Earning Your Oxygen

 

As I mentioned in my previous post, Ambivalence, I’ve learned a lot from my cousin Steve. As I said before, he tries to be open minded, empathetic, and look for the good in people, and he has found that the more you know about people, the harder it is to judge them. 

Another thing Steve considers important is what he calls  “earning your oxygen.” The basic requirements for earning your oxygen are what you might guess: supporting your family, and being kind and generous with your time and resources. Steve has worked hard all his life. He’s retired now, but still finds ways to earn his oxygen. One way is by washing dishes at the local animal shelter. Who would have thought an animal shelter would need a dish washer, but it’s a big job. It takes him upward of four hours, twice a week. 

Also Steve has been compiling a detailed genealogy of his and his wife’s family. He’s sent me some parts of it that relate to our cousins, and just that amounts to thousands of pages of data, a huge accomplishment, and a wonderful heritage for our families. 

Over the last several years Steve has lost most of his hearing. I don’t hear so well either, so our biweekly phone calls are a challenge. The good thing about it is that we probably communicate with each other better than we do with anyone else. Steve carries a marker and writing board, but he can’t really communicate well enough to participate in a conversation. Nevertheless, he attends all his grandchildren’s events and takes pictures which he compiles into a folder for each child. 

Since Steve has introduced me to the concept of earning your oxygen, I find myself using it to judge my own actions and plans. I like to play the violin, but I’ve decided that I’m not really earning my oxygen unless I’m using it to give someone else pleasure. So, although I was trained to play classical music, I’ve developed a repertoire of popular music to play for audiences. I recently gave up playing weekly at a hospice facility because as I’ve gotten older it’s harder to maintain my energy level enough to play for two hours. Since then, I’ve felt that I need to do something to replace that effort. I’m considering performing for shorter periods, or applying to be a tutor at the local grade school. 

Earning your oxygen is also useful in judging others. The usual things that we admire or aspire to aren’t necessarily worth much oxygen. Making a good grade, being successful in your profession, winning a contest, being chosen as a leader, having or making a lot of money, being a member of a prominent family, don’t really earn any oxygen. Whether you earn oxygen or not depends on how you use your accomplishments. For instance, if you are fair in your leadership role, and use your influence to benefit others in some way, then you’re earning your oxygen. On the other hand if you become prominent by pushing others aside, or use your position just to attain more power or wealth, then you’re creating an oxygen deficit. 

Earning your oxygen requires no special ability or talent. I know a couple who have a child who is severely incapacitated by cerebral palsy. She can only respond by waving her arms or crying out. Her parents were told that she wouldn’t live more than a year, but she’s now over fifty. She’s a big part of their lives. She goes everywhere with them. All their friends know her and accept her as part of the group. Her parents each have professions and lead full lives in spite of having to spend considerable time and effort in meeting her needs. She’s definitely earning her oxygen. 

I think that earning your oxygen makes you a better person, and by definition it benefits others. I’ve also found that the more oxygen you earn, the happier and more satisfied you are in life.

 

They Can't Take That Away

Vietnam, Why Did We Got Involved?

 

                    Potsdam Conference, July, 1945

Back in 1969, when I went to Vietnam, I didn’t much question our reasons for entering the conflict. I accepted the government line that we were justified in intervening there to fight against the spread of communism. I do remember thinking that maybe we should have just let the Vietnamese settle their differences among themselves. I still think that if we hadn’t become involved, it wouldn’t have escalated into a major war.  

Since then, I’ve questioned our motives for being there, and for staying as long as we did, in spite of the tremendous costs of the war, both for the Americans and the Vietnamese. I now realize that we were involved there for almost 30 years.  during the terms of five presidents, both Democrat and Republican, from Truman to Nixon. Our reasons for entering were based on speculation, not facts, and every president had opportunities to get out, but kept pursuing the same policy, in spite of mounting evidence that our involvement was folly.  

The historian, Barbara Tuchman, published a book in 1984, The March of Folly[i], in which she points out this conundrum, the tendency of governments to pursue policies that “prevailing information indicate as hopeless.” Our involvement in Vietnam is the example she sights from modern history.

It was 1945 when the United States first became involved in Vietnam, or French Indochina as it was then known. I was only three years old. As WWII was ending, Franklin Roosevelt, president during the war, was vehemently opposed to the return of the French to Vietnam, which they had oppressed and exploited for over eighty years, but he died in April of that year, just four months before the Japanese surrender, and Harry Truman became president. Viet Minh guerilla forces under Ho Chi Minh took control of Vietnam after the Japanese surrender, and the Free French party under Charles de Gaulle took control of France after the fall of the Nazis. They both requested aid from the US, the Viet Minh to set up a new government and to defend themselves against the return of the French, and the French, to reimpose their rule over Vietnam.  

