America's Last President: Monika Wiesak's excellent new book

[Sean Coleman]

Wow, pro-war AND pro-Israel!!

What next, eat the poor?

 

[Michael Griffith]

11 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

So I think the time has come to ask Mike--since he supported Nixon's bombs away police in Indochina, and he is clearly a staunch supporter of Israel--and especially after his attack on Joe M, are you a neocon?  Because that is not what JFK was.

Here is another one : remember Hanoi, not Saigon.

 

No, I am not a neocon. I thought I had made that abundantly clear, but I guess it went in one ear and out the other. 

Why do you continue to spread Communist propaganda? Nixon's bombing in Indochina was not "bombs away" but was carefully targeted to keep civilian casualties as low as possible. 

I see you are still holding to the bizarre, really obscene, line that the Communist takeover of Vietnam was not really all that bad and that things are not really all that bad in Vietnam today. This is from a report on Vietnam jointly issued just a few weeks ago by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Article 19, and the ICJ:

          Since announcing its candidacy for the HRC on 22 February 2021, Viet Nam has detained, arrested, or sentenced at least 48 journalists, activists, and NGO leaders for arbitrary crimes ranging from ‘abusing democratic freedoms’ to ‘propaganda against the State’ to ‘tax evasion’, articles 311, 117 and 200 of the Criminal Code. Two emblematic cases of the recent trend are Pham Chi Dung, former president of the Independent Journalists Association of Viet Nam, who was sentenced to 15 years in prison in January 2021, and Pham Doan Trang, a prominent independent journalist and human rights defender, who was sentenced to 9 years imprisonment also on propaganda charges in December 2021.

          Viet Nam has pledged to raise awareness of human rights among the public, but any such measures are undermined by recent decrees aiming to control NGOs, many of whose core activities are education programs that raise public awareness of human rights. On 31 August 2022, Viet Nam introduced Decree 58, which regulates foreign NGOs. Viet Nam has also drafted the Regulations on the organization, operation and management of associations aimed at regulating domestic NGOs. Both regulations allow for the termination of NGOs on vague grounds such as ‘national interest’ and ‘social order’, providing the Viet Nam authorities with almost indefinite scope to silence their critics and those engaging in disfavoured expression. This scope is worsened in the draft decree for local NGOs, which prohibits the ‘[u]ndermining’ of the State under article 11(1).

          Viet Nam has pledged to carry out legal reforms to further incorporate provisions of international human rights treaties into national laws. But these recent decrees allow the State to punish NGOs for what may amount to publicly voiced criticism. They are non-compliant with Viet Nam’s obligations to respect and ensure the rights to freedom of expression and association provided for in articles 19 and 22 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) to which Viet Nam is a State-party.

          The authorities have long used the law to attack anybody in Viet Nam who speaks out in defense of their and others’ human rights. This includes articles from the Criminal Code, especially Article 117, which criminalises ‘making, storing, distributing or disseminating information, documents and items against the Socialist Republic of Vietnam’, and Article 331, which criminalizes ‘abusing democratic freedoms to infringe on the interests of the State’. In particular, the UN Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression previously stated that Article 117 is “overly broad and appears to be aimed at silencing those who seek to exercise their human right to freely express their views and share information with others”.

          Our organizations have documented the use of these charges, and similar charges, by Viet Nam to arrest and threaten more than 100 human rights defenders and activists since 2019. While Viet Nam has pledged to conduct legal reforms aimed at enhancing its institutional, judicial, and policy foundation related to human rights, the continued abuse of critics brave enough to speak out against the Vietnamese government since the pledge was made demonstrates they do not intend to honour it. (Vietnam: Human Rights Council candidacy demands human rights progress - ARTICLE 19)

You don't want to admit the ugly truth about the reign of terror that the North Vietnamese Communists imposed on the South Vietnamese after Saigon fell, and about the brutal regime that Vietnam's government continues to be, because you don't want to admit that the anti-war liberals supported the forces of evil guys in the Vietnam War and betrayed the good guys.

[James DiEugenio]

Now we trust NGO's?

OMG we are in VIctoria Nuland/Kagan land.

And Mike says he is not a Neocon.

Edited October 27, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

I really object to the smearing of Monica as a liberal--the Bushian "L" word-- because she is trying to explicate Kennedy's Middle East foreign policy.

This is what a writer is supposed to do.  Not bring one's own prejudices to the subject, but to meet that subject on its own turf.

Kennedy was trying to find the moderates on each side.  With the Arabs he had settled on Nasser.  

