This was probably because we saw that it would have made good Communist propaganda It did anyway. I don't know if you are old enough to remember; I am - just about - and I can tell you that the news we heard left the impression that Germany and Japan had had it light as compared with Vietnam. Plus, there was the special nastiness of napalm and Agent Orange. Since the Soviets were getting their poundsworth of propaganda anyway, you might as well have gone in hard.
The problem with a crusading spirit is that it needs crusading results. As I said, the people of the US, if not their commanders, deserve congratulations for managing to keep up their fighting spirit for years in spite of increasingly frustrating circumstances. And perhaps, if someone had understood the kind of war that was coming upon them, and said clearly: "My fellow citizens, we are fighting a war that will last long, and our goal is simply to keep going as long as it takes", they might have gone on even longer. However, what the authorities did was to keep holding out a delusive expectation of victory which the Pentagon Papers proved they themselves did not believe. And if they did not believe it,why should the citizens and why should the soldiers?
This was probably because we saw that it would have made good Communist propaganda ...
It did anyway. I don't know if you are old enough to remember; I am - just about - and I can tell you that the news we heard left the impression that Germany and Japan had had it light as compared with Vietnam. Plus, there was the special nastiness of napalm and Agent Orange. Since the Soviets were getting their poundsworth of propaganda anyway, you might as well have gone in hard.
Yes, I know. And in fact napalm (and other incendiaries) were used during World War II as well. It's just that in World War II the international media weren't focusing on this.
And the media has stuck with that template. Wars in which extreme care is taken to avoid bombing civilians, such as the Iraq campaign of 2003-09, are described as "America bombing civilians." Sometimes, through an excess of enthusiasm, as "saturation" or "carpet"-bombing of civilians, as if these adjectives were merely amplifiers and did not have specific military meanings.
It did anyway. I don't know if you are old enough to remember; I am - just about - and I can tell you that the news we heard left the impression that Germany and Japan had had it light as compared with Vietnam. Plus, there was the special nastiness of napalm and Agent Orange. Since the Soviets were getting their poundsworth of propaganda anyway, you might as well have gone in hard.
The problem with a crusading spirit is that it needs crusading results.
As I said, the people of the US, if not their commanders, deserve congratulations for managing to keep up their fighting spirit for years in spite of increasingly frustrating circumstances. And perhaps, if someone had understood the kind of war that was coming upon them, and said clearly: "My fellow citizens, we are fighting a war that will last long, and our goal is simply to keep going as long as it takes", they might have gone on even longer. However, what the authorities did was to keep holding out a delusive expectation of victory which the Pentagon Papers proved they themselves did not believe. And if they did not believe it,why should the citizens and why should the soldiers?
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It did anyway. I don't know if you are old enough to remember; I am - just about - and I can tell you that the news we heard left the impression that Germany and Japan had had it light as compared with Vietnam. Plus, there was the special nastiness of napalm and Agent Orange. Since the Soviets were getting their poundsworth of propaganda anyway, you might as well have gone in hard.
Yes, I know. And in fact napalm (and other incendiaries) were used during World War II as well. It's just that in World War II the international media weren't focusing on this.
And the media has stuck with that template. Wars in which extreme care is taken to avoid bombing civilians, such as the Iraq campaign of 2003-09, are described as "America bombing civilians." Sometimes, through an excess of enthusiasm, as "saturation" or "carpet"-bombing of civilians, as if these adjectives were merely amplifiers and did not have specific military meanings.
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