[Vision2020] Iraq's My Lai Massacre

[nickgier at adelphia.net]

Greetings:

Now that I'm retired and my brain is going sof, it's good to now that there is someone in Lewiston to keep track of my motivations and to clarify my intentions for me and others on this list.  This person is such a seer that he thinks he knows what went on in my classrooms.

On Saturday as I went in to buy groceries for the Sunday dinner I prepared, I gave the VFW fellow $5 and thanked him for his service to our country.  Early on the in the debate about the war, I made it clear that with few exceptions our troops were the best trained in the world.  It just tried to find the letter to Daily News in which I said that, but I could not find it in my "out" file.

The worst possible decision a president can make is to put the best troops in the world in countries where we have no right to be. The Johnson administration placed U. S. troops on the losing side of a civil war in Vietnam, and then Nixon intervened on the side of the right wingers in Cambodia led right into the Killing Fields.  

Our fine soldiers are now in a country in which it is very clear that we are not welcome.  I'm not sure how I would react if I find my buddies being killed left and right by the people that we are supposed to liberate.  I don't blame the troops, I blame the Bush administration for replaying Vietnam in the Middle East. These are wasted lives.  Their tragic sacrifice has made us less free and less secure.

If my Lewiston "minder" is interested, I would like to share with him some retirement letters my students wrote on my behalf.  It would give a different view of what he thinks went on my classes.  My favorite memory are the students in my philosophy of religion class who thought I was a Christian. 

Nick Gier