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FBI Informant: Ray Bradbury's Sci-fi Written To Induce Communistic Mass Hysteria
v3rgEz writes: The FBI followed Ray Bradbury's career very closely, in part because an informant warned them that his writing was not enjoyable fantasy, but rather tantamount to psychological warfare. "The general aim of these science fiction writers is to frighten the people into a state of paralysis or psychological incompetence bordering on hysteria," the informant warned. "Which would make it very possible to conduct a Third World War in which the American people would believe could not be won since their morale had seriously been destroyed."
The government is taking the position that saying things that disagree with the official government position on things are subversive, anti-American, defeatist, comfort-to-the-enemony traitors? Color me surprised!
some things never change
All of the stuff written from the COINTELPRO/pre-Church committee era should be exhibit #1 for the case of why the national security apparatus needs to be strictly controlled, and heavily limited in its ability to spy on American citizens. We don't even have to go back far to see the rampant abuses, paranoid delusions, and intrusive actions taken with the intent of ruining the lives of those deemed to be political enemies, subversives, or anything else.
This sort of shit is un-american, undemocratic, and the sort of thing that should have no place in a free society.
Obviously we should give the government more power. After all, as Barney Frank says, "Government is simply the name we give to the things we choose to do together.”
You chose this, right?
Vietnam is the prime example of this. The NVA despite taking overwhelming losses on the battle field manage to win by destroying the will of the American homefront to prosecute the war.
When I find out who leaked this to the Feds we're going to have a purge. Workers of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!
"Communistic mass hysteria"? Not clear what that means. It looks like they played with the idea that making people think about society made people more susceptible to Communism. Probably true in some cases.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
Most people get so caught up in the fantastical stories of science fiction they don't stop to think about how science fiction came about. It's writing in which the environment has been exaggerated in some fashion by science and technology, and this is used to make certain moral and ethical arguments more blatantly obvious.
Authors during the Cold War were grappling with the issues of nuclear war, ideological combat and widespread authoritarianism. This hasn't really subsided all that much even today.
I'm not sure these guys could distinguish a credible threat from a popular band fan base... Oh wait, they can't: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
of course they followed an old white guy, but where was the FBI when that presbolutheran inuit transgender pansexual furry was writing all that sonic the hedgehog slash fic? It is time for equal rights when it comes to governmental agencies wildly overstepping the bounds of their duties.
lose != loose
We have access to literally MILLIONS of attempts at propaganda - both from the US and from outside agencies.
It's not that hard to recognize propaganda and his work is not it. You have to target your intended audience pretty highly and anyone not in the target audience can easily see through it for garbage.
Otherwise, it's not propaganda, it's truth that you disagree with. So you call it propaganda and pretend it is based on lies.
The reason for this is simple - the only way to convince someone that a lie is 'true', is if the lie is aimed directly at their own personal belief structure. You can't convince a liberal that there is a secret conspiracy in the US Government to 'invade texas' without a TON of proof, but you can convince certain conservatives with radio broadcast and an internet web page.
Similarly, you can't convince a Republican that the Pro-life movement is designed to keep women barefoot and pregnant (rather than to stop abortion), but you can convince certain liberals with an article and a news report.
As such, any real attempt at Propaganda is obvious to anyone not targeted by it, and it's ridiculous to believe that an author could engage in 'secret' propaganda.
excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
"The general aim of these science fiction writers is to frighten the people into a state of paralysis or psychological incompetence bordering on hysteria,"
"...and believe me, you're talking to a man with a _lot_ of experience with psychological incompetence bordering on hysteria."
I'm no professional historian, but I question your assertion.
American lost the Vietnam War because we weren't able to cope with a situation where there was so much guerrilla warfare taking place. Everything was a big question-mark. Did we eliminate all of the enemies in locations A and B? Did those snipers shooting from unseen locations in the jungle represent the only 1 or 2 enemies left, or were there many more? We kept dumping loads of money on equipment and manpower without any ability to see clear results.