 

As Pete points out, what has happened in the Middle East today is that the extremes won out.  When Saudi Arabia can murder a Washington Post journalist and Trump decides to do nothing, and Biden then visits the country?  While Saudi Arabia is financing a war in Yemen?  

Nasser fought the Saudis in Yemen, and JFK backed him.  Why? Because Nasser was trying to install a republic there while the Saudis wanted to continue a royal monarchy.

What Kennedy was trying to do was to work with the moderates on the Arab side.  Its funny, because the Israelis even objected to Nasser. Comparing him to Hitler.

Please note: Mike ignored Pete's comments on Pappe.

Edited October 27, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Michael Griffith]

On 10/26/2022 at 1:37 PM, James DiEugenio said:

Concerning Nasser, this is so visionary of JFK,  I give him all the credit I can for it.  It was as smart as getting out of Vietnam. 

Oh, wow. Uh, are we talking about the same Gamal Abdel Nasser who banned all political parties except his own after he took power, who recommended the obscene anti-Semitic screed Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion, who later tried to legitimize his dictatorship by winning 99% of the vote in a clearly bogus election (even Diem and Thieu never claimed such an amazing margin of victory), who began sending terrorist teams into Israel in 1954, who signed arms deals with the Soviets and the Czechs in 1955 (which caused even the very pro-Arab Dwight Eisenhower to pull U.S. funding for the Aswan Dam), who claimed in a 1960 speech to the UN that Israel's independence was an "error," who closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli ships in 1956, who condemned Tunisian President Habib Bourguiba in 1965 for daring to suggest that Arab nations should recognize Israel and explore a political solution, who closed the Straits of Tiran to Israeli ships again in May 1967, who publicly declared in that same month that "our objective will be to destroy Israel," who demanded that the UN peacekeeping force leave the Sinai in 1967 and then proceeded to blockade Israeli ships from the Gulf of Aqaba and moved an extra 45,000 troops into the Sinai in preparation for a full-scale attack on Israel (but whose aggression was foiled when the Israelis detected his invasion preparations and stopped them with preemptive strikes that virtually wiped out Egypt's air force), who also dragged Egypt into a war with Yemen, who murdered political opponents, etc.? Is that the Nasser you're talking about? Sheesh, is there no murdering thug you won't defend if that thug was pro-communist?

And what exactly was "smart" about getting out of Vietnam? (JFK did no such thing, but the Democrat-controlled Congress did this in 1973.) Was it handing over 18 million people to Hanoi's tyranny? Was it the "reign of terror" that the North Vietnamese Communists imposed on the South Vietnamese? (I'm using quotes for "reign of terror" because that's the term that a former Vietcong leader used to describe the brutality that the Communists imposed on the South after Saigon fell.) Was it the 60,000-plus executions that the Communists carried out? Was it the sending of 1-2 million South Vietnamese to concentration camps? Was it the killing of tens of thousands of other South Vietnamese in those concentration camps through abuse and inhumane conditions? Was it the abolition of basic freedoms such as freedom of the press, freedom of speech, freedom of religion? Was it the shutting down of all private schools? Was it the confiscation of all the property and life savings of hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese? Was it Communist Vietnam's well-documented repression and brutality in the decades that followed the war? Is it the fact that even today, in 2022, Communist Vietnam is ranked by even the most liberal human rights groups as one of the worst, most oppressive regimes on the planet? 

You slander JFK by praising him for "getting out of Vietnam." He did no such thing, and there's not a shred of credible evidence to support your theory that he planned on totally abandoning South Vietnam regardless of the consequences after he was reelected. Even James Galbraith, a fierce advocate of the case for JFK's intention to withdraw, admits that under JFK's plan, aid to South Vietnam would continue after 1965 and 1,500 support troops would remain after 1965. 

 

 

[James DiEugenio]

No Mike we are talking about Nasser the guy who wanted to bring secularism to the Middle East, replacing fundamentalism.  I mean you did watch the video right?

Nasser, the man who went to war with the Moslem Brotherhood and won. Why did he do it? Because they wanted him dead.

Nassser, the man who held so much promise for the future of Pan Arabism, that one of  the Crown Princes of Saudi Arabia defected.

Nasser, the man who decided to nationalize the Suez Canal for Egypt and stood up to Israel, France and England, thus becoming the most influential leader of the Arab world.

Nasser, the man who took the fees from Suez and tried to elevate the lives of the people of his country, who loved him for that.

