The Vietnam "Virus"

From Noam Chomsky's blog:

The issue that concerned planners from the 1950s was the usual one: independent nationalism in Vietnam might prove successful in terms meaningful to others in the region facing similar problems, and the “virus” might spread, “infecting” others, in Thailand, Malaya, sooner or later Indonesia, which was regarded as the second-most important domino.

And

That intolerable consequence was prevented, very efficiently, by the rational means of destroying the virus of potential successful economic development in Vietnam, and “inoculating” the region, often by the support of brutal and vicious military dictatorships, including Indonesia, after the failure of Eisenhower’s efforts to break off the outer islands (where most of the wealth is) in 1958. That’s a very considerable victory, and the US corporate system has gained enormously from it—which, incidentally, includes China.

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So, in terms of power structures, Vietnam had much less to do with fighting communism than it did with opposing economic development outside the US sphere of influence. Indeed, US foreign policy since WWII has been to oppose, across the board, the economic rise of any new nations that could not be controlled by Washington--this opposition has taken several forms, including economic subversion, covert operations, and overt war; Cuba has been beseiged by all three since Castro came to power. Of course, most Americans don't realize this: most of the time US foreign policy is sold to the masses as being always benevolent, and the corporate news media is usually a compliant accomplice. That's why Vietnam was about "fighting communism" and Iraq was about "weapons of mass destruction" and is now about bringing "democracy" and "freedom" to the Iraqi people. The reality is that it's all about economic control.

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