Fifty years after America signed the Paris Peace Accords with Vietnam, the pact is a reminder that Congress is capable of abandoning an ally in the middle of a war.
The thing to remember — on the anniversary of the signing of the Paris Peace Accords, a catastrophic compromise forced by America on the government of Free Vietnam — is that it could yet happen in respect of Ukraine. This time the pressure for a negotiated settlement is coming, at least in part, from the right. Senator Rand Paul, the libertarian-type Republican, just offered another warning against the war in Ukraine becoming “endless.”
So left or right, it is a possibility — slim at the moment, but history teaches to beware — that Congress will get tired of this war and end the support. Even if no GIs ever go to Ukraine. This is one of the great lessons of Vietnam. It wasn’t about saving our GIs there. American combat soldiers were long since withdrawn from Vietnam when Congress cut off military support for the Free Vietnamese forces.