Tuchman contends that after WWII we had an opportunity to “gain for America an enviable primacy among Western nations and confirm the foundation of goodwill in Asia by aligning ourselves with, even supporting, the independence movements.” Truman decided instead to side with French.

There was ample evidence from the start, that siding with the French was a mistake. First of all, the Vietnamese hated the French. They had revolted multiple times against the French before the war and were even more determined to prevent their return afterwards. Bao Dai, hereditary emperor of Vietnam, and actually supported by the French, said in a letter to de Gaulle, “You would understand better if you could see what is happening here, if you could feel this desire for independence which is in everyone’s heart and which no human force can any longer restrain. Even if you come to re-establish a French administration here, it will no longer be obeyed: each village will be a nest of resistance, each former collaborator an enemy, and your officials and colonists will themselves ask to leave this atmosphere which they will be unable to breathe.” Second, knowledgeable officials in the US government advised against supporting French return to Vietnam.  Charles Yost, political officer in Bangkok, reported that American prestige in SE Asia was seriously deteriorating due to our failure to support nationalist movements. John Ohly of the State Department warned that we could replace France as Vietnam’s oppressors. Third, military experts in the Pentagon reported that the Vietnamese revolutionaries couldn’t be defeated by outside intervention. Even General Jacques Leclerc, hero of the French liberation, said, “It would take 500,000 men to do it (take control of Vietnam), and even then it could not be done.”

 Why would President Truman ignore all this and support the French in their reconquest of Vietnam? Truman, British Prime Minister Clement Atlee, and Russian Premier Joseph Stalin had discussed the disposition of Vietnam at the Potsdam conference in July of ’45, prior to the end of WWII. Independence for Vietnam was not considered then, since it was still under the control of Japan, and Vietnam was not considered “ready” for independence. There was a feeling that former colonies needed guidance before they could rule themselves. So at Potsdam the decision was made to divide the country temporarily into northern and southern sections at the 16^th parallel, with Nationalist China in control of the northern part and Britain in control of the south.

Since the USSR had taken advantage of Germany’s surrender to annex most of eastern Europe, there was a fear that communism would spread over the world. Actually there was no evidence of Russian influence in Vietnam, but this fear of communism led some American leaders to favor French return to Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh, popular leader of the Viet Minh, was indeed a communist. He joined the communist party while living in France because the communists there supported independence movements in several countries, but his main aim was independence for Vietnam. During WWII Ho fought with the American OSS (Office of Strategic Services), forerunner of the CIA, against the Japanese. After the war, he expected that the US would support his fight for independence, like we had the Filipinos. The OSS officers who worked with Ho wanted to support the Viet Minh, but their chief vetoed them since Ho was communist. What really tipped the scales in France’s favor was when Charles de Gaulle demanded that we transport French troops to Vietnam to reimpose French control. He told the American ambassador in Paris, “If you are against us in Indochina,”  it would cause “terrific disappointment” in France, which could drive her into the Soviet orbit. “We do not want to become Communist…but I hope you do not push into it.” When de Gaulle visited Washington weeks later Truman agreed to his request.

 Over the next six months, as French troops were arriving in Vietnam on American ships, supplied with American equipment, sometimes even wearing American uniforms, Ho Chi Minh appealed to President Truman on eight separate occasions for support and financial aid, but his requests went unanswered. 

Truman’s decision to oppose Vietnamese independence was based on fantasy. The fantasy that the Vietnamese would be better off under the colonial domination of France. The fantasy that the Vietnamese communists were Russian puppets, and the fantasy that we would be welcomed as liberators. By the end of his administration, we were sending millions of dollars, as well as military equipment, and MAAG (Military Assistance Advisory Group) military advisors, to aid the French. He justified his efforts by what came to be known as the “Truman Doctrine,” described in a speech to Congress in March of 1947: “It is the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.”^[ii] The Vietnamese revolutionaries were not a minority, and the outside pressure trying to subjugate them was us. 

[i] The March of Folly, From Troy to Vietnam, Barbara W Tuchman, Ballantine Books, NY, 1984

 [ii] https://www.archives.gov/milestone-documents/truman-doctrine

The Folly of the Israel Hamas War

 

                                                                    Gaza City

                                        

The book I’m reading now is The March of Folly, by Barbara Tuchman, about the tendency of governments and leaders make foolish, tragic decisions, and then to continue the policies in spite of evidence that they’re folly. Her examples are the Trojans taking the wooden horse filled with Greeks into their city, the Renaissance Popes provoking the Protestant secession, the British losing her American colonies, and finally America’s travesty in Vietnam. The conclusions Ms. Tuchman draws are very perceptive and timely, even though her book was published in 1984. 

