Conspiracy Theory

[Guest MikeSC]

My point about Osama and Saddam wasn't to criticise U.S policy (my point about Vietnam, on the other hand...), it was merely to show that sometimes conspiracy theories aren't as crazy and outlandish as you may think. I never said the U.S arming the Mujahideen wasn't justified.

Conspiracy theories --- in particular the ones you specifically mentioned, ARE asinine.

And as for the point about the U.S being able to win the Vietnam war at anytime, I still think it's bullshit. You acknowledge the role of the media in the U.S' decision to pull out, but then say they 'could have stayed there for as long as they like'. Yes, they could have, but that wouldn't have been winning the war.

We could've "won" the war, but S. Vietnam was woefully incapable of governing, so we had that problem.

The media would still have been reporting U.S casualties, North Vietnamese successes

They really didn't HAVE many successes. They lost almost every single battle in the war. Heck, the Tet offensive was a rather dominating U.S VICTORY.

and U.S errors like the My Lai massacre.

Thing is, clearly, the My Lai massacre was a rare exception. God knows the press would have found MORE atrocities had they occurred. The military is piss poor at keeping those secrets.

You're acknowledging the role of the media in one part of the sentance and then ignoring it in the next. The U.S military and economy could have easily supported decades more U.S involvement in Vietnam, but the media and the American people wouldn't have put up with it.

ACTUALLY, if they never instituted a draft, they'd have never had a problem. Then again, if the protestors had a clue how to actually frame their protests (their "moral high ground" approach was about as ineffective as humanly possible), they'd have really shut down the war.

The NVA mightn't have had a hope in hell of defeating the U.S, but that still doesn't mean the U.S could win the war.

The U.S could've wiped out the NVA --- but there was no benefit in doing so as S. Vietnam was run by idiots.

-=Mike

[Justice 0]

My point about Osama and Saddam wasn't to criticise U.S policy (my point about Vietnam, on the other hand...), it was merely to show that sometimes conspiracy theories aren't as crazy and outlandish as you may think. I never said the U.S arming the Mujahideen wasn't justified.

But your points really don't have a point. We know we armed Osama and Saddam. For what it's worth, the US help with their terror was minimal. There's no point to it besides to obviously flamebaiting for some of us. We already know all that shit; to parade it around as though it's incredibly new or shocking is moronic.

 

And as for the point about the U.S being able to win the Vietnam war at anytime, I still think it's bullshit. You acknowledge the role of the media in the U.S' decision to pull out, but then say they 'could have stayed there for as long as they like'.

 

We could have stayed there as long as we wanted; the media lacks any say in US foreign policy, sorry to say. If we really wanted to stay in Vietnam, nothing would be able to stop us. The NVA had no chance of uprooting. Protesters could protest all they like, but if we were adamant about staying in Vietnam no one could stop us.

 

The media would still have been reporting U.S casualties, North Vietnamese successes and U.S errors like the My Lai massacre.

 

The reason we DID pull out WAS because of the media, not because we couldn't win. Indeed, there would be some successes and failures, but things like the Tet Offensive, which was a huge Viet Cong failure but portrayed by the media as one of our own failures hurt us.

 

You're acknowledging the role of the media in one part of the sentance and then ignoring it in the next. The U.S military and economy could have easily supported decades more U.S involvement in Vietnam, but the media and the American people wouldn't have put up with it. The NVA mightn't have had a hope in hell of defeating the U.S, but that still doesn't mean the U.S could win the war.

 

Again, nice try but no. The media doesn't dictate foreign policy. If we had stayed in Vietnam, even against the public will, we could have won. I didn't contradict myself, but a nice effort there.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

I thought this was going to be one of those "We didn't really capture Saddam, just one of his doubles".

Have we ever seen a Saddam double? I don't understand how that works.

 

I mean, plastic surgery? How far can you go with that? You can make people less ugly. You know, do a Greta Van Sustern job on them. But you can't make Greta Van Sustern look like Diane Sawyer, if you know what I mean. You can't make someone look exactly like someone else.

 

Where are the doubles? Are they hiding in spider holes, too? Are we going to see in 16 months a body double come out of a hole and pretend to be Saddam after we've already got the real one? I don't know about you, but I'd hate to be a Saddam body double since the Sunnis want to kick the guy in the balls and kill him. If I was a body double coming out of the hole, I'd be all "ATTENTION! I AM NOT THE REAL SADDAM! I AM JUST A DOUBLE!"

 

Although it wouldn't help. The Sunnis would probably STILL hang me from the nearest tree.