Nasser, the Pan Arab visionary who almost succeeded in uniting Egypt with Syria, but Saudi Arabia undermined it.

Why did Saudi Arabia undermine and fear Nasser?  Because Nasser thought that, as a Pan Arab,  the oil in the mIddle East belonged to all the Arabs.  And this is why England hated him, because they knew if he won out, they would be dealing with a much tougher bargaining agent than the royal family in Saudi Arabia.

Nasser, the Pan Arab who wanted to install a republic in Yemen and went to war with Saudi Arabia who wanted to keep the royal monarchy there. Incredibly, Kennedy backed Nasser on this.

How much was Nasser loved?  When he died, 6 million people showed up to mourn him.  Some of them weeping uncontrollably.  Trees buckled because people wanted to see his coffin and climbed up the limbs.  So many did that the branches broke and they fell to the ground.

Nasser was so far ahead of his time, that the women in Iran are just catching up to him.  Watch the speech.  Learn something.

Keep that rightwing propaganda flying Mike.  I like swatting it away.

Edited October 28, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Guest]

8 hours ago, Michael Griffith said:

You slander JFK by praising him for "getting out of Vietnam." He did no such thing, and there's not a shred of credible evidence to support your theory that he planned on totally abandoning South Vietnam regardless of the consequences after he was reelected. Even James Galbraith, a fierce advocate of the case for JFK's intention to withdraw, admits that under JFK's plan, aid to South Vietnam would continue after 1965 and 1,500 support troops would remain after 1965. 

Can’t you have both, Michael? I mean its clear JFK never thought the US should be in Vietnam in the first place. He saw it with his own eyes during the French colonial period. He knew it was impossible to win and felt that the Vietnamese should be fighting their own war. I think you may not have considered the consequences of a sudden withdrawal vs a gradual one. The former creates an implosion, the latter causes a handover situation. I am totally clear that he wanted a US exit but, that he couldn’t do it in a day, he had to stagger it, for multiple reasons. 
1500 support troops is nothing, you could have that many providing training and strategic support. 

[Michael Griffith]

Since Jim has posted a video about modern Vietnam, I thought I would post some videos about modern Vietnam's brutality and suppression of human rights. The first video is a portion of a UN Watch meeting held a few weeks on why Vietnam should not be granted a seat on the UN Human Rights Council. The second video, produced earlier this year, is a Human Rights Watch video on the treatment of human rights activists in Vietnam. The third video is another Human Rights Watch video on the treatment of activists in Vietnam. The fourth video is a brief speech given in 2007 by Democratic Congresswoman Loretta Sanchez on the state of human rights in Vietnam at the time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmPm8smE0QU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ygjwww4qLvY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RMjxhlvyHlQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yo2q1J0MYYI

 

 

 

Edited October 28, 2022 by Michael Griffith

[James DiEugenio]

10 hours ago, Chris Barnard said:

Can’t you have both, Michael? I mean its clear JFK never thought the US should be in Vietnam in the first place. He saw it with his own eyes during the French colonial period. He knew it was impossible to win and felt that the Vietnamese should be fighting their own war. I think you may not have considered the consequences of a sudden withdrawal vs a gradual one. The former creates an implosion, the latter causes a handover situation. I am totally clear that he wanted a US exit but, that he couldn’t do it in a day, he had to stagger it, for multiple reasons. 
1500 support troops is nothing, you could have that many providing training and strategic support. 

This is acute of you Chris.. Why?

The last thing JFK said about Vietnam was to Mike Forrestal, Bundy's assistant on the NSC.

Kennedy said to him,  when I get back from Texas, "I want to start a complete and very profound review of how we got into this country, what we thought we were doing, and what we now think we can do.  I even want to think about whether of not we should be there." (Douglass, p. 183, italics added)

Again, I like the Wiesak book because it shows us who Kennedy was without bringing any biases to the discussion.  She is trying to understand Kennedy and his policies on their own.  What do they mean?  What do they say about the man and his presidency?  What was he trying to achieve?

If part of that policy was an attempt to befriend Nasser--and it was--then fine. Why did Kennedy wish to do that?  If part of that policy was withdrawing from VIetnam--and it was--then why did Kennedy want to do that? 

These are important issues because they went against the grain.  Both in historic terms-- e. g. Foster Dulles feared Nasser and had turned to Saudi Arabia--and also against his current advisors--Lemnitzer, and others, wanted to go into Vietnam--so this explicates and delineates just who Kennedy was and why he was unique.

