World Affairs
IMPERIALIST PATRIOTISM
Ever since the US imperialists
had come to the fore as the leader
of capitalist world in the post-
Second World War period they
had been carrying out all the
strategies and designs aimed at
imposingtheir own hegemony over
the world. The armed invasions
against the other Countries are a
part of them. The US had stepped
into Vietnam in the early 1950s. It
first deployed a few “advisers” in
Vietnam. By July 1965, it resorted
to a full scale armed aggression
against Vietnam. By this time,
there were 5 Lakhs of US soldiers
on the Vietnamese soil. The
Vietnamese people fought against
this aggression with an
unprecedented heroism and
valour. They confronted the modern
weapons of US imperialists with
conventional weapons and by the
method of guerrilla warfare. They
inflicted many defeats and heavy
losses to the aggressors.
According to one estimate; 30
Lakh people had lost their lives in
this national liberation war. Half of
them were Vietnamese people.
The US had dropped 140 Lakhs
of bombs and other weapons on
Vietnam. It is said that 10 per cent
of them did not explode. Many
exploded after the war at different
times and at least one Lakh
Vietnamese people had died as a
consequence of it. The just
struggle of Vietnamese people had
received extensive and whole
hearted support and solidarity
from the people of China, Russia,
Indo-China, India and all the
countries of the world. Particularly,
a powerful protest movement
against the US aggression had
come up right in the US. The
January - 2018
American people had taken the US
rulers to task in several ways.
Thus the historic struggle of the
Vietnamese people against the
US aggression and for national
liberation was just and patriotic
war. The sacrifices made by the
Vietnamese people during this war
are invaluable and inspiring for the
entire exploited and oppressed
people of the world. The Vietnamese
people’s struggle and sacrifices
are memorable.
The US rulers were compelled
to enter into a dialogue with the
Vietnamese leaders after tasting
series of defeats and when they
found their final defeat quite
inescapable. The last US soldier
had left Vietnam by April 1975. All
the workers, oppressed and
peace loving people who were
aspiring and struggling for the
independence, liberation, democracy
and peace in various countries of
the world hated the invading US
soldiers. These soldiers were
seen as none but the mercenary
forces of the enemy. The American
people too were not waiting with
garlands to welcome the US
soldiers who were returning to
their homeland after butchering
lakhs of people in a decade-long
unjust war of invasion against
another Country. They only
greeted the US soldiers with
protests and demonstrations.
However, the peculiar thing is,
the US imperialist rulers had begun
celebrating the “Fiftieth Anniversary
of Vietnam War” since 2012. They
spread these celebrations to every
nook and corner of the US. The
US rulers had built up a big
Memorial in Washington DC
where they engraved the names
of 58200 US soldiers who died in
the Vietnam War. They are
describing the period of US
aggression against Vietnam as the
period of “patriotic sacrifices” and
these armed men as “War
Veterans”. The US rulers, however,
never talk about why they had sent
these soldiers to a small country
situated at a distance of thousands
of kilo metres and what atrocities
and massacres they had
committed there.
How an American soldier sent
to trample the independence and
freedom of Vietnamese people
and the Vietnamese people who
fought against the US aggression
and to defend the independence
and freedom of their own Country
- both can be called as “patriotic
fighters” and “heroes”? Can there
be more vulgarisation of the word
“patriotism” and “Heroism” than
this?
How the conscious masses
of American people view the
memorials built by the US rulers
for their sons whom the Imperialist
rulers had forced todie in an unjust
war against the people of other
Country? Will not the act of US
rulers who had used the American
people as cannon fodder in a war
to impose their own plunder us
hegemony over the people of
another Country cause pain and
anger to the people ? What
message the U S imperialist rulers
wish to convey to the American
people by this kind of memorials,
centres and celebrations? Are
they not calling upon the American
people
through
this
to
enthusiastically die in the ongoing
wars of invasion and be prepared
to die in the wars they propose to
wage in future? contd. in page 7
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