Democrats blast Bush’s Vietnam comparison

Democrats Wednesday strongly rejected President Bush’s comparison of the Vietnam War to the conflict in Iraq, saying that drawing parallels is inaccurate and irresponsible.

{mosads}Bush, in a speech to the annual convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, used the example of the Vietnam War to show the possible consequences of withdrawing troops from Iraq. The president said that millions of people “paid the price” when the U.S. left Vietnam.

But Democratic leaders insisted that was a false comparison.

“Invoking the tragedy of Vietnam to defend the failed policy in Iraq is as irresponsible as it is ignorant of the realities of both of those wars,” said Sen. John Kerry (Mass.), the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate.

Democrats were also quick to point out that the White House had in the past rejected comparisons between the wars in Iraq and Vietnam. Among others, they point to a statement from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who said during a visit to Vietnam in 2006 that “historical parallels of that kind are, I think, not very helpful, and I don’t think they happen to be right” when asked to compare the conflicts.

“If anything, an examination of history and the situation on the ground shows us the importance of creating a new direction in Iraq,” said House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.). “We must initiate a strategic redeployment from Iraq so that we may focus our resources on the greatest danger — the war on terror — rather than keep our military mired in Iraq's sectarian war.”

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said that Bush, “instead of providing the country with a history lesson … should be reevaluating his flawed strategies that have led to one of the worst foreign policy blunders in our nation’s history.”

The president, in his speech, said “one unmistakable legacy of Vietnam is that the price of America’s withdrawal was paid by millions of innocent citizens whose agonies would add to our vocabulary new terms like ‘boat people,’ ‘re-education camps’ and ‘killing fields.’”

Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) said that the “disastrous consequences described by President Bush are already in motion and are a direct result of a war that should never have been authorized.”

Obama added that Iraq’s problems cannot be solved through military means and that “the only way to reverse these consequences is to change course through a surge in our diplomatic and humanitarian efforts in Iraq and the region, and a phased withdrawal of our forces that puts real pressure on the Iraqi government to act.”