[Guest]

38 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

This is acute of you Chris.. Why?

Hi James,

It certainly wasn’t meant to be that way but, I did catch the end of the convo. Michael made a comment about there being no evidence of JFK intending to pull out of Vietnam and stated he wanted troops there after 1965. Which I addressed, JFK clearly wanted out and didn’t want to be there in the first place. 
 

My point to Michael is that even if it did extend longer than 1965, it does change or dilute JFK’s mission to leave. He wanted out and there is ample evidence of that. 
 

Is that clearer? 
 

Cheers,

Chris

[Matthew Koch]

On 10/27/2022 at 7:50 AM, Michael Griffith said:

Many people will, unfortunately, judge a book by reading a single chapter, much less two chapters, if that chapter cites and quotes a fringe, discredited fraud who has made crazy claims. 

You appear to have misread my comments about Wiesak's statements on the Arab-Israeli conflict as saying that JFK was anti-Israeli. No, I do not believe that JFK was anti-Israeli. But, Wiesak seems to harbor an anti-Israeli bias. Since she is an ultra-liberal, this is not shocking, since an increasing number of radical liberals are turning against Israel and, incredibly and shamefully, are painting Israeli Jews as the aggressors and the Palestinians as the victims. 

I was an Arabic and Hebrew linguist in the military; I have lived in Israel; and I have been researching the Arab-Israeli conflict for nearly 40 years. 

As you have done in your research on the Vietnam War, you appear to have gotten most of your information on the Arab-Israeli issue from extremist, unreliable sources.

 

Michael, don't let James call you a NeoCon or fling that kind of mud

Remember the Ben Shapiro post I made, James DiEugenio platformed Ryan Dawson and Ryan Dawson claims he turned Jim into the Isreali info in Destiny Betrayed (Don't kill the messenger his words not mine) Ryan Dawson has been kicked off more platforms than Kayne West. https://www.stopantisemitism.org/antisemite-of-the-week-6/antisemite-of-the-week-ryan-dawson-the-holocaust-denying-bigot If you haven't read the end of Reclaiming Parkland about Georgy Zhukov I would recommend reading and you'll understand why arguing with Jim about anything pinko is waste of time.. 

 

[James DiEugenio]

Mathew:

Are you still holding a  grudge about me calling you out for comparing me to W?

1.  I did not call Mike a neocon, I asked him if he was one.  Big difference

2. Ryan Dawson never convinced me of anything and I did not platform him.   Period.

FInally, I stand by what  I said about Zhukov and Barbarossa.  And I think Mike is honest enough to agree with me.  It was the Russians who broke the back of the Wehrmacht. And its simple arithmetic.  Germany had about 80-85% of its army on the eastern front.  When they failed at all three goals--Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad-- Hitler made two great gambles, Stalingrad and Kursk, Germany was for all intents and purposes defeated. It was just a matter of how long it would take to get to Berlin from either the west or east. Stalingrad was the greatest infantry battle in history, and the Nazis lost.  Kursk was the greatest tank battle in history, and although Germany did not technically lose, it did not win either, and they had to win.  

These were the last two real battles on the eastern front. With about 80 per cent of the German army there.  There was only one last offensive that the Nazis launched, the Battle of the Bulge, and that was a last desperate act.

So yes the failure of Barbarrosa--the greatest land invasion in history-- turned the war, and Zhukov was a brilliant commander. I think Mike would agree with those two judgments.

 

Edited October 29, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[Matthew Koch]

1 hour ago, James DiEugenio said:

Mathew:

Are you still holding a  grudge about me calling you out for comparing me to W?

1.  I did not call Mike a neocon, I asked him if he was one.  Big difference

2. Ryan Dawson never convinced me of anything and I did not platform him.   Period.

FInally, I stand by what  I said about Zhukov and Barbarossa.  And I think Mike is honest enough to agree with me.  It was the Russians who broke the back of the Wehrmacht. And its simple arithmetic.  Germany had about 80-85% of its army on the eastern front.  When they failed at all three goals--Leningrad, Moscow and Stalingrad-- Hitler made two great gambles, Stalingrad and Kursk, Germany was for all intents and purposes defeated. It was just a matter of how long it would take to get to Berlin from either the west or east. Stalingrad was the greatest infantry battle in history, and the Nazis lost.  Kursk was the greatest tank battle in history, and although Germany did not technically lose, it did not win either, and they had to win.  

These were the last two real battles on the eastern front. With about 80 per cent of the German army there.  There was only one last offensive that the Nazis launched, the Battle of the Bulge, and that was a last desperate act.

