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Comment by renewiltord | Hacker News Reader

The military covered the whole thing up even with this guy kicking up a righteous fuss. And his friends and he were treated as pariahs.

Makes you wonder what happened when there was no one like this guy around. Reckon there's a bunch of villages there with no one left to tell the tale.

I suppose no one there ever asked "Are we the baddies?"

Pretty amazing from the people of that nation, though, to beat three world powers in the matter of a couple decades: France, the US, China. Takes quite something to do that when your enemies will do things like this. With the gloves off it's not clear that the powers can beat locals - as Russia is finding out.

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The people of North Vietnam beat the people of South Vietnam, with heavy American (and Chinese and Russian) intervention. There were "baddies" on every side:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_at_Hu%E1%BA%BF

The communist single-party government of Vietnam refuses to acknowledge the Hue Massacre, and persecutes Vietnamese who speak out about it:

>The Vietnamese government still does not acknowledge that a massacre took place and does not allow any public dissent from this position.

War is complicated. The Vietnam War is extremely complicated. It is good that America can face up to the crimes committed in that war by its soldiers. I hope one day the Communist Party of Vietnam can do the same.

Please be careful with this line of thought as it can slide into whataboutism really quickly.

It'll take all the warriors from that war dying, that's the first step.

You're right about Vietnam tho, it was a very complex war.

They thought they were fighting for freedom, we thought we were fighting communism. Perhaps if South Vietnam was less corrupt.. wishful thinking.

In the end - no one comes away with clean hands from war. No one.

There were "baddies" on every side, but one side was the morally "rightest" - the ones fighting for their freedom and independence (aka North Vietnam, the communists). All the rest were colonial powers trying to force a corrupt puppet state which had nothing positive going for it other than being against the communists. So, motives-wise for war crimes, I'd take "freedom (not individual, for the country and peoples) and independence" over any of the reasons why France, the US or China were there. Still war crimes, still needed to be tried, but nobody did that anyways in that war, so all else being equal the motives "win".

"baddies on all sides" gets a downvote from me.

At the very most favorable view of that sentiment, it's true. Completely true.

In the least favorable light, this post is trying to play down something else without evidence. Thus it's some trolling lie.

Downplaying the conflict's moral depth without evidence is what you did, and why I posted my comment. I happen to know Vietnamese who fled to America as refugees after the war. They don't feel that Americans and South Vietnam were "the baddies", or that communists who invaded the South in the first place and violently suppress(ed) knowledge of things like the Hue Massacre are "the good guys." Many Vietnamese remain divided on these issues. It's complicated. That's the point.

If you view attempts at nuance as "trolling lies," you might be a great fit for one-party government.

I’m not sure why HN always falls into black and white thinking. Maybe engineers aren’t good at seeing gray.

But your point is true. There are good and bad people on each side of every war.

People love to talk about how the South Vietnam government was never democratic and heavily corrupt but never seem to consider the state of the country today in that same light.

There are good and bad people on each side of every war.

This "fact" doesn't justify those wars.

I don't follow the logic. Where did someone argue it did justify those wars?

Should USA have gone to war against Vietnam?

Who are you talking to?

War is terrible. Thus, even "good people" in a voluntary unjustified war on the other side of the planet do terrible things. Emphasizing some unprovable triviality like "I'm sure there were some NVA soldiers who fired several shots at USA troops who wanted to surrender" is just a distraction from the only relevant point. The NVA wouldn't have fired those shots if we hadn't invaded. Whatever they did wrong was LBJ's fault. (Sure, it seems unfair to blame him for going to war, when refusing to do so was the reason his predecessor was killed, but life ain't fair.) The massacre discussed here wouldn't have happened if we hadn't invaded. None of the bloodshed, whether "good" or "bad", would have happened. "Shades of gray" has no place in a discussion of a developing nation resisting a violent invasion from people they've never threatened on the other side of the planet. When you parrot this lukewarm on-the-one-hand-on-the-other-hand bullshit, you distract from the basic point: the worst actions of the Vietnamese during USA's invasion of Vietnam were entirely USA's fault.

I'm surprised I have to explain this on a forum frequented by adults. Then again, in this thread we see the goofy idea that there are "good people" and "bad people"...

I'm surprised I have to explain this on a forum frequented by adults

It's funny you accuse others of having an infantile view of the war when you seem to be espousing the unsophisticated view of "good guys and bad guys".

You: There are good and bad people... [0]

Me: This "fact"... in this thread we see the goofy idea that there are "good people" and "bad people"...

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32201608

You're wrong on basic facts. The US never invaded Vietnam. On the contrary, NVA and Viet Cong ireggulars invaded the countries of both South Vietnam and Laos. US armed forces entered South Vietnam at the invitation of that country's (sadly corrupt and undemocratic) government for the purpose of territorial defense. The US specifically chose not to invade North Vietnam in order to avoid war with China, who stationed more than 150,000 soldiers there during the war.

The entity that became RVN was specifically created by USA and France to undermine the Geneva Conference and protect Western access to rubber plantations. At USA's behest, the former emperor appointed Ngô Đình Diệm prime minister. Ngô kicked out the French in favor of USA, rigged elections, and instituted policies of anti-Buddhist Christian bigotry. He was never elected in a real election, rather propped up by Westerners because he served their interests. Those interests included his inviting lots of USA military and spooks into RVN. When his service no longer pleased us, we had him killed, and Hồ Chí Minh accurately predicted that his absence would lead to the reunification of Vietnam. Ngô's various successors behaved in similarly craven fashion toward USA. Nothing about the USA occupation was the sovereign will of the Vietnamese people.

This was just as much of an invasion as if USA were to occupy Venezuela at the invitation of Juan Guaidó. You should ask some Vietnam veterans about this.

Ngô kicked out the French in favor of USA, rigged elections, and instituted policies of anti-Buddhist Christian bigotry. He was never elected in a real election, rather propped up by Westerners because he served their interests.

Have you tried evaluating the North by the same standards?

"Ho Chi Minh kicked out the French in favor of USSR, rigged elections, and instituted policies of anti-religious secular bigotry. He was never elected in a real election, rather propped up by China/USSR because he served their interests."

Sure, we can criticize anti-democratic actions no matter who does them. I submit that there is a difference between such action taken within one's own nation and such action taken on the other side of the planet. Hồ Chí Minh was a complicated man, but he really did try to improve the lives of his fellow Vietnamese. Somehow Truman chose to rebuff him while coddling a troglodyte like Rhee Syngman. The point is that we must have a sense of proportion. Nations should govern themselves. Accusations of deficiencies of democracy do not justify voluntary wars against remote nations who could not possibly threaten the aggressor.

Also, French and American commercial interests in rubber plantations did not justify the mass murder of Vietnamese people and large-scale bribery that was required in order to install Ngô Đình Diệm as prime minister in the first place.

> I suppose no one there ever asked "Are we the baddies?"

I don't see a point asking this question, given that "we" are executing unarmed women and children.

Consider that their success in warfare may be attributed to the fact that, in their culture, subversives like yourself are dealt with. In the end, they are better fighters.

I have to upvote this if only for the compliment of being called subversive!

FWIW I won't be complaining about America if war makes its way here.

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