It's rude to speak ill of the dead. So to stay polite, this is about all I can say.
Greg | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 12:23 pm | #

Well, let's see...

He fraked up the Ford Thunderbird by putting in the second seat.

He fraked up the M16 by refusing to chrome-line the barrel and substituting low-grade powder for the cartridge.

He fraked up the F4 Phantom II by refusing to allow McDonnell Douglas to incorporate an integrated gun into the airframe.

He fraked up the Vietnam War by... well, y'all know how he did that.


Yeah, God might forgive him, but history probably won't. Don't know if I'll be able to either.
Raptor | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 1:37 pm | #

He supposedly helped us win WWII by supporting Hap Arnold, but no one can really say what he and the other whiz kids like Eindhoven actually did while in the Pentagon.

All in all, just a man who was too damned smart for his own (and our) good.

I won't miss him!
Rich | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 2:30 pm | #

Or you could put, "Trust me, I know I'm Right"

Even though he didn't have a clue most of the time. May he rest in peace; Lord knows we all screw up, just that his screw up cost American lives and lost the trust of many citizens in their government's leadership.
T F Stern | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 2:51 pm | #

Yes he certainly got it all wrong during the war in Vietnam. Then he lived with that for the rest of his life and he knew and admitted that he had gotten it wrong. I suppose that is little or no solace to the families of the dead, or to those who were wounded, but at least he was man enough to admit his faults and later speak out against them.

All the best,
Glenn B
Glenn B | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 4:14 pm | #

Pugs of War is harsher than you were. Two-faced lying SOB sort of story.

Don't know if its true, but it has the ring of truth to it.
Borepatch | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 6:33 pm | #

I don't think the world will forgive him, I know I wont. Too many people died for his mistakes.
Secesh | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 6:58 pm | #

I've got skin in his game. I'll never forgive him. I also would like to know where he is buried, so I can leave my "condolences' on his grave.
AW1 Tim | Email | Homepage | 07.06.09 - 7:28 pm | #

Few years back I caught part of an interview in which he said that he'd decided, fairly early on as I recall, that we couldn't win in Vietnam. Interviewer asked him why he kept telling the President 'We can' and saying it; this bastard replied that he had to support the President.

So, he apparently thought 'supporting' meant lying to him while people were dying, instead of telling him what he really thought and standing by it, even if it meant resigning.

For that alone, I don't think I can ever forgive him.
Firehand | Email | Homepage | 07.07.09 - 9:56 am | #

I did find his documentary on the war interesting, just in how brutally honest he was about his and our failures.

I think the most telling part of it was when he mentioned a dinner he had attended in Vietnam years after the war. He and an old Vietnamese leader nearly came to blow as old men because they disagreed on why the North Vietnamese were fighting the war.

He said it really drove home to him afterward just how badly they had failed to understand their enemy, and how as long as they lacked that understanding they could never win. Sounds like an important thing to remember in foreign policy.

His comment that if we'd lost, we would have been tried for war crimes for Tokyo and Dresden was very strong as well.

There's a lesson in his life, somewhere.
Mike | Email | Homepage | 07.07.09 - 10:27 am | #