GUEST OPINION

WE'RE GOING TO WIN THE WAR IN VIET NAM!

Opinion by Don Bendell

            Some of us went and fought and bled. Some died. Some stayed home and cried out against our fight. Some, with heads draped in hooded cloaks of shame and fear, went to Canada, most claiming disdain and loathing for that far-off war, not admitting actually succumbing to an inner fear of death or of wounding in a foreign land.

            We won every major battle, in the tradition of our forefathers at St Mere E’Glise, Normandy, San Juan Hill, and we left our virgin naiveté in those steaming emerald jungles of fear, or in the muddy larvae-laden waters of the lowland paddies checker-boarding the giant green and brown,  dirty sponge called the Mekong Delta.

            Then came Tet, 1968, and it was more like Christmas for those of us who became men in less than one year’s time. Those black-pajamaed shadow warriors and khaki-clad dedicated soldiers of Hanoi, came up out of the ground, like AK-armed human coatimundis bravely, sometimes insanely, hurling their bodies, thousands of them, at the staccato blazing fire of M-16’s, M-60’s,  and many other weapons of choice of our GI’s and Marines. We did not have to look beyond the moonlit bloodied bodies in the barbed wire perimeters across the dark jade countryside to see the tide was about to change in that bitter war. Like G.I. Joe or Sergeant Rock, with drops of real blood, and the acrid smell of napalm in our nostrils, we lit our cigarettes with shaky hands, patting one another on sweaty shoulders, trying hard to pretend it was just another day at the office.

            But, our forever protectors, those camera-toting, micro-phone-holding, self-appointed arbiters of information, back home in the World, said otherwise on network newscasts and in daily written tomes. It was the “Communist’s successful Tet Offensive,” not  even close to its true back-breaking role in the communist’s insurgency effort. The serpent’s head was severed, but then, following the media’s lead,  one shimmering ray of light made them decide to grip with worn yellow fingers and just hold on. Those holding that tiny beacon of hope for Hanoi had names like Kerry, Fonda, and McCarthy, and so the North Vietnamese waited for the tide to turn, and so it did.

            Politicians, who had been telling our jets to fly over Sam Missile factories in the north, without “dropping deadly eggs” on civilian factory workers just to satisfy political-correctness, finally caved in to those who stayed and played, those who called us the crazies, baby-killers, and war criminals.

            Some guys in suits in Washington and Paris said that we lost that war, but I did not. I did not surrender or even lose a battle. It was the same with all my brothers in blood, my trauma team.

We were given a mission, and many; like me, still work to accomplish it, to this day. Oh, I know the well-worn Hollywood stereotype, a fatigue-clad, bearded hippy with PTSD and a Bottle of Ripple, under the local urban bridge in a flea-infested K-Mart economy model sleeping bag, right? I think not.  Actually, less than one half of one percent of Viet Nam vets have ever been arrested, our personal income is one-fifth higher on average than all similar age groups, 2/3rds of us were volunteers not draftees, and Viet Nam veterans as a group are more successful and have more education than any similar age group? No, we were not all “black and poor.” In fact, 13%  of the US population during the Viet Nam War was black, and 12% of all American fighting men in Viet Nam were black.

58,000 heroes died in Viet Nam and millions more, who were all heroes, came home, but we were not treated as heroes by our neighbors like our soldiers were from all other wars. It was inexpedient, and oh so uncomfortable, to do so. People would actually have to admit to nationalism, maybe even patriotism in those days, hardly a way to make the A-party list of the intelligentsia.

The fiercely pro-American nomadic, proud Montagnard tribespeople, who I lived and fought beside in 1968 and 1969, are still being decimated, executed, forcibly-sterilized, and falsely-imprisoned at the hands of the Vietnamese government in Hanoi, and led by the storm trooper-like secret police, the Cong An. To a lesser extent, the Cham minority, as well as some Buddhist sects, suffer discrimination as well.

So far, we are being selective in the carrots we dangle for Hanoi, but there are those in Congress who are pushing hard, and have been for years, to fill the pockets of lobbyist buddies from the Rice Bowl and to fully normalize relations with Hanoi. As we successfully fought, with quills and not spears, to deter an infiltration into the White House by those with no honor, who would use the blood of fallen heroes to try wash away their betrayal, so we must all stand with the ethnic minorities in Viet Nam, as well as those of the greater population who are mere serfs for the aristocracy of Hanoi and other population centers. 

The Vietnamese citizenry, both lowlander and highlander alike who value the blessings of human freedom and national enrichment of liberty and democracy, taught me a valuable lesson. I have been patient. We shall win this horrible war yet.  Between February and November of 2004, we fought a major and glorious battle and stood in triumph at the end, and victory is now in sight.

Dr. Rice, Mademoiselle Secretary, those in power in Hanoi refer to the Montagnard tribespeople as “Moi,” which in their dictionary means “Savage,” but in their everyday slang means, “Nigger.” They refuse to allow us to freely examine or monitor suspected human rights abuses in the Central Highlands or to allow the free travel back and forth of their indigenous mountain people. As brazen as Saddam Hussein’s treachery, their’s has simply been shrouded in secrecy and hidden behind a curtain of bamboo. It is time for us to talk and them to listen. We patiently await your response. When the Montagnards and all Vietnamese are no longer suppressed, then my brothers and I will finally be free, too, of the pledge we who wore the green beret made, to always help our Montagnard brothers and sisters who always helped us. On that day, our war will have been won, and we will point to Heaven in victory and praise.