SwiftVets.com

[streetsweeper95B]

I emailed about the subject several days ago & received this afternoon the following information from Joe Galloway.

quote:

"Gen Vo Ngyuen Giap has NEVER talked about thinking it was time to surrender at any point during the Vietnam War, far from it. When LT. General Moore and I interviewed him in 1991 and 1992 he (Gen Giap) stated flatly: "We were prepared to fight for 10 or 20 or 50 years...to lose a million, five million, ten million dead....if that is what it took to drive the foreigner out of our country".

unquote.
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"Proud Member of the Freak Show"

[AMOS]

B.S.

[Deuce]

[USMCWayne]

"snatching defeat from the jaws of victory" is a great description for what happened in 1968...as well as what occured four years later.

During Operation Linebacker II, supposedly conducted to force the North Viets back to the bargaining table in late December of 72, the damage to North Vietnam's infrastructure was severe.

Linebacker II was the most intensive bombing campaign of the war. The Air Force estimated 500 rail interdictions had taken place, 372 pieces of rolling stock and three million gallons of petroleum products were destroyed, and 80 percent of the the North's electrical power production capability had been eliminated.

Logistical inputs into North Vietnam were assessed by U.S. intelligence at 160,000 tons per month when the operation began. By January 1973, those imports had dropped to 30,000 tons per month.

We had won the war again but, as noted caustically by Kissinger aide John Negroponte, "We bombed the North Vietnamese into accepting our concessions."

America wimped out, and the eventual peace agreement was basically the same one that had been reached in October 72. Additional U.S. demands were generally discarded or went against the U.S.

[streetsweeper95B]

I never made any claims as to whether I believe it or not, gentlemen. Do know that I'm searching through the Vietnam archives at the University of Texas, Austin. lol!
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"Proud Member of the Freak Show"

[USMCWayne]

Point taken, but I don't think we were shooting the messenger.

[streetsweeper95B]

whewwwwwwwwwwww!
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"Proud Member of the Freak Show"

[LewWaters]

Has anyone considered that Giap, interviewed in the 90's, 30 odd years after the fact, decided to downplay earlier comments or deny them, since they were ulitmately victorious?

That I can find, this claim has never actually appeared in any English publication. The closest I found was the October 2005 interview of General Nguyen Duc Huy in Vietnam magazine;

[BuffaloJack]

I don't know if many of you remember the Canadian "Ten Thousand Day War" documentary (1980). There are numerous interviews with Giap dispersed throughout the series episodes. If memory serves me, one of them had Giap making the the statement that Lew quotes above; another has Giap stating that the North was holding meetings outside of Hanoi discussing what terms they would ask of the Americans to stop the bombing of Hanoi into so much dust and debris. Giap stated that they had already decided to give it up when the bombing stopped. When the bombs stopped they switched positions and the war continued. They were one day away from suing for peace.
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Swift Boats - Qui Nhon (12/69-4/70), Cat Lo (4/70-5/70), Vung Tau (5/70-12/71)

[Deuce]

USMCWayne, et al...

agreed, no sniping at messenger's here either. Just would be great if we could shut down all the little Kronkite Wanabees and avoid snatching Defeat from the jaws of victory on the war on terror (aka the war against the reformation of the Caliphate in Baghdad)!!!

just damn,
Deuce

[streetsweeper95B]

[LewWaters]

For any interested, the complete interview with General Huy and others is now available online at Interviews with a Top North Vietnam Army General and Two Former Soldiers
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Clark County Conservative