LETTERS

Letters from Irish Voice readers

LETTERS

April 9, 2008

Revisionism Goes On

AS proud as I am that John F. Kennedy was the first Irish Catholic president in history, I am astounded at the lengths some in the Irish American community will go to in order to shield his image against the realities of some of the bad decisions he made involving Vietnam.
The latest in the litany is letter writer John O’Donnell (“Obama Will Lead Us,” March 19-25). O’Donnell is, ironically, a Vietnam veteran.

He repeats the myth in his letter that JFK, without a doubt, was preparing to withdraw from Vietnam.

The U.S. had approximately 17,000 soldiers stationed in Vietnam on the day JFK died (whether or not you consider those soldiers advisors or combat soldiers is a matter of semantics). According to Dean Rusk, JFK’s former secretary of state, JFK never discussed a withdrawal.

Noam Chomsky in his book Rethinking Camelot goes on to rebut this revisionism, which stems from John Newman’s book JFK and Vietnam. Newman’s premise is based on a new declassified national security memorandum #363 which does discuss an initial withdrawal of 1,000 soldiers from Vietnam, but there was a catch – the military/political situation needed to be stabilized.

Apparently the situation would only deteriorate with the military coup against Ngo Dinh Diem, which would have precluded any withdrawal had Kennedy lived. Years later the unpleasant truth is revealed that the Kennedy administration facilitated the coup, if it didn’t outright plan the thing.

Any assertions to the contrary, particularly from former JFK people, are made with the tinge of regret (and maybe some guilt), peering through the prism of hindsight for placing the country in such an interminable conflict like the one we’re engaged in now.

W. Glenn McNally
Brooklyn, New York

Too Partisan

WHILE I fully understand and appreciate the gratitude felt by the Irish Voice for the role of the Clinton administration in the peace process, I believe you have been unduly partisan on behalf of the presidential candidacy of Senator Hillary Clinton.

If, as I believe likely, the Democratic nominee and next president is the Irish American / African American Senator Barack Obama, it does not serve the cause of immigration reform or sustaining the peace process for our leading publication to have been seen so one-sided.

The issue of Senator Clinton’s role in the Irish peace process is not whether she supported it, or whether she subsequently lent her office to publicizing and sustaining it. The question is the legitimacy of her claim to have played a role in its negotiation, in order to make the case that she is better prepared to be president.

Retrospective testimonials may suggest such a role, but can be influenced by current interests and allegiances. I find it significant that Conor O’Clery’s thorough history of the peace process, Daring Diplomacy, has five index references to Hillary Clinton, but none are substantive.

Is there contemporaneous documentation or an independent disinterested history which proves her purported role in the peace process is more than campaign hyperbole?

Obama and Clinton, as well as John McCain, are likely to be equally sympathetic to fulfillment of our hopes for Ireland and immigration reform. Irish American voters might better look to other indicators of their foreign policy orientation, not least how they have and will address the problem of U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq.

John McAuliff
Irvington, New York

Please Let Us Know

THE recent storm regarding Taoiseach Bertie Ahern’s Capitol Hill comments on the Irish undocumented have an interesting context. Whenever the Irish economy was halfway between the bathroom and the septic tank –- i.e., quite frequently — the Irish state was content to sit back and allow its young people to relocate to other countries.

They headed to Britain, Australia, America, Canada, etc. It didn’t really matter as long as they went quietly.

With Ireland an integral part of Europe, the begging bowl was whipped out for agriculture, roads, roundabouts. The money didn’t just appear out of nowhere. Successive finance ministers probably had to prostrate themselves in Brussels to achieve the maximum payout. They had to ask for it.

Meanwhile, as the wheels went back on the economic bike, the departed were remembered every Christmas with a candle at Aras An Uachtarain, the presidential residence.

Down the years emigrants who left Ireland asked for nothing but were piously mentioned in all the right speeches, so we all felt good because we were part of a “diaspora.”

Well, diaspora this — if the Dail (Irish Parliament) was prepared to table and accept an all-party motion supporting the pursuit of a bilateral agreement between the U.S. and Ireland, how did the taoiseach manage to both ignore that initiative and insult the U.S. lobby groups in a few terse comments on St. Patrick’s Day saying that the supporters of relief for the undocumented didn’t know what they were talking about?

Even if he had asked for a deal, and they said no, at least we’d be wiser. It’s the not knowing that’s the worst.

Anyway, the best we can do now is struggle on. There will surely be others chances along soon, and we’ll take nothing too personally, being Irish and bright. Is it my round, lads?

Jimmy Lyne
New York, New York

Disgust at Bertie

I AM writing to express my disgust that Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Bertie Ahern has put me and 50,000 Irish citizens who unfortunately are undocumented on the back burner. I have being living here in U.S. for many years without papers. It maddens me to hear Ahern suggest we return to Ireland.

My life is here in U.S. and I would find it extremely difficult to move lock, stock and barrel to Ireland and try and adjust to Irish living (not that there is anything wrong with it).

I would not be in this situation if I didn’t have to immigrate back in the 1980s as there was no work. I would also not be in this situation if our Irish government did what they were suppose to do and help us get legalized.

I understand the Irish economy is slowing down and people have stared to immigrate again to the U.S., yet Ahem is suggesting we go back. No, thank you. I left that unemployment line 20 years ago.

Mr. Ahern, as the leader of Ireland until you stand down next month, you should be helping us undocumented gain legal status like the Chilean and Australian leaders did.

My family has always voted for your party and I can honestly say you have lost all of those votes from our family and extended from North Kerry.

I hope that when you address Congress later this month that you will reconsider what you recently said on St. Patrick’s Day and discuss our fates, as you do have the power and influence.

Mary Brennan
Yonkers, New York

No Honor in War

BRENDAN O’Neill, he of that fine American name, opined in last week’s letters page that the McCain fellow who is running for president is a hero because he was shot down by the Vietnamese freedom fighters. Well, he’s not. He was then, as he is now, an inflated ego who is a war monger and a potential tyrant in the same mold as the present incumbent.

He is just as likely to gather around him at the White House a gang of criminals every bit as bad as the ones there now.

The U.S. is a sorry place. People like Brendan just don’t get it yet.

There was absolutely no honor in the Vietnam war — not for the Americans. There was/is only shame and dishonor for an adventure which destroyed two million Vietnamese lives.

Live with that ,America, plus the murder of a million more innocents in Iraq. Ugh.

Robert O’Sullivan,
Bantry, Co. Cork, Ireland

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