Thursday, April 30, 2015

Forty years ago ... last flight out of Saigon

The war that formed the awful backdrop of my young adulthood ended like this on April 30, 1975.

Our elites have still not taken the lesson: no attempt by the United States to install an enduring regime by direct force in someone else's country has taken root since 1945 -- except perhaps in fly-speck Grenada. Even our less direct interventions have come to little except carnage and oppression.

As the generation dies off that saw the United States facilitating the recovery of western Europe and Japan from militarist and fascist barbarism in the mid-20th century, can we accept that this age no longer tolerates empire?

Photo via Wikipedia.

1 comment:

tina a Lebanese in Beirut said...

If reparations had been paid to the Vietnamese, no other wars would have been launched. When will the USA pay reparations to the countries it still works at destroying? (but now without involving a single US soldier) It will happen the day the Empire will loose. Will it loose without a war launched on its own territory with US civilians killed and properties destroyed?

(I live in an area, surrounded by countries destroyed by the Empire: from Palestine, to Yemen, to Iraq, to Syria, not to mention Lybia. In Lebanon, half of our population is made of refugees thanks to the Empire. We live under the constant threat of Israel armed and supported by the Empire and of ISIS/Nosra(Qaeda) armed if not openly supported by the Empire.)