She concludes that “Once a policy has been adopted and implemented, all subsequent activity becomes an effort to justify it.” That was certainly true in Vietnam, where we were involved for almost 30 years, with each of five different presidents trying to justify the original decision. 

We made a similar mistake more recently in Afghanistan. We fought there for 20 years through the administrations of four different presidents, trying first to defeat Al-Qaeda, and then the Taliban – resulting in our humiliating defeat in 2021, when we finally withdrew our troops. 

As I follow the news of the world’s latest conflicts, I’m afraid Tuchman’s observations may apply to them as well. First, Putin’s invasion of the Ukraine, which was supposed to be over in a couple of weeks, has lasted over a year. His reasons for the invasion, allegedly to weaken NATO and create a buffer zone between Russia and the rest of Europe, have backfired. NATO is stronger than ever, and may even add Ukraine as a new member. In spite of the failure of his policy, Putin seems to be following Tuchman’s rule, attempting to justify his policy and persisting in his war. 

As I observe Netanyahu’s response to Hamas’ brutal attack on Israel, and our unquestioning support of him, I see the same situation developing. He has vowed to destroy Hamas, but he seems destined to kill an enormous number of civilians in the process, and to create a humanitarian crisis for those remaining. The conflict has already involved the West Bank Palestinians, Hezbollah and Iran, and who knows where the war will spread to next. 

I’m afraid Netanyahu is likely to follow Tuchman’s rule and continue his invasion of Gaza, refusing to back off from his futile attempt to destroy Palestinian opposition, and the more ships and arms we send to support him, the more likely we are to be drawn in with him. 

I know it’s complicated, but someone should show concern for the almost 12,000 lives already lost in Israel and Gaza. As was shown in WWII,  Vietnam, and Afghanistan, dropping more bombs does not result in de-escalation of a conflict. It’s more likely to make the Palestinians more resolute in their resistance, and to make it easier to recruit more terrorists. The best course at this point would be for both sides to declare that sacrificing more lives will not solve the problem, and to start a real negotiation that aims for independence and survival for both Israel and Palestine.   

Fat chance.

Ambivalence

 

        
                                

                                                               Steven McLean

I’ve been reading a book - rereading actually - The March of Folly, by Barbara Tuchman. It gives examples of governments’ tendency to pursue hopeless policies, and then to cling tenaciously to those policies in the face of mounting evidence that they are “folly.” The US involvement in Vietnam is one of her examples. 

Anyway, Ms. Tuchman describes Lyndon Johnson, one of five presidents responsible for prolonging our involvement in Vietnam, as a man driven mainly by political motives. This was kind of a shock to me because I had previously read a book published by the Associated Press, Eyewitness History of the Vietnamese War, which describes Johnson as a man of courage and principle, who started the process of withdrawal from Vietnam. 

Neither writer says anything that is untrue. They just emphasize different facts. This caused me to feel ambivalence toward President Johnson, in place of the admiration and respect I had for him after reading the first book. This conundrum reminded me of a principle I learned from my cousin Steve, the importance of being ambivalent. 

Steve and I are close in age and we have similar interests. We’ve never lived near each other, but I’ve always felt close to him, and we’ve always maintained contact. When we were little we saw each other each summer when his mother would bring him down to Pauls Valley to see our grandmother. As we got older we went camping together, and when we were in college we corresponded by mail. When I was in practice, he travelled a lot selling oil field equipment, and sometimes when I was off he’d come by and we’d spent the day talking as he drove from one well to another. Now that we’re older and somewhat disabled, we still get together by phone every other week and chat about whatever comes to mind. In fact, we’re scheduled to talk tomorrow night. 

Steve is one of those people who are always interested in something. When we were kids he collected stuff: stamps, rocks. He lived in Texas, where not much grows except cacti, so he became interested in cacti. He took me out into the desert once and showed me a dozen or more varieties of cacti.  When his parents took him on road trips he would have them stop at all the historical markers, and he made special trips to mines in Texas, Arizona, Colorado and Mexico, collecting different minerals. In college, he majored in geochemistry, specializing in clay minerology, and he amazed me with the different uses for clay. Slick shiny magazine covers for one thing. He did a survey once of a potential site for a landfill for hazardous waste. I learned from him that landfills should be bordered by clay deposits so the toxic waste can’t leak out into the ground water. His geochemical studies revealed a clay mineral type that was previously unknown in Texas, and was forming in a unique environment. 

