Clinton, Bound for Vietnam, Reassesses War
He Opposed,
Wednesday,
November 15, 2000


BY TERENCE HUNT
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

BANDAR SERI
BEGAWAN, Brunei --
Soon to be the first U.S.
president to visit Hanoi,
capital of communist
Vietnam, President
Clinton said Tuesday that
he is more sympathetic
about Lyndon Johnson's
escalation of the war
there. "He did what he
thought was right," said
Clinton, a college war
protester who avoided
military service.
In an interview aboard Air Force One on a trip that will make him the
first American president to visit since the war ended in 1975, Clinton
said, "I now see how hard it was" for Johnson.
When Johnson took office in 1963, the United States had 16,000
military personnel in South Vietnam. U.S. troop strength grew to
536,100 by the time Johnson left office in 1969, and more than 30,000
Americans were killed in action while Johnson was president.
"I believe he did what he thought was right under the circumstances,"
Clinton said. "These decisions are hard. And one of the things I have
learned, too, is when you decide to employ force, there will always be
unintended consequences."
The president avoided saying whether he holds second thoughts about
his 1969 description of the war as one he despised. Instead, he said he is
glad "the American people have been able to look to the future" in
relations with Vietnam.
As a student at Oxford University in England, Clinton was a chief
organizer of two anti-war rallies in London in 1969 and, back home,
helped organize a huge march on Washington.
Clinton spoke en route to an economic summit in Brunei with leaders
of Pacific Rim nations. Relaxing in a leather seat, wearing jeans and a
jacket embroidered with his name and the presidential seal, he was in
high spirits even though it was nearly 1 a.m.
He said the United States does not owe Vietnam an apology for its
involvement in the war, and that no one should say the 58,000 Americans
and the 3 million Vietnamese who were killed lost their lives in vain. "I
don't think any person is fit to make that judgment," he said.
"People fight honorably for what they believe in and they lose their
lives," the president said. "No one has a right to say that those lives were
wasted. I think that would be a travesty."
Turning to the Florida election dispute, Clinton said he hoped the
deadlock between Al Gore and George W. Bush would not lead to a
president crippled by controversy.
"I t's too soon to say that bitterness and partisanship will paralyze the
next president," Clinton said. "We don't know that."
Clinton said he had mixed feelings about proposals to abolish the
Electoral College in favor of electing the president by popular vote, as
advocated by his wife, Sen.-elect Hillary Rodham Clinton, and others.
He acknowledged the argument that the electoral system, in which
each state casts as many ballots as it has members of Congress, gives
small states a role they might lose were presidents chosen by national
popular vote.
But, he said, "I'm not necessarily sure that's so." In a popular-vote
system, Clinton said, a candidate resigned to losing a state might
campaign there anyhow because every vote would count.
As for the mood engendered by the Florida standoff, Clinton said, " A
lot of people's feelings will be determined by the sense they have about
the fairness and adequacy of this process over the next -- however long it
takes to resolve."
"There's lots of time, you know," Clinton said, pointing out that the
Electoral College will not meet until Dec. 18. "It's a very stable country,
and they're working through it and we'll see what happens."
Despite the disputed election and the sharp split in Congress, Clinton
said the new president may find a receptive mood on Capitol Hill.
" Now the country may be quite sobered by this and the Congress
may be somewhat sobered by it," the president said. "You might well find
that there is a real willingness to work together."
While it was a hard-fought campaign, he said, "there wasn't a lot of
personal criticism" of the candidates and the race was run largely on
different approaches to issues. "So I don't think we are necessarily
doomed to four years of stalemate and partisanship, and I hope that
won't be the case."
Clinton said whether the atmosphere is poisoned "depends on what
happens in the next few days."
"I just think we ought to let the thing play out," he said.
He said it was probably inevitable that the courts would have to decide
in some instances which votes count.
"Isome of these cases there may not be any alternative," he said,
"because the right to vote is protected and defined in both state and
federal law. There's probably no alternative here."
Before leaving Washington, Clinton met with Israeli Prime Minister
Ehud Barak in search of a way to end the violence between Israelis and
Palestinians. He said that neither Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat nor
Barak may be able to control events completely. "But this thing can be
reduced dramatically if they want to get back to the negotiating table,"
Clinton said.
"I think the Israelis will respond in kind if the Palestinian shootings will
diminish now."
Source:
http://www.sltrib.com/11152000/nation_w/43805.htm

TERENCE HUNT