I think we saw the same issue with the "war on terror" in countries like Afghanistan, except this time, it's notable that reconnaissance missions played a very big role with liberal use of drones, spy satellites and more. There's a growing realization that even if you're technically winning a war, you're still losing if you can't tell the current "score of the game".
This aggression will not stand.
I know that when I was a kid, every time I read a Bradbury story I got into a state of communistic panic, and it took a hot dog, piece of apple pie and a baseball game to calm me down.
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
Wait....
"Which would make it very possible to conduct a Third World War in which the American people would believe could not be won"
Does that mean anyone in the FBI was crazy enough that a 3rd world war could actually be "won" in some kind?
bickerdyke
In both cases, the wars were unwinnable because you had proxies providing material support without any real repercussions. The fighters are in plentiful supply because they are pissed off about the state of their country. The materiel is plentiful because it is being supplied from outside the country by entities that we can't, for political or practical reasons, go after. At that point you have to decide whether to go into "kill everyone" mode or just get the hell out.
W..w..W - Willy Waterloo washes Warren Wiggins who is washing Waldo Woo.
Aren't you just providing the details behind his assertion? The US was not willing to prosecute total war in order to win and it lost the will to fight a protracted guerrilla campaign. The British won their war in Malaysia using more overwhelming numbers and cutting off access to the villages by the guerrillas. It took about 10 years if I recall. It also takes a good 10 to 1 manpower advantage to pull this off. The US wasn't willing to make that commitment and the US population lost patience. News reports and general agitation by those opposing the war raised the public's consciousness about the war and how it was being prosecuted. (Interesting factoid, even though at the peak we had over 524000 service men and women in Vietnam, only 80,000 had direct combat roles. That' the same number the French had with only 140,000 + soldiers.) The French didn't have golf courses and pizza delivery by helicopter.
Very often, people confuse simple with simplistic. The nuance is lost on most. - Clement Mok
Martian Chronicles is so strange ... it was all about inciting hysteria, not about story telling.
sigs are for losers (except to point out that sigs are for losers)
Obviously reading Badbury's story induced communistic-related mass hysteria in the informant.
Well, I've got to get back to work. When I stop rowing, the slave ship just goes in circles.
I'm no professional historian, but I question your assertion.
American lost the Vietnam War because we weren't able to cope with a situation where there was so much guerrilla warfare taking place. Everything was a big question-mark. Did we eliminate all of the enemies in locations A and B? Did those snipers shooting from unseen locations in the jungle represent the only 1 or 2 enemies left, or were there many more? We kept dumping loads of money on equipment and manpower without any ability to see clear results.
America lost Vietnam precisely because of the political pressure at home, which indirectly caused much of what you describe above.
A little history lesson:
The Tet offensive in 1968, which garnered a lot of negative media attention in the US, effectively broke the back of the NVA. Until that offensive there were quite a few "traditional" battles. Remember, the NVA was a professional military force complete with armor and aircraft (in the case of the North Vietnamese air force). For several years after this the US was mainly fighting the VC (the guys in black pajamas), not the NVA. The NVA and the VC did most of their training, troop movement, and had much of ther senior command based in neighboring Laos. The US knew this, but apart from some small actions earlier in the war, barred the military from conducting operations in Laos due to fears of being seen as "widening the war". Had the US been able to put pressure (and keep it on) these troop marshaling areas and supply routes they could have pressed their advantage in both manpower and weaponry.
The negative publicity and public sentiment was not just felt in the White House and Pentagon, but in the squads and platoons climbing those hills for the 2nd and 3rd time. They knew the war was unpopular, had no real clue why they were there beside some vague notion of stopping the Communists (believe it or not, give soldiers a good, real reason to fight and they will put up with a lot), and very likely were against the war themselves in the case of draftees. When your primary goal is to survive your 1 year tour as opposed to winning the war, you probably are not going to win.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
... has always been on the part of the wingnuts. They perceive themselves as the ultimate "victims" while trampling the rights and lives of any who dare question them. Of course, they justify it all as "God's Will", while pounding the Bible and wrapping themselves in the flag.
If you go back in history, just about all wars were won when then victors pretty much stomped out the losers, across the board, to such an extent that they capitulated or were dead.
