Assignment concerning the Vietnam War

In English on 09th October the course was divided in pairs of two and we had to analyse a newspaper article where the former defense secretary critisises his own policy and americas failures in Vietnam. He wrote a book about Americas mistakes.

Newspaper article
Warmonger says conflict in Vietnam was wrong
Assignments – Lisa Stanke and David Mohr

1. Collect comments of the author
He doesn’t comment because he is objective

2. Collect facts on McNamara

• He was Defence Secretary from 1961 to 1968 during Vietnam War under Johnson and Kennedy
• He was hardliner concerning the “containment”[1] policy
• He was pursuing the Vietnam War very determined è Vietnam War’s nickname became “McNamara’s War”
• After he left his office he became president of the World Bank
• Nowadays, he criticises the Vietnam War including all the mistakes which led to war and partly made by him
• He wrote a book “In Retrospect: the Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam” in which he wrote down his memoirs

 3. What reasons are given for publishing the book

• It is his wish to show America why and which mistakes were made and how to learn from them
• He thinks that his generation owes the future generations to show that America was wrong, so that the future generation won’t make the same mistakes they did
• It is his opinion that it is important for the American people to watch the actions of the government critically and not to trust them blindly

 4. Which reasons does McNamara give for the failure of the war?

• Misjudgement and exaggeration of north Vietnam’s geopolitical intentions
• America has seen the Vietnam people as individuals with same ambitions for freedom and democracy
• America underestimated the nationalistic attitude

è AMERICAS IGNORANCE CONCERNING OTHER COUNTRIES

• America thought high-tech would outplay geographical knowledge and experience in the jungle
• America  didn’t realise that although they are a world power they needed international, especially moral support

 5. Do you think your article is objectively informing you?We think that the author is pretty objective because he does not comment the opinion of McNamara, he only describes what he says about his book and the Vietnam War in general.

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[1] containment policy = policy to prevent the spread of communism