Ho Chi Minh: Weapons of Mass Destruction--The Human Mind

---

I was 10 years old in 1970. My father became friends with a pharmaceutical representative who had four sons and one daughter. Our family had three daughters and one son, me. Once and awhile, my mom would send me to play with the boys and take their daughter home to play with my sisters, presumably to give me some exposure to testosterone and their only daughter some exposure to estrogen.

On one visit, their father and the oldest son (Dale) were glued to the TV set. Dale was wondering if he would be drafted to go to Vietnam that day. He was not drafted that day, but I think he was later. He was one of the lucky ones. He didn’t come home in a box. Luckily, I was too young to go to Vietnam.

18 year old American boys were picked at random in a lottery system and sent off to the Vietnam War.

As a boy in the USA in the late 60s, and even still some today, we were taught that communism is bad and capitalism is good. In the 60s, we were told that “commies” needed to be killed before they spread their political philosophy throughout the world. We met our friends in orchards and city parks and played war. We shot play guns at commies. I had never met a commie, but I knew they were bad. Don’t mess with us, we are Americans. We’ll take 10 of yours for every one of ours you take.

You had to argue a bit to determine who would be the commies and who would be the Americans. That was often determined by drawing straws. The shortest straws were the commies. Then you would spread apart and start making sounds like you were shooting each other. Rata, tat, tat. “You dirty commies.” "I killed you commie." We were acting out what we saw on TV. We were killing commies.

It was us against them. I remember learning that commies were not allowed to have more than one child. Commies didn’t believe in god. Commies weren’t allowed to vote for a representative government. The commie leaders got all the toys, so it didn’t matter how hard you worked, you could never get ahead in life unless you became part of the ruling class. All the money and power was held by the government. There is no motivation for success. All success comes from moving up a political ladder instead of creating a business and being the captain of your own destiny. All commie products are shit because nobody cared about quality. Commies don’t want to work. Commies want free stuff.

I remember learning that if the commies won the war in Vietnam, communism would be allowed to spread, eventually to the United States and Europe, and none of us would be allowed to believe in god. The commies would close our churches.

Please don’t be offended. I am only recalling the thoughts and fantasies of a boy playing with my childhood friends. These memories streamed into my mind involuntarily when I was at the War Remnants museum in Ho Chi Minh. The victors write the history books.

The past is the past, but some days, it comes streaming back in detail. It was a time of war and I am American. This was how we thought. This is what I remember learning at the time. Only the hippies in America were protesting. Some people thought we should kill the hippies too. The government did kill some hippies in America. Freedom of association wasn’t for commies or hippies.

We also learned that the commies, like us, had thermonuclear warheads. That mankind could end at any moment, if either side launched their weapons. There were enough bombs to kill everyone on the planet many times over. We hoped that commies weren’t stupid enough to do a first strike. But we had radar targeted on the commies. If they shot their missiles at us, we would know before they exploded here. We had people ready to launch all our nuclear weapons at the commies the moment we saw their missiles in the air. We hoped that the guaranteed mutual destruction would prevent the commies from launching first. But we weren’t leaving the world to the bad guys if they launched first. If they thought otherwise, they might launch. So we had to launch if they did. We all waited to see if the commies would end the world.

So it was our duty as an American, to go to Vietnam and kill as many commies as possible before they took over the world. My country taught me, that commies wanted to kill me and my way of life. With all those missiles pointed at us, it wasn’t hard to believe. I am not saying this is really how things were, I am saying this is how I understood them to be, at the time.

That is how life was in America back in the 60s. I understood America to be the watch dog for capitalism, democracy, and freedom. We were protecting the World from evil people. That if we let the rest of the world fall into communism, the world would enter the dark ages again. We would devolve into an age of concentrated self-serving leadership without individual self-motivation for success. Freedom would end. We thought that without freedom of press, the self-serving concentrated leadership would continue to rule for centuries, without vote, as the world did for thousands of years before the advent of democracy. No voice, no freedom. No vote, no freedom. No god, no freedom.

We believed we were fighting an evil force, worse, a godless evil force.

Some of our hearts were good when we started. But it turns out that our passion may have led to some very bad decisions that were carried out on the ground here in Vietnam. We even crop dusted people with poison that has caused birth defects for generations. How fucked up do you have to be to make a decision like that? How bad are the commies?

Around 1968, the hippies started to convince the American people that the war was bad. Things were changing fast. My dad even started to sound like a hippie. Maybe we should pull out of Vietnam? Maybe we can’t kill all the commies. There are a billion or more commies out there, and the commies don’t fight fair.

That was a long time ago. Things are so different now. Aren't they?

In order to pick up a gun and shoot people (or animals), you have to turn them into objects in your mind. You start by objectifying the target. We turned people on the other side into objects and treated them as objects. They needed to die. They were commies.

As citizens, we owe it to citizens of other countries, to make sure our country acts responsibly. Not everything we were told was true. Did we fail to understand that they were people, like us, under the influence of other people, who were not being completely honest with them? Like us, not everything they were told was true? Is it possible there were people in power on both sides telling a lie or two? Is that how you get people to shoot each other?

Nothing has changed my friends. Open your eyes. There is always someone trying to influence you. Who are they and what part of what they say is true? Who are they marginalizing? Could some part of what the marginalized people are saying be true?

You can’t arrive at any useful understanding when you listen to one side, one country, one philosophy, one spiritual view. You shouldn't believe everything either side is saying. Even your own mind is polluted with decades of rhetoric that must be filtered through. Find someone saying something you don’t believe and ask yourself what part of what they are saying is true? Are they hungry? Are they poor? Are they being marginalized by their existing government or by your government? Are they suffering some injustice?

Would you be upset if you were being treated that way? Could someone speaking partial truths come along, activate these marginalized people, offer them bread and water and “protection” from injustice, and arm them? Why are you surprised when it happens? War must be cheaper than justice because we seem to throw more money at war than we do at justice?

If you are always listening to the same sources of information, and you like and believe what they are saying, be careful. Make sure you listen carefully to those you don’t believe. What is the injustice their listeners suffer that will motivate their listeners to turn to violence?

The world is small now. We need it to work for everyone. There is no “us versus them” anymore. If we allow injustice to continue in the world, we are ruining ourselves not just another part of the world.

The weapons of mass destruction are our minds. Humans are the biggest threat on the planet. If you allow yourself to be part of a group marginalizing the other, you have become the weapons of mass destruction. You are a cog in a manipulators wheel. Are you going to promote a world that filters and integrates information from multiple, diverse, contrary sources? Are you going to facilitate true justice or are you going to listen to the same old single rhetoric sources?

Wake yourself up if you can. Only the date has changed. Who are the kids pretending to shoot in the park today?

---

Comments

[Jaunty Jul]

Beautiful City
Love the photos. And I agree with you on "the weapon of mass destruction is in the mind". Looking forward to your next travel. Have a great time (^_^)

[Paul Mathew]

Violence!
How true! All violence finds its origin in our minds, in my sense of otherness that gives us different labels - Hindu, Muslim, Christina, Communist, Capitalist, Indian, Pakistani . . .