poverty of never ending internecine wars. Cambodia was the true lesson to be learned from SE Asia. Communism was merely an excuse, a subterfuge for nationalism, and its use became an excuse for ethnic brutality. The North Vietnamese wanted peace, and they truly weren't prepared for the collapse of the south once we left. They should have learned a lesson from Cuba, when Castro's forces strolled into Havana the corrupt regime collapse, the mercenary military collapsed with it, and that is what happened in Vietnam. The North did not trust China nor Russia, and it was exhausted. No one can continuously live underground as unlimited bombs keep falling. The ceasefire negotiated in Paris was earnest for the north Vietnamese, they wanted peace, whatever the cost, but as nationalists negotiated for their own best interests. The US had no interests to negotiate for other than pride and humiliation of not winning. The greatest military in the history of the world, in its own eyes and others, the military that defeated the Axis powers in less than 5 years and kept the Russian bear at bay failed to defeat a primitive, impoverished force that was minuscule in comparison.

There are no winners of any wars, only losers. We lost not just 50k dead Americans, but all those who came back suffering the experience, and in the process divided out nation culturally which is still suffering its ramifications. Claiming a field of what if's resolves nothing. The history is written and no one can rewrite it. The dead will remain dead. We as a nation have learned little. When people elsewhere want to torture and murder each other, it is not for us to play policeman. Yes, we have trade interests to protect, but we haven't learned when it is more valuable to us and for us to stand down. I don't know that we ever will. This earth has always been a cruel world. Dreamers are entitled to their dreams, but then reality punches us all in the guts.

General Lecleric, 1946: " It would take 500,000 men to do it, and even then it could not be done." It took 20 years to learn that lesson.

PCB66 said:

What the hell does that racist asshole Spike Lee know about Vietnam?

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You’ve seen the film, I assume. Give us your critique.

OldFatGuy said:

41% of American military personnel in SE Asia were black, compared to 11% of the population. Who is being a bigot?

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Disproportion of African American casualties
African Americans suffered disproportionately high casualty rates in Vietnam. In 1965 alone they comprised 14.1% of total combat deaths, when they only comprised approximately 11% of the total U.S. population in the same year.[79][80] With the draft increasing due to the troop buildup in South Vietnam, the military significantly lowered its admission standards. In October 1966, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara initiated Project 100,000 which further lowered military standards for 100,000 additional draftees per year. McNamara claimed this program would provide valuable training, skills and opportunity to America's poor—a promise that was never carried out. Many black men who had previously been ineligible could now be drafted, along with many poor and racially intolerant white men from the southern states. This led to increased racial tension in the military.[81][82]

The number of US military personnel in Vietnam jumped from 23,300 in 1965 to 465,600 by the end of 1967. Between October 1966 and June 1969, 246,000 soldiers were recruited through Project 100,000, of whom 41% were black, while blacks only made up about 11% of the population of the US.[81] Of the 27 million draft-age men between 1964 and 1973, 40% were drafted into military service, and only 10% were actually sent to Vietnam. This group was made up almost entirely of either work-class or rural youth. College students who did not avoid the draft were generally sent to non-combat and service roles or made officers, while high school drop-outs and the working class were sent into combat roles. Blacks often made up a disproportionate 25% or more of combat units, while constituting only 12% of the military. 20% of black males were combat soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines.[79][83]

Civil rights leaders including Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, John Lewis, Muhammad Ali, and others, criticized the racial disparity in both casualties and representation in the entire military, prompting the Pentagon to order cutbacks in the number of African Americans in combat positions. Commander George L. Jackson said, "In response to this criticism, the Department of Defense took steps to readjust force levels in order to achieve an equitable proportion and employment of Negroes in Vietnam." The Army instigated myriad reforms, addressed issues of discrimination and prejudice from the post exchanges to the lack of black officers, and introduced "Mandatory Watch And Action Committees" into each unit. This resulted in a dramatic decrease in the proportion of black casualties, and by late 1967, black casualties had fallen to 13%, and were below 10% in 1970 to 1972.[81][84] As a result, by the war's completion, total black casualties averaged 12.5% of US combat deaths, approximately equal to percentage of draft-eligible black men, though still slightly higher than the 10% who served in the military.[84]

I think you have confused your facts. Yes a higher number of black soldiers than the 11% of the population. Yes the Project 100,000 brought in 41% black soldiers but those did not create a 41% of soldiers in Vietnam being black.

Integrityrespec said:

I think you have confused your facts. Yes a higher number of black soldiers than the 11% of the population. Yes the Project 100,000 brought in 41% black soldiers but those did not create a 41% of soldiers in Vietnam being black.

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Think what you want. Official numbers were like the body counts, unbelievable, incredulous, and plain fubar. I knew who had my back, and I knew who's back I had.