NationStates Jolt Archive

One of my fathers friends, who I have met a few times, is a veteran of the Vietnam War. He is a good guy, and here is one of his many stories.

Every year he travels back to Vietnam and finds a rural village. He then finds the poorest family in the village. The family who has twenty people living in a 5x5 hut with a grass roof and lives by digging into the dirt around the town well for dropped food and money. Or maybe it's just one old woman who doesn't even have a 5x5 hut and sleeps in the cemetary where her dead relatives are buried. He finds the people who hold no hope for the future.

What he then does is spend $2,000 to build that family a house beyond their wildest dreams (nice even by the standards of US housing). Two or three stories tall, carpeting, air conditioning and heating, electricity, cable television, everything they could possibly need. He does this purely out of the goodness of his heart, he gets no return on this. The $2,000 is his own money.

People have often asked "Why go to Vietnam for this? There are poor right here in the USA who need help just as badly." The answer is that the $2,000 he uses to build a small manison in Vietnam will, in the USA, buy a small play house for a child to be put up in a real houses backyard. Here it buys a kid a toy, there is buys a desperate and hopeless person a new life.

The next time you want to condemn a veteran of the Vietnam War as a 'baby-killer', think about what this veteran does. Then look at yourself, and ask yourself who the better person is.

I bet that if this breaks into 2 pages then Kerry and Bush will be mentioned at least once. Guaranteed. Its election fever. :headbang:

I bet that if this breaks into 2 pages then Kerry and Bush will be mentioned at least once. Guaranteed. Its election fever. :headbang:


BUSH! Mwahahahahaha! :D

....didn't you just mention Kerry and Bush by making that statement, anyway?

Mac

....didn't you just mention Kerry and Bush by making that statement, anyway?

Mac
It's not about them, although he mentioned them. Just like how Moby Dick isn't about wooden teeth.

Okay, can we got some intelligent comments here?

Well, this is just wrong. I make a thread about a person doing a selfless and Saint-worthy action and it dies a quick death, but you make a thread about the newest way to belch and it stays on the boards for days. For shame!

Well, this is just wrong. I make a thread about a person doing a selfless and Saint-worthy action and it dies a quick death, but you make a thread about the newest way to belch and it stays on the boards for days. For shame!

Please give this guy my regards. There's no one on earth I respect more than Vietnam veterans.

this just isnt anything controversial in what this wonderful man is doing.

what can anyone do but be amazed as his devotion to helping people he doesnt know?

Please give this guy my regards. There's no one on earth I respect more than Vietnam veterans.

Deeply, deeply appreciated. Thank you.

Deeply, deeply appreciated. Thank you.

You're welcome.

this just isnt anything controversial in what this wonderful man is doing.

what can anyone do but be amazed as his devotion to helping people he doesnt know?

There are lots more like him. I know many of them. I suppose service just gets to be a habit, eh? :)

No more comments? Come on, when I first heard this story I could barely keep myself from bowing at this guys feet! Now-a-days people wont even give a beggar a quarter on ths street, he spends two grand a year!

That's...uh...great. I'm not sure where the controversy is.

Although, being as liberal as they come, I've never denegrated any veterans, excepting those at higher levels of the chain of command--and even then, solely based on illegal and immoral actions they themselves undertook. The soldiers themselves are almost entirely blameless.

I don't see any controversy here, either. Why do you mention it?

I don't see any controversy here, either. Why do you mention it?

Welllll, that's why nobody commenting.

There's nothing to comment about other then "awesome" and "nicely done" and such :p

Well, you can mention good deeds people you know have done. Or maybe figure out how you could do something similar.

I'm swedish and I hate american so I will be mean. No kidding aside I think the gesture is nice and I know that you have both idealism and pragmatism in your foreign policy. Of course the wietnam hade some idealsim and idealistic people who wanted to free and help the wietnanes like that vet. But the war was also alot of pragmatism and imperalistism to keep wietnam loyal to america. And the war was in many regards (but not all) done with disregard to civilian life. And it is also a fact that american during their stay in wietnam didn't manage to rally enough wietnamese support or build a democratic goverment instead they had to support a dictarorship. But I don't blame the soilders (if they didn't do warcrimes on their free will) I blame the generals and politicians. And I appriciate the idea but I have some succesion instead of making a familly happy he could make a entirer village happy buy asking them about their needs. For example a well with clean water could greatly improve the life of a entire village under 2000$. But of course have no right to tell him wait to do with his money. But I hope that you understand that you can dislike a war with out hating all the soldiers involved and that the good heart of one ex soldiers will not change the opinion of the war.

Firstly, the word 'Vietnam' begins with a V, not a W.

Since you can't even spell the word correctly I'm not even going to bother to respond to the rest of your post.

Firstly, the word 'Vietnam' begins with a V, not a W.

Since you can't even spell the word correctly I'm not even going to bother to respond to the rest of your post.