The cesspool just got a check and balance.
Ignorance is King. Many would not profit from his overthrow for they enrich themselves by means of his dark monarchy. They are his Court and under his aegis they defraud and govern for their own benefit and to perpetuate their power. They milk and shear and butcher the flocks that they maintain on bread and circuses, herding and stampeding them at their whim. Communication and education they fear, for the written word and the ability to think are channels by which the subjects may lift themselves into the light of reason, there to see the glaring flaws of the reign and rise up to throw off its yoke. The minions of Ignorance have weapons keen-honed and they use them with skill. They will press battle upon the world when their interests are threatened, and the violence which follows will last until the structure of society as it now exists is leveled to rubble and we are left among the ruins. Adapted from the 1959 post-apocalyptic cautionary tale ‘A Canticle for Leibowitz’ by WM Miller Jr .
*"Cogito Ergo Liberalis"*
America lost Vietnam precisely because of the political pressure at home, which indirectly caused much of what you describe above.
America lost Vietnam because the people at home came to realize we had wasted more than 50,000 young American lives fighting on behalf of a tyrannical, oppressive government the Vietnamese people hated, and were doing so not to oppose communism but mainly to protect rubber plantations belonging to companies like DuPont. There was no good point to the war, and people eventually wised up.
#DeleteChrome
American lost the Vietnam War because we weren't able to cope with a situation where there was so much guerrilla warfare taking place.
Add in the things that made prosecuting the war harder for the military, like LBJ's insistence on personally approving all targets for the bombing campaign to ensure that the selection of targets 'sent the right message' to the NVA government.
The NVA despite taking overwhelming losses on the battle field manage to win by destroying the will of the American homefront to prosecute the war.
The Vietnam war was, like many wars of the era, a proxy war. The NVA were backed by China and the USSR among others. The US could have but never did invade North Vietnam mostly because of the potential for direct conflict with the Chinese. The USSR provided very substantial hardware and training assistance. The NVA didn't really have to win, they just had to not lose and eventually the US had to go home. Without the backing of China and others the NVA couldn't have lasted for long. Similar situation happened in Korea and we see shades of it in the middle east today. No country that isn't backed by a major power can last long in combat with another major power. The NVA didn't really win - China and the USSR did.
And you know what? Between Vietnam and going into Iraq and Afghanistan in the early 2000's America spent years teaching this kind of asymmetric warfare around the world.
In Latin America. In Afghanistan. To Osama Bin Laden himself. Against a democracy and in favor of dictators if it was in the interests of the US.
So, like the British got all upset when America was fighting for independence that the Americans didn't wear uniforms and line up in rows, America has spent the last bunch of decades teaching how to do this very thing ... and are upset that people don't wear uniforms and line up in rows or play by any established rules of the game.
Sorry, that's not technically winning.
It's called being engaged in "low intensity" or "asymmetrical warfare", and means you might not be winning, and might not even know how you'd be able to tell.
Like the Russians weren't winning in Afghanistan.
And, in a similar way, why bombing ISIS and claiming you're winning doesn't mean you're winning when you can't change anything happening on the ground. It means the people who are counting the "score of the game" don't know if they're winning or losing, or what criteria to judge that.
It's notable to realize that America is now fighting people they trained and armed as they were fighting the Russians under the theory of "the enemy of my enemy is my friend", only to find out that isn't the case.
America lost the war before they even left, walked away from it and claimed to have done a great job, and now they're wondering why they think they "technically" won the war all the while discovering they didn't even know the rules of the game.
Especially now that the game has shifted to a new playing field, and people will have to re-learn the historical lesson that you can't control a country from the air.
Arguably, the Middle East might have been safer and less volatile if Bush hadn't gone into Iraq under bogus pretenses in the first place.
The problem is nobody else is playing this according to how the US strategists have claimed it would play out. Which means the US strategists don't seem to really know what is happening.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
We can't have people doing that. That's the government's job.
Have gnu, will travel.
The government is taking the position that saying things that disagree with the official government position on things are subversive, anti-American, defeatist, comfort-to-the-enemony traitors? Color me surprised!
