> Nick asks:
>
> > I couldn't avoid a little cynicism here:
> >
> >  Was Ho Chi Minh a nationalist first or a Communist first?
>
> There wasn't any difference between the two -- or any seeming
alternative --
> for many people around the world in the first half of the 20th Century. At
> the heart of every great struggle lies the question of social justice, not
> economics or a lust for power. Ho Chi Minh was primarily a nationalist;
> Communism was the mechanism by which he believed he could achieve that end
> for Viet Nam, but he was also very pro-American and he very much believed
in
> the ideals of Jefferson.
>
Is "social justice" at the point of a gun really justice?

OK his alliance with the Soviets was only a means to an end.  But what was
really his
aim?  Again I refer you to the Cuba experience.  "Social justice" or
socialism or
whatever you want to call it is eventually stultifying.

Our role in Viet Nam was obviously full of political and strategic blunders
but that does
not make Ho Chi Minh Mr. Goody Two Shoes anymore than what happened to the
North (china) an example for a prosperous and civil society.

Nick D.

* To join/leave the list, search archives, change list settings, *
* etc., please visit http://raven.utc.edu/archives/hp3000-l.html *