Is there a connection?
The current pipe bomb scare is typical of deranged persons trying to make a statement with a sensational threat. Something dramatic enough to catch national attention. This is nothing new.
In my historical narrative, RECALL, I trace this violent, terroristic activity to the intense passions and divisions the Vietnam War caused.
Our country became politically polarized during the controversies of the Vietnam era and has never recovered. I invite you to read my blogs on the chaos occurring in the middle to late ‘60’s to give you an idea. Half our population was not born then and have no point of reference for how much this period of history influenced our nation for the next five decades.
Some Examples:
- How Well Do You Remember the Vietnam War?
- Vietnam – The Cultural Journey That Followed
- Vietnam and World Events 50 Years Ago
These blogs will provide a background to form your own opinions to judge my assertion that the Vietnam War birthed the wide divide in worldviews and comity that we see today. We live in two worlds, the right and left. But, believe it or not, it was worse back then.
In fact, fifty years ago when I returned to SF from Vietnam, the Weather Underground, a radical off shoot of the Students for Democratic Society, SDS, at Berkeley blew up a SF police station in Golden Gate Park killing a police sergeant and wounding others. Previously, in the late ‘60’s, they threw Molotov cocktails at campus ROTC buildings to express their antiwar sentiments. Now they were full-fledged seditionists.
The violence escalated and spread in the ‘70’s with dramatic bombings in Chicago, NYC, and Washington, D.C. including the Capital and the Pentagon. Anarchists disrupted public life, led by a parade of other radical groups- Symbionese Liberation Army (who kidnapped Patty Hearst), Black Panthers and Black Liberation Army, and the New World Liberation Army. Over 100 were listed on the FBI’s “Most Wanted” list including Bill Ayers and Benardine Dohrn (do those names ring a bell?) The violence got so out of hand that the Weather Underground bombed the funeral of a police officer they had killed!
Given this historical perspective, how do we view this current terror act? Was the pipe bomber an amateur? Did he intend the bombs to explode or only threaten? While the case is unraveling, consider the motives?
Was he a deranged, lone wolf, right-wing nut case targeting Democrats?
Was he a “false flag”? A left-wing operative disseminating bomb threats to cast the Republicans in a negative light before an election?
Or, for you conspiracy theorists, was he a Russian agent spreading disinformation to disrupt an election? A “Dossier” sort of plot we witnessed two years ago?
Time will tell. Stand by. But, meanwhile, the political rancor will go on…Hate to be cynical, but it’s nothing new.
What about domestic violence ny wives of Viet Nam Vetrrans: Including mental cruelty: Psychological abuse;;financial abuse; prevention of male Vereran from getting counseling, or treatment; denial of home living! Financial theft, etc, etc