Charlie Rose

REMant  01/13/2010 01:19 AM Report

Saw him on The News Hour earlier. There seems little new in his story. During the Vietnam War areas of that country were essentially the same, at least at times. That brings to mind something that bears repeating in this context. In Vietnam there never was much of any kind of indigenous market class. What there was, was identified with the French, the Americans and perhaps the Chinese. Nor was there a clear aristocracy, independent of the central government, altho with the varied history of the area, landlords did exist from time-to-time. As with the Chinese there was a mandarin class subordinated to the emperor or emperors. The contest was largely was over who would head this govt, even up to the struggle between Ho and Diem, despite the fact that Ho called himself a Marxist-Leninist and Diem, a Catholic. Both sides at times laid claim to the mantle, tho the NLF considered itself the people's party, and the GVN sided more with the upper classes. It is as if you compared James I with his republican opposition, omitting the liberal Whigs, and see that while James sees himself in the loop and the republicans do not, they do agree on the basic philosophy. In Vietnam this was probably due to the influence of the Buddhists, and overlaid on the Confucian family base. Americans never quite realized this and I suspect something of the same can be said about Afghanistan, the important part being that it is NOT a market society.