-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: August 21, 2007 11:40:28 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Draft-Dodging Chickenhawk Attacks "Misguided" Anti-Vietnam-
War Crowd (His Age)
Those "on the LOSING side of history"
get to re-write it for future generations
Bush to invoke Vietnam
in arguing against Iraq pullout
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- As he awaits a crucial progress report on Iraq,
President Bush will try to put a twist on comparisons of the war to
Vietnam by invoking the historical lessons of that conflict to
argue against pulling out.
President Bush pauses Tuesday during a news conference at the North
American Leaders summit in Canada.
On Wednesday in Kansas City, Missouri, Bush will tell members of
the Veterans of Foreign Wars that "then, as now, people argued that
the real problem was America's presence and that if we would just
withdraw, the killing would end," according to speech excerpts
released Tuesday by the White House.
"Three decades later, there is a legitimate debate about how we got
into the Vietnam War and how we left," Bush will say.
"Whatever your position in that debate, one unmistakable legacy of
Vietnam is that the price of America's withdrawal was paid by
millions of innocent citizens, whose agonies would add to our
vocabulary new terms like 'boat people,' 're-education camps' and
'killing fields,' " the president will say.
The president will also make the argument that withdrawing from
Vietnam emboldened today's terrorists by compromising U.S.
credibility, citing a quote from al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden
that the American people would rise against the Iraq war the same
way they rose against the war in Vietnam, according to the excerpts.
"Here at home, some can argue our withdrawal from Vietnam carried
no price to American credibility, but the terrorists see things
differently," Bush will say.
The White House is billing the speech, along with another address
next week to the American Legion, as an effort to "provide broader
context" for the debate over the upcoming Iraq progress report by
Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander, and Ryan
Crocker, the U.S. ambassador in Baghdad.
President Bush has frequently asked lawmakers -- and the American
people -- to withhold judgment on his troop "surge" in Iraq until
the report comes out in September.
It is being closely watched on Capitol Hill, particularly by
Republicans nervous about the political fallout from an
increasingly unpopular war.
Earlier this month, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he would
wait for the report before deciding when a drawdown of the 160,000
U.S. troops in Iraq might begin.
Bush's speeches Wednesday and next week are the latest in a series
of attempts by the White House to try to reframe the debate over
Iraq, as public support for the war continues to sag.
A recent CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll found that almost
two-thirds of Americans -- 64 percent -- now oppose the Iraq war,
and 72 percent say that even if Petraeus reports progress, it won't
change their opinion.
The poll also found a great deal of skepticism about the report; 53
percent said they do not trust Petraeus to give an accurate
assessment of the situation in Iraq.
In addition to his analogy to Vietnam, Bush in Wednesday's speech
will invoke other historical comparisons from Asia, including the
U.S. defeat and occupation of Japan after World War II and the
Korean War in the 1950s, according to the excerpts.
"In the aftermath of Japan's surrender, many thought it naive to
help the Japanese transform themselves into a democracy. Then, as
now, the critics argued that some people were simply not fit for
freedom," Bush will say. "Today, in defiance of the critics,
Japan ... stands as one of the world's great free societies."
Speaking about the Korean War, Bush will note that at the time
"critics argued that the war was futile, that we never should have
sent our troops in, or that America's intervention was divisive
here at home."
"While it is true that the Korean War had its share of challenges,
America never broke its word," Bush will say. "Without America's
intervention during the war, and our willingness to stick with the
South Koreans after the war, millions of South Koreans would now be
living under a brutal and repressive regime."
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