On Dec 12, 2004, at 9:32 PM, Dan Minette wrote:
From: "Warren Ockrassa" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
I honestly don't know why the lessons of history manage to go unlearned, Dan. I only know that they do.
That wasn't the question.
It wasn't?
When a foreign policy graduate student at MIT, who received a degree in government from Harvard states that your point differs from historians and political scientists who are studying the period, then it is highly likely that you hold such an opinion.
Hold such a what of an opinion?
I'd lay
odds that he is reasonable familiar with the general scholarship in these
fields. So, the question is how do you know that they are all wrong and
you are right?
First off, who precisely are these "they all" to which you refer?
What is arrogant and belligerant about this? Personally, a sweeping statement that those bright folks who work in the field have missed the obvious which you clearly know, sounds arrogant and pompous to me. But, YMMV.
I don't think you read my initial statement too closely, and I have to wonder if you saw Gautam's response.
==
Here's what Damon said:
Which reinforces my contention that the current administration has not learned from Vietnam.
Here's what I said:
Which is even more disgusting, since half of them were AROUND when Viet Nam was taking place. How pig-stupid ass-backwards do you have to be to not even recall the lessons of history you've lived through?
==
Here's how Gautam responded:
Wow, Warren, political scientists, historians, and just about everyone else have been discussing Vietnam for thirty years, trying to figure out exactly what the "lessons of Vietnam" are - and you know for sure what we can learn from that war? Pray tell, do share them with us.
==
Please show me which sentence in that note was not pompous and arrogant. By contrast your query was quite reasonable. I tend to respond a lot more reasonably to questions that aren't asked in a belittling, condescending or otherwise snotty tone. I don't think I need to explain why.
To the earlier exchange, I think the question's pretty clear: How is it that so many people seem not to have learned from history?
I don't know what question you think I was asking, but it doesn't seem to be whatever it was you were responding to.
Given that I don't know any of Gautam's academic background, I'm not
sure what degree he might hold nor what significance it carries in this
discussion.
Well, if you read his posts, you would have some familiarity.
How? Is there a resume posted somewhere? Do listers put CVs online so they can be read from time to time? Or are we simply supposed to guess?
I'm sorry but I don't buy it. I can't know someone's credentials if they're not available to me. This is a little too much like "ignorance of the law is no excuse". It's just not my responsibility to research Gautam's academic credentials.
Are you arguing that there is no such thing as scholarship in history, foreign affairs, and political science?
Course not. Where did I say I was?
I know, for example, that he had Stanley
Hoffmann as his senior thesis advisor and has Dr. Hoffmann's professional
respect.
Gee, since my Psychic Friends® TeleHelmet™ is in the shop this week, I guess I have to cry mea culpa for not knowing that particular datum. How shocking, utterly shocking of me to overlook this blatantly obvious piece of information.
And going through your points, I'm not sure how many of them could possibly be lessons from Viet Nam. For example, how could one call Robert McNamara an old war dog?
I didn't, and wasn't referring to him anyway. I referred specifically to Rummy and Cheney.
Then what in the world was the lesson that should have been learned from
Viet Nam.
It would seem you chose to overlook the other items I listed. And it would seem you chose to overlook the context I later gave for mentioning Rummy and Cheney.
This, Dan, is why I don't particularly have a lot of patience sometimes when discussing things with you. I have to restate things I said in earlier posts on the same thread. That gets frustrating.
Both Nam and Iraq are about nothing but conquest. 30 years ago it was
about overthrowing Communism; now it's about a "war on terror"; but the
subtests of BOTH conflicts were "liberating the people" of those
nations, whether they wanted to be liberated or not.
What Communist government was overthrown in South Viet Nam?
None. That's kind of the point, man. The propaganda for Nam was "domino theory" -- and the effects were nil. All that action, and to what end?
I don't assume anyone's an idiot without some evidence to support the
determination. I'm aware that others who came before me were not
stupid. That's why it's utterly baffling to me that we are getting some
serious national deja vu out of Iraq now.
Because there is a general tendency to see any war in terms of the war of
one's formative year and see parallels that do not bear up under
scholarship.
I have no conscious recollection of Viet Nam.
I don't know why I have to perennially cite evidence for OPINION in the
Court of Gautam the Almighty. But if he's incapable of looking at
nightly news reports and drawing conclusions based on them,
particularly if he's got a background in history, it seems that his
view, not mine, is the indefensible one.
No, that's not it. But, with all due respect, you tend to make strong statements without considering facts first.
Gee, in an arena of opinion I can see how that ... would seem ... unusual. C'mon. I most certainly am not the only one who makes strong statements.
A couple examples of this was
quoting a well know liberal ecconomist and member of this list, as well as
former member of the Clinton administration, as a clear supporter of Bush.
Oh? I must have overlooked something then. Who, where, etc.?
Or calling the Viet Nam war a war to overthrow a communist government.
That's precisely the line that was handed to the US during the conflict, unless I'm woefully misinformed.
Now if Gautam wishes to address this issue further he's welcome to do so, but I won't carry on a discussion by proxy.
OK, you won't answer my posts, that's your business.
That's not what I said. This is another reason I get frustrated in discussing things with you. You seem to have a real talent for putting words in my mouth rather than responding to things I've actually written.
I won't carry on a discussion where one participant is saying things like, "what this guy really meant was..." and so on. I'll gladly discuss many topics with you, but I will not discuss with you what Gautam might have meant by anything. He can speak for himself.
-- Warren Ockrassa, Publisher/Editor, nightwares Books http://books.nightwares.com/ Current work in progress "The Seven-Year Mirror" http://www.nightwares.com/books/ockrassa/Flat_Out.pdf
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