It was the McCarthy era - the American Inquisition. He wasn't hauled up in front of HUAC (The House {of representatives} Un-Ameracan Activities Committee), so I presume, if he was investigated, the FBI (and the other witch-hunters) didn't find any evidence of an actual association between Bradbury and any of the Communist regimes.
Having said that: Bradbury's dystopias always struck me as an attempt to transplant mainstream literature's techniques and biases into Science Fiction.
SF is the art of the technical class. The central message is "You can fix it or create wonders by applying intelligence and dilligence to the problem." Even the dystopias a subset of "cautionary tales", with the central message being "Be careful not the break it THIS way, because that could wreck it so badly you CAN'T fix it.
Mainstream fiction is the propaganda of control of the general population: The central message is futility: "Do what the authorities tell you to do. No matrer HOW badly they're doing and HOW bad things get, don't try to improve them. Anything you try will make them worse."
My impression of Bradbury is that he tried to use mainstream fiction techniques and in the process imported the mainstream fiction message.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
And as a corollary:
"Hello, Authorities? I think this man is up to No Good. I'm seeing behavior that leads me to think a Plot is Afoot.".
"Thank you Sir. We'll check it out."
[an Investigation is Conducted]
"Well, it turns out that there's nothing going on that contravenes the law. No Nefarious Plot. We'll file this in our archives and move on to something else."
The fact that an investigation was conducted in response to a complaint is *to be expected*. That's what the "I" in "FBI" is all about. The good news here was that when the investigation turned up nothing illegal, it was shelved.
Now it is certainly true that during the McCarthy Era, there *were* investigations that went too far, and innocent people suffered consequences even when they were never charged and convicted. There was much for law enforcement and government to learn during this time period. I'm certainly no fan of witch hunts - especially ones where the definition of "witch" is not well defined.
But it is also true that there *were* foreign agents about, and they *were* seeking to do harm. Investigating leads that might end up in a legitimate conviction is a good thing. Dropping an investigation that proves unfounded is also a good thing.
But Oh Noes! Government! Security! These things must be bad, right?
Want to learn about race cars? Read my Book
I stand vindicated! I've been reading seditious material my whole life and really did need that tinfoil hat to keep the FBI from reading my seditious thoughts. No wonder my high school English teacher declared that science fiction wasn't literature and refused to allow book reports about it, she was protecting us from the FBI!
It's fortunate you're not a professional historian, because South Vietnam was independent, relatively free, and barely able to hold its own when the U.S. left. It took an infusion of Red Chinese money and arms to turn the tide against S.V., while the U.S. Congress refused to provide any help.
Read and learn, and don't accept the revisionist lies. The U.S. was not defeated in Vietnam. South Vietnam fell well after the U.S. left.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
I think this FBI informant had a geek crush on Ray Bradbury. He wanted to stalk him at all costs. He invented this elaborate "Communist-angle" ruse to justify to his superiors the inordinate amount of time he used obsessing over Bradbury's every move, admiring him from afar. I imagine it's easier to maintain this fib than do actual work of any value.
This would make a good comedy sketch, actually! Like a variant of The Tailor of Panama.
"Love heals scars love left." -- Henry Rollins
I guess you could look at it that way (that my comments were just providing details behind the original assertion).
Although, I'd also say that America has *never* really been willing to wage "total war" to win one since WWII. I don't think the majority is really behind the idea that it's about "winning at any/all costs" unless the war directly threatens their continued existence. (If someone starts launching nuclear missiles with targets on U.S. soil? That would provoke a "total war is acceptable" response. Not much less than that would do so.)
Therefore, wars America gets involved in are probably much more about analyzing things and setting expectations. (Can we reasonably expect to win using no more than than X dollars and Y manpower, over Z length of time?) I don't know that the enemy "destroyed our will to fight" in these scenarios? It's more of a, "Hey... we tried and it turns out we misjudged what it would take to win. Time to cut the losses." situation.
There is only one way to win war. That is to wipe out the opposition (something America has not had the will for since WWII).
