1. The Vietnam veteran's duty was "police action”: to arrest the Communist take-
over of South Vietnam. The Vietnam veteran, when serving in Vietnam, accom-
plished his duty. Moreover the Vietnam veteran won every battle including the misreported 1968 Tet Offensive. Thereafter thc U.S. military withdrew its
combat troops from South Vietnam, August 11, 1972. On January 27, 1973, a
four party Peace Accord and Ceasefire was signed in Paris by all sides:
U.S.A., S. Vietnam, Viet Cong, N. Vietnam. Our last [non-combat] troops
left S. Vietnam March 29, 1973. When the Ceasefire was signed more popula-
tion and land were under Saigon control than any time previously. So in
this regard we left winning and with military victory in 1973.
2. Six months after our last troops left, the International Control Commission
reported N. Vietnamese troops committing daily violations inside S. Vietnam.
While on monitoring patrol over S. Vietnam in 1973, a Commission helicopter
was shot down by the North Vietnamese Army. The Commission withdrew, July,
1973. Full scale war returned. The Ceasefire's failure was N. Vietnam's
fault. December, 1974 the U.S. Congress ended U.S. military hardware aid to
the S. Vietnamese military with the Case-Church Amendment.
3. In early 1975 the world press reported a massive, multi-division, tank and
troop invasion launched from N. Vietnam down into S. Vietnam. Without con-
tinuing U.S. military aid and replacement parts, S. Vietnam alone surrender-
ed to N. Vietnam, April 30, 1975. By then U.S. troops had been gone from
South Vietnam’s soil for over two years. The invasion ultimately reached Cambodia.
4. Unsuccessful foreign policy is different from battlefield defeat. Because
the U.S.A. as a nation was not invaded, occupied or signatory to a surrend-
er. Surrender is defeat in war for a nation, ie; Germany and Japan in WW II.
Not only is it a hasty generalization to state: " The U.S.A. lost the war
in S. Vietnam, " but also logically, the False Dilemma Fallacy; the " eith-
er/or situation” ….either the U.S.A. won the war, or, the U.S.A. lost the
war. But this is illogical because it does not logically allow for the
existing alternative... such as the U.S.A. participating successfully until
the 1973 Ceasefire; all sides signing that Ceasefire; the U.S.A. withdraw-
ing; and then the last phase, or 3rd war counting the French, being fought
between S. Vietnam and N. Vietnam from 1974 to 1975 resulting in S. Viet-
nam’s defeat and surrender on April 30, 1975.
5. The Vietnam veteran was The U.S.A. per se in Vietnam. Therefore how may a nat-
ion be defeated in the war if its military troops are not actively partic-
ipating at the time the defeat occurs? Militarily speaking then the S. Viet-
namese lost the war. Politically speaking some politicians lost the war.
Unsuccessful foreign policy is different from ‘defeat’ in war.
