Indeed. As Robin Moore noted in The Green Berets (I'm citing this quote by memory, it may not be word-for-word accurate), "I've seen some sorry LLDB (South Vietnamese Special Forces) types, but I've also seen some as good as any in the world." ARVN gets a bad reputation almost entirely from reading David Halberstam and Neil Sheehan, whose sloppy reportage was refuted by Marguerite Higgins and Joe Alsop, who both had vastly greater familiarity with the region than Halberstam-Sheehan ever did. In actuality ARVN did well, given it was an army literally fighting for survival.

I don't support John Derbyshire's line, I support George W. Bush and his firm policy of fighting to win.

However, if someone says that we can't win because the Iraqi security forces are like the South Vietnamese armed forces, it isn't good enough to reply that the South Vietnamese forces were actually fine. The only acceptable answer is to show why the Iraqi security forces haven't been, or aren't now, or at least hopefully won't in future be like the South Vietnamese were.

In my opinion the government of South Vietnam was a worthless thug-ocracy that never took responsibility, destroyed domestic military leadership talent so that it could never threaten the thugs and thieves at the top, and starred only in putting guilt on the Americans, so the Americans would provide more and more good blood to feed the Vietnamese leech. All the slaughter of good soldiers was only to sustain temporarily the rule of thugs and thieves whose positions could never hold up in the long run because of their own irresponsibility.

George W. Bush is strongly committed to democracy, and he has put himself in a better position to achieve it in Iraq than the Americans could ever have been in to build democracy in South Vietnam. There is a huge cultural negative in building democracy in Iraq: Islam. But that is not George's fault, he is doing his best, and on the whole democracy is advancing. While the terrorists are not growing weaker the government is growing stronger. That points to a long term victory.

A vital difference between this situation and that in South Vietnam (one of many) is that a democratic government with institutionalised civilian control of the military does not have an institutional stake in the suppression of military talent. Talented military leaders are the most useful servants of the embattled democratic regime, they are not automatically seen as the next generation of coup-plotters to be suppressed.

We will win this war. But not because military leadership like that which South Vietnam produced is or ever could be good enough. We will win because democracy is attractive and effective, even in a purely military sense, and because we have leaders who are determined to back that wager all the way.

DB: Interestingly, I am longtime friends with a former consultant to the South Vietnamese gov't whose team of consultants concluded that the (western) systems they wanted to institute wouldn't work there because of the deepseated cultural disinclination to honest and open discussion/action that was endemic to SV official levels.

That is interesting, Ruth. Thank you.

DB:
I presume you are one of those GOP types afflicted with cognitive disconnect, ignoring facts that don't fit your view of the world. I'm not surprised, given the extraordinary record of Bush et al ignoring the facts on the ground, and punishing those unwise enough to mention them.
Do we need to talk about Bush flip flopping his way to the war's justification?
Tactics though; easily enough troops to wreck Saddam's hollow legions. Far from enough to secure the public order, to secure the borders, or to secure the munitions thick on the ground there.
The very fact that terrorists are streaming in bespeaks of Bush's poor leadership. Have you considered the record of counter insurgency campaigns where the borders are secured vs those where they are not? Malaysia vs Vietnam. Think of Algeria.
And then good god, the torture. Alone this justifies imprisoning Bush and his whole rotten gang. Look how far we have fallen from the days when the USA was the good guy and it was our enemies that vanished suspects into the maw of state security for interrogation.
You see how easy it is to get scared when the terrorists attack, and feel you have to get "tough". You could see it in the faces of the frat boy tough guys of the GOP... Finally the kids gloves are off!
This stems from poor leadership. Bush quit his flying job. (I can't grace it with the term "duty", for all he cared about it). Cheney had "other priorities" when he was needed. etc and etc...
And look at what we have. Scared men running scared using the countries fear to pump up support and quash internal dissent.
Where are the real leaders? Where are the men who actually did have the guts to go to Vietnam when there were young?
And the ARVN argument... more fuel to "the media lost us Vietnam". Yeah right. Another hollow legion, defending a rotten regime, that folded as soon as our support faded.

