No Alligator Tears For Walter Cronkite
Originally posted June 22, 2008
Now that the adulation for the grand-daddy of liberal journalism has left this world to be with his master, allow me to re-post something from last year.
I think you just might find it interesting...
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Uncle Walter Appears As An Angel Of Light
And he brought the Wicked Witch from the North with him
In every glib comment, there a grain (and sometimes a truckload) of truth. I tend to think the latter when Walter Cronkite was presented some award from group calling itself the World Federalist Association.
The ol' Cronkster made no bones about his desire for nations to surrender certain aspects of national sovereignty in his clarion call for One World Government. And as Uncle Walter was chiding and ridiculing Christianity in general (and Pat Robertson specifically) that there would be no world order until the 'arrival of The Messiah', and anything done for such without Christ, is the work of the devil. Much laughter from the assembled minions at this point.
But I wasn't laughing when Cronkite said; "Join me, I'm glad to sit at the right hand of satan".
Remember, this is the same Walter Cronkite who publicly stated "The Viet-Nam War is unwinnable" during the Tet Offensive. Never mind the fact that the US Armed Forces kicked the living shit out of the Viet Cong. Hell, they had their asses whipped so badly, they were knocked out of the war for the remainder of the war, and North Viet-Nam (who were ALREADY in-country) had to militarily fill the vacuum.
But gee, I thought that Viet-Nam was just a civil war. At least that's what my hippie, draft-dodger college history professors told me.
Oh, and Uncle Walter, too.
Originally posted June 22, 2008
Now that the adulation for the grand-daddy of liberal journalism has left this world to be with his master, allow me to re-post something from last year.
I think you just might find it interesting...
And he brought the Wicked Witch from the North with him
In every glib comment, there a grain (and sometimes a truckload) of truth. I tend to think the latter when Walter Cronkite was presented some award from group calling itself the World Federalist Association.
The ol' Cronkster made no bones about his desire for nations to surrender certain aspects of national sovereignty in his clarion call for One World Government. And as Uncle Walter was chiding and ridiculing Christianity in general (and Pat Robertson specifically) that there would be no world order until the 'arrival of The Messiah', and anything done for such without Christ, is the work of the devil. Much laughter from the assembled minions at this point.
But I wasn't laughing when Cronkite said; "Join me, I'm glad to sit at the right hand of satan".
Remember, this is the same Walter Cronkite who publicly stated "The Viet-Nam War is unwinnable" during the Tet Offensive. Never mind the fact that the US Armed Forces kicked the living shit out of the Viet Cong. Hell, they had their asses whipped so badly, they were knocked out of the war for the remainder of the war, and North Viet-Nam (who were ALREADY in-country) had to militarily fill the vacuum.
But gee, I thought that Viet-Nam was just a civil war. At least that's what my hippie, draft-dodger college history professors told me.
Oh, and Uncle Walter, too.
posted by Kevin Whiteman at
2:12 PM
10 Comments:
I was too young at the time to fully comprehend Cronkite's misinformation on the Tet Offensive. I never ever took notice of him really or listened to what he said over the years... just another liberal journalist. But I can remember in the late 1990s, on TV, watching him brown nosing with Clinton. Then I said to myself: "Yup, there's defintely something rotten in Denmark."
Hell, they had their asses whipped so badly, they were knocked out of the war for the remainder of the war, and North Viet-Nam (who were ALREADY in-country) had to militarily fill the vacuum.
Had to militarily fill the vacuum? They wanted to and intended to by means of the Tet Offensive!
Before my tour in Vietnam toward the end of the war (1972 for me), we received a (at the time) classified briefing on the Vietnam War by a CIA employee attached to the Vietnam Orientation Course at the Naval Amphibious Base, Coronado, CA. He stated that the intent of North Vietnam was to destroy the Viet Cong infrastructure because they were acting too independently of their Hanoi bosses.
No. Vn told their So. Viet cousins (Viet Cong) to rise up against the Americans and then the North would invade the South to help them throw the imperialists into the sea. Naturally, the No. Vn. military made no such move.
