Iraq & Vietnam

The most recent post to the New York Times Front Lines blog by Capt. Will Smith sought to dispel the oft-mentioned parallels between Iraq and Vietnam. He shares a letter in which his father--also a Marine--writes of his experiences during the Vietnam War. Beyond their entry into the armed forces (both were volunteers), Capt. Smith asserts, there are hardly any facets on which his father's time in Vietnam can be likened to his stint in Iraq. He highlights the differences in military technology, the terrain, and the tactics of the insurgents. The level of support for the current war and the soldiers fighting to win it is incomparable to the hostility his father faced thirty years ago. The difference, Smith says, is that "[w]e are not fighting the war for Iraq; we are fighting it with them."

Iraq has its issues, don’t get me wrong. But when did Vietnam have elections and draft constitutions? Where were the Vietnamese army when my dad patrolled? We work side by side with the Iraqi security forces, and I see them getting bigger and stronger every day. Gone are the days when they would throw down their guns and run away. Believe it or not, there are often more people wanting to join the security apparatus in Iraq than the local government can supply and train. When one goes down, two more step up to take the fallen soldier’s place.
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Think about this the next time you hear a talking head on TV or overhear someone at the supermarket making the comparison between the two wars. Iraq is not Vietnam. Both are insurgencies, but that is all they have in common.

But is it really so unreasonable to draw that comparison? A recent article in the New York Review of Books (I've been stealing Bobby's copy ever since he got a subscription) called "History and National Stupidity" by Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., indicates otherwise:

Sometimes, when I am particularly depressed, I ascribe our behavior to stupidity--the stupidity of our leadership, the stupidity if our culture. Thirty years ago we suffered military defeat--fighting an unwinnable war against a country about which we knew nothing and in which we had no vital interests at stake. Vietnam was bad enough, but to repeat the same experiment thirty years later in Iraq is a strong argument for a case of national stupidity.

I agree with Capt. Smith that equating Iraq with Vietnam is to overlook many important aspects of our situation there, both past and present. And it is certainly true that there are vast differences in the caliber of the military personnel, the gear being employed by the soldiers, the level of cooperation we're getting from the Iraqis, and domestic support for the troops. But a close examination of the causes of both wars and the reasons behind our stymied progress in Iraq and failure in Vietnam reveals parallels that runs quite deep. Both were undeclared wars spearheaded by the Oval Office. Both wars suffered from a near-complete vacuum of preparation and understanding of the 'enemy.' In both cases, we stayed much longer and shipped home many more body bags than we ever imagined possible.

Perhaps the most telling sign is the similarity between the present-day American's response to updates on Iraq, and the nation's tumultuous reaction to Vietnam thirty years ago. This may be a result of where I live and who my friends are, but the general feeling I've encountered is one of appreciation and support for the troops coupled with a deep-seated anger at those who orchestrated the war and their complete lack of respect for the lives being lost as a result of their gross incompetence. There are two questions these Americans ask themselves when they read the escalating death tolls and view the bloody photos from the front lines: "Why are we over there?" and "Is it worth dying for?" And much to their disillusionment and despair, adequate answers have yet to be provided. To people who view Iraq in this light, the quagmire there is so like the one thirty years ago that we wonder if we've made any progress as a nation at all.

Because my senior essay was about historiography as it relates to portrayals of war in textbooks, I have to wonder if the American education system might in some indirect way have contributed to our current situation. While analyzing Chinese and Japanese history textbooks, I couldn't help but think that their distortions of World War II could have real and frightening consequences for the Sino-Japanese relationship in the future. (Note: When I'm particularly depressed, I think it's only a matter of time before East Asia will erupt into nuclear war.) No country wants to parade its historical screw-ups to its young citizenry, but I really do believe--however naively--that fully empowering the population through unbiased history lessons is one of the best way to prevent those mistakes from happening again. As Schlesinger puts it:

History is the best antidote to illustrations of omnipotence and omniscience...A nation informed by a vivid understanding of the ironies of history is, I believe, best equipped to live with the temptations and tragedy of power. Since we are condemned as a nation to be a superpower, let a growing sense of history temper and civilize our use of that power.