Carry Me Home Read Online Free Page B

escalation of military operations by U.S. forces since President Nixon took office on Jan. 20....
    NEW TACTICS: As with many arguments about the Vietnamese war, the truth in this case seemed to be more elusive than was indicated by Washington’s statistics. Undoubtedly, Hanoi’s policy is to maximize U.S. casualties in South Vietnam in hopes of making an impact on American public opinion and improving its bargaining position at the Paris peace talks.... Which is exactly our policy also. To inflict enough hurt on them to make them stop invading the south. Cautioned by North Vietnamese President Ho Chi Minh that they must “economize human and material resources,” the Communists this time are avoiding human-wave assaults. Instead it appears they have opted for radically different tactics that combine mortar and rocket attacks with hit-and-run raids by small, elite sapper squads.... What’s radically different about that? That’s been going on for years. What the hell are these guys ...
    When he halted the U.S. bombing of North Vietnam last November, President Johnson also approved a policy of exerting “maximum pressure” on the enemy in South Vietnam. The Nixon Administration has never thought fit to alter that policy.... Why the hell should it? What are we supposed to do, exert minimum pressure? They’d simply fill in the voids. They’d be in the population centers. These people don’t understand.
    U.S. military men defend this “maximum pressure” strategy as the only one that can prevent large-scale Communist ground attacks on South Vietnam’s major cities. “The idea of pulling back and letting the enemy have the jungles because it would cut down on American casualties is a military fallacy,” said a high-ranking U.S. officer.... “If we let them back in, it would increase casualties, not lower them.” That may be so. May be? But in the meantime, as the latest weekly casualty list showed (265 American dead, 1,863 wounded), both sides seem intent on using military force to crystalize their political position.
    Wapinski stopped reading. The cacophony of sounds, the buzz of fluorescent lights, the click of high heels on tile floors, the broken and static announcements, the roar of takeoffs, a baby crying, and the asinine perspective of the article tore at him. He closed his eyes, tight, opened them, took a deep breath. If we didn’t, he said to himself, do they think the NVA’d stop? Do you think they’d just go away? It is a war over there. These people don’t understand. They just don’t fuckin understand.
    He flipped further into the magazine. There was a lengthy article about the military-industrial complex, a reiteration of President Eisenhower’s 1961 warning that the nation “must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence” by the MIC, and an assessment of congressional moves to exert control over the Pentagon.
    Wapinski flipped back to the Viet Nam section. “Disclaim responsibility,” he read again. He almost threw the magazine across the waiting room. He ground his teeth, lit a cigarette, flipped back to the photo of the 101st Airborne troops on Dong Ap Bia. He searched the faces to see if he knew the men. Sure, he thought, he recognized one. Again the chill. He looked about, checked his watch. Why wasn’t the Williamsport plane at the gate? He flipped to the back of the magazine, to the Stewart Alsop column entitled “No Disguised Defeat?” He could not read it.
    “It means—” he heard a voice, glanced left, right, “when everyone is saying this is the way it was—” another takeoff roar, another static announcement, another flyover vibrating his damaged eardrums, no one near him, yet the voice, “don’t let em convince you ...”
    Wapinski stared at the column. He shook his head imperceptibly. The articles gave a different dimension to the Southeast Asia he had been dealing with for the past year. He knew the North Viet Namese had suffered seriously during his