Not true. The way you win a war is to eliminate your opponent's will to fight. You fight them until they don't want to fight anymore. Sometimes this can come fairly quickly. Sometimes you have to wipe them out. They could be left with nothing but sticks and rocks, but if they still want to fight then you will have to shoot or bomb people armed with rocks.
And if Vietnam was a stalemate then why is Saigon now called Ho Chi Minh City?
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
I have no other subversive desires.
And yes, I chose to post anonymously to avoid trollings.
posting anonymously is subversive
produce paralysis through mass hysteria is spewed on cable news channels
only senile people in nursing homes are watching cable news any more
http://www.businessinsider.com/cable-tv-subscribers-plunging-2015-8
If you go back in history, just about all wars were won when then victors pretty much stomped out the losers, across the board, to such an extent that they capitulated or were dead.
Really? US civil war? WW I? Korea? Iraq? Afghanistan?
I was not sure where to put this, so I chose here. All of the problems in Vietnam resulted from the fact that the decision had been made to fight the Soviet Union in a series of proxy wars designed to cost them more than they could afford. That decision in itself was a good one, the dangers of fighting the Soviet Union directly were too great to risk. The problem was that the decision makers in Washington did not fight in Vietnam with the intention of winning that engagement. They decided to continue that proxy war indefinitely. If they had fought Vietnam with the intention of winning, it would likely have been over in 1968 or sooner. This strategy was complicated by their belief that they could control what information about the war came out (causing them to think they could lie about what was going on and not get caught).
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
> Really? US civil war? WW I? Korea? Iraq? Afghanistan?
Yes, really.
And the US Civil War? Like you really have to ask on this one... They pretty much invented "total war" during this one.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
And the US Civil War? Like you really have to ask on this one... They pretty much invented "total war" during this one.
yes exactly right, the white supremacists gave up completely and faded away
Switch communist for terrorist and "winning the third world war" for "winning the war on terror" and you can have a comfortable life as an informant again.
Some things never change. Snitches are like composers, to be successful all they have to do is adapt to what their audience wants to hear. Just dress up the same old song with a different tune.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
The U.S. was not defeated in Vietnam.
I'm confused, what do you call it when you pick up all your stuff and run away to not fight again? Most people would call that "defeated"
I think he means "destroyed their capability to fight." This ends the war.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
This really shows how out of step the FBI is, that they thought Ray Bradbury could be an agent of international communism. Why, Raymond Bradbury is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life.
Slashdot: providing anti-social weirdos a soapbox, since 1997.
two countries couldn't have closer economic, social and military ties than the US and Canada.
There are plenty of examples of countries with far closer ties: members of the EU; England, Scotland and Wales; the counties in the former Soviet Union etc. Indeed I would argue that Canada has closer ties with the UK than the US: we share a monarch, style of government and social morals the later of which is very different from the US in that we have national healthcare, functioning social welfare etc. Of those you list I'd say that only our economic ties are closer to the US than the UK.
One of the reports mentions "he noticed that some of Bradbury's stories have been definitely slated against the United States and its capitalistic form of government." Strange, I thought we had a constitutional republic. I didn't realize "capitalism" was a form of government. But, it does show what those in power, especially then (but especially now), think of how things are meant to be run.
Similar to the upcoming US election results
Or do we keep hiring people with paranoid delusions to work in our security agencies?
Maybe this is not such a good idea...
"I suspect the "informant" was Phillip K. Dick"
It could be. The name "Phil Dick" just sound suspicious.
Political correctness is really just herd psychology pushed by insecure people who desperately seek social conformity.
First off, Bradbury wrote about human emotions, he was not _just_ a science fiction writer. Second, he was one of the best authors of the 20th century in writing about the human condition. Finally, they were bother by Bradbury, but didn't have any problem with L. Ron Hubbard?!? Really?!?!?!?! WTF!!!!!
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
The general theme in much of SciFi is "Question Authority". The only people that would be bothered by that would be fascists, which are the very people whose authority SHOULD be questioned!
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
Well, that's the difference between winning the war and winning the peace.
The choice after the Civil War was either Reconstruction, on VERY generous terms, or risk insurgency and partisan actions for generations.
See also the end of WW1 versus the end of WW2.
