Rethinking Camelot - Noam Chomsky

RETHINKING CAMELOT – NOAM CHOMSKY

The world is indeed a wonderful place as Louis Armstrong once advised, though made horrible by people, particularly those with a hard-on for power. Of course, that's not how Noam Chomsky would ever describe it but that's the gist of it. According to the economist philosopher Adam Smith, every age of human history reveals the workings of 'the vile maxim of the masters of mankind: All for ourselves, and nothing for other people', which according to Chomsky still stands to this day.

To this Chomsky also adds that throughout history the rabble (meaning you and me) have sought more freedom and justice, and have often won improved conditions of life. The 'men of best quality', however, have been less than delighted with these developments. There has been broad agreement among them that the rabble should not be permitted to interfere in the management of public affairs and should instead be mere spectators, not participants, as modern democratic theory holds. Kept in line with 'necessary illusions' and 'emotionally potent oversimplifications'. And if this fails there is always State violence and State control to fall back on in the form of truncheons and other assorted armoury. This is the Western model designed to protect Western values so as to protect the Western economy designed to favour the rich and the powerful.

As historians recognise, the Cold war began in 1917 not 1945, and in its earlier years Russia was never regarded as a military threat though it was always viewed as a virus that had to be contained if not destroyed. Arguably, Russia's expansionist plans were always a Western construct based on such suggestions as the Russians not having entirely proven they were without such expansionist ambitions. Which leads us directly (or in a roundabout way, at least) to the Vietnam War and Rethinking Camelot by Noam Chomsky.

'What were you doing when Kennedy died?' as the question goes but for Chomsky this is irrelevant. Instead, what is of more concern to him is Kennedy's legacy and how it's been manipulated to suggest that Kennedy was a dove rather than the actual hawk that he was – and which Chomsky sets out to prove.

On taking office in 1961, Kennedy immediately escalated US military support for its client regime in South Vietnam and then soon after escalated it further before then also authorising the use of napalm. The reason given for such concern over Vietnam was that if it fell under the Communist control of Ho Chi Minh and the Viet Cong, it wouldn't be too long before the whole of Southeast Asia went the same way and this was just a stake too high to afford to lose.

Chomsky points out, however, that it was actually Ho Chi Minh's ultra-nationalism that made him unacceptable, not his services to the 'Kremlin conspiracy' or 'Soviet expansion' – which means everything you have been told about the Vietnam War is a lie. Equally, JFK's deification by liberals, based on his supposed intention before being assassinated of withdrawing from Vietnam without victory is also wrong.

As might be expected, Chomsky is meticulous with his study and when he says there is 'no hint of any intention by JFK to withdraw without victory – quite the contrary', then you'd better believe it. Thousands of of government documents and reports have now been released for the period covering the Vietnam War and Chomsky seems to have trawled through them all.

There are, of course, insights aplenty regarding the political so-called 'planning' of the war, not least the incomprehension as to how the Viet Cong were able to draw their fellow countrymen onto their side but the Americans were not. The Viet Cong 'have an amazing ability to maintain morale' and are able 'continuously to rebuild their units and to make good their losses', exhibiting 'the recuperative powers of the phoenix'. This is 'one of the mysteries of this guerilla war', JFK's specialist on political warfare lamented, adding that 'we still find no plausible explanation for it'.

With this kind of absolute perplexity going on, America's war in Vietnam was doomed to failure, really. So much so that as Chomsky points out, it would be comical if the consequences for the victims were not so disastrous.

Interestingly and rather encouragingly, Chomsky also pulls out some choice insights regarding the effect of the war at home in the USA. Apparently, in considering further troop deployments to Vietnam, the government's chief advisors wanted to ensure that 'sufficient forces would still be available for civil disorder control', fearing that an escalation of the war might lead to 'increased defiance of the draft and growing unrest in the cities', running the risk of 'provoking a domestic crisis of unprecedented proportions'.

Rethinking Camelot is yet another valuable book in Noam Chomsky's canon, shedding a light upon a period in America's history that has always previously been obscured by propaganda and diversionary tangents. It's an illuminating exercise that cannot fail to leave the reader wondering how such a war as the one in Vietnam was ever allowed to happen and how any similar war must never be allowed to happen again. I wonder if Trump has ever read Chomsky? Indeed, I wonder if very many people at all have actually read him?

John Serpico