Oz, it is amusing that you write of others' supposed "cognitive disconnect" and then give us a paragraph of repeated myths.

Then again, perhaps it is not amusing.

The very fact that terrorists are streaming in bespeaks of Bush's poor leadership

I'm not sure you can define terrorists as "streaming in." According to the Brookings Institute, there are 750-1,000 foreign jihadists in Iraq. That's a sizeable enough number to carry out sensational headline grabbing attacks (remember how two snipers created massive fear in Maryland and Virginia a few years back), but in a region of billions of Muslims, where is the great jihad? I mean really, where is it?

You have the infidel Satan going into the heart of the middle east and the only people Zarqawi can muster up are the most fanatical of the radicals? Moderate Muslims aren't buying into this crap.

That's not to say concerns about border control are not valid, this has been a challenge groups of people and later governments have faced for as long as mankind has lived in communities that required defending. The fact Iraq is bordered by Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, Turkey and Iran doesn't make that job any easier.

How you manage to connect the issue of securing the borders in Iraq to a failure in leadership is a mystery.

Robin:
Hmmmm, myths of my own!
Perhaps I am wrong. Perhaps the Brits didn't control the Malaysian borders but won anyway. And do I have it all wrong about Vietnam too?
Gosh, you're right. Bush didn't quit the Air Guard to go to Harvard business school, he quit to go to Nam! Where he served honorably with Dick in the thick of it.
And the torture, that's nothing. Waterbording... hell frat boys do it all the time.
Thanks for setting me straight.

MB:
Securing the borders in a counter insurgency campaign is basic strategy, and correlates well with victory or defeat.
The flow of terrorists into Iraq is obvious. There are more and more suicide attacks and IED attacks. Most of the suiciders are thought to be foreigners.
Occupying a country like Iraq is a big job. It takes big leadership. It takes a smart leader willing to address what is real. Not the "we are reality" crowd of the Bush administration.

Minh-Duc

It is people like Minh Duc who can apply the corrective to myths so that we learn "real" history rather than p.c. history.

We owe him a debt of gratitude.

~D

I think the conduct of the ARVN after we withdrew lends credence to the "myth" of it's pitiful performance.

General Scwartzkopf fought with a battalion of ARVN rangers,loved and respected them and it may be we did not see a more proper ARVN training because too many of we Yanks did not expect much from them when we trained them.

But,the ARVN collapsed as fast as the French Army did in 1940,I really don't see how one can argue it was a credit worthy force.

Oz, you've obviously not paid any attention to the issue of the performance of ARVN. But its of a kind to your repetition of falsehoods.

And wow, how could I not be in awe of such immense strategic insight as "big leadership" and simplistic prescriptions like securing the borders.

Oz, I'm not familiar with the British experience in Malaysia. It sounds interesting. Yet a quick glance at the map shows me there's a practical difference between that case and Iraq. Malaysia has, what, about 200 miles of land border with Thailand? The rest is surrounded by ocean. It would have been possible to concentrate the ground forces on that bottleneck and let the navy secure the coasts. Insurgents couldn't just walk across from Sumatra.

Iraq has exactly the opposite configuration. If land and sea were reversed, I suspect the U.S. would be doing a good deal better than it is.

Your cry of, "Look how far we have fallen from the days when the USA was the good guy" is one I've heard before. Usually it's uttered by people who never in their lives believed or said that the Americans were "good guys." That is, the attitude of shattered illusion and wounded innocence is false, and really the statement is meant to do nothing but twit the supposed pro-Americanism of one's opponents.

I don't know you or your history, so I don't know if this is true in your case. But I will tell you the notion of the Americans as the "good guys" in war was based as much on media perceptions as realities.

On the whole, individual American soldiers and U.S. military policies were "good guys," but in war that's a relative thing. That's true in this war, too. But there have been many instances in American history of enemies of the state thrown in extra-legal prisons (Lincoln, 1861-2), enemy POWs abused with tacit approval from military authorities (Pacific, 1943) and wanton disregard for civilians caught in a war zone (Germany, 1945). That happens in this war, too.