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
SF is the art of the technical class. The central message is "You can fix it or create wonders by applying intelligence and dilligence to the problem."
Mainstream fiction is the propaganda of control of the general population: The central message is futility: "Do what the authorities tell you to do."
Ray Bradbury and Robert Heinlein entered the mainstream because they wrote entertaining, well-written. stories for adults with engaging themes, three-dimensional characters and a minimum of techno-babble.
Heinlein, of course, could be remarkably observant and cynical about "the technical class" and its own desire for control --- not to mention its complicity in providing the means to control others.
I have often thought it a pity that he didn't live long enough to see the geek in full flight. The privileged adolescent who suddenly discovers that he can't have everything his own way.
The Tet offensive in 1968, which garnered a lot of negative media attention in the US, effectively broke the back of the NVA.
The Tet offensive wasn't supposed to happen.
It struck like a thunderbolt, destroying whatever credibility the American military and government had back home.
Making people think about things is EXACTLY the kind of subversion that threatens the Powers that Be.
And maybe you and Stephen King like to write innocuous fluff, but many of the classics of literature became classics precisely because they were questioning people's certitudes.
In fact, somewhere circa 1970, Harlan Ellison published an entire series of books titled "Dangerous Visions" whose many and varied contents were supposed to be on the edge.
I'm sure that J. Edgar had a field day with "A Boy and His Dog". Ursula LeGuin explored sexual fluidity at a time when being simply gay could earn you a beating, much less being transsexual. Terry Pratchett was rather famous for noting that while living in a slum practically made you a criminal, owning a whole block of rat-infested tenements merely meant that you got invited to all the best high-society parties. And on, and on, and on.
Afghanistan is always a massive problem; it's not the external forces so much, it's more that it's so heavily tribal, and you don't know who is on your side, and that can vary. If somebody is identified as an islamist of some kind by an informant, chances are it's just another tribe settling a score. And later, did they just bomb you because they're terrorists, or because you just shot somebody who was on their side???
Outsiders never quite know what's going on, and the Afghanis don't want you there anyway, because you're invading their country. Stir in lots of Afghani fighters with a reckless, fatalistic streak and... you're gonna have a hard time.
-WolfWithoutAClause
"Gravity is only a theory, not a fact!"And when the government said 'butter is bad, margarine is good, because science says so' - the gullible masses argued? And now that the government says 'margarine is bad, butter is good, because science says so' - the gullible masses should argue? And when the government says things like 'income tax is good', 'the minimum wage is good', at what point are people supposed to throw on their blinders?
It would be much more accurate to say: "The general aim of these SECURITY AGENCIES (FBI, CIA, ... ) is to frighten the people into a state of paralysis or psychological incompetence bordering on hysteria,"
Unabated, huh? Sooo, how many countries do these "unabated" Nazis run these days?
"You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
How many times have we all seen the clip of JFK promising to put a man on the moon?
How many of us know what the rest of the speech said about Sputnik and the Kremlin?
It was 1960, the US still clung to the idea that all out nuclear war was winnable, the coffers of the military-industrial complex depended on that belief. Sputnik put them on the back foot, a communist radio beeper was whizzing over their heads with impunity in broad daylight. Sputnik scared the crap out of the Pentagon, the fear motivated them to seek the highest ground there is - the Moon. Amazingly, they reached it.
I was a 10yo kid in a small Aussie town, I saw the moon landing live and rehearsed the "duck and cover" thing at school, nobody (least of all me) connected the two. Everyone I knew watched the landing, TV's were set up in public halls, pubs, and shops, since there will still plenty of homes that didn't have one. IMO there really hasn't been a world event to rival the public attention the moon landing received. Yes, 911 was a huge shock, but from a historical POV it was just another suprise attack on a dominant power.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
The Tet offensive in 1968, which garnered a lot of negative media attention in the US, effectively broke the back of the NVA. Until that offensive there were quite a few "traditional" battles. Remember, the NVA was a professional military force complete with armor and aircraft (in the case of the North Vietnamese air force). For several years after this the US was mainly fighting the VC (the guys in black pajamas), not the NVA.