Tsk! He was trying to be nice, I thought. And I suspect that he typed in "w" because that's the letter most germanic-based languages use to indicate the "vuh" sound.

Ah....whoops. I thought he was just an idiot without even basic knowledge of Vietnam (like how to spell it) but was trying to sound intelligent anyway. (Wow, that sounded a lot more sarcastic than I wanted it to.)

she says what I like best about america is the freedom
and that in america we are all americans, in my nation (country)
Vietnam ( communist) there is no freedom and if you are vietnamese you
are vietnamese and if you are chinese that is what you are.

I happen to be cuban and she also said to me
my nation and your nation are alike the same
there is no freedom.

Every Vietnam Veteran should do that!

The next time you want to condemn a veteran of the Vietnam War as a 'baby-killer', think about what this veteran does. Then look at yourself, and ask yourself who the better person is.
Veterans tend to be a good bunch, although this guy stands out even amongst them. Given how many thousand year grudges are being held by nations around the world, he may (in the long term) be more important than any mere politician alive: long after we've been forgotten, his work will have helped ensure that Vietnam isn't itching for revenge.
Please pass on my warm regards to him next time you see him, and my thanks for his work.

I really dont think anyone has seriously called a Veitnam Veteran a "Baby-Killer" in nearly 20 years.
Long ago, when these people were getting home, there were attacks of this nature, but that was a different time, the turbulent 60's.

These days all you hear is "Support our Troops", and thats just great as long as that statement means only that, and not a campaign speech for one politician or another.

What changed?
Soldiers are still dropping bombs on children arent they?
Innocents still die in wars started by the rich.

The difference is that these troops are your fathers, brothers sisters...aunts and uncles.
Everyone in America either is related to, or knows someone who went to Iraq, or is there now.

Well, you can mention good deeds people you know have done. Or maybe figure out how you could do something similar.
Er... Well, my grandpa used to close down his office (he was a small town doctor) for a few weeks every year to go somewhere with my dad and uncles to do some humanitarian work. Not sure about many of the details, since I never got to know him too well, and haven't really talked to my dad about it. But it is pretty amazing, this guy you mentioned. To think that the $100 you spend on a night on the town could probably make things a hell of a lot better for some family out there, and this guy went above and beyond that and completely turned peoples' lives around. He certainly has my respect.

I play battfield vietnam, it is a very good game I recomend it.

I'm swedish and I hate american so I will be mean. No kidding aside I think the gesture is nice and I know that you have both idealism and pragmatism in your foreign policy. Of course the wietnam hade some idealsim and idealistic people who wanted to free and help the wietnanes like that vet. But the war was also alot of pragmatism and imperalistism to keep wietnam loyal to america. And the war was in many regards (but not all) done with disregard to civilian life. And it is also a fact that american during their stay in wietnam didn't manage to rally enough wietnamese support or build a democratic goverment instead they had to support a dictarorship. But I don't blame the soilders (if they didn't do warcrimes on their free will) I blame the generals and politicians. And I appriciate the idea but I have some succesion instead of making a familly happy he could make a entirer village happy buy asking them about their needs. For example a well with clean water could greatly improve the life of a entire village under 2000$. But of course have no right to tell him wait to do with his money. But I hope that you understand that you can dislike a war with out hating all the soldiers involved and that the good heart of one ex soldiers will not change the opinion of the war.

Exactly, you're Swedish lmao :rolleyes:! The most boring people on the planet. . .

And you create shite football managers, we don't want him anymore!

Please give this guy my regards. There's no one on earth I respect more than Vietnam veterans.

Please don't give him my regards. He should feel regret for what he and his countrymen gave done.

He, and those around him, killed millions (literally) of Vietnamese. You have to burn the village to save the village. Please..... The same could be said of the right wing US electorate.

God bless contientious objectors (which is quite separate from Draft dodging alcoholic daddy's boys who later try to claim credit for someone else's military achievement eg. "Mission Accomplished")

SO, you know nothing about him besides this one thing that I mentioned, but because a huge minority of people in the army at he same time as him did something horrible you instantly think he's a bad person?

SO, you know nothing about him besides this one thing that I mentioned, but because a huge minority of people in the army at he same time as him did something horrible you instantly think he's a bad person?

You said it - the minority was huge.

The problem with the US is that anyone who does "bad" is a minority. The US should not have been in Vietnam. It had no business in Vietnam. It may have been a big step for someone to become an objector, but anyone with a conscience would have done so. The people of Vietnam had decided their own fate - that is why the US was defeated there, and that is why the US will eventually put a positive spin on it and run from iraq.

No one wants to be run by foreign capitalists or communists, no matter how much you try to convince yourself. No one! Enforced democracy in the style of a country which cannot legitimately elect a president is not what anyone wants.

the sooner America gives up and concentrates on domestic policy the better for everyone except americans

Then look at yourself, and ask yourself who the better person is.I don't know him from Jack, but offhand I'd say he is. I am very thankful that I have never been put in the horrible situations that soldiers in Vietnam were put into.