ASA 2 Section A01
Reflection #5: From Saigon to Baghdad
4/27/14
Personally, I strongly believe that war is stupid, unnecessary, and could be complete unavoidable. No one truly wins in wars and wars only cause despair throughout the world. This despair transcends races, locations, and even time itself. More than 30 years after the Vietnam War, we find ourselves referring back to the tragedy that was the Vietnam War when new war arose with Iraq. After reading this article, I learned that the war had affected the world more than I thought. The world, mainly the US, became more paranoid after this power struggle. Was there truly a point to this war? Did we lose a lot more than we gained? We fought this war to try to get into good standing with Vietnam and protect its rights; instead, there is still conflict between us. The Vietnam War truly effected the US negatively. With the outbreak of the Iraq war, people started to compare the two together. A repeat of this devastating war would be too much for the US and the world to handle. I was pleased to read that following the Vietnam war, the US attempted to fix their foreign policy in order to avoid future foreign disasters. Although this did not go entirely as planned, the fact that the US started to learn from their mistakes brought me relief. The Vietnam Syndrome that affects the US is apparent and still active today; we are crippled by our mistakes years ago. Although we are slowly fixing ourselves, I believe that the Vietnam War and its effects will never be forgotten. However, that doesn't mean that we shouldn't try. As shown by the Vietnam War, war is terrible and affects everyone significantly and drastically. If we as a world can work together to stop war, then maybe peace can be obtained.
How different would the US be today if the US never participated in the Vietnam War? How different would the US be if we actually WON the Vietnam war?
No comments:
Post a Comment