So yes the failure of Barbarrosa--the greatest land invasion in history-- turned the war, and Zhukov was a brilliant commander. I think Mike would agree with those two judgments.

 

James,

I do not know you personally, and I want you to know I don't hold a personal grudge. I was trolling you earlier, with the mission accomplished because to use a boxing analogy you landed a punch not a knock out and I didn't think you could claim you knocked Michael out of the debate and leaving out Communist China attacking Communist Vietnam is leaving out a lot of the story if you wanna say modern day communist Vietnam is amazing because America left. IMO, China kinda did do what America was attempting, they neutralized the country.. 

Michael said he gave it a B- based upon the points he made he didn't trash it. I've followed the Middle East history and both sides do bad things so I would have similar reservations if someone didn't frame it that way. I'm no fan of current day Israel but on the left to seem to portray it one sided. The video you posted about Hanoi, you would find the same thing in Cuba. I've backpacked Cuba and my friends who did it with me just got back from backpacking Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia and flew through Florida, I went Mexico City and flew into a different air port that wasn't built like a jail. lol. My friends said Cuba was similar to SE Asia but in the Asian countries people did stuff for even less money than the Cubans. 
I felt like the Nixon bombing Neo Con comment was un-fair and I mentioned the Dawson stuff because if someone wanted to cite your connection to Dawson they could unfairly discount what you have to say. If you say Dawson never convinced you and you didn't platform him then I take you at your word. I'll try to find clip where he says that stuff I mentioned, he's done it a couple of times. I watch Dawson for the same reason I watch debunker stuff, to make sure I disagree with it. 

You said Zhukov was one of the greatest and could be the greatest general of all time. There is a difference from that and what you say above, especially when you factor in he would kill his troops for retreating and put down the revolution in Hungary and later forced to retire for corruption. What a great guy! (I'd also factor in Hitler was a meth head that stupidly didn't properly equip his troops. Fighting at Stalingrad instead of continuing on to Moscow was stupid, he then split his forces and they lost. Patton was prevented from taking Berlin and was most likely killed for "Deep Politics" in the war.) Russia did a scorched earth policy until we started funding their war effort. I'd agree that he's discounted but those reasons I think kinda are why. A lot of the 20million Russian deaths in the war come from the starvation from that strategy. Now I don't know if you did it on purpose but you have said some rather disrespectful stuff about D-Day invasion and effort after IMO. That's where my bias and condescending attitude comes from that you interpret as a grudge. (I don't feel that way towards you on stuff on the Kennedy case.) 
I'm not trying to bring this into a WWII debate but it just seems like you have an overly anti American bias that seems to be myopic to the point of ignoring the bad stuff the other side whether it be Soviets, Palestinians or Communist Vietnamese does to the point of picking a side and not listening, which is why I said what did. 

[James DiEugenio]

Zhukov commandeered the defenses of Leningrad, Stalingrad, Moscow and Kursk.

At the beginning of the German invasion, Stalin would not come out of his bedroom.  So Zhukov had to take command and he designed the sieges of Leningrad,  the counter operation in Moscow, and finally the counter pincers movement that led to block by block street fighting in Stalingrad.  He also is given much of the credit for the Russian defenses at Kursk.

In my opinion that is quite a record.  No one thought the German blitzkrieg could be stopped at that time.  But I also add that Zhukov had some luck because of Hitler's mistakes.  But in my view, what Zhukov did was more impressive than what Eisenhower did.  And, in fact, if  Barbarossa had succeeded I am not so sure D Day would have come off as it did. 

Yes I do think that Zhukov deserves to be ranked as one of the best commanders in history.  Operation Uranus, the encirclement of the German Army at Stalingrad, followed up by Operation Mars, those two operations basically  cornered five Axis armies, including one Panzer tank army.  It was that pincers movement, worthy of Hannibal, that led to the disaster at Stalingrad.  And that is just one of the four.

Edited October 29, 2022 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

To get back to my point and Monica's book.

Monica does a very good job in explicating Kennedy's Middle East policy, which one of the pegs was an approach to Nasser.

But really, if you ask me, her chapters on Kennedy's economic policies are the best I have seen outside of Donald Gibson, who is the gold standard as far as I am concerned. What Kennedy did to avoid a recession, to boost productivity, all the time avoiding inflation, and running minimum deficits, that record is pretty remarkable. And I don't think he gets enough credit for that.

Edited October 29, 2022 by James DiEugenio