The difference is in the way the reporters stack it up to tell their story.

Malaysian geography lent itself to securing the borders. Algeria was harder, though most of the rebels tried to come West from Tunisia. Vietnam, obviously, was incredibly difficult.
Iraq is a harder case too.
All the more reason to have sent enough troops to the do the job right. If a job is hard then take it seriously. Bush has not done so.
America the good guy... maybe you're right, and we never were. I'm sure the slaves, the massacred Indians, and the German and Japanese civilians who were killed by the 100,000's (despite our observation that German terror bombing of the Brits only made them mad) would agree.
No, I'm thinking of how we were compared to the Soviets post WW 2.
Robin, the ARVN folded as soon as our support was withdrawn.

It is my opinion that Iraqification is not an exit strategy (which implies cut-and-run), it is a vitory strategy.

Marvin the ARVN has gotten a lousy shake from popular depictions of the war - generally being shown as cowardly, treacherous, and brutal towards civilians.

South Vietnamese troops arguably spent more time in continuous combat than any of their counterparts, counting not just the ARVN but the Ruff Puffs, the SF Mike Forces, and the Kit Carson scouts. American soldiers went home after 365 days. The average Viet Cong or PAVN soldier actually spent less time in combat than American soldiers did - most of their time was spent on the move, digging tunnels, or performing other non-combat duties while waiting for the next grand offensive. (Jim Dunnigan has a lot of data on this in Dirty Little Secrets of the Vietnam War.)

So it was Marvin who faced more bullets than anybody else, and most of his efforts were ignored or denigrated, just as those of the Iraqi soldiers will be. For the same reasons, by the same people.

Now we have the "Oz" Doctrine: Only go to war where the geography is optimal.

Brilliant.

I'm sure the slaves, the massacred Indians, and the German and Japanese civilians who were killed by the 100,000's (despite our observation that German terror bombing of the Brits only made them mad) would agree.

You left out Marilyn Monroe, and that girl that Fatty Arbuckle killed with a bottle. You left out yourself as well, and you're a life-long victim if I ever heard one.

Robin:
Yer killin' me! Really though, you can't always choose your wars. But if the situation is harder, then deal with it.
In a way you have a point, choose the easy wars.
But if circumstances require a hard one, then deal with the facts on the ground.
History is pretty clear on the benefit insurgencies get from open borders, and battlefields awash with munitions they can turn on their foes.
If Iraq has long borders, then send enough troops to secure them. If Iraq is full of ammo dumps, then send enough troops to gather the stuff up. If Iraqis are divided culturally and religiously and are emerging from decades of brutality, then send enough troops to keep the public order.
Glen, you stalwart palladin you, defending the ill maligned ARVN's honor. Too bad your damsel in distress was just that.

Oz, I long ago tired of the amateur strategists who solve all operational and strategic problems with a wave of their little wands. Your grotesque oversimplificaton of the history of counter-insurgencies impresses no one. When you've counted how many soldiers it takes to stand shoulder to shoulder on the entire Iraqi border, call Don Rumsfeld - I'm sure he's awaiting your call with baited breath.

Oz,

We defeated the German and the Japanese during WWII, it does not mean that German and Japanese military was incompetent or their soldiers inferior. In fact they had superb militaries whose fought bravely. Poor strategy (and bad political leadership) was the reason for their demises. The same is true of South Vietnam. Nothing can compensate for poor strategy.

DB overdoes criticisms of South Vietnam's government. It brings to mind a chapter in Al Santoli's book "To Bear Any Burden" authored by Mrs. Le Thi An, an antiwar activist who left South Vietnam in 1962, lived in the US (I think in Cambridge, MA), and returned in 1971; as she relates in the book, everything in South Vietnam had changed for the better by the time she returned, and she notes in the book how the American press grossly exaggerated the incompetence and so forth of South Vietnam's government.