It was actually the other way around. The Tet offensive broke the back of the "VC". They bore the brunt of the onslaught and after the dust had settled the North had to fill in the ranks of the "VC" with regular north Vietnamese troops, NVA. One third of the troops in the south were NVA after Tet, that's how large the losses were. (In fact the unequal losses have made some historians speculate that the whole point of the Tet offensive was to bleed the south dry so that the north could take over. But that's very speculative, and probably going much too far). Didn't matter much in the end, since the north could make up those losses without much trouble.
Now, as others have stated, the main US problem with the Tet offensive wasn't that it was successful, It was militarily mostly a complete failure. However, the US message at home was that "We're winning this, the enemy isn't putting up much of a fight, it'll be over in a year or so". Tet proved decisively that that wasn't true. So even if it took years for the opposition to build up their forces to where they could be a real threat again, strategically and politically it weakened the US position substantially.
Stefan Axelsson
What an absolute crock of paranoid delusional bullshit. Fahrenheit 451 was dangerous alright...but not to us his readers. I was blessed once to have a long conversation with Mr. Ray, and this brilliant, gracious and thoroughly awake human being would have loved the absurdity of this.
Correct.
The big problem was that the war was pointless, at least as waged by LBJ. There was no good idea of what we were accomplished or when we could bring the troops home. We killed a bunch of people, who we were told were insurgents. Then the next day we killed another bunch of people. Nothing much was changing except the increasing US death toll. In the meantime, the South Vietnamese government wasn't going to inspire anybody to heroic efforts to save it (in the US and South Vietnam).
Therefore, all the military could do was promise the light at the end of the tunnel (prompting lots of cartoons like "Will the last GI in Vietnam please turn out the light at the end of the tunnel?)"
LBJ underestimated the anti-war movement he provoked, causing it to continue to grow until it prevented any later US involvement.
The only way to win that war would have been to have an actual strategy and an actual goal, and somebody to tell the US public about it.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
Yes. We're in violent agreement there. The problem with fighting an insurgency is that they need only to not lose for them to win, while you need to actually decisively win, to, well, win.
Since the politics of the situation prevented actually striking decisively against the North (which would also have been costly in its own right) or even their supply routes through neighbouring countries, the war was "un-winnable" from the start. Given the situation the best that could have been achieved was a drawn out occupation by security forces of a pacified rural south. Probably complete with an East German "iron curtain" border. Like Korea but much, much worse. (Speaking of the border situation. Not the pacification.)
A pretty crappy situation to be in politically and economically in either case.
Stefan Axelsson
The facts are that all during his time in office the number of troops went up. What might have happened is and will always be a guess.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
The US was defeated in Vietnam. Their enemy overran their positions, and the US fled never to return to the fight. You are the very image of the blind patriot. It's not becoming.
It is possible to win a counter-insurgency campaign, but you have to know what you're doing, and to keep political support you need to manage expectations. What we needed to do is counter-insurgency (done right) while actively transitioning to the South Vietnamese Army and other forces. I saw no sign of this while the anti-war movement picked up steam.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
It is possible to win a counter-insurgency campaign...
Yes, sure. Witness the British in Malaya, or Kenya to take just two examples.
However, the Vietnamese situation was complicated by external state actors, the North, the Soviet Union. Even if you could have isolated the southern insurgents from their supporting base, (Either the decent way, like Malaya, or the deplorable way, like in Kenya), they could still have received substantial support from the North, like they did during the majority of the war. So any strategy would have had to be two pronged, both a "hearts and minds" to isolate insurgents from their support in the south (the US didn't have the stomach for a Kenyan solution, which is a good thing), and a military intervention against supporting external regimes and their supply lines. Without the latter part, the insurgents would still have had much too much wind in their sails, for too long.
As it was, they couldn't get popular support, in no small part due to the corruption of the southern regime, and a decisive military intervention was politically impossible. A no-win situation if there ever was one.
And even with the right strategy, counter insurgencies take time. Something the US doesn't have, as their political will, and hence staying power has been, and probably will always be, low.
Stefan Axelsson