i wondered too

i wondered when i would go to vietnam. all thru my school years, the war was building up. my brother went in 68 and made it thru the tet offensive. i was ready to go and do my part as soon as i graduated. i wanted to kill those commies that were killing our guys. thankgod i didnt have to go. when i was young, war was a romantic novel to be read by all young men. we didnt think about dieing, only living the experience. i felt cheated when they stopped the draft just as i was getting ready to graduate. i read all that i could about the war. i idolized my brother for volunteering. he never talked about the war too much, although he had it better than many guys by his own admission. he was in the airforce, stationed at danang. still, he lived thru the tet offensive, dropping supplies to outpost over the northern part of the country. thats was the problem. we all (myself included) looked at vietnam as two different countries. we all believed in the domino theory as put out by our leaders. no-one ever stopped to read the history of vietnam. it was a country that had been invaded many times, but never conquered. not the french, the japanese, twice at least by the chinese, and at least once by the cambodians, had ever been able to subjugate the people. to the vietnamese, the non-catholic at least, we were just another invading force. we could never have hoped to win the hearts and minds of these people. while our intintions may have been honourable at the start, we became a country determined not to lose a war by any means. alot of good men and woman paid the ultimate price for our arrougance. do not misunderstand my position. i did then and i still do support the average guy who did his time and went home. it was just the wrong war at the wrong time in the wrong place. thanks guys for doing your part.