Letter of mine published in West County Times on April 26, 2004.
A recent letter in the Times by Bob Leach blames Democrat administrations for "no-win wars in Korea and Vietnam."
Well, he is half right. Democrat administrations (Truman, Kennedy, Johnson) were certainly responsible for the "wars" part of his claim.
Leach seems to forget, however, that the "no-win" part derived from the policies of their republican successors (Eisenhower, Nixon) ― though, giving Eisenhower his due, to call Korea "no-win" is perhaps excessive, since we got what we wanted out of that war (the status quo) and the other side (control over the entire peninsula) did not.
Leach also claims that the Panama Canal is now in Chinese hands. He must have just seen Pierce Brosnan in "The Tailor of Panama" ― and even as part of the plot of that movie, Chinese control of the Panama Canal was a fabrication.