Of course the unintended result of the Tet Offensive from the No. Vn. POV was the propaganda coup no doubt aided by the world press, but most specifically by the U.S. news media. The intended result was also achieved "in spades." The Viet Cong never recovered from the Tet Offensive as you had stated in your post.
Why this was a classified briefing I'll never know. The entire American electorate should have been informed.
Thanks Walter . . . thanks ABC, NBC, CBS, et. al., . . . .
That said, I wish we had never gone into Vietnam in the first place, but that is/was water under the bridge. I just wish that the truth would have won out, the truth that would have made both or all sides of the arguments over the Vietnam War very uncomfortable.
Adeo, thanks for the straight scoop. I always knew the North Vietnamese wanted to run the show. I just never knew it was a matter of national policy.
Looks like Uncle Ho had a useful idiot in Uncle Walter.
I was called up in 1965 but flunked the physical. Lost six buddies there and after.
Stanley Karnow, in his book Vietnam says he interviewed Gen. Giap way after the war and Giap said that Tet was a disaster for the communists. Giap also said two of Hanoi's best allies were the American media and American student protests, some of which I saw at the U of MN in the late 60s.
This spring I found a tape of Cat Ballou and bought it because it's funny and it was made before Jane was Hanoi Jane.
Giap way after the war and Giap said that Tet was a disaster for the communists.
I read Karnow's book, but unfortunately I do not recall this statement. Hard to believe that Gen Giap would have seriously believed that the Viet Cong could throw the Americans into the sea. Very naive. Tet 1968 was largely a Viet Cong affair. And Giap was a brilliant general.
I would like to correct some of my aforementioned statements. I went into my personal library to "catch up" on some history about the Vn War. Some corrections and or modifications to be made:
1. No. Vietnam's military was heavily involved in the Tet Offensive, not just the Viet Cong.
2. Although the North gained increased political and military control over Viet Cong programs and policies in So. Vn. as a result of the Tet Offensive, this was not originally an intention of the No. Vn. planners. It was the result, however, of the military disaster that was ultimately visited upon the Communists by the American and So. Vn. military.
3. The "all out" offensive of Tet included the hope/intention that the So. Vn. people would rise up and help throw the Americans out of Vietnam. Of course, this didn't happen. The development of a general offensive was the result of political squabbles among the No. Vn. leadership by hard liners and moderates. The hard liners won. The moderates favored protracted warfare.
4. My statement that No. Vn. wanted to reduce the independence and influence of the Viet Cong leadership was incorrect, but this statement was made by a CIA staffer attached to the Vietnam Orientation Course faculty while I was a student there.
5. The Tet Offensive was still a huge propaganda victory for the No. even though their military forces had their collective @sses kicked, as so ably stated by our Cave Master. It also exposed how unrealistic were the U.S. estimates that the So. was well on the road to pacification which it wasn't. Westy and his boys messed up royally.
6. I was never a big fan of Uncle Walter, but he was correct in one sense regarding the war not being winnable. It was not winnable the way Americans were fighting it. Also, our ignoble allies were not worthy of all the blood and treasure that the United States invested in their cause.
7. I had personal experience with some of their politicians when I served in-country. They were venal, corrupt, and incompetent. They behaved almost as badly as the U.S. Democratic party behaves today, not that the Republicans have done such a 4.0 job these past few years! LOL (but not really).
Adeodatus49 -- the blog equivilent of a flaming 500 lb canister of napalmy goodness.
You REALLY DO need to start your own blog. If would be bloggerific.
Now that I am retired, maybe I will! :-)
Friends, Cronkite took the side of the communists in calling the Viet Nam War "unwinnable". The U.S. Military has done the lion's share of defeating inhuman enemies such as slavery here and Nazism abroad. God Has Blessed America.
God Bless our Military and all who've served and serve today. Thanks to you we're still FREE.
Felt a chill run down my spine hearing Cronkite say "Join me, I'm glad to sit at the right hand of satan"- disgusting words from (as he's been called) "the most trusted man in America".
Damn straight, Helen!!!!
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