David Sirota: The Legend of the Spat-Upon Veteran

[malthaussen]

22. The Stab in the Back Theory

After WWI, many German vets adopted the belief that they would have "won" that war if the Jews and Commies and peaceniks hadn't "stabbed them in the back" and stopped "supporting the troops." This theory can be directly linked to the rise of Fascism and the overthrow of Weimar -- although there were, of course, many other reasons contributing to that upset. The Vietnam war was not even over before certain Fascist-inclined elements in this country decided to exploit the confusion and resentment of some returning veterans and float their own version of that chestnut.

It's interesting that 40 years after the fact, politicians are still trying to exploit that confusion and resentment to serve their own ends. Frankly, I find this fact to be evidence in favor of the argument that the Vietnam vets have been stabbed in the back -- but not by the American people in general, rather by the liars and fakirs who are the spritual heirs of the liars and fakirs who sent them to fight in Vietnam in the first place.

But the responses here are interesting, and illustrative of why this process works so well. Instead of addressing the substance of the article -- that the whole "support the troops" meme is actually code for the exact opposite -- most posters in this thread are concerned with individual anectdote: what this or that vet "told" them about what happened, or what they themselves did or experienced. Which is really not the point, is it? Regardless of how returning veterans were treated and by whom they received whatever treatment, the legend of their treatment is used as political fodder specifically by those who think the best way to "support" the troops is to create more wars and thus create the need for more troops. I guess we could call this "job creation."

-- Mal