I’ve learned a lot from Steve over the years, and I still do, when we talk every other Friday night. He isn’t just interesting for all he knows, he also has a lot of wisdom too. One of the things he takes pride in is being ambivalent. He believes that the more you know about people, the less sure you can be about your opinion of them. More knowledge makes you more empathetic, but it also raises more questions about their motivation and judgement. So Steve tries to be open minded, and he looks for the good in people. He told me, “I am the most judgmental about people who are judgmental.” 

I have a tendency to jump to conclusions, but I’ve found some scientific research that backs Steve up. Studies have shown that while people with strong opinions often get their way, an organization is more productive, and the people are happier and feel more fulfilled, when differences of opinion are encouraged. I’ve come to believe that is an important principle, especially in these times when the population seems so polarized. I learned that listening to NPR radio, while Steve figured it out on his own, with an assist from Pollyanna, his favorite movie (he added).

Life is Precious:

 

 I think almost everyone agrees that life is precious. We all treasure our relationships with our family, our friends, and our heritage. We all have goals we’d like to achieve, and heroes we’d like to emulate. The entertainment industry is supported by empathy for the characters in its dramas, and the advertising industry by aspiration for a certain life style. We all feel sympathy for those in need or suffering, and the death of a loved one, even when expected or “natural” is a tragic loss. Most countries have outlawed the death penalty, even for murderers.

 

The accidental death of my mother’s oldest brother tore her family apart, and, one way or another colored their lives thereafter. Another of her brothers decided to run for the state legislature when he was barely old enough to vote, and became a prominent politician for the next 20 years, helping our family with jobs and inspiration during the Great Depression.

 

You never know how someone, no matter how seemingly insignificant, will affect your life. We have some friends whose daughter has severe cerebral palsy. Her doctors told them she wouldn’t live beyond infancy, but she’s in her 50’s now and is an important part of their lives. She goes everywhere with them. All their friends accept her as part of the family. It would be devastating if they lost her.

 

One of the lessons I learned in Vietnam is that war turns reverence for life on its head, especially the lives of “the enemy,” which in Vietnam was practically everyone. I was shocked when I first heard the Vietnamese referred to as “gooks,” or “dinks.” Vietnamese taken to the hospital were sometimes dropped off their stretchers “accidentally,” and even dropped out of helicopters to avoid taking them to the hospital. There was one ward at the main hospital reserved for Vietnamese. I went there one night and mentioned to the nurse that many of them were groaning in pain. Her response was “They just want attention. They don’t feel pain like we do.”  

 

I used to attend the commanding general’s briefing every Friday morning. Every unit in the division, battalion and above, was represented by an officer. There were several generals, but mostly colonels and lieutenant colonels, the men responsible for the strategy of the war, and the lives of the thousands of men under their command. I was responsible for reporting the health statistics: how many cases of malaria, hepatitis, plague, trench foot. How many amputations. How many men had to be evacuated for higher level care, or sent home.

 

What shocked me was the atmosphere of the meetings. What everyone was interested in was the “body count.” It was like they were discussing a ball game. “How many gooks did you kill this week? We got 20 but lost 5.” To these men, lives were just statistics, even the lives of their own men. 

 

It strikes me that our leaders view the current wars the same. Hamas killed 1400 Israelis, and the Palestinian body count is currently estimated at 8500. I don’t know what the latest numbers are for Ukrainians and Russians. What justifies this slaughter, this total disregard for the value of life? Netanyahu says his aim is revenge, and Putin wants to be another Peter the Great. I guess Peter the Great killed a lot of people too. As for Hamas, I’ve never understood terrorists, but they share the same disregard for life. It’s worth sacrificing thousands for what? Independence for Gaza? Destruction of Israel? Glory?

 

In Vietnam the goal was “attrition,” which, I have learned, means destroying the enemy’s resources so they can no longer fight. Vietnam’s resources were their rice fields, and their people, because their people supported the revolution. So winning meant killing all the people, so there’s no one left to fight. I’ve heard Putin’s strategy also described as attrition, and from the sound of Netanyahu’s statements, he’s aiming for the same thing.

 

Where’s the reverence for life in all this? How would the fatalities vote if they could be resurrected for a referendum? When I was in Vietnam I listened to a speech by the president, in which he said, “I don’t want to be the first president to lose a war.” We were fighting and dying so he could save face?

 

Somehow those who have died and are about to die should have a say in the decisions our leaders make about war.