I couldn't agree more.

Just a slight point I think is more making:

> We never celebrate the Viet Cong for defending themselves successfully against the most powerful military in the world, against all the odds, over decades.

"During the Vietnam War, China provided substantial military and economic aid to North Vietnam, playing a crucial role in supporting their war effort against the United States. This aid included troops for infrastructure repair and defense, military equipment, and financial assistance."

But you are correct.

For starters, this is an American website run by Americans. To expect any different is equal to the intrinsic value of a pound of rotten fish.

> We never celebrate the Viet Cong

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viet_Cong_and_People%27s_Army_...

Always? Celebrating the war in Vietnam is a very fringe viewpoint in the US.

They actually believe they are geniuses. More than the stories about their own greatness, is the level of Energy they have to run around telling the stories non stop come what may. And promoting people who do so. That's the biggest factor in what stories stay alive and what stories are forgotten. Someone has to constantly bang the drum. Frequency matters more than anything. Who beats the drum the most? People who have the most energy and no other work or capacity to do any other work.

Someone or group with matching energy has to then waste their lives running behind this over energetic army to neutralize the effect. Who is going to do that full time> No one sane.

I think you can celebrate the ingenuity of a moment in a conflict without condoning the whole of it. Shooting down a plane with a helicopter is hard, this is the first time it happened as far as we know.

Also, when I was taught about the Vietnam War there was a huge amount of respect paid to the creativity of the North Korean forces in how they ran their military operations. Obviously a 1/n anecdote.

Because we do not saddle every individual soldier with responsibility for an entire war. That is the responsibility of politicians, and the people who elect them. Don't like the Vietnam war? Talk to all those people who voted in the leaders that perpetuated that war. Do it fast. They aren't getting any younger.

This soldier did not commit a war crime by shooting down an enemy plane. He was doing exactly what he was asked by his country to do.

Because the US wasn't invading. The US was defending South Vietnam from North Vietnam, because the fear was if they fell to communism then more Asian countries would. We basically helped with a civil war.

> Why are the US's (or the west at large) war crimes always seen as "cool" and "unconventional" when it is just terrorism.

I have read the article carefully and I'm unsure why do you think this incident is terrorism?

Well, that’s one way to look at it. Another is to consider the fact that the target was an Antonov 2. How did that get there?? Soviets were the original invader, following a power vacuum from the fall of Japan and inability of France to reestablish a colony. Mass executions were taking place in the north prior to US involvement.

It was quite messy, including the US actions, and the “facts” can vary wildly based on who tells the story, but it is inaccurate to simply label America as the invader.