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Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

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Gunny Sergeant
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Minuteman
Nov 5, 2007
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www.chinesefortunecalendar.com
Got this in the mail. and thought it was worth sharing.

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We do not live in Viet Nam , Viet Nam lives in us.
Vietnam Facts vs Fiction.


I found this article very interesting. The most notable fact is that 2.7 million Americans actually served in the Vietnam Theater of war.
In the last census nearly 14 million Americans claimed they served in Vietnam ..
Four out of five are lying. I wonder why.

Vietnam Facts vs Fiction

For over 30 years I....like many Vietnam veterans....seldom spoke of Vietnam, except with other veterans, when training soldiers, and in public speeches. These past five years I have joined the hundreds of thousands who believe it is high time the truth be told about the Vietnam War and the people who served there. It's time the American people learn that the United States military did not lose the War, and that a surprisingly high number of people who claim to have served there, in fact, DID NOT.
As Americans, support the men and women involved in the War on Terrorism, the mainstream media are once again working tirelessly to undermine their efforts and force a psychological loss or stalemate for the United States . We cannot stand by and let the media do to today's warriors what they did to us 35 years ago.
Below are some assembled facts most readers will find interesting. It isn't a long read, but it will....I guarantee....teach you some things you did not know about the Vietnam War and those who served, fought, or died there. Please share it with those with whom you communicate.
Capt. Marshal Hanson, U.S.N.R (Ret.)
Capt. Scott Beaton, Statistical Source

Vietnam War Facts:
Facts, Statistics, Fake Warrior Numbers, and Myths Dispelled

9,087,000 (Million) military personnel served on active duty during the official Vietnam era from August 5, 1964 to May 7, 1975.
2,709,918 Americans served in uniform in Vietnam
Veterans represented 9.7% of their generation.
240 men were awarded the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War
1. The first man to die in Vietnam was James Davis, in 1958. He was with the >509th Radio Research Station. Davis Station in Saigon was named for him.
2. 58,148 were killed in Vietnam
3. 75,000 were severely disabled .
4. 23,214 were 100% disabled .

5. 5,283 lost limbs.

6. 1,081 sustained multiple amputations.
7. Of those killed, 61% were younger than 21.

8. 11,465 of those killed were younger than 20 years old.

9. Of those killed, 17,539 were married .

10. Average age of men killed: 23.1 years .

11. Five men killed in Vietnam were only 16 years old.

12. The oldest man killed was 62 years old.

13. As of January 15, 2004, there are 1,875 Americans still unaccounted for from the Vietnam War .

14. 97% of Vietnam Veterans were honorably discharged .

15. 91% of Vietnam Veterans say they are glad they served.

16. 74% say they would serve again, even knowing the outcome.

17. Vietnam veterans have a lower unemployment rate than the same non-vet age groups.

18. Vietnam veterans' personal income exceeds that of our non-veteran age group >by more than 18 percent.

19. 87% of Americans hold Vietnam Veterans in high esteem.

20. There is no difference in drug usage between Vietnam Veterans and non-Vietnam Veterans of the same age group (Source: Veterans Administration >Study)

21. Vietnam Veterans are less likely to be in prison - only one-half of one percent of Vietnam Veterans have been jailed for crimes.

22. 85% of Vietnam Veterans made successful transitions to civilian life.

23. Interesting Census Stats and "Been There" Wanabees:
a. 1,713,823 of those who served in Vietnam were still alive as of August, 1995 (census figures).
b. During that same Census count, the number of Americans falsely claiming to have served in-country was: 9,492,958.

24. As of the current Census taken during August, 2000, the surviving U.S. Vietnam Veteran population estimate is: 1,002,511. This is hard to believe, losing nearly 711,000 between '95 and '00. That's 390 per day.

24. During this Census count, the number of Americans falsely claiming to have served in-country is: 13,853,027. By this census, FOUR OUT OF FIVE WHO CLAIM TO BE Vietnam vets are not.

25. The Department of Defense Vietnam War Service Index officially provided by The War Library originally reported with errors that 2,709,918 U.S.military personnel as having served in-country. Corrections and confirmations to this index resulted in the addition of 358 U.S. military personnel confirmed to have served in Vietnam but not originally listed by the Department of Defense. (All names are currently on file and accessible 24/7/365).

26. Isolated atrocities committed by American Soldiers produced torrents of outrage from anti-war critics and the news media while Communist atrocities were so common that they received hardly any media mention at all. The United States sought to minimize and prevent attacks on civilians while North Vietnam made attacks on civilians a centerpiece of its strategy.
27. Americans who deliberately killed civilians received prison sentences while Communists who did so received commendations. From 1957 to 1973, the National Liberation Front assassinated 36,725 Vietnamese and abducted another 58,499. The death squads focused on leaders at the village level and on anyone who improved the lives o f the peasants such as medical personnel, social workers, and school teachers. - Nixon Presidential Papers .

Common Myths Dispelled:

#1. Myth: Common Belief is that most Vietnam veterans were drafted.
Fact: 2/3 of the men who served in Vietnam were volunteers. 2/3 of the men who served in World War II were drafted. Approximately 70% of those killed >in Vietnam were volunteers.

#2. Myth: The media have reported that suicides among Vietnam veterans range from 50,000 to 100,000 - 6 to 11 times the non-Vietnam veteran population.
Fact: Mortality studies show that 9,000 is a better estimate. "The CDC Vietnam Experience Study Mortality Assessment showed that during the first 5 years after discharge, deaths from suicide were 1.7 times more likely among Vietnam veterans than non-Vietnam veterans. After that initial post-service period, Vietnam veterans were no more likely to die from suicide than non-Vietnam veterans. In fact, after the 5-year post-service period, the rate of suicides is less in the Vietnam veterans' group.

#3. Myth: Common belief is that a disproportionate number of blacks were killed in the Vietnam War.
Fact: 86% of the men who died in Vietnam were Caucasians, 12.5% were black, >1.2% was other races. Sociologists Charles C. Moskos and John Sibley >Butler, in their recently published book "All That We Can Be," said they analyzed the claim that blacks were used like cannon fodder during Vietnam "and can report definitely that this charge is untrue. Black fatalities amounted to 12 percent of all Americans killed in Southeast Asia, a figure proportional to the number of blacks in the U.S. population at the time and slightly lower than the proportion of blacks in the Army at the close of the war."

#4. Myth: Common belief is that the war was fought largely by the poor and uneducated.
Fact: Servicemen who went to Vietnam from well-to-do areas had a slightly elevated risk of dying because they were more likely to be pilots or infantry officers. Vietnam Veterans were the best educated forces our nation had ever sent into combat. 79% had a high school education or better. Here are statistics from the Combat Area Casualty File (CACF) as of November 1993. The CACF is the basis for the Vietnam Veterans Memorial (The Wall): Average age of 58,148 killed in Vietnam was 23.11 years. (Although 58,169 names are in the Nov. 93 database, only 58,148 have both event date and birth date. Event date is used instead of declared dead date for some of those who were listed as missing in action) Deaths Average Age Total: 58,148, 23.11 years Enlisted: 50,274, 22.37 years Officers: 6,598, 28.43 years Warrants: 1,276, 24.73 years E1 525, 20.34 years 11B MOS: 18,465, >22.55 years

#5. Myth: The common belief is the average age of an infantryman fighting in Vietnam was 19.
Fact: Assuming KIAs accurately represented age groups serving in Vietnam, the average age of an infantryman (MOS 11B) serving in Vietnam to be 19 years old is a myth, it is actually 22. None of the enlisted grades have an average age of less than 20. The average man who fought in World War II was 26 years of age.

#6. Myth: The Common belief is that the domino theory was proved false.
Fact: The domino theory was accurate. The ASEAN (Association of Southeast >Asian Nations) countries, Philippines , Indonesia , Malaysia , Singapore , and Thailand stayed free of Communism because of the U.S. commitment to Vietnam . The Indonesians threw the Soviets out in 1966 because of America 's commitment in Vietnam . Without that commitment, Communism would have swept all the way to the Malacca Straits that is south of Singapore and of great strategic importance to the free world. If you ask people who live in these countries that won the war in Vietnam , they have a different opinion from the American news media. The Vietnam War was the turning point for Communism.

#7. Myth: The common belief is that the fighting in Vietnam was not as intense as in World War II.
Fact: The average infantryman in the South Pacific during World War II saw about 40 days of combat in four years. The average infantryman in Vietnam saw about 240 days of combat in one year thanks to the mobility of the helicopter. One out of every 10 Americans who served in Vietnam was a casualty.. 58,148 were killed and 304,000 wounded out of 2.7 million who served. Although the percent that died is similar to other wars, amputations or crippling wounds were 300 percent higher than in World War II ....75,000 Vietnam veterans are severely disabled. MEDEVAC helicopters flew nearly 500,000 missions. Over 900,000 patients were airlifted (nearly half were American). The average time lapse between wounding to hospitalization was less than one hour. As a result, less than one percent of all Americans wounded, who survived the first 24 hours, died. The helicopter provided unprecedented mobility. Without the helicopter it would have taken three times as many troops to secure the 800 mile border with Cambodia and Laos (the politicians thought the Geneva Conventions of 1954 and the Geneva Accords or 1962 would secure the border).

#8. Myth: Kim Phuc, the little nine year old Vietnamese girl running naked from the napalm strike near Trang Bang on 8 June 1972.....shown a million times on American television....was burned by Americans bombing Trang Bang.
Fact: No American had involvement in this incident near Trang Bang that burned Phan Thi Kim Phuc. The planes doing the bombing near the village were VNAF (Vietnam Air Force) and were being flown by Vietnamese pilots in support of South Vietnamese troops on the ground. The Vietnamese pilot who dropped the napalm in error is currently living in the United States . Even the AP photographer, Nick Ut, who took the picture, was Vietnamese. The incident in the photo took place on the second day of a three day battle between the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) who occupied the village of Trang Bang and the ARVN (Army of the Republic of Vietnam ) who were trying to force the NVA out of the village. Recent reports in the news media that an American commander ordered the air strike that burned Kim Phuc areincorrect. There were no Americans involved in any capacity. "We (Americans) had nothing to do with controlling VNAF," according to Lieutenant General (Ret) James F. Hollingsworth, the Commanding General of TRAC at that time. Also, it has been incorrectly reported that two of Kim Phuc's brothers were killed in this incident. They were Kim's cousins not her brothers.

#9. Myth: The United States lost the war in Vietnam .
Fact: The American military was not defeated in Vietnam . The American military did not lose a battle of any consequence. From a military standpoint, it was almost an unprecedented performance. General Westmoreland quoting Douglas Pike, a professor at the University of California , Berkley a major military defeat for the VC and NVA.
FACT: THE UNITED STATES DID NOT LOSE THE WAR IN VIETNAM , THE SOUTH VIETNAMESE DID. Read on........
The fall of Saigon happened 30 April 1975, two years AFTER the American military left Vietnam. The last American troops departed in their entirety 29 March 1973.
FACT: How could we lose a war we had already stopped fighting? We fought to an agreed stalemate. The peace settlement was signed in Paris on 27 January 1973.
* It called for release of all U.S. prisoners, withdrawal of U.S. forces, limitation of both sides' forces inside South Vietnam and a commitment to peaceful reunification.
*The 140,000 evacuees in April 1975 during the fall of Saigon consisted almost entirely of civilians and Vietnamese military, NOT American military running for their lives.
*There were almost twice as many casualties in Southeast Asia (primarily Cambodia ) the first two years after the fall of Saigon in 1975 then there were during the ten years the U.S. was involved in Vietnam ..
*Thanks for the perceived loss and the countless assassinations and torture visited upon Vietnamese, Laotians, and Cambodians goes mainly to the American media and their undying support-by-misrepresentation of the anti-War movement in the United States .
*As with much of the Vietnam War, the news media misreported and misinterpreted the 1968 Tet Offensive. It was reported as an overwhelming success for the Communist forces and a decided defeat for the U.S. forces. Nothing could be further from the truth. Despite initial victories by the Communists forces, the Tet Offensive resulted in a major defeat of those forces. General Vo Nguyen Giap, the designer of the Tet Offensive, is considered by some as ranking with Wellington , Grant, Lee and MacArthur as a great commander. Still, militarily, the Tet Offensive was a total defeat of the Communist forces on all fronts. It resulted in the death of some 45,000 NVA troops and the complete, if not total destruction of the Viet Cong elements in South Vietnam . The Organization of the Viet Cong Units in the South never recovered. The Tet Offensive succeeded on only one front and that was the News front and the political arena. This was another example in the Vietnam War of an inaccuracy becoming the perceived truth. However, inaccurately reported, the News Media made the Tet Offensive famous.

Please give all credit and research to:
Capt. Marshal Hanson, U.S.N.R (Ret.)
Capt. Scott Beaton, Statistical Source
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

Thanks for posting this.......
LT -lieutenant
VN -Vietnam
68 -1968
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

41,

Sent you a e-mail.

Thanks

John
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

Forty-One,

Thanks for posting, brings back memories.

QM2, US Coast Guard, Operation MarketTime, RVN, 1970-1971,

Bob
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

Excellent post. Thanks good read.
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

Amen - Amen.


Now continue your reading with my homework assignment that I did back in 03 or 04 - ? _ comparing Vietnam to IRaq - this actually shut my professor up and got me an A+, not just an A.

Two hide members are listed in teh casualty section:

http://www.tngbbs.com/eng355/


I am forwarding your post in an email - snopes has no information - and I've seen the facts in my own research above...:)
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

In the Feb 2010 issue of VFW magazine there is an article about the "myth" of drug use in the military during Vietnam.
Here's a link to that...(page 22) Link

On Stategy: a critical analysis of the Vietnam War by Harry G. Summers Jr is a good read of that whole war in general.

If anyone wants to borrow it, let me know.
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

As in my signature, I served in VN, with a Recon/Scout/Sniper team, We did it all. That doesn't make me an expert on the entire theater or war, and I don't claim that in any way.
My comment is regarding the book Stolen Valor, a book I own, and have read several times.
I took issue with certain "Proofs" given in the book, that are accepted not only by people in general, but by the VA as well. This is regarding the Agent Orange claims given by many vets (including myself), describing getting soaked by the spraying event. The proof given in the book, and used by the military and the VA to deny some claims was based on evidence such as sprayer nozzle orifice size, droplet size, and other factors. "Stolen Valor" didn't help the cause any, by buying into the Government's argument.
Although the size of droplets may have been such that the agent sprayed on us wouldn't coalesce into rain-like drops, the product still dripped from leaf to leaf, through the triple canopy, and then showered on us. By the end of an afternoon of walking in a forest that had been sprayed, our hats, and shoulders were soaked, the air stunk of diesel fuel, and the water in streams had the oily rainbow sheen of contaminated water. This was the only water we had to drink, since most of us went though our entire load of water each day.
There are and will continue to be a lot of myths, about this and other wars, and it is only through the sheer indomitable will of those who supported us (some politicians, thankfully, and of course the VFW, and other service organizations, and our families) that Agent Orange is even considered, and some of the diagnoses have been recognized.
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

Always good to see a lot of myth's dispelled. Got a guy at work who was a cook in the Nam, but claims he was a tunnel rat and only carried a flashlight and a .357. As usual my BS meter was pegging when he went there. He even claimed to know one of our other members here as a 'Tech Sergeant' who I of course texted as we were speaking and suammarily denied any knowledge of the guy.
I wonder whatever happened to ol Aho Boogershat. I lost track of him after his umpteenth change...as always Atticus, your dope is straight
grin.gif
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

A returnee in 1967, a civilian three months later in 1968; in 42 years I have tried to research and understand the actual facts of my and my Nation's commitment to the SEATO pact.

Now, this information comes to my attention for the first time, despite my efforts. I am not a conspiracy theorist, but honestly, this prevarication and duplicity between the progressive anti war political faction and the American media at all levels is flatly impossible to define as anything else. It is a political offensive of such depth and breadth waged in deliberate deception of American youth, through their education system, and the American electorate, through deliberately selective, slanted, omissive, and openly deceptive reportage, deliberately intended to render a disadvantage to political opposition and moral viewpoint.

The control of the education system and media resources is complete and unshakable. It is testament to the despicable level of duplicity openly accepted and praised among those whose philosophy begins with, "The end justifies any means". The system is incapable of fixing itself, the corruption runs solid from the surface to the foundation. Any within the system who might want to alter its direction face dismissal and disrepute. The class warfare which has been constantly provoked at the subliminal level is at the brink of the inevitable backlash.

The horse is dead. No whip can raise it from its repose. Time to dig the grave.

Time for a new start.

Change?

When the 'change' is simply slow suicide renamed, there's no benefit to be expected or derived. No, all we can do with the 'change' is try to weather it with the minimum of irreparable harm.

Greg
 
Re: Viet Nam: Fact vs. Fiction

<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: kraigWY</div><div class="ubbcode-body"><div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Quote:</div><div class="ubbcode-body">comparing Vietnam to IRaq </div></div>

There is no comparison,.............we had better music.

http://chu65nang67.us/nam/vietnam.html </div></div>

I'm 44, did not serve in Vietnam but YES YOU DID have better music!!!

I still love that music.

FOr whatever reason I find the study of that era fascinating - past life? Dunno, but knew so many people that were over there growing up - an uncle who came back with PTSD in the worst way, step-dad who was in Radio Research, one of his friends who was a Marine and still treats people mean LOL...

I grew up with the VEterans of Vietnam and they always have a place in my heart.


But yeah, way better music back then - REAL music with real instruments and real voices - none of this synthetic photoshopped